Greek Church Father. One of the three Cappadocian Fathers, and the brother of Basil and Macrina. He was appointed bp. of Nyssa ca. 371. A considerable number of his works were translated into Syriac in the 5th/6th cent., and many of these survive complete, though very few have yet been published (details are given in Parmentier 1989). The extant complete (or nearly so) translations are: ‘to Eustathius on the Trinity’ ( CPG 3137), ‘to Ablabius’ ( CPG 3139), ‘to Theophilus’ ( CPG 3143), ‘to Letoius’ ( CPG 3148), ‘Great Catechetical Oration’ ( CPG 3150), ‘on the Creation of Man’ ( CPG 3154), ‘Homilies on the Song of Songs’ ( CPG 3158), ‘on the Lord’s Prayer’ ( CPG 3160), ‘on the Beatitudes’ ( CPG 3161), ‘on Virginity’ ( CPG 3165), ‘Funeral oration on Meletius’ ( CPG 3180), ‘Life of Gregory Thaumaturgus ’ ( CPG 3184), ‘Encomium on Stephen’ ( CPG 3186), ‘Homily on the Nativity’ ( CPG 3194), ‘Letter to his brother Peter’ ( CPG 3196; for editions of this see under Basil, Letter 38).
A Syriac homily on Poverty is attributed to Gregory, but this has been shown (Parmentier 1993) to be an abbreviation of Philoxenos , Discourse 9.
His commemoration is given as either 10 Jan. or 15 Nov.