.I am reading Robert Letham's book Through Western Eyes: Eastern Orthodoxy: A Reformed Perspective right now and it is has raised a few questions in my mind. I'll post my questions here so that those more knowledgable than I can hopefully point the way forward to some answers.
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I am uneasy about the presence of such a large and ancient portion of Christendom that I am out of communion with. But this raises an important question: in what sense can we even meaningfully speak about Eastern Orthodoxy being out of communion with the Western Church? After all, there have been significant ecumenical meetings between Popes and Patriarchs of Constantinople which have included a lifting of previous excommunications. The most recent meeting was between Benedict XVI and Bartholomew I, who signed the Common Declaration which stated that "We give thanks to the Author of all that is good, who allows us once again, in prayer and in dialogue, to express the joy we feel as brothers and to renew our commitment to move towards full communion".
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When I asked an Eastern Orthodox brother about this he said that Constantinople was acting as an aberrant congregation when they did this. However, given that the various Pentarchy in the East have a relationship that is primus inter pares rather than hierarchical, and that each main Orthodox communion is autocephalous, by what criteria can we claim that Constantinople did not represent Orthodoxy? If they were violating the decrees of an ecumenical council it would be a different matter, but there never has (to my knowledge) been a formal severing of communion with the West on the part of the East. The altercation of 1054 (known subsequently and somewhat anachronistically as the "Great Schism") was largely personal and did not, at the time, represent a full scale separation of the Western and Eastern branches of Christendom. The two branches remained in intermittent communion after that and only fell out of communion gradually. As far as I can make out, there never was a point when the East and West corporately and officially stopped being in communion. Now this is crucial because it raises the question: if the separation between the East and the West was gradual, non-corporate and never formalized, then re-assuming communion could also be gradual, non-corporate and non-formalized. But if so, then on what basis can we claim that the liberal ecumenical strains of Orthodoxy are anachronistic?
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55 comments:
Is there a way that yahoo account holders can leave messages on your blog without having to have a gmail account?
According to recent statements by the Vatican and Roman Catholic practice, it could be argued that the seperation is not corporate, that they are in communion with us but we are not in communion with them. But consider the words of Bishop Kallistos Ware from his book The Orthodox Church on a chapter called The Great Schism:
It is this incident (1054) which has conventionally been taken to mark the beginning of the great schism between the Orthodox east and the Latin west. But the schism, as historians now generally recognize, is not really an event whose beginning can be exactly dated. It was something that came about gradually, as the result of along and complicated process, starting well before the eleventh century and not completed until some time after.
In this long and complicated process, many different influences were at work. The schism was conditioned by cultural, political, and economic factors; yet its fundamental cause was not secular but theological. In the last resort it was over matters of doctrine that east and west quarreled — two matters in particular: the Papal claims and the filioque. But before we look more closely at these two major differences, and before we consider the actual course of the schism, something must be said about the wider background. Long before there was an open and formal schism between east and west, the two sides had become strangers to one another; and in attempting to understand how and why the communion of Christendom was broken, we must start with this fact of increasing estrangement.
I don't know the answer to your question about yahoo account holders.
If the separation between the East and the West was gradual, non-corporate and never formalized, then re-assuming communion could also be gradual, non-corporate and non-formalized. This could create the template for a more open approach to communion within the Eastern Church.
Robin, I received your email and I think it must be this comment on Orthodoxy you were referencing.
I have no useful input to your direct question about the whats, hows and whens of the Schism. I do know approximately what I was taught during my Catechesis, and it is very much an East-centric view... that Rome left the Church, and Orthodoxy continued unchanged. Of course there were geographic and cultural isolations that played as great a role as the philioque, if not greater. Fr. Kevin even explained that the addition to the Creed was around A.D. 700 in Spain, and was a proper response to heresies which were raging in Spain at the time.
So he described the roots of the split going back a full 400 years before the ultimate breach, which was the sacking of Constantinople in 1066 by the Crusaders.
I find it interesting that there seems to be a market for books on Orthodoxy, looking from the outside in. It seems to me, as an Orthodox, to be like carrying coals to Newcastle, or perhaps like a tourist in Yosemite remaining blindfolded and relying on verbal descriptions by companions. Well... perhaps it is not that silly, but I just cannot get worked up enough to put too many words together on the subject...
It was my experience of Orthodoxy that led to my conversion. Not my reason and understanding of ancient church history. I cannot say or judge whether any others have anything to learn from Orthodoxy. But I can say unequivocally that I have much to learn from that tradition, so much so that I have chosen an Orthodox church to belong to, to worship in, and to have my spiritual journey furthered within its framework.
Sorry to be of so little help.
Glen
Yes, you said that. But why are you so interested in being in communion with Orthodoxy when, to my knowledge, you have never once visited an Orthodox parish? It seems that it is the principle that matters more because there are many aspects of the life of the parish that you can share. For example, after the communion EVERYONE is welcome to go and receive blessed bread. As an Orthodox Christian, I cannot just take communion anytime I want, I need to have other sacrements around communion. For a reformed protestant, out of contact with Orthodox clergy, there is no way to reconcile the other sacraments, like confession---which is mandatory for certain sins and, after which, communion might be banned (like for divorce). It seems that the problem arises when we look at communion in isolation apart from community, a point which has been made so eloquently by Fr. John Behr in his book Being As Communion, a book which might answer many of your questions. Aside from that, protestants in a sense are in rebellion against tradition because they exalt human reason above tradition and scripture. There are many heresies they hold de facto simply by virtue of not being part of the Orthodox church. But a first step towards sharing communion would be to visit an Orthodox church, at least that way they would know if it was compatible with their form of worship and mores.
As for your question about how Ryan´s commments about hell help us with the Augustinian dillemma, you seem to be advocating anniliationism when you say there are only two options: universalism or God wiping the damned out (for eternity)...anniliation. What I was trying to say, which prompted Ryan´s comments, is that this is a false dillema because a third possibility is possible. While this concept of hell can´t be said to be fully remedial, it does mannage to handle evil in a way that leaves God´s soverignty entact.
If you look closely at what Patriarch Bartholomew was saying, it is different from what the Vatican has been saying. He isn´t advocating full communion, just advocating diologue. The Vatican lifted the ban and now encourages inter-sacramental sharing, as do the Anglicans and Baptists and everyone else for that matter, but the Orthodox have never gone so far. It often happens that the Orthodox expressions of desire for ecumenical diolouge is seen as desire for full communion. Even many Orthodox (less liberal than myself) mistakenly think ecuminism has as its end-goal an intercommunion super church, something that has been refuted by those within the ecuminical movement, for example Fr. Thomas Hopko in his book Speaking The Truth In Love.
Patrick, I have visited our local Orthodox church with my family - it was a great experience. We got in line to receive communion but weren't allowed to. When the bread was offered at the end it was no longer the Eucharist.
Glen, your comments are interesting, but do I detect some of the reason/experience dualism that I complained about in my earlier discussion with Patrick Barnes (http://robinphillips.blogspot.com/2008/08/debate-is-protestantism-heretical.html)? I am a whole person and I could never embrace a tradition that elevated one part of me over another.
I'm sorry to have declared or addressed an apparent dualism between intellectual understanding and experience. One of the most severe defenses I had to struggle through, in my healing, was a habitual, immediate retreat into an intellectual debate every time I got near my emotions.
It is a classic PTS reaction, and for me it was fatal to any useful progress.
So over a long time, with repeated gentle nudging, Mark helped me to see the need for experiential understanding... not anti-intellect, but hauling the whole person into the process of learning and growing, in the here-and-now moment. When I began to struggle to do that, it was like walking straight into the pain. But it was also the moment when I began to make progress.
When I walk into an Orthodox church, or any other here-and-now that I find myself in, my challenges is to be here with my whole person, unlike what I was taught by my Kingdom upbringing where they would literally talk about a figurative beheading, the leaving of intellect entirely behind. Now THERE was an error.
Now, my intellect comes along. And my heart is fed.
Coming from the injuries I have, I just have very little patience with the endless rhetoric (Not just Robin's rhetoric, but all of it all over.)
When it comes down to whether I can be present with my family, whether I can treat every person who crosses my path as the Icon of Christ, these things have very little to do with scholastic labors.
Just because Frank Sandford misused rhetoric about practical religion as an anti-intellectual tool to control his underlings, is not sufficient reason for me to throw over and neglect the teaching of scripture about bringing every thought into captivity.
Captivity to what? The heart.
I cannot speak for or judge any other. I am sure that for some, Orthodoxy represents precisely the same toxicity that the Kingdom did for me. And those persons should NOT try to be Orthodox.
Seriously.
Love and best wishes,
Glen
Have had trouble posting a rejoinder; don't know why and I do not have time to resolve it. This is my last attempt tonight.
For me it is not dualism between intellect and practicality. I have learned, with difficulty, patience, and persistence, to begin dragging my whole person into the here-and-now. Intellect included, which is exactly what I was trained not to do in the Kingdom.
For you it may be dualism, for me it is life.
Not everyone should be Orthodox. For some the very toxicity I grew up with in the Kingdom is what they find when they approach Orthodoxy. For those persons, I believe that becoming Orthodox is the worst thing that could happen.
Seriously.
I can only speak for myself.
Love and best wishes to you and yours,
Glen
For the sake of others who may be reading this, I'll share something I recently wrote to Glen.
In defending Eastern Orthodoxy, Patrick Barnes’ final answer to all my questions was an appeal to private judgment exercised through “a mysterious process” of going-away-so-the-Holy-Spirit-will-show-you. Quite frankly, it sounded so similar to the Mormon’s “burning in the bosom” that it gave me the creeps (its spooky!), not to mention that it seemed very similar to the subjective epistemology in various heretical sects I have been involved with in the past. And frankly (and I don’t mean this critically, Glen) your recent comments about taking every thought captive to the heart, also suggest to me the same suffocating dualism. I would find it equally suffocating to say that I have to take my heart captive to my head: I am a whole person and need to function without either part being submerged to the other. Anything less, for me at least, is a throw-back to the kingdom cult or the England cult. And by the way, aren't we commanded to take thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ?
The comments about the Roman church beings the ones who broke away simply solidify the grounds of my original question.
I do not mean to contradict Patrick Barnes whom, I respect, for he has been Orthodox a lot longer than I and has read much more than I from the Fathers of the Church. But I will offer you my perspective.
I do not dispute the premise that there is no way to escape "personal judgment." I heard this discussed in tapes from as far back as the 1996 Credenda/Agenda Ministerial Conference: the Unity of the Church. Fr Andrew, an Orthodox priest in the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania, said that the in the west epistemological certainty has become an obsession, and I believe that it can drive people mad. One thing that Van Til (as well as Godel) taught me is that all formal systems of thought are circular, based on unproven premises or presuppositions. Some circles are smaller and more vicious than others. Some hold together more while others fall apart rather easily.
I have previously shared with you my sentences on Scripture, Tradition, and Authority in the Church, and we seemed to agree on much already. Most of the Orthodox critique of Sola Scriptura is in reality a critique of Solo Scriptura and therefore inapplicable to Classical Protestants. My short sentences were written to refute accusations of Orthodoxy such as those found in "The Shape of Sola Scriptura," an otherwise great book. I will quote myself very shortly from comments on your blog article, "The Importance of Church":
Roman Catholicism has the idea of "development of dogma" that means that what a good Roman Catholic believed two hundred years ago might make him a heretic today. The Immaculate Conception of Mary is a good example of this. Many of their second millennium saints were firmly opposed to it but now it is a dogma, a fundamental Christian truth. The very fact that it wasn't always believed everywhere and by all Christians means it could never be True because it was never part of the tradition. Subsequently Roman Catholics do not value the writings of the early Church Fathers. "If the pope says it, I believe it, that settles it." A similar thing is going on for Solo-Scriptura Christians. "If the bible says it, I believe it, that settles it."
In contrast to this, classical Protestants and Orthodox believe in an Apostolic Deposit, a Regula Fide, a right interpretation of Scriptures taught to the disciples by Jesus himself and passed on to us in a Holy Spirit directed process of spiritual fatherhood and sonship. In this sense Protestant and Orthodox confessions are fundamentally "descriptive" rather than "prescriptive." They do not dictate what must be believed but describe what faithful Christians have always believed.
Yet in Reformed Christianity latter confessions carry more weight than early ones, which is something shared with Roman Catholicism. The Westminster Catechism trumps the Scott's Confession in the same way that Vatican II trumps the councils of Lyons or Frankfurt. In Orthodoxy, there were confessions and councils in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries yet these are seen as less authoritative than early creeds and symbols. Another way to say this is that the latter confessions are of a derivative authority in as much as they correspond to the Holy Scripture and the witness of the Truth in the early Church. Latter confessions are more apt to be polluted and less faithful to the Apostolic Deposit and are therefore used with caution.
So in the west, Tradition or Parodisis was conceived of as external authority, either embraced or rejected. In the Orthodox Christian East, Parodisis is understood to be a participation with the Holy Spirit guided and on-going life of the Church as it hands on the truth from generation to generation in a process of spiritual fatherhood and sonship. The Holy Spirit reminds the Church about what Christ taught the disciples; charismatically enabling the Church (from within itself) to discern what has always been believed by all Christians everywhere. This is beyond subjectivity because part of this charismatic process is objective historic succession and consensus. This does not deliver the Orthodox Christian from "personal judgment" to "epistemological certainty" but it is a system that holds together quite well.
I do not believe that Orthodoxy asks Christians to eliminate the mind but rather to crucify it along with every other aspects of our lives, submit it in obedience to Christ. I believe that what Glen must be saying is that some forms of Christianity are so heavily intellectual in an unbalanced way that they retreat into gnosticism. If you advocate a balanced approach then you basically agree.
+ + + + + + + + + +
Furthermore, some Orthodox theologians emphasis the role of "experience" in the sense of "experimental," in the sense of being the basis of science:
http://www.romanity.org/htm/rom.00.en.some_underlying_positions_of_this_website.htm
search for the words:
"14. Orthodox Fathers of the Church"
http://www.romanity.org/htm/rom.03.en.franks_romans_feudalism_and_doctrine.02.htm
search for the headings:
"The Bible and Tradition" & "Instruments, Observation, Concepts, and Language"
Now back to the original question:
I do not dispute that the Schism was gradual. However there were councils, both local and ecumenical, that declare certain doctrines of the Western Churches unacceptable. That's putting it lightly.
The Eighth Ecumenical Council (879-880)
The Fourth Council of Constantinople of 879-880 is the Eighth Ecumenical Council for Eastern Orthodox Christians. In 858, Emperor Michael III had deposed the previous patriarch, Ignatius, and appointed Photius, a noble layman from a local family, as the new Patriarch of Constantinople. Ignatius refused to abdicate, setting up a power struggle between the Emperor and the Pope. In 867, a council in Constantinople deposed the pope, declared him anathema, and excommunicated him. In addition Roman claims of Papal primacy and the Filioque clause were condemned.
Another council in Constantinople, called in 869 by Emperor Basil I the Macedonian and Pope Adrian II, deposed Photius. After the death of Ignatius in 877, Photius once again become the Patriarch. A Council was called in 879 and affirmed the restoration of Photius the Great. Attended by 383 bishops, comprising the representatives of all the five patriarchates, including that of Rome whose legates were present at the behest of Pope John VIII, this reunion council was originally accepted and fully endorsed by the papacy in Rome. It was repudiated by Rome in the 11th century, retroactively regarding the robber council of 869-870 to be ecumenical.
Additionally, the council condemned any alteration whatsoever to the original Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, thereby condemning the addition of the Filioque clause to the creed as heretical. I present two translations of the Horos or Rule of the Council that appears in both the minutes of the sixth and the seventh acts.
http://www.unexpectedjoy.org/Confessions/confessions1.html#8th
Council of Blachernae (1285)
The Tomus, or declaration, of the Council of Blachernae held in 1285 is the most detailed and official Orthodox response to the Latin Filioque heresy. It also contains a synopsis of the previous seven Ecumenical Councils.
Council of Blachernae, convened and presided over by Ecumenical Patriarch Gregory II the Cypriot, condemns the actions of the eastern delegation at the false council of Lyons. It also condemns the Franko-Latins who use of the filioque clause in terms of interpreting the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit as from both the Father and the Son, rather than eternally from the Father alone and through the Son only in a temporal sense.
Some key statements by Patriarch Gregory II of Cyprus are:
" The all-Holy Spirit's existence is not 'through the Son' and 'from the Son' as they who hasten toward their destruction and separation from God understand and teach.
It does not, however, mean that it subsists through the Son and from the Son, and that it receives its being through Him and from Him. For this would mean that the Spirit has the Son as cause and source (exactly as it has the Father), not to say that it has its cause and source more so from the Son than from the Father; for it is said that that from which existence is derived likewise is believed to enrich the source and to be the cause of being. To those who believe and say such things, we pronounce the above resolution and judgment, we cut them off from the membership of the Orthodox, and we banish them from the flock of the Church of God."
Council of Haghia Sophia (Ninth Ecumenical Council) (1341)
"Council of Haghia Sophia (Ninth Ecumenical) convened by Roman Emperor Andronicus III, presided over by Ecumenical Patriarch John Calecas, and attended by the Patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, and several bishops and abbots, including St. Gregory Palamas. This council condemns Barlaam of Calabria, who believes the light of Mt. Tabor is created, and who criticizes the mystical Jesus Prayer as a supposed practice of the Bogomils, and charges it for not proclaiming Christ as God. Emperor Andronicus dies after the council's first session, and the second session is convened by de facto Roman Emperor John VI Cantacuzene, and presided over by Patriarch John Calecas. This council condemns Acindynus, who takes the opposite extreme to Barlaam of Calabria, believing that the light of Mt. Tabor is the divine essence itself, rather than God's uncreated grace and energy, distinct from His divine essence."
This is actualy a much more important issue than it seems at first. This council justifies the theology of God's essence and energies that comes from the Capadocian Fathers and St Maximos. See:
http://www.geocities.com/trvalentine/orthodox/florov_palamas.html
http://www.nicenetruth.com/home/2009/02/the-distinction-between-essence-and-energies-.html
The question assumes that there are western churches rather than groups of Christians. If Orthodoxy is the church, the visible and spiritual society founded by Christ, then these other bodies aren’t Churches. The only way the question can go through is on the assumption of an ecclesiology which is not Orthodox. Such an ecclesiology makes it quite difficult to say exactly what schism *from* the church amounts to. On such a view how is schism even possible?
The lifting of excommunications was on the respective individuals. The condemnations of respective doctrines or the lack thereof on both sides still stands. Second, it is important to note that the patriarch is not a pope. Statements made by him are not necessarily binding in the way that papal statements can be.
The standard would be the continuous tradition. As has already been noted the councils of 880 A.D. and Blachernae are sufficient here. Second, if a see falls into heresy, there doesn’t need to be a new condemnation if the heresy has already been condemned. By the time of the sack of Constantinople in 1204 and then the 70 years of papal forced Latinization, the Orthodox fairly uniformly regarded the Latins as heterodox and refused communion with them. They didn’t just fall out of communion like one happens to catch a cold.
Part of the problem with Cardinal Humbert’s excommunication was that at the time he made it, the sitting pope was dead, which meant that the Cardinal’s commission had expired and hence his actions as a papal representative were void.
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As for a few other things, its true that Barnes’ response to you was inadequate as I pointed out. But my answer to your questions did not turn on a subjective appeal. In fact, I think the shoe is on the other foot. The issue of private judgment has to be clarified. Private judgment as a concept does not touch epistemological matters of knowing if such and so proposition is true. What it says is that each individual can only be normatively bound or obligated to adhere to a doctrine if and only if they judge it to be scriptural. That is why books like the Shape of Sola Scriptura are irrelevant. While it is true that the classical reformation posited different levels of authority, the individual cannot be bound to adhere to them if he qua individual judges otherwise. If all councils and all interpretations are fallible, then the individual can’t be bound with divine authority to salvation or damnation in an absolute way. Hence the Orthodox just isn’t in the same position as the Reformed.
I would say rather that Rome and Protestants both adhere to the notion of doctrinal development. This is how Protestant distinctives are defended in light of church history.
I was using the word "church" in a sociological sense as bodies that self-identify as "church." In a strict sense Orthodox Christians do not believe in "Churches." There is only One Church, One Body of Christ. This is the issue of exclusivity.
As an evangelical I had no difficulty moving from one denomination to another within certain parameters. When, as a pentecostal, I was traveling, I could visit a baptist or methodist church and receive communion without worrying. Despite being organizationally separate we were essentially in full communion. Using this as a basis we may begin defining communion as an aggregate body composed of those organizationally distinct local Christian bodies one feels comfortable moving between without crisis. This arrogate need not be institutional or even explicit.
Furthermore, one feels that their own communion, somehow possesses more of the fullness of the faith than other communions that necessarily teach a distorted Gospel. For instance, a Southern Baptist may have no problem if their son attends an Assembly of God parish while in college. But if his daughter becomes a Roman Catholic he flips out. She has gone beyond the boundaries of the communion. So the limits of a communion represent the region where conversion (of heart) becomes necessary. The limits of a communion also represent where those within become skeptical of the ultimate salvation of those without. My pentecostal father, for instance, estimates that fewer than 10% of Roman Catholics will make it to heaven. He says those 10% are saved despite Catholic teachings and practices, not because of them.
You can see where I am going with this. The Orthodox Communion is composed of jurisdictionally distinct ecclesial bodies called "Local Churches" held together in a bond of love. A Greek Orthodox man would have absolutely no problem if his daughter worshiped at a Russian or American Orthodox parish while in college. Likewise, it is an Orthodox Christian's sincere opinion that in the Orthodox Church alone is the fullness of the faith. However, an Orthodox Christian never judges those of other Christian confessions. While he feels he can find salvation for his soul only in the One Holy Orthodox Church he does not doubt that other Christians are sincere Christ lovers, being saved by Christ because they love him. Non-Orthodox Christians may even be filled with the Holy Spirit with deep devotion and holiness. But he feels this is possible in spite of what he believes are distortions in the teaching of the Gospel found in the traditions of Non-Orthodox churches.
You can see, most serious Christians have similar convictions about the exclusivity of their communions. This does not imply judgmentalism nor diminish the importance of evangelism. An Orthodox Christian's motivation for evangelizing his Protestant or Roman Catholic friends is that he knows they will find deeper healing and surer salvation for their souls in the Orthodox Christian Church than in any other body. It is a proven fact that small wooden rafts can sail the Ocean. But if you find such a raft in a storm while sailing an ocean liner you would not think twice about inviting the raft's occupants on board.
Orthodox Christians believe that the fullness of salvation is found only in the One Holy Orthodox Christian Church, the Body of Christ where God is present with his people through the sacraments, vitally indwelling them, healing them, and making them like he is through the power of his Incarnation, Crucifixion, and Resurrection. Yet, we take seriously the Biblical admonition not to neglect so great a salvation but to hear the Word and keep it. We know that there will be many priests in hell because they were filled with pride and self-confidence, not relying on Christ alone because they thought they were holy. Conversely, we know that many prostitutes and drug dealers will be saved because they had no confidence in themselves. They knew they were broken and needed a savior.
That should answer just about any objection or alarm over claims of exclusivity.
Those are some very helpful answers and have given me more food for thought. Although Perry’s comment beginning, “Private judgment as a concept does not touch epistemological matters...” is incoherent to me.
I guess my next question would be: what criteria do you employ to know what counts as an "ecumenical" counsel? Also, I'm troubled by the reference to the infallibility of the church. The church doesn’t have to be infallible in order to be authoritative. The federal government is authoritative but it is not infallible.
Robin,
Let me explain. There is the judgment that each individual may make about the truth of some claim. To meet the conditions on knowledge one doesn't have to be infallible. That is absurd. I don't have to be infallible to know that I have a toothbrush. Historically, the concept of private judgment doesn't pick out that concept, judging to know the truth of some claim.
Private Judgment is the thesis about normativity or what one is obligated to believe.it is the thesis in rough that the individual can't be obligated with divine authority to believe something even if he fails to meet the conditions on knowledge. This implies that every doctrine is a reconstruction of biblical matter made by fallible men. Consequently every doctrinal formula is provisional and revisable.
As for being authoritative but not infallible, is this the case with God? Is teaching from God authoritative but not infallible? When the church excommunicates and hands people over to satan as Paul did, was that authoritative but fallible? When the church judges in Act 15 as a council is that authoritative but not infallible?
As for the criteria for what constitutes an ecumenical council, try reading the councils, specifially 2nd Nicea which gives the conditions.
Those are helpful answer to my questions - thanks. I will read the councils. Does the Roman Catholic church accept the same criteria for what constitutes an ecumenical council or do they interpret 2nd Nicea different?
Other than the church fathers, what are some books you would recommend on EO?
Robin,
They are mostly the same, except for papal confirmation. I believe they are in 2nd Nicea session 5, but I'd have to check.
As for books,
Andrew Louth, Greek East and Latin West
Henry Chadwick, East and West: The Making of a Rift in the Church
John Meyendorff, Imperial Unity and Christian Divisions
______________. The Christian East and the Rise of the Papacy
______________, Byzantium and the Rise of Russia
______________,Christ in Eastern Christian Thought
_______________,
Byzantine Theology: Historical Trends and Doctrinal Themes
George Florovksy, Creation and Redemption
Khalid Anatolios, Athanasius: The Coherence of His Thought
Joseph Farrell, Free Choice in St. Maximus the Confessor
Saint Maximus the Confessor, Paul Blowers, trans., ed., On The Cosmic Mystery of Jesus Christ
Richard Haugh, Photius and the Carolingians
Constantine Tsirpanlis, Mark Eugenicus and the Council of Florence
Duncan Reid, Energies of the Spirit: Trinitarian Models East-West
John McGuckin, Saint Cyril of Alexandria and the Christological Controversy
Michel Barnes, The Power of God: Dynamis in Gregory of Nyssa’s Trinitarian Theology
David Bradshaw, Aristotle East and West
Norman Russell, The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition
Ambrosios Giakalis Images of the Divine: The Theology of Icons at the Seventh Ecumenical Council
Donald Winslow, The Dynamics of Salvation: A Study in Gregory of Nazianzus
I would love to read the councels. I tried to get them one time from my local Orthodox bookstore but couldn´t. I did, however, read once that the councel which condemned Nestorious and approved the name Theotokos also said that no Bishop could claim jurisdictional authority over another Bishop´s sea. This was an early ecumenical councel which Rome participated in. So I don´t see how the Roman Catholics can now retroactively say they accept it when it contradicts so much of what they now teach.
patrick
"When the church excommunicates and hands people over to satan as Paul did, was that authoritative but fallible?" Good question. Seeing that the church has excommunicated people before and then revoked it, I guess I would have to say yes.
I will read those books and then come back with more questions.
Richard Haugh, Photius and the Carolingians
I think this one is a must read, as is Fr. John Romanides, Franks, Romans, Feudalism and Doctrine. It isn't very long and is available online too. Basic premise is that the Greek East / Latin West dichotomy is Frankish/Carolingian propaganda. The East and West Romans existed as a united nation. The Pope in Rome publicly prayed for the Emperor in Constantinople and dated letters using the year of the reign of the current Emperor in Constantinople. Charlemagne wanted to make it seem that the "Greeks" so-called had abandoned Rome for Constantinople, replaced Christianity with paganism. Roman was synonymous with Christian so if the East Romans were heretics they were no longer Roman and he could claim a universal Carolingian Empire. Through a process of war and subjugation the Roman peoples were made serfs under their Frankish/Germanic/Norman lords who used theology to drive a wedge between East and West Romans. For instance, Pope Leo, the one who crowned Charlemagne Emperor refused to add Charlemagne's Fillioque, casting a gold plaque with the original creed and placing it in St Peter's. Charlemagne also took no sides in the iconoclast controversy and then had the Libri Carolini written, based on a bad translation of the 7th Council, as a third way. His plan: either way the controversy turned out he could make East Romans and their Empress look bad. The Franks were eventually successful in capturing Southern Italy and the Papacy resulting in the Saeculum obscurum or Pornocracy and ultimately to the corruption and theological crisis that necessitated the Reformation.
Looking at it this way, he says that the French Revolution and the Greek Revolution were essentially the same kind of movement, ethnically Roman people, under a centuries long serfdom, up raising against their 9th century conquerors.
Robin,
I'd suggest that a deeper understanding of excommunication will get us past that view.
But in the case of Paul, was Paul's excommunication in Corinth, authoritative but not infallible?
I would be interested in knowing what that “deeper view of excommunication is.” I think I would need to know that before I was in a position to answer the question about Paul. However, I suspect that Paul’s excommunication was
(A) authoritative
(B) not infallible
(C) a correct judgment.
I don't think it damages the inspiration of scripture to say that Paul was fallible and never claimed infallibility. Through the work of the Holy Spirit, the fallible Biblical writers wrote infallible truths, just as every time I say that 2+2=4 it is the words of a fallible man uttering an infallible truth. The question then arises: is the church like that (fallible and sometimes getting it right but sometimes getting it wrong) and like the federal government (having genuine authority but being fallible), or is the church like God, being both authoritative and infallible. It is clear from your questions about Paul and God that you are trying to press forward the latter idea, namely that the church is both authoritative and infallible, and that the former proceeds from the latter. As you write, “If all councils and all interpretations are fallible, then the individual can’t be bound with divine authority to salvation or damnation in an absolute way.” But this raises three problems.
First, since a fallible agent can utter an infallible truth (as I do when I say I have a toothbrush, assuming that I do, or when I claim that two and three make five in base ten), it follows that certain interpretations and councils can be infallible and yet bind with divine authority. When a council happens to get it right, or when my 7-year old boy happens to get his multiplication right, the fallible agent has pronounced an infallible truth. Thus, the church can sometimes be binding and sometimes not. A case when the church is not binding is when it falsely excommunicates someone and has to revoke it later in time or pronounces a heretical doctrine. Now although the Orthodox acknowledge that certain groups have embraced heresy at various times, as soon as that happens they are committed to maintaining that those groups are, by definition, no longer part of the Visible Church (i.e., your comments about the non-existence of the schism). Having thus stipulated a priori that the true Church is corporately infallible, it follows that all incidents of heresy have not occurred within the true Church. This allows you to continue to maintain the Church’s perfect record. But I am uncomfortable with that as it seems a bit of clever sophistry! It would be like if I had a chess club and every time a member of the club lost a game, I said that this proves they were not really a true member of the club. In such a way I could claim that my chess club has been undefeated for its entire existence and will necessarily remain so throughout the future. We need to consider if that is how the Bible talks about the church, and I maintain that it doesn’t. Paul talks about the church as a mixture which includes ferocious wolves and leaders who can make mistakes, including mistakes when they are pronouncing doctrine and anathemas and excommunications (didn’t Paul warn the believers that wolves would arise from among the church leaders? Acts 20:29-30) Suppose there are enough of these heretical leaders to band together and satisfy the conditions of an ecumenical council laid down by 2 Nicaea – does that suddenly mean that they speak truly for the church? The possibility of such an event under Orthodox ecclesiological epistemology suggests to me that your position, not the Protestant one, leaves open the possibility that doctrine is always reversible.
Second, it is not even clear what you mean by infallible. Glen has suggested to me that all you mean is that the traditions of the church constitute a well-worn path of spiritual growth. If that is all you mean, then I have no argument. But if that is all of what you mean, then many of the implications you draw from it would seem to be non sequiturs.
Third, I am having trouble harmonizing your view that the church’s authority rests in her infallibility (which is the implication I am drawing from your question about God and Paul) with my VERY brief and insufficient reading of other orthodox writers. Maybe you could help me out from your more extensive reading and background, but you seem to be in a minority by apparently suggesting that the infallible church is an external authority in the believer’s life. Thomas Hopko, in his article “Criteria of Truth in Orthodox Theology” surveys a great number of Orthodox theologians and concludes that there is no ultimate criterion of truth for Christians other than the Holy Spirit, least of all any authority that is “external” to the believer (which the councils clearly are). Similarly, in a book that my brother sent me, titled Common Ground: An Introduction to Eastern Christianity for the American Christian by Jordan Bajis, this Orthodox writer states that “Neither Pope, Church structure, the Bible alone, ‘Apostolic Succession, ‘tradition’, or councils [note well] can be trusted to always testify to the Truth.” This seems to be at odds with your view that ecumenical councils can be trusted to always give us the truth and provide a barometer that is external to the believer. Bajis ends up having to default to personal experience as the ultimate criterion (a theme that is recurring with worrying regularity in my limited exposure with Eastern Orthodoxy): “No extrinsic authority can take the place of Christ’s reign in the Church as manifested by the Spirit. …every Church member is actively involved in the process of discerning His voice, and every church member personally experiences the fruit of His government. God’s authority is real and absolute, but it can only be communicated and encountered personally.”
Well, quite frankly, I can do that as a Protestant just as easily, maybe even better, so what is the big difference? Is Eastern Orthodoxy just one more denomination to choose from if the only authority it offers is something that has to be felt but can’t even be defined?
I genuinely want to know the answers guys, but at the moment Eastern Orthodoxy both fascinates and confuses me.
Robin,
I am glad that this conversation has gone on for so long and so cordially. It is very interesting that this conversation about the Great Schism has returned to the idea of authority and infallibility.
You say, "Through the work of the Holy Spirit, the fallible Biblical writers wrote infallible truths, just as every time I say that 2+2=4 it is the words of a fallible man uttering an infallible truth. The question then arises: is the church like that (fallible and sometimes getting it right but sometimes getting it wrong)?"
Upon reflection I believe your analogy accurately reflects what Orthodox Christians believe. I think we too often talk past one another because we are using the word "Church" in subtly different ways.
The particular human side of the Church is fallible. Arius was a presbyter. Nestorius was a Patriarch. They had positions of authority in the Church even though what they taught was false. Even saints sin or fail to get it right 100% of the time, such as St Gregory Nazianzen who sometimes expressed a form Apocastasis. But as you said, "a fallible agent can [sometimes] utter an infallible truth. By cooperating with the Holy Spirit these fallible human beings, the Prophets, Apostles, and Fathers wrote and divided infallible truths.
What Orthodox Christians mean when they say feel they can trust the Church or they have learned to trust the Church's teachings has little to do with the particular human and contemporary institution they may encounter. What they mean is that they find the continuous experience of Life in Christ through the centuries to be a trustworthy whiteness, that they trust the gift of those who come before over their own judgment, even if they have to use their own judgment to come to that conclusion.
You say, "Thus, the church can sometimes be binding and sometimes not. A case when the church is not binding is when it falsely excommunicates someone and has to revoke it later in time or pronounces a heretical doctrine."
You ask us how an excommunication can take place between say the East Roman Orthodox Church and Frankish Papal Catholicism or between the Orthodox Church and the Monophysites (Non-Chalcedon) and then latter be revoked? Here you have an excellent example of how people in the Church are both authoritative and fallible.
The contemporary Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch should not have entered into de-facto full communion with their Non-Chalcedon counterparts because those churches persist in their rejection of the Christological truths that are fundamental to our salvation. In doing so they have elevated themselves over both the Fathers of the council of Chalcedon and 1700 years of Orthodox Christians (not to mention Catholic and Protestant Christians) who have confirmed the Truth of Christ's full humanity and full divinity in their lives and often in their deaths. The contemporary Patriarch of Constantinople has the authority to revoke the excommunications and anathemas between the East Roman Orthodox Church and the Frankish Catholic Church, but in doing so he has erred. The Patriarchs have the authority to do these things but they must not do them because they are bound to a higher authority: Revealed Truth, the Word of God, the Apostolic Deposit, the Holy Scriptures.
You say, "Now although the Orthodox acknowledge that certain groups have embraced heresy at various times, as soon as that happens they are committed to maintaining that those groups are, by definition, no longer part of the Visible Church. . . . it follows that all incidents of heresy have not occurred within the true Church. This allows you to continue to maintain the Church’s perfect record. . . . It would be like if I had a chess club and every time a member of the club lost a game, I said that this proves they were not really a true member of the club. In such a way I could claim that my chess club has been undefeated for its entire existence and will necessarily remain so throughout the future."
This argument is inapplicable. The particular human side of the Church is fallible. Most of the heretics in history were part of the Church. Arius was a presbyter. Nestorius was a Patriarch. We don't say they were not part of the Church but rather, they separated themselves from the Church. We neither sweep it under the rug nor pretend it didn't happen. We admit they were wrong and try to learn from it. Those "groups" who are "no longer part of the Visible Church" are the ones who have insisted that the chess defeat was a victory.
You say, "Paul talks about the church as a mixture which includes ferocious wolves and leaders who can make mistakes. . ."
Asking if the Church is fallible or infallible won't get us very far if we don't have the same vision of what Church is. If you define the Church as the institutional and particular human leadership at a single time in history, then of course it is fallible. Councils have erred, we call them Robber Councils. Patriarchs have taught heresy, we call them heretics. But those Patriarchs and Robber-Councils have been recognized for what they were, traitors to the Truth and rebelled against the blood of the martyrs who died for that Truth.
You say, "Suppose there are enough of these heretical leaders to band together and satisfy the conditions of an ecumenical council laid down by 2 Nicea - does that suddenly mean that they speak truly for the church? The possibility of such an event under Orthodox ecclesiological epistemology suggests to me that your position, not the Protestant one, leaves open the possibility that doctrine is always reversible."
I think you get close to what Orthodox Christians mean when you realize that the Holy Spirit causes or initiates a remembrance of the Truth in the faithful, enabling them in their many places to whiteness to that truth and even die for it often at the hands of ferocious wolves, the "official" church. So a council does not receive "ecumenical" status simply because it meets certain exterior criteria as if "ecumenical councils" were the Orthodox Pope! In fact a council doesn't need to be "ecumenical" at all to be both authoritative and infallible. Nicea I is an example of an "ecumenical" council and Jerusalem I a "local" council that even Protestants agree correctly divided the Word of Truth. A council has authority, and speaks an infallible truth, if the Holy Spirit causes the fathers of the council to remember the Truth, to recognize heresy (that which does not lead to healing), and clearly teach the Truth always believed by all Christians everywhere.
The Orthodox Church is often long suffering, willing to be patient, inviting erring parties to come, sit down, discuss things, and have a change of mind. Significant parts of the Church in the West were long in heresy but the fathers of the Eastern Churches did not rush to cut them out of the One Holy Church. In fact they prudently anathematize only those who promote and fervently believe soul destroying heresy and it was the Frankish Papacy that eventually cut themselves off from the One Church.
For instance, the Eighth Ecumenical Council (879-880) clearly condemns the claims of Papal universal jurisdiction and the Double Procession. The local Council of Blachernae (1285) says, "To those who believe and say such things, we pronounce the above resolution and judgment, we cut them off from the membership of the Orthodox, and we banish them from the flock of the Church of God." These councils were officially and judiciously cutting off from Communion the Patriarchs, Bishops, and "official" church authorities, wherever they may be, who refuse to listen to the sanity of Orthodoxy. They were not condemning the innocent Roman, Gual, Hispanic, and Celtic serfs working on Frankish and Visagoth Manors throughout Europe who were scared into submission by a Christianity hijacked and perverted into a tool of control and violence.
The faithful recognized the Truth in these declarations and confirmed it in blood for centuries, often at the hands of East Roman Emperors and Patriarchs, rather than be (re)united with what is not True. Thus a remembrance of the Truth was initiated in the faithful by the Holy Spirit enabling them to recognize and stand AGAINST A REVERSAL OF DOCTRINE. The Truth does not change, it was once delivered to the saints, and must never be surrendered. Therefore there is no possibility that doctrine is reversible.
Thus the excommunications are irreversible, valid, and binding and can never be revoked, just as the Church can never revoke its declaration that "While Christ is a single, undivided person, He is not only from two natures but in two natures." In order for Communion to be restored between Orthodox and Non-Chalcedon they must accept the Council's declaration and confess that Christ's two natures, human and divine, were neither separate nor mixed and confused, but united. Likewise, contemporary Roman Catholics cannot simply be brought into the One Holy Church by decree without change of heart. A case when the "official" church is not binding is when it falsely re-establishes communion, accepts false teachings, or reverses doctrine.
You say, "Bajis ends up having to default to personal experience as the ultimate criterion (a theme that is recurring with worrying regularity in my limited exposure with Eastern Orthodoxy): 'No extrinsic authority can take the place of Christ’s reign in the Church as manifested by the Spirit. . . . every Church member is actively involved in the process of discerning His voice, and every church member personally experiences the fruit of His government. God’s authority is real and absolute, but it can only be communicated and encountered personally.' "
This is precisely the point, for Orthodox Christians. Christ is the Head of the Church and it is a headship that he has never surrendered. Orthodoxy is so instant on this point it could be called the Church of the Headship of Christ. So despite the fact that you find this subjective Orthodox Christians know what they believe and maintain remarkable uniformity of belief and practice over time and space while Protestants who have an external (objective) authority do not, at least not in any globally united sense, believe or do the same thing. If you have two Evangelicals in a room they will have three opinions.
But you are not an Evangelical, you are Anglican, or at least Classical (catholic) Protestant. That means you understand the authority of the Church and ecclesial confession as descriptive rather than prescriptive. The only real difference is that Classical Protestants believe latter confessions are more authoritative and Orthodox Christians believe earlier confessions are more authoritative. This means that any contemporary Protestant denomination can come up with a new confession, as the PC(USA) did, and they have constituted a new form of religion, a doctrinal reversal, based upon their own opinions. This is fiat doctrine derived from a fallible institution.
Orthodox Christians don't want a new form of religion, we want the old ways, the faith of our fathers who were saved and healed and experienced the presence of the Holy Three-Personed God because we too want to see God in the flesh, we too want to be transformed by the Resurrection Power of Christ through the Holy Spirit.
. . . but you seem to be in a minority by apparently suggesting that the infallible church is an external authority in the believer’s life.
Authority in Orthodoxy is not based on coercion as it was in the Roman Catholic Church. There is no concept of a legalistic obligation to believe a certain list of doctrines or else go to hell. Christ alone is the Head of his Body and just as the Father knows the Son from within himself and the Son knows the Father from within himself, Christ knows us from within himself and we know him from within ourselves. This is the result of the closeness of our union with the Divine parachoretic Trinitarian Life. God's Kingdom, the reign of Christ, is his parusia, his glorious uncreated presence in our lives. As Fr John Romanides writes,
Another most devastating result of the Augustinian presuppositions of the Filioque is the destruction of the prophetic and apostolic understanding of grace and its replacement with the whole system of created graces distributed in Latin Christendom by the hocus pocus of the clergy.
For the Bible and the Fathers, grace is the uncreated glory and rule (basileia) of God seen by the prophets, apostles, and saints and participated in by the faithful followers of the prophets and the apostles. The source [initiation -R.] of this glory and rule is the Father who, in begetting the Logos, and projecting the Spirit, communicates this glory and rule so that he Son and the Spirit are also by nature one source of grace with the Father. This uncreated grace and rule (basileia) is participated in by the faithful according to their preparedness for reception, and is seen by the friends of God who have become gods by grace.
Because the Frankish Filioque presupposes the identity of uncreated divine essence and energy [simplicity -R.], and because participation in the divine essence is impossible [which it is -R.], the Latin tradition was led automatically into accepting communicated grace as created, leading to its objectification and magical priestly manipulation.
On the other hand, the reduction by Augustine of this revealed glory and rule (basileia) to the status of a creature has misled modern biblical scholars into the endless discussion concerning the coming of the "Kingdom" (basileia should rather be rule) without realizing its identity with the uncreated glory and grace of God.
Thus "No extrinsic authority can take the place of Christ’s reign in the Church as manifested by the Spirit" since it is this reign that is God's uncreated presence to us constituting us as the Body of Christ. ". . . every Church member is actively involved in the process of discerning His voice, and every church member personally experiences the fruit of His government," namely, becoming like God, glorification. Fr John Romanides continues,
In this patristic tradition, all dogma or truth is experienced in glorification. The final form of glorification is that of Pentecost, in which the apostles were led by the Spirit into all the truth, as promised by Christ at the Last Supper. Since Pentecost, every incident of the glorification of a saint, (in other words, of a saint having a vision of God's uncreated glory in Christ as its source), is an extension of Pentecost at various levels of intensity.
When, therefore, the Fathers add terms to the biblical language concerning God and His relations to the world, like hypostasis, ousia, physis, homoousios, etc., they are not doing this because they are improving current understanding as over against a former age. Pentecost cannot be improved upon. All they are doing is defending the Pentecostal experience which transcends words, in the language of their time, because a particular heresy leads away from, and not to, this experience, which means spiritual death to those led astray.
Ryan---I am not aware of constantanople revoking any anathama as a move to full communion with Rome. If they did indeed do this at any point it is the most unreported news story of the century. The fact that the Vatican does this every few years in various ways should not confuse us. Neither should we be confused by the diologue canstantonople engages in because it is just that---diologue. It probably does not help that the word ecumenical is tossed around by the right wing of Orthodoxy to mean something that those involved in the movement expressely do not mean by it.
I am also skepticle if the patriarchs of Antoich and Alexandria really did start full communion with the so-called non-chalsedonian churches. Since those seas, Antioch and Alexandria, function in countries where non-chalsedonian churches are present, Syria and Egypt, often under situations of intense persecution from both Jews and Muslims, it makes sense that in practice many so-called monophosites would come over to Orthodox parishes, but this should be seen in practical terms or even as a blessing in disguise.
Ryan, I am struggling unsuccessfully to harmonize your comments with Perry’s earlier assertions. Moreover, even on their own, I do not understand what you mean. I feel really bad saying that since you have obviously put a lot of energy into trying to answer my questions. Perhaps if you could put your answers into some charts and diagrams that would help me, or alternatively you could rework it in symbolic logic. Either of those might go a long way in rendering your words intelligible to me. Or you could simply take another shot at it.
Just suppose for a second that the PCA wrote a new confession of faith, which according to the Classical Protestant view, being latter, might be more authoritative. Suppose that this new confession said that Christ's two natures fused into a mixed hybrid nature, a single nature neither human nor divine. Would they be in heresy according to the Fathers of the Council of Chalcedon? Yes. Would the Orthodox Church have to call a new council to address this? No. It is not a new heresy. The Church has already spoken with irrevocable authority. No Orthodox Church would have the authority to establish full communion with them unless they accepted the One Orthodox Faith.
The particular human institutional side of the Church is fallible but but with the help of the Holy Spirit can make infallible statements just like you said. I would be happy to continue the conversation, it is helping me to clarify my own understanding. I addressed most of your points. However, if it was insufficient, maybe you could ask a particular question. Yet we may have to admit that the Orthodox position is incompatible with your presuppositions. I look forward to reading your question on Monday.
And thank you Patrick, you have greatly reassured me. I have been wondering how to confirm such things.
Ryan wrote, "Yet we may have to admit that the Orthodox position is incompatible with your presuppositions." That may be so, but it doesn't explain my inability to derive intelligibility from your comments since I am trying to understand your presuppositions on your own terms. Whether I would agree or not is another matter, but I just want to understand what the Orthodox are saying.
Ryan wrote, "I look forward to reading your question on Monday." Whose question? Nobody said anything about writing a question on Monday.
Ryan, here are some questions about the things I didn’t understand in your earlier answers. My brother Patrick may also like to field these. But again let me say how thankful I am that you took the time to try to answer my questions and how sorry I am that I didn’t understand. I am really trying to understand this, not just to find more fodder for debate, because this is a subject that I want to come to grips with. In the past I have been involved in situations where people have taken offence when I didn’t understand their philosophical or theological formulations, so it is always with a bit of hesitance that I admit my questions, but I trust that you will appreciate where I am coming from. So here are the things I didn’t understand in your answers:
Question 1: in your initial response to my questions, you say that “Upon reflection I believe your analogy accurately reflects what Orthodox Christians believe.” But then you go on to say that we are using the word ‘Church’ in different ways. So how can my analogy accurately reflect Orthodoxy if it is using a different concept of the church?
Question 2: since my analogy hinged on the fact that the church sometimes gets it right and sometimes wrong, what criteria would the Orthodox employ to distinguish between these?
Question 3: If I am defining the church in subtle different ways to you, how would the Orthodox define it?
Question 4: Since your discussion of the church in the same answer says nothing that I protestant could not also consistently affirm, I am curious why you think we are defining church different and what would need to change in my ecclesiological theology were I ever to convert to EO (not that I have plans to do so – the question is purely hypothetical!).
Question 5: You write that the Orthodox “trust the gift of those who come before over their own judgment, even if they have to use their own judgment to come to that conclusion” but earlier in the paragraph preceding, you mentioned a number of leaders who “came before” that the Orthodox reject? What criteria do you employ to distinguish these?
Question 6: You wrote that “The contemporary Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch should not have entered into de-facto full communion with their Non-Chalcedon counterparts.” However, given that the various Pentarchy in the East have a relationship that is primus inter pares rather than hierarchical, and that each main Orthodox communion is autocephalous, by what criteria can we claim that Constantinople did not represent Orthodoxy when doing so?
Question 7: You say that they were elevating themselves over Chalcedon and 1700 years of Orthodox Christians, but since they were themselves part of the living tradition of Orthodox and since the 1700 years to which you refer includes themselves and their own interpretation of Chalcedon, on what basis can you claim they were acting out of continuity? Moreover, by what external criteria can you claim that your own particular interpretation of Chalcedon is correct? How do the Orthodox avoid the same hermeneutical anarchy that they accuse Protestants of – displacing the problem of private interpretation of scripture with private interpretation of church councils? Of the various interpretations of Chalcedon among the Orthodox (at least two, given Constantinople’s dicey action), what yardstick can we use to decide whose trumps? Moreover, since you have affirmed that the Orthodox have authority but denied that they have any ultimate “external” authority, then on the basis of the law of excluded middle, they must have internal authority; but how can internal authority function to establish that Constantinople was out of step with 1700 years of Orthodox Christianity? For all I know, based on the internal authority you implicitly appeal to (see above) the majority of the Orthodox church was out of step with the true Orthodoxy and Constantinople wasn’t?
The rest of the questions will follow, but I have to get ready for church now.
The Russian theologian Pavel Florovsky once wrote (paraphrase) that learning about Orthodoxy from books was like the way he was recently hearing people were learning to swim, by lying on the floor on top of machines and never exposing themselves to water. So I want to prefix my comments by saying that Orthodoxy is first something that needs to be experienced in order to make sense. Beyond that, though, it is faith. Unfortunately, in contrast to New Testiment times, faith in Christ now means faith in ecclesiology. That´s why a proper understanding of church history is so important. This confusion arises from the fact that protestants put Orthodox appologists into the position of having to defend church rather than defending Christ. For the people of the New Testiment, however, these two things went hand and hand and were undistinguishable. I say this because it is unfortunate that you can´t look for your answers in scripture alone where you can see already functioning Orthodox parishes that still exist to this day. Part of the confusion is that oftetimes Orthodoxy is seen as something ¨other¨ or ¨later¨ than the New Testiment so that the New Testiment doesn´t act as the criteria. But the early Christians only adopted the word ¨Orthodox¨ as a last resort after the schism. Even today in traditional countries the word Christian often supersedes the word Orthodox. But Orthodox use the word Orthodox as an implicit acknowledgement that other Christian groups have some truth, but then we are told we shouldn´t be using it. But what sounds better, ¨The Orthodox fast on Wed and Fridays¨ or ¨Christians fast on Wed and Fridays.¨ See my point.
Patrick. My comments continue below.
Patrick Phillips writes (I´m using an ad-hok gmail account since blogspot doesn´t accept yahoo users)
Forgive the repitition, but can we please stop using the examples of ¨aberrant¨ jurisdictions re-establishing communion with seperated and semi-seperated brothers. Ryan acknowledged my observations here and so I thought it should have been clear that nobody re-established communion. That is because these bishops know that by themselves they don´t have the authority. Just think about the implications if this were really so. If the Greeks all threw open their doors to Roman Catholics (by virtue of the ecumenical patriarch---who is always chosen by Bishops in Greece and nowhere else), which would also mean throwing their doors open to Ukranian Greek Catholics, as has now been repeatedly suggested on this website, 30 million Russian Orthodox throughout the world would be up in arms because this would also mean inter-sacramental sharing on every level. My parish is directly under the ecumentical patriarch and in a Roman Catholic country and nobody shares communion. I would like to read where the Ecumenical Patriarch even remotely suggested that this was the case or that he had removed any ban. The only reference on this website was a link to a quotaiton where he said that diologue was paving the way for open communion, which is a goal I hope we all share but very far from reality.
The local church IS the fullness of Orthodoxy, not the other way around as in Roman Catholic ecclesiology. Orthodox ecclesiology starts at the parish level. This whole diologue seem to presuppose the opposite. But because it is the mystical Body of Christ, the Church cannot be proven logically. There is no perfect criteria for establishing just what constitutes absolute truth/authority for the Orthodox Church as a whole. It is a mystery and we might just have to say we don´t know. Some will say scripture, others will say Christ, while still others will say tradition, but these are all approximations because as soon as one starts stripping it all down to the sub-atomic level there comes a point where one has to say with Peter, ¨My Lord and my God...I believe.¨ I would venture to say the same would be true for reformed ecclesiology tambien. You might say, ¨well, it´s scripture¨ but then who interprets the scripture and so off we go. The whole thrust and force of the faith that is initiated and demanded in the New Testiment is absent from these sorts of discussions precicely because Orthodoxy is viewed by non-Orthodox as an innovation and therefore the bible isn´t seen as relevent or even helpful.
Fr. John Behr does a good job in his book Being As Communion of showing how Orthodox ecclesiology starts at the parish level and it may help answer your questions. Thanks for the invitation to diologue.
I will keep talking about ¨aberrant¨ jurisdictions re-establishing communion until you can show a criteria for even determining what constitutes “aberrant.” Given that the Orthodox admit that councils are not infallible and do not constitute a final external authority (see quotations from Jordan Bajis cited earlier), you cannot appeal to these councils as the reason we know certain jurisdictions are “aberrant” (as Ryan did). It seems that the key, as far as the Orthodox are concerned, is being able to establish that a council is truly ecumenical. But even here the Orthodox are incredibly vague. Timothy Ware revealingly asks, “How then can one be certain that a particular gathering is truly an Ecumenical Council and therefore that its decrees are infallible? Many councils have considered themselves ecumenical and have claimed to speak in the name of the whole Church, and yet the Church has rejected them as heretical... Yet these councils seem in no way different in outward appearance from the Ecumenical Councils. What, then, is the criterion for determining whether a council is ecumenical?...This is a more difficult question to answer than might at first appear, and though it has been much discussed by Orthodox during the past hundred years, it cannot be said that the solution suggested are entirely satisfactory. All Orthodox know which are the seven councils that their Church accepts as ecumenical, but precisely what it is that makes a council ecumenical is not so clear.” At the end, all the Orthodox can do is argue in a circle: judging councils by the yardstick of correct doctrine and judging correct doctrine by the yardstick of councils. Even saying that an ecumenical council is one that is accepted by the whole church doesn’t help. Chalcedon was rejected by Syria and Egypt: does that mean that Chalcedon is not ecumenical? Don’t forget that the whole church didn’t accept Nicaea immediately. And what about the heretics themselves: was it unnecessary for the Arian party to accept the council since, as soon as the council was complete, the Arians were no longer part of the church? If so, then heresy is determined by majority vote? What then are we to do with the time when Athanasius stood against the world? My point is that the very concept of an ecumenical council is incoherent if there is no way to determine what can pass as an ecumenical council. My pastor accepts certain ecumenical councils that both Rome and the East later annulled. But this raises the question: if the East can annul a council that was once considered ecumenical, what is stopping them from annulling Nicaea in a few thousand years? In the end nothing is solid and Eastern Orthodoxy gives us an epistemology in which all doctrine is potentially reversible and in which theology is in a constant state of potential flux. Ironically, this was the very claim that was made against Protestantism.
Fr John Romanides says that demeening experience for the sake of abstract reasoning alone as if experience were somehow opposed to education is like an astronomer being accused of being opposed to education because he insists that science text books are no substitute for observation of stars through a telescope. This is the meaning behind the comments about experience and learning to swim without water. The books aren't bad, and nor do Orthodox Christians demean reason and education, but the point out the obvious role of experiential verification.
I would like to point out that this blog post is ABOUT excommunication and ultimately reestablishing communion. Robin claimed the West had not violated any Ecumenical Council. I provided proof that there was an ecumenical council in 879 condemning the fillioque and universal papal jurisdiction that was confirmed by Pope John the VIII. I also provided proof of Orthodox councils that proved the Orthodox Church has officially and judicially excommunicated the Frankish Papal Church. I can provide other councils and confessions where Protestant dogma was specifically condemned. I do this to dispel the misguided notion that our separation was never official but only personal. Our excommunication from one another is real and ecclesiastical.
I continue to discuss the reconciliations of local Orthodox Church's with so-called "aberrant" jurisdictions because it is the explicit subject of this post. The epistemological foundation of authority is secondary to the question that was asked. In long discussions like this it is easy to loose site of the original question.
I have read reports that Patriarch Athenagoras wrote a letter to the Pope saying he would commemorate his name in the dyptics. I admit that this is second hand and until I go to Constantinople I will reserve final judgment. Of course I don't speak fluent Greek but I think I could pick the name Benedict out if I heard it.
On the other hand it is quite public that the Patriarchates of Antioch and Alexandrian have initiated full cooperation and con-celebration agreements with their Monophysite counterparts. As proof I offer the following articles
http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/ecumenism/mono_2.aspx {con}
http://www.orthodoxunity.org/article09.php {pro}
Don't get me wrong. I pray that the Monophysite Churches would become fully Orthodox and accept that Christ's two natures were united fully while remaining distinct and unconfused. And perhaps by being more closely united to Chalcedoninan Christians they will have a change of heart. But what if the opposite occurs and the Orthodox Church there becomes more and more Monophysite. This is why it is important.
And even if I am wrong, at least it is a theoretical issue very pertinent to this conversation.
I am working on responses to Robin's questions and will post them tomorrow. But I do want to point out that fulfilling external criteria for an ecumenical council can never be enough. Like I said, the "official church" often put the faithful to death so we must look elsewhere to find the Truth. As an example, a group of politicians could usurp the United States Congress and Judiciary and constitute a legal gathering judicially meeting the external criteria of the United States government, but it could still pass laws that destroy the nation.
It is exactly our instance not to accept anything but the Truth that opens us up to attack, for we refuse the interpretations of Popes and Councils (the official church) when they err, and we remind the world that tradition without truth is only the antiquity of heresy.
Lastly, for now, it is exactly because doctrine is NOT reversible that we know when some doctrine or teacher or church is no longer in continuity with Tradition/Parodisis. Latter formulations are LESS authoritative for us. Roman Catholics believe in the development of doctrine in order to justify not being in continuity. For this reason, a good Roman Catholic from 500 years ago would be a heretic today because their Church's dogma concerning the Virgin Mary and the nature of Papal authority has "developed." An Orthodox Christian in any century is always an Orthodox Christian and we are self-consciously in continuity and communion with them.
One more thing, this obsession with the word "ecumenical" attached to the word "council" is not really my experience of Orthodoxy. The councils could be called "imperial" or "Orthodox." It is mostly Protestants and Catholics who talks about "ecumenical councils." Orthodox Christians have only become concerned about the "criteria" of what an ecumenical council is since Vatican II. It is mostly a legalistic western idea based on Catholic council envy.
The criteria is neither that the whole world participated nor a majority vote nor officialdom. Nestorius was a Patriarch and many martyrs were killed by the "official" church.
Now Nicea could never be revoked or reversed because Nicea rightly divided the right doctrine, enabled by the Holy Spirit to defend the Pentecostal experience of Life in Christ the Church has always had. The Holy Spirit convened real councils to address robber councils within a lifetime of the offense just as Paul publicly addressed Peter for his sin. The Holy Spirit did not allow the Church to continue thinking Peter was right forever. The Holy Spirit convened a local council in Jerusalem and the correspondence and confessions of faith, hymns and sermons that lead up to and interpreted that council are recorded in the New Testament.
Robin,
No offense, but your comments sound like the attacks against Christianity by atheists and radical skeptics.
You know that I do not deny the problem of private interpretation of Holy Scripture, why would you assume I glibly dismiss the problem of private interpretation of church councils? The yardstick we use to divide the Truth is the Holy Spirit directed experience of and participation in the "Life in Christ" through the continuous and public worship of God's people through out history that has consistently lead to glorification / theosis.
Question: By what external criteria can you claim that your own particular interpretation of Chalcedon, or Augsburg, or Dort, or Westminster is correct? If you say by the external authority / criteria / yardstick of Holy Scriptures then by what external criteria can you claim that your own particular interpretation of Holy Scriptures is correct? If by private interpretation then how do Classical Protestants avoid the same hermeneutical and epistimological anarchy that they accuse the Orthodox of?
Perhaps the Frankish Catholic Church has it right and the only way beyond such epistemological anarchy is an ultimate external and coercive authority hypostasis-ized in the person of the Pope of Rome. That way our headship as members of the Body of Christ will be a real, external, concrete, objective, and infallible human being.
Or perhaps our problem lies in our western obsession with epistemological certainty. Van Til said that all formal systems of thought are circular, based on unproven premises or presuppositions. Some circles are smaller and more vicious than others. Some hold together more while others fall apart rather easily.
Given the epistemology you are implying no one could know who their father was. One couldn't use records because there wouldn't be criteria to tell between authentic and counterfeit birth certificates. One couldn't go to their mother to find out because their mother might not be their real mother. Both mother and father might be lying. You could judge which birth certificate was true based on the testimony of the mother or father, but which one? You could decide whether mother or father was telling the truth by confirming it with the documents. But was the birth announcement at the local Baptist church or in the newspaper correct. You can never get any closer than a radical discontinuous and ever revisable non-identity.
An astronomer might tell us that there are rings around Saturn, but how do we know? Can we trust the astronomer? Maybe he misinterpreted what he saw. Maybe his instrument was dirty. You cannot judge the text book based on the authority of the scientist and you have no criteria for judging between real astronomers and charlatans. There is no possibility of knowledge about the universe.
Robin, please tell us, what do you believe concerning the "the first principles of the oracles of God?" What criteria do you use to judge between true and false teachers, true and false doctrines, true and false interpretations of Holy Scripture?
Great questions Ryan. I have been up since 5:00 studying about the use of icons and images in worship, and this afternoon I have a lot of phone calls to make in my continual search for employment, and this evening a friend is bringing his drums round to play some rock and roll with me, so it might be a while before I can get to answering these great questions.
Robin
I have an acoustic guitar I have been playing for about three months.
What are you waiting for - get over here and we'll have a jam session? We've got enough space for you and Tami to stay, and we'd be able to carry on the discussion a lot better than through the internet. But I would need to check with Esther to confirm that she was okay about it, assuming you are interested.
I will “try” to have to have this be my final comment because my intellectual energies are going to be engaged with the issue of icons for some time. But feel free to carry on the discussion amongst yourselves or to ask for clarity on anything I have written.
My original question was answered long ago by Ryan’s helpful posts. I acknowledged this by replying to Ryan’s earlier post about the different councils which officially condemnded Protestant dogma by saying, “Those are some very helpful answers and have given me more food for thought.” Since then the discussion has moved on away from my original question (which Ryan answered and which I acknowledged) to my more general struggles over the Orthodox concept of authority. The reason I moved the discussion on to the issue of authority (which, I agree, is secondary to the question that was asked) is because a local Orthodox brother and good friend of mine (you will know who I mean, Patrick) encouraged me to take my biggest objection to Orthodoxy and study it. Since my biggest objection is that the Orthodox concept of authority seems to lack coherence and remains, to my way of thinking at least, fundamentally ambiguous, I have used this dialogue as a springboard to delve further into that problem. I appreciate all of your patience with my questions on that subject.
Of course, I agree Ryan that fulfilling external criteria for an ecumenical council can never be enough. But while more is needed than merely fulfilling the external conditions, surely less is not required. Surely a minimum should be that a council fulfills the external conditions for being ecumenical, even if more is required than merely this. Given the fact that you have said that the “official” church can error, just as politicians might usurp the Congress, we would need to be able to know that this is not what happened in the case of the councils on which Eastern Orthodoxy is accustomed to relying. Call them Orthodox councils rather than ecumenical and the fundamental problem remains. The problem is summarized by Timothy Ware when he asked “How then can one be certain that a particular gathering is truly an Ecumenical [Orthodox] Council and therefore that its decrees are infallible?” He doesn’t know, saying that “precisely what it is that makes a council ecumenical [Orthodox] is not so clear.” As I said before, even saying that an ecumenical council is one that is accepted by the whole church doesn’t help. Chalcedon was rejected by Syria and Egypt: does that mean that Chalcedon is not ecumenical? Don’t forget that the whole church didn’t accept Nicaea immediately. And what about the heretics themselves: was it unnecessary for the Arian party to accept the council since, as soon as the council was complete, the Arians were no longer part of the church? If so, then heresy is determined by majority vote? What then are we to do with the time when Athanasius stood against the world? Forgive me for repeating myself, but it still seems that the very concept of an Orthodox council is incoherent if there is no way to determine what can pass as Orthodox. You have told me what the criteria is NOT (“The criteria is neither that the whole world participated nor a majority vote nor officialdom. Nestorius was a Patriarch and many martyrs were killed by the ‘official’ church”) but not what it IS.
The idea that later Protestant creeds are more authoritative is something I have not encountered before. Ryan, although you are normally quite good at not giving false caricatures of Protestantism, I am wondering whether you are doing justice to Protestantism in this area. My understanding is that the Westminster Confession is only authoritative because it is a summary of scripture and has no authority on its own. All the pastors I know pick and choose which parts they agree or disagree with, based on their understanding of scripture.
To say that Nicea could never be revoked because it rightly divided the right doctrine seems to be begging the question. We have to first establish that Nicea in fact rightly divided the correct doctrine, that the Holy Spirit in fact directed experience at that time, but some councils which the Orthodox once believed did rightly divide the right doctrine they have later decided did not (an Orthodox friend told me that). Thus, I think that my concern about the potential reversibility of doctrine remains a legitimate concern. A similar concern could be urged against your comment about the yardstick the Orthodox use to divide the Truth.
You ask about my own epistemology. I agree with you and Van Till that all beliefs form webs of multiple reciprocities and that we should reject rationalistic foundationalist epistemologies that try to work everything out from first principles (as if a neutral and assumption-less first principles can even exist). So there are a variety of influences which coalesce to support the truth claims that I make: the church fathers, experience, logic, Holy Scripture, reason, the councils I happen to agree with (!), the authority of people I trust, etc.. But the ULTIMATE authority in all matters (and by ultimate I do not mean the only authority nor do I mean the epistemological starting point, because I dispute that there is one since all beliefs form webs of multiple reciprocities, which is not an excuse for circular reasoning by the way) is Holy Scripture, interpreted through the lens of the Apostolic deposit.
Now to attempt to answer your question. “By what external criteria can you claim that your own particular interpretation of Chalcedon, or Augsburg, or Dort, or Westminster is correct? If you say by the external authority / criteria / yardstick of Holy Scriptures then by what external criteria can you claim that your own particular interpretation of Holy Scriptures is correct? If by private interpretation then how do Classical Protestants avoid the same hermeneutical and epistimological anarchy that they accuse the Orthodox of?”
I’m not really sure how to answer that question. Let me stew on it for a few months. It has never occurred to me before this morning that the same epistemological arguments I am urging against the Orthodox could also be used against my own epistemology and theological hermeneutics, but now I am wondering if that is in fact the case. My standard is the authority of scripture interpreted through the lens of the historic faith, but I don’t have a single monolithic external authority for knowing what constitutes the latter, so I guess that puts me in the same boat as you. I guess the only solution is to pope. Okay, I’m taking the next flight to the Vatican!
I was seriously worried about that for a moment. But I can accept this position. I seriously don't think there is a way out of the problem, and that is why I do not try to glibly explain away "privet interpretation" whether of Holy Scripture or of Councils. I also think I have a better and more sophisticated understanding of Sola Scriptura position and how it may have developed into it's current form intellectually during the Middle Ages.
Nonetheless, I do encourage people to read the Shape of Sola Scriptura as it 1) gives examples of Scripture's primacy in the Church Fathers, 2) refutes Solo Scriptura (or Nuda Scriptura) as well as the Roman Catholic 2-Source theory of Scripture + Tradition. It's treatment of Orthodoxy I feel leaves much to be desired, and Robin has basically repeated it here. I of course disagree for reasons I have discussed above, 1) Parodisis is descriptive and no-coercive rather than the Roman Catholic understanding of tradition as prescriptive and coercive, 2) latter councils have less authority and continuity with the past is much of the criteria so that Nicea could not ever be reversed, 3) Orthodoxy is not the Church of the Headship of the Councils like Catholicism is the Church of the Headship of the Pope.
Lastly, I think the confusion comes from the idea of councils themselves, which are not of the essence of Christianity. The fullness of the Christian Church and the One True Faith in the Triune God was present at Pentecost. No council was ever necessary except as a defense against heresy and then it took a purely descriptive nature. This means that the criteria is the Truth as revealed by Christ on the day of Pentecost and passed on in a public, historic, and objective process we call Parodisis.
Thank you all for the good times.
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