A Critical Assessment of Georges Florovsky’s Notion of Christian Hellenism as philosophia perennis Viorel Coman Georges Florovsky (1893-1979) 1 was one of the most influential twentieth century Orthodox thinkers, whose vision of a Neo-Patristic synthesis has deci- sively shaped the theological trajectory of modern Eastern Christianity. The Neo-Patristic synthesis refers to a restauratio patristica in twentieth century Orthodoxy, which aimed at renewing Eastern theology through a departure from the influences of Western scholasticism, which had permeated its eccle- siology, ethics, and spirituality for centuries 2 . Florovsky’s call for a “return to the Church Fathers” had been so widely embraced by his colleagues during the second half of the past century that, for many people, the Neo-Patristic movement “became virtually synonymous to modern Orthodox theology” 3 . That being the case, in Orthodoxy the theological model of the Neo-Patristic movement went virtually unchallenged until the turn of the new millennium, when Paul Valliere started questioning its monopoly and basic tenets 4 . More recently, Pantelis Kalaitzidis and other Orthodox scholars have taken the crit- icism even further, claiming that the Neo-Patristic agenda contributed (i) to the consolidation of anti-Western and anti-ecumenical attitudes in the Or- thodox world; its anti-scholasticism turned easily into anti-Westernism in the works of some Neo-Patristic figures; (ii) to the Orthodox tendency to see the theology of the Church Fathers as a harmonious and perfectly symphonic sys- 1 For a comprehensive introduction in Florovsky’s theology, see Brandon Gallaher and Paul Ladouceur (eds.), The Patristic Witness of Georges Florovsky: Essential Theological Writings (London: T&T Clark, 2019), 1-30; Jean-Claude Larchet, En suivant les Pères... La vie et l’œuvre du Père Georges Florovsky (Genève: Éditions des Syrtes, 2019); Paul Gavrilyuk, Georges Florovsky and the Russian Religious Renaissance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013); Andrew Blane (ed.), Georges Florovsky: Russian Intellectual and Orthodox Churchman (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1993). 2 See also Paul Ladouceur, Modern Orthodox Theology: ‘Behold, I Make All Things New’ (London: T&T Clark, 2019); Viorel Coman, “Revisiting the Agenda of the Neo-Patristic Movement”, The Downside Review 136/2 (2018), 99-117; Andrew Louth, “The Patristic Revival and Its Protagonists,” in M. B. Cunningham and E. Theokritoff (eds.), The Cambridge Companion to Orthodox Christian Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni- versity Press, 2008), 188-203. 3 Paul Ladouceur, “Treasures New and Old: Landmarks of Orthodox Neo-Patristic Theology”, St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 56/2 (2012), 191. 4 Paul Valliere, Modern Russian Theology: Bukharev, Soloviev, Bulgakov (London: T&T Clark, 2000).