Maximus the Confessor and Christological Realization

Although Maximus hardly ever invokes the word “hierarchy” directly, he adopts the Dionysian concept of hierarchy as a theological given and draws on it to facilitate his own theological maneuvering of ecclesial authority. Maximus links the Dionysian ideal of hierarchy to a specifically orthodox confession of faith and adopts it as the foundation for his naming of that which renders both lay and ordained humanity divinized and God manifest. Maximus uses this concept to affirm the importance of order, unity, particularity, and liturgical hierarchy, even while the historical (and hagiographical) evidence of his life displays a discontinuity with what one might otherwise identify as ecclesiastical hierarchy. Maximus is an example of Dionysius’s hierarchic legacy existing beyond the mere adoption of a term as a way to name the boundaries of orthodoxy and heterodoxy, legitimate and illegitimate positions of authority, and the image of God in the world.