Clement of Alexandria - Legacy

Legacy

Eusebius is the first writer to provide an account of Clement's life and works, in the Church History. There are two separate sections of the work dedicated to Clement (5, 11 and 6, 6), the of latter which seems decidedly out of place, and Valesius argued that this was evidence that Eusebius never revised his work. Eusebius provides a list of Clement's works, biographical information, and an extended quotation from the Stromata.

Photios I of Constantinople writes against Clement's theology in the Bibliotheca, although he is appreciative of Clement's learning and the literary merits of his work. In particular, he is highly critical of the Hypotyposes, a work of biblical exegesis of which only a few fragments have survived. Photius compared Clement's treatise, which like his other works was highly syncretic, featuring ideas of Hellenistic, Jewish and Gnostic origin, unfavourably against the prevailing orthodoxy of the 9th century. Among the particular ideas Photius deemed heretical were:

• His belief that matter and thought are eternal, and thus did not originate from God, contradicting the doctrine of Creatio ex nihilo.
• His belief in cosmic cycles predating the creation of the world, following Heraclitus, which is extra-Biblical in origin.
• His belief that Christ, as Logos, was in some sense created, contrary to John 1 but following Philo.
• His ambivalence towards docetism, the heretical doctrine that Christ's earthly body was an illusion.
• His belief that Eve was created from Adam's sperm after he ejaculated during the night.
• His belief that Genesis 6:2 implies that angels indulged in coitus with human women. In orthodox Catholic theology, angels are considered genderless.

Down to the seventeenth century he was venerated as a saint in Catholicism. His name was to be found in the martyrologies, and his feast fell on the fourth of December. But when the Roman Martyrology was revised by Pope Clement VIII his name was dropped from the calendar on the advice of Cardinal Baronius. Benedict XIV maintained this decision of his predecessor on the grounds that Clement's life was little known that he had never obtained public cultus in the Church, and that some of his doctrines were, if not erroneous, at least suspect. He is not revered as a saint in contemporary Roman Catholicism. Nor is he considered a saint in much of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Clement's veneration is very limited, although the Universal Catholic Church's cathedral in Dallas is dedicated to him. As one of the earliest of the Church fathers whose works have survived, he is the subject of a significant amount of recent academic work, mainly focusing on the relationship between his thought and non-Christian philosophy and his influence on Origen.