Gonzalez' technique is unusual. He writes history as if it were a novel, full of conversations and nuance and details which occasionally have no referenced source; for instance, "Gregory [of Nazianzus] was in shock" (215) is a very dramatic sentence, but Gonzalez uses no footnotes to indicate his sources for such statements. At most, he uses vague references to various works and/or writers: for example, in his discussion of the positive reaction of Christians to the new order under Emperor Constantine, he writes, "Typical of this attitude was church historian Eusebius" (147). He therefore gives an indirect and unspecific reference to where that reaction may have been recorded/documented, but no specific source.
Saint Gregory of Nazianzus - Fresco from Kariye Camii, Instanbul, Turkey.
(Image found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregory_of_Nazianzus)
Gonzalez possibly writes this way for a reason -- it is an engaging and
vivid methodology, and his content is likely documented in any number of
other external sources. However, it gives the impression that Gonzalez
is more interested in simply telling the story than presenting a
well-referenced historiographical tool.
It is also possible that the breadth and depth of information on particularly the theological concepts and debates throughout the period of history that Gonzalez encompasses is a seriously limiting factor for his text. Presumably, there are sometimes only fragments of various primary source texts which have survived the passage of time; certainly some debates are only represented through one party's argument, not both. As a result, Gonzalez is forced to summarize his various sources into a single comprehensive narrative.
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