Valery V. Petroff

Head of the Department of Ancient and Medieval Philosophy and Science 

Chief Research Fellow of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences  

Director of the Centre for Ancient and Mediaeval Philosophy and Science at the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences 

Academic Degrees

• DSc in Philosophy
• Ph.D. in Philosophy
• M.A. in Mediaeval Sudies

 ORCID: 0000-0001-6529-1409

 ResearcherID: V-6127-2018

  Scopus Author ID: 38761922200

  РИНЦ SPIN: 1132-8634, Author ID: 74276

Professor of the Department of Ancient Languages and Ancient Christian Writing at the Faculty of Theology of St. Tikhon's Orthodox University for the Humanities 

Doctor of Science Dissertation: «The Teaching of Maximus the Confessor in the Context of Late Ancient and Early Medieval Philosophy and Theology» (Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 2008)

Ph.D. Dissertation: «Nature in the Teaching of John Scottus» (Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 1997)

M.A. Thesis: «Aulae sidereae - the World by Eriugena» (Central European University, Mediaeval Department, Budapest, 1996) 

• Ancient and Medieval Philosophy and Science,
• Platonism, Neoplatonism, Christian Platonism, Aristotle and Aristotelian tradidion,
• history of Ideas, intellectual history, 
• post-classical science and philosophy,
• hermeneutics, writing and editorial theories,
• Russian philosophy, science and literature of the Modernist period 

• Société Internationale pour l’Étude de la Philosophie Médiévale 
• Society for the Promotion of Eriugenian Studies
• The International Association for the Humanities 

• «Philosophy and Intellectual World of John Scottus Eriugena»
• «Carolingian Intellectual Culture» 
• «Intellectual Culture from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages» 
• «Early Medieval Ireland»
• «The Cult of the Saints in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages» 
• «The Beginnings of Christian Philosophy (Patrology)»
• «Christian Theology»
• «The Reception of Ancient Philosophy in the Patristics»

Publications    

Full List of Publications

Books (in Russian):

• John Scottus Eriugena. Homily on the Prologue to St John’s Gospel. Introduction, Russian translation and notes by Valery V. Petroff (Moscow: Museum Graeco-Latinum, 1995), 352 p. 

• Maximus the Confessor: Ontology and Method in the 7th Century Byzantine Philosophy (Moscow: Insitute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 2007), 200 p.

Publications (in Russian, if not indicated otherwise): 

2024

•  “Concepts of Physics as Metaphors for Existential Anxiety in Andrey Bely’s ‘Diaries of an Idiot’,” in: Andrey Bely: Aspects, Contexts, Subtexts. Articles and Publications. Eds. Monica Spivak, Elena Glukhova, Ioanna Delektorskaya. Moscow: RAS Institute of World Literature Publ., 2024, 38-56. (In Russian) 

• “Here Geometry Becomes a Religion”: Metaphorics of non-Euclidean Geometry in Dmitry Merezhkovsky’s Theoretical Reasoning,” in: National Philosophy. 2024. Vol. 2 (1), 19–36. (In Russian)

• “The Concept of Three Revolutions in the Works of Dmitry Merezhkovsky,” in: Civilization and Barbarity. 2024. Vol. 13. P. 190-210, 342-344. DOI: 10.21267/AQUILO.2024.3133.13.008. (in Russian)

2023

• “Eos and Tithonus: Metamorphoses of Corporeality,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ (Schole). 2023. Vol. 17 (2), 899-938. (In Russian) 

• “Cultivation of Antiquity as a condition for the “renaissance” of national culture: the Sources and Contexts of Thaddeus Zielinski’s concept,” in: Fuga temporum. Essays in Honour of Aza Taho-Godi on her 100th Birthday. Ed. by Elena Taho-Godi. Saint Petersburg: Aletheia, 2023, 157-169. (In Russian)

2022

• “Classical Studies as Cultural Philosophy: Thaddeus Zielinski and Karl Kerényi,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ (Schole). 2022. Vol. 16 (2), 814-840. (In Russian) 

• “The London Vortex in Andrei Bely’s ‘Diaries of an Idiot’,” in: Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present. 2022. Vol. 6, 306-368. (In Russian) 

2021

• “The Upside-Down Man, the Overturned World: Transmigrations of a Motive,” in: History of Philosophy Yearbook. 2021. Vol. 36, 109-141. (In Russian) 

• “Karl Kerényi on the Archetype of the Academic and the Priest,” in: Civilization and Barbarity. 2021. Vol. 10, 9-38. (In Russian) 

• “Sermon on Silence and Regeneration from the Martyrdom of the Apostle Peter: Its Sources and Background,” in: Platonic Investigations. 2021. Vol. 14 (1), 54-77. (In Russian) 

• “Art, Science, and Paideia in Aristides Quintilianus’ De Musica,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ (Schole). 2021. Vol. 15 (2), 935-965. (In Russian)

2020

• “‘On the Nature of Things’ by Bede the Venerable and the Carolingian Glossographic Tradition,” in: The Writings of Bede the Venerable and Intellectual Traditions of His Time. Ed. by Maya S. Petrova. Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2020, 114-152. 

• “Bede’s Eschatology and the Natural Philosophy of His Time,” in: The Writings of Bede the Venerable and Intellectual Traditions of His Time. Ed. by Maya S. Petrova. Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2020, 153-163. 

• “The Upside Down Man of Plato’s ‘Timaeus’ in the Apocryphal ‘Martyrdom of Peter’ and ‘Martyrdom of Philip’,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ (Schole). 2020. Vol. 14 (2), 535-566. (In Russian) 

• “Philological Existentialism of Karl Kerényi,” in: Civilization and Barbarity. 2020. Vol. 9, 96-129. (In Russian) 

• “Origen’s Speculative Organology and Early Christian Commentaries on the Psalms,” in: Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present. 2020. Vol. 5, 214–256. (In Russian)

2019

• “Philosophical and Aesthetic Views of Vyacheslav Ivanov in the Essay ‘Forma formans and forma formata’,” in: Studia litterarum. 2019. Vol. 4 (2), 228-251. (In Russian)  

• “Plato’s Timaeus on Types of Movements, the ‘Heavenly Plant’ and the Vertical Posture of Man,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ (Schole). 2019. Vol. 13 (2), 705-716. (In Russian) 

• “The Concepts of ‘polyphony’ and ‘polychordia’ in Music and Culture,” in: Thought on Music in the Abrahamic Traditions — 2019: Conceptions of Sound & Sonority from Antiquity to 21st Century. Proceedings of the International Scientific Conference (Moscow, 6-7 November), ed. by Giula B. Shamilli. Moscow: SIAS, 2019, 166-179. (In Russian)

2018

• “The Revolution of 1917 in its Contemporary Literary-Philosophical Apocalypticism,” in: Revolution, Evolution and Dialogue of cultures. Papers on the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution on the World Philosophy Day at the RAS Institute of Philosophy, November 14 and 16, 2017. Ed. by Anatoly Chernyaev. Moscow: Gnosis, 2018, 69-92. (In Russian) 

• “‘Recollections of a Strange Man, Andrei Bely’ as a Diary of States of Consciousness,” in: Literary Fact. 2018. Vol. 10, 210-235. (In Russian)  

• “The Revolution in Physics and Andrei Bely’s Anthroposophical Doctrine of the Solar Atom,” in: Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present. 2018. Vol. 4, 349–390. (In Russian) 

• “Valentin Asmus and Andrei Bely in 1936,” Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present. 2018. Vol. 4, 415–452. (In Russian) 

• “The doctrinal content and sources of Vyacheslav Ivanov’s paper ‘The Meaning of the Word ‘Earth’ in the Gospels’,” Literary fact. 2018. Vol. 7, 257–287. (In Russian) 

• “Vyacheslav Ivanov and his Exegesis of the Word “Earth” in the Gospels,” in: New Testament Images and Subjects in the Culture of Russian Modernism / Ed. by Olga Bogdanova, Anastasia Gacheva. Moscow: Indrik, 2018, 78-97. (In Russian) 

• “Languages of Civilizations, Identity and Transgression in the Essayism of Péter Nádas”, in: Civilization and Barbarity. 2018. Vol. 6. P. 260-279. 

• “Frater Tertius in Apostle Paul, Peter Abelard and Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky,” Dialogue with Time. 2018. Vol. 63, 339–346. (In Russian) 

• “‘Two Abysses’ in the Russian literary and Philosophical Tradition: Fyodor Tyutchev, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, and Vyacheslav Ivanov,” Dmitry Merezhkovsky: Writer — Critic — Thinker: Collection of essays. Ed. by Oleg Korostelev, Alexey Kholikov. Moscow: Dmitri Sechin Press, Litfact, 2018, 240-268. (In Russian) 

• “Teleology, the Fourth Dimension and Time Running Backwards in the Works of Andrei Bely, Vyacheslav Ivanov, and Maximilian Voloshin,” in: Vyacheslav Ivanov: Studies and Texts. Issue 3. Eds. Svetlana Fedotova and Andrei Chichkine. Moscow: RAS Institute of World Literature, 2018, 13-65. (In Russian) 

• “Appropriation of Foreign Learning in Ancient and Medieval Latin tradition,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ (Schole). 2018. Vol. 12 (2), 569–581. (In Russian) 

• “Kinor and Nevel in the String Family of the Middle East, the Mediterranean and the Near East,” Conceptualization of Music in the Abrahamic Traditions / Ed. by G. Shamilli. Moscow: SIAS, 2018, 18-37. (In Russian)

2017

• “The Soul Putting On Bodies, the Soul Weaving Bodies,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ (Schole). 2017. Vol. 11 (1), 166-176. (In Russian)
•  
• “Aristotle’s Teaching on Growth and Growing and the Problem of Identity of a Human Body,” The Legacies of Aristotle as Constitutive Element of European Rationality. Proceedings of the Moscow International Conference on Aristotle. RAS Institute of Philosophy, October 17–19, 2016. Ed. by Valery V. Petroff. Aquilo Press, 2017, 326-346.
•  
• “Aristotle’s Teaching on Growth and Growing and the Problem of Identity of a Human Body,” Aristotle Ideas and Interpretations. Ed. by Maya Petrova. Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2017, 245-280. (In Russian)
•  
• “Corpus Areopagiticum as a Project of Intertextuality,” in: Dire Dieu. Principes méthodologiques de l’écriture sur Dieu en patristique. Actes du colloque de Tours, 17-18 avril 2015. Ed. by Bernard Pouderon et Anna Usacheva. Paris: Beauchesne, 2017, 253-275. (In English)
•  
• “Arist. Nicom. Ethic. III 4, 1111b 4 – 7, 1113b 22 as the Source of the Conceptual Apparatus in Maximus the Confessor’s Teaching about Will and Volitional Act,” in: ΣΧΟΛΗ. 2017. Vol. 11 (2), 393-406. (in Russian)
•  
• “Armonia rerum in John Scottus’ Aulae sidereae,” in: Micrologus: Nature, Sciences and Medieval Societies. Vol. 25: Ideas of Harmony in Medieval Culture and Society. Firenze: SISMEL Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2017, 47-66. (In English)
•   
• “Representation of Space in the ‘Return’ by Andrei Bely,” Andrei Bely’s Arabesques: Biography, Spiritual Quest, Poetics. Ed. by Kornelija Ičin and Monica Spivak. Beograd, Moscow: Philology Department of Belgrade University Press, 2017, 561-577.
•  
• “Multidirectional Streams in Vyacheslav Ivanov’s ‘Dream of Melampus’: An Intertextual Analysis,” in: Dialettica tra contingenza storica e valore universale in Vjačeslav Ivanov. X convegno internazionale. A cura di Maria Pliukhanova e Andrei Shishkin. Salerno 2017. P. 23–54 (Europa Orientalis. 2017. Vol. 29) (In Russian)
•  
• “‘Revolution of Consciousness’ in Andrei Bely’s Works of 1917-1919,” The 1917 Historical Rift: The Revolutionary Context for Russian Literature: Studies and Texts. Ed. by Vadim Polonsky, Vera Vvedenskaya, Elena Glukhova, Michail Koz’menko. Moscow: RAS Institute of World Literature, 2017, 56-76.

2016

• “Self and Its Corporeality in the History of European Thought”, A Living Body in the History of Philosophy. Proceedings of the Conference held at the RAS Institute of Philosophy, 19.05.2015. Moscow, Saint Petersburg: The Humanitarian Initiative Centre, 2016, 11-42.

• “Conceptual and Perceptual Space in the Earlier Writings of Andrei Bely”, Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present. Vol. III (Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2016), 287-331.

• “Elements of Aristotelian Doctrine of Growth and Growing in Origen, Methodius of Olympus and Gregory of Nyssa”, Schole 10.1 (2016), 117-130. 

• “Philosophical Discourse as Hymn-singing in Late Platonism and the Corpus Areopagiticum”, Platonic Investigations IV (Moscow, Saint Petersburg,2016), 76-97.  

• “John Scottus’s “Aulae sidereae”: a Cosmos Built by a Philosopher,” in: Anatomy of Philosophy: How the Text Works. Moscow: Languages of Slavic Culture, 2016, 267-306.

2015 

• “ Ὑπάρχω and ὑφίστημι in Maximus the Confessor’s Ambigua”, The Architecture of the Cosmos: St. Maximus the Confessor. New perspectives. Eds. A. Lévy, P. Annala, O. Hallamaa, and T. Lankila (Helsinki: Luther-Agricola-Society, 2015), 93-122. 

• “The Ocean of Being, Life and Mind in the Philosophical, Mystical and Psychoanalytic Traditions”, The Measure of Things: Man in the History of European Thought. Ed. by Galina Vdovina (Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2015), 191-248. 

• “Cognitive Psychology in Late Ancient and Early Christian Neo-Platonism”, The Measure of Things: Man in the History of European Thought. Ed. by Galina Vdovina (Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2015), 595-617.  

• “Gnosis in Maximus the Confessor”,  The Measure of Things: Man in the History of European Thought. Ed. by Galina Vdovina (Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2015), 618-640. 

• “Reality as Lived-Through Experience in Philosophical Writings of Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky”, The Measure of Things: Man in the History of European Thought. Ed. by Galina Vdovina (Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2015), 247-271. 

• “Friedrich Nietzsche and the Eternal Recurrence”, The Measure of Things: Man in the History of European Thought. Ed. by Galina Vdovina (Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2015), 773-879. 

• “Corpus Areopagiticum as an Example of Successful Reconciliation through Synthesis of Religious and Civilizational Differences”, Russia in Global World’s Architecture: Civilizational Dimension. Ed. by Andrei Smirnov (Moscow: Languages of Slavic Culture, 2015), 67-112. 

• “Aristotelian Tradition on Flow and Continuity in the Ever-Changing Living Bodies of Individuals”, Dialogue with Time52 (2015), 82-92.  

• “Aristotle and Alexander of Aphrodisias on Growth and Growing”, Schole 9.2 (2015), 394-403. 

• “Corpus Areopagiticum as a Project of Intertextuality”, Philosophical Journal 8.2 (2015), 56-75. 

 2014

• “The Second Speech of Socrates from Plato’s Phaedrus as a Background for Liturgical Metaphysics of the Corpus Areopagiticum”, Platonic Investigations I (Moscow, Saint Petersburg,2014), 296-311. 

• “Bede’s Eschatology and the Natural Philosophy of His Time”, Czech and Slovak Journal of Humanities. Philosophica (Palacký University, Olomouc) 2 (2013), 104-111.

• “Being and Logic in Philosophical Writings of Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky”, Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present III (Moscow: Aquilo Press, 2014),340-372. 

• “Books edited by the Centre for Ancient and Mediaeval Philosophy and Science”, Philosophical Sciences 5 (2014), 150-155.

2013  

• “Plato and His Teaching in Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky (1887-1950)”, Logos 6 [90] (2012), 58-84.

• “Ὑφίστημι and ὑπάρχω in Maximus the Confessor’s Ambigua”, The XXIIth  Annual Theological Conference of St Tikhon’s Orthodox University. Vol. 1 (Moscow: St Tikhon’s University Press, 2012), 299-306. 

• “ΠΛΑΤΩΝΙΚΑ ΖΗΤΗΜΑΤΑ: New Approaches to the Ancient Tradition”, ΠΛΑΤΩΝΙΚΑ ΖΗΤΗΜΑΤΑ. Studies in the  History of Platonism. Ed. by Valery V. Petroff (Мoscow: Krugh 2013), 13-36.

• “Σύμβολα and συνθήματα in the Theurgical Neoplatonism of Iamblichus and Proclus”, Ibid., 220-225. 

• “A Chain of Great Light: the Sun in the Platonism of Late Antiquity and the ‘Corpus Areopagiticum’”, Ibid., 240-263.

• “Symbol and the Sacred Action in the Later Neoplatonism and the 'Corpus Areopagiticum', Ibid., 264-308.

• “Theology of Symbol in Karl Rahner and Herbert Vorgrimler”, Ibid., 309-317.

• “ Ὑπάρχω and ὑφίστημι in Maximus the Confessor’s Ambigua”, Ibid., 338-375.

• “Transformation of Ancient Ontology in the ‘Corpus Areopagiticum’ and Maximus the Confessor”, Ibid., 376-393.

• “Plato and His Dialogues in the Writings of Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky”, Ibid., 674-720.

Interviews:

• Édouard Jeauneau, “Athens and Chartres”: a Conversation with Valery Petroff, Ibid., 581-629.

• Luc Brisson, “‘Philosophy is what structures human being...’: a Conversation with Valery Petroff”, Ibid., 630-654.

Translations:

• Jozef Matula, “Thomas Aquinas and His Criticism of Avempace’s Theory of the Intellect”, Ibid., 394-406.

• Emmanuel Falque, “The Phenomenological Practice of Medieval Philosophy. I. Fons signatus: The Sealed Source. II. God-as-Phenomenon: John Scottus”. Translation by Andrey Seregin. Revised by Valery Petroff, Ibid., 505-580. 

2012

• «History of Unwilled Alley: to a Short Story by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky», Toronto Slavic Quarterly 41 (2012), 85-102. 

• Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky. “Unwilled Alley”. Text edition and notes by Valery V. Petroff, Toronto Slavic Quarterly 41 (2012), 103-128. 

• “Symbol and the Sacred Action in the Later Neoplatonism and the Corpus Areopagiticum”, Theological Works 43-44 (2012), 305–341. 

• “Eschatology of Bede the Venerable and Natural Philosophy of His Time”, Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present (studies and translations). Ed. by Maya S. Petrova (Moscow: Institute of World History, 2012), 102-114. 

• “Seven Letters from Unwilled Alley: to the Publication of a Short Story by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky”, Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present (studies and translations). Ed. by Maya S. Petrova (Moscow: Institute of World History, 2012), 205-218. 

• Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky. “Unwilled Alley”. Text edition and notes by Valery V. Petroff, Intellectual Traditions in Past and Present (studies and translations). Ed. by Maya S. Petrova (Moscow: Institute of World History, 2012), 219-236.  

• in English: "Plato’s Phaedrus and Neoplatonic Teaching on Dissimilar Symbols and Sacred Fiction in the Corpus Areopagiticum", Byzantine Theology and Its Philosophical Background. Ed. Antonio Rigo [Studies in Byzantine History and Civilization, 4] (Turnhout: Brepols, 2011), 32-49.

2011

• «S(igizmund) K(rzhizhanovsky) | K(rasny) S(neg)», Toronto Slavic Quarterly 35 (2011), 112-185.

• «Philosophy is what structures human being. Conversations with Luc Brisson», Philosophical Journal 2 [7] (2011), 59-77.

2010

• «Epilogue of John Scottus’ Aulae sidereae (vv. 72-101) and the Earlier Poetic Tradition», Intellectual Traditions of Antiquity and the Middle Ages (Studies and Translations), ed. by Maya S. Petrova (Moscow: Krugh, 2010), 465-483. 

• «Kinnor, Cithara, Psaltery in Iconography and Texts: to the Interpretation of an Anglo-Saxon Gloss», Intellectual Traditions of Antiquity and the Middle Ages (Studies and Translations), ed. by Maya S. Petrova (Moscow: Krugh, 2010), 589-714. 

• «Noeric Hymn and Anagogic Prayer in Dionysius the Areopagite and His Neoplatonic Predecessors», COSMOS AND SOUL. Teachings on the Universe and Man in Antiquity and the Middle Ages (Essays and Translations). Part II. Ed. Andrey V. Seregin (Moscow: Progress-Tradition, 2010), p. 210-239. 

• «Anagogic Rays of the Good: the Sun in the Platonism of Late Antiquity and the Corpus Areopagiticum», History of Philosophy Yearbook 2009 (Moscow: Center for Humanitarian Initiatives, 2010), 112-139. 

• «The Real Symbol in the Neoplatonism and in the Christian Tradition (in the Corpus Areopagiticum and in Karl Rahner)», Bulletin of St Tikhon’s Orthodox University. Series I: Theology. Philosophy 3 [31] (2010), 36-52.