Lossky, the militant

This article by Jean Meyendorff is devoted to the figure and work of Vladimir Lossky, an Orthodox theologian of the Russian emigration in France, who died in 1958. Belonging to both the theological essay and the intellectual portrait, the text traces Lossky's trajectory as a defender of Orthodox identity in the face of the Christian West, particularly in the context of the postwar Catholic patristic renewal. The central idea is that Lossky, through his Essay on the Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church and his posthumous publications, established Orthodoxy as a serious theological interlocutor, irreducible to exoticism or schism. Meyendorff emphasizes the lasting contribution of this work: despite certain polemical schematizations, Lossky rigorously articulated the Eastern patristic tradition and opened an in-depth dialogue with Western Christian thought, including medieval Latin thought.