Studia Humanitatis No. I (XIX) / 2025
Patristic views on the relationship between humans and animals
Professor, PhD Miltiade Vantzos This article analyses the patristic perspective on the relationship between humans and animals, beginning with Celsus’s critique of the Christian teaching on human dominion over creation and continuing with the responses of Origen, Saint Basil the Great, Saint John Chrysostom, Saint Gregory of Nyssa and Theodoret of Cyrus, who establish a dominion based on reason, responsibility and cooperation, not on violence.