Iconoclasts: Orthodoxy's "Conservatives" by Christos Yannaras

I will attempt to show that iconoclasts are always the "conservatives" of Orthodoxy.

Their stumbling block is the scandal of the persona. An icon (image) is the verification of a person - the verification of freedom.  It is not a coincidence that the historical starting point of the Iconomachy is Monotheletism and its champion the emperor Philippikos-Vardanis (711-713). The Monotheletes denied the distinction between volition and person; in other words, they refused to separate the person from nature. Human nature is one and it is common to all, whereas human beings are "myriads" and dissimilar to each other. Volition is the work of nature, whereas freedom, as opposed to volition, is ascribed to the person; it is the verification of the person.  Volition pertains to the physical individual, whereas freedom is linked to the human person.

Distinguishing is of extreme importance to us.  Man realizes his personal hypostasis, when he denies his physical volition - that is, when he ceases to be an individual, a physical self-awareness which projects his individual nature as an "I" in others' natures.  Individualism is the confusing of nature and person; it is the fragmenting of nature, which is attributed entirely to corruption through sin.  We determine the human person by his individual, physical characteristics, while his person remains inaccessible to any natural determination whatsoever - unique, incomparable and dissimilar, containing the entirety of his nature and constituting a separate and unprecedented possibility of being a depiction of God.

The iconoclasts would ask the defenders of Icons which of the two natures of Christ were being portrayed - the divine or the human.  And Saint Theodore the Studite replied that "in everyone who is depicted, it is not the (Trns.note:physical) nature, but the hypostasis that is depicted."  This means that Orthodox hagiography does not aspire to portray individual natures; it only depicts the "event" of that person. It does not seek to symbolize the person of the Holy Mother by resorting to the features of a contemporary young woman; it strictly confirms the presence among us of a Virgin and a Mother of God.  The character of hagiography is therefore neither a symbolic nor a relative one; it is an admission and a certification of facts.

This distinguishing between the image of things and the shadow of things is found in the Epistle to Hebrews: "...for the Law is but the shadow of future things, and not the image itself of those things" (Hebr.10:1).  It is only within this ontological content that we can perceive Man as an "image of God" (Genesis 1:26). Man is a depiction of God, not per nature (ie proportionately and symbolically), but as a distinction between nature and person; that is, between "actually" and "ontologically".  The first meaning of "icon" (image) - the proportionate and symbolic one - is of Hellenic origin. The second meaning is the meaning per the Bible and Judean tradition.

The Septuagint fathers had rendered the Hebrew word "chelem" as meaning "image", which is interpreted (on the basis of paleo-Judean and Babylonian sources) as "appearance", "representation", "equivalence", "substitute".  At the same time, it also has the meaning of creative depiction - of a dimensional representative presence.  It is characteristic, that in passages of the Old Testament and the New Testament, the meaning of "icon" is linked to (or interpreted with) the meaning of "glory" - with the corresponding Hebrew word that implies something objectively supreme, which is offered to Man as an immediate sensation and empirical knowledge.  It is the appearance and the manifestation of the holiness of Jahwe, which is usually perceived as "light" and as "power".

It is in this sense that Christ is likewise the "image of God the invisible" (2 Cor.4:4 and Colos.1:14); in other words, the appearance of God, the manifestation of God.  And Christians are called upon to become "of similar form to the image of the Son of God" (Rom.8:29).  With our natural (physical) birth, we "donned the earthen image", which does not cease to be the image of our Creator God, despite all the confusion between individual nature and the persona.  With our spiritual rebirth "we shall also don the image of the celestial" (1 Cor.15:49); in other words, we shall be rendered a form of "God's likeness" - the appearance and the manifestation of God.  In this verse, the future tense of the verb (shall) refers us to the eschatological end, - which should not be understood as referring only to Time, given that the "eschaton" (final) is in reference to the major accomplishment of the Church - but rather it refers us to the form of the "new man", the one who is "renewed with the conscience of being the image of the one who created him" (Colos. 3:10)

This renewal - with conscience - into the image of,  pertains to the Church's presence and comprises the "manifestation" of the children of God, the fullness of humanity's destination.  The consciousness of God leads to the revelation of the human person; Man fulfils his personal hypostasis within the event of being the "image of God".  "Never until now  has it been revealed what we shall be like.  We do know, that if it is revealed, we shall be alike to Him, for we shall be seeing Him the way He is" (Ούπω εφανερώθη τι εσόμεθα. Οίδαμεν δε ότι εάν φανερωθή όμοιοι αυτώ εσόμεθα, ότι οψόμεθα αυτόν καθώς εστιν) (1 John 3:2). Within the realm (the 'Kingdom'), the cognizance of God is not a relative and metaphysical one; it is not a knowledge "about God", but rather a direct view - a depiction of the personal God in the human person.  Man becomes "the place of God" - the appearance and the manifestation of God. "All of us, with our persons revealed and reflecting the glory of God, are transformed into that same image, from glory to glory, as by the spirit of the Lord." (Ημείς πάντες ανακεκαλυμμένω προσώπω την δόξαν Κυρίου κατοπτριζόμενοι την αυτήν εικόνα μεταμορφούμεθα από δόξης εις δόξαν, καθάπερ από Κυρίου πνεύματος. (2 Cor. 3:18).

And that is the scandal for the Iconoclasts. This ontology of the icon/image is unfathomable to them, and that is why they prefer the path of emulation: 'We need to resemble Christ'... These are the moralists. They appeared in History as revolutionaries and radicals, tearing down the "forms" and the "images" for the sake of promoting the pure truth of the word. Iconoclastically speaking, these are all pietistic movements within the bosom of the Church. Conscious or unconscious ones.  They usually appear for the purpose of restoring disturbed moral order, and they have an a priori disdain for the lay respect of forms and symbols.  They seek to replace formal religiosity with the "essence" of moral consequence.  They deny the image for the sake of the word.  To resemble Christ means to mimic Him in His specific moral virtues; it is something that can be controlled with one's logic. But to actually comprise the image of God - the revealing and manifestation of God - well, that is a leap that is impossible to perform with the crutches of iconoclast logic.  It presupposes a forsaking of the word and the acceptance of the whole man as an instrument for approaching the truth.

Then there is the scandal called 'freedom'.  Emulation requires subordination; depiction presupposes dialogue in the person. And dialogue means the undertaking of an extreme responsibility, which cannot be shared with any spiritual authority.  Iconoclasts deny the icon/image, because they find it impossible to grasp its ontological content, the certainty of the person's presence and the immediate potential for dialogue with the depicted person.  They are only familiar with individual natures, which, when depicted, cannot portray their morally perfected character, which is why their depiction is considered redundant.  If there is ever going to be a compromise with conjectural representation, it will lead to the acceptance, not of images, but of religious art, because of its ability to subject one sentimentally and facilitate the accomplishment of a moral obligation.

At best, religious art is a form of learning, a reference to the past life of the persons being portrayed. However, an Icon is always the Church's expression of certainty of the immediate presence of those who are "already perfected" - the testifying and the experiencing of a community of the living and the reposed.

"For where the imprint is, there he (the depicted one) also is" (Ένθα γαρ αν ή το σημείον, εκεί και αυτός έσται), says Saint John of Damascus. And elsewhere he supplements: "The Apostles had seen the Lord with their corporeal eyes, and the Apostles were seen by others, and the martyrs by others. It is my desire to also behold them, with my soul and with my eyes... because, being a human and having a body, it is my desire to likewise address and behold holy things corporeally. " (Είδον οι απόστολοι τον Κύριον σωματικοίς οφθαλμοίς, και τους αποστόλους έτεροι, και τους μάρτυρας έτεροι. Ποθώ καγώ τούτους οράν ψυχή τε και σώματι… επεί άνθρωπός ειμι, και σώμα περίκειμαι, ποθώ και σωματικώς ομιλείν, και οράν τα άγια.

And it is also a characteristic fact that while religious art is almost always naturalistic (ie, it depicts only individual natures), hagiography sees objects complete with soul and body and it portrays their form as already glorified bodies: that certainty about the person which relates overall to the entire body and has no need for natural beauty in order to be "actually" revealed.

In other words, iconography is the denial of moralistic models, the denial of relative teaching for the sake of the person alone.  The "fact" of the person is a moral risking, as it presupposes dialogue with God, ie, an awareness of God's absence (which we call repentance), with a previous awareness of sinfulness.  This is where the scandal called 'freedom' is located, which is why monasticism - that incessant grieving during one's repentance - is incomprehensible to iconoclasts, from the time of the Iconomachy through to this day.

Thirdly, it is the scandal of materialism, of matter.

Iconoclasts seek spiritual worship; they are forever wary of the danger of idols. This is yet another consequence of the denial of the person, because the human person is the hypostatic "blending" and "adjoining" of matter and spirit. Man comprises an image of God in precisely such an overall synthesis.

Says Saint Gregory Palamas: "Not the soul alone, nor the body alone is called Man, but both of them together, which, having also been made as an image of God, must be thus called" (Μη αν ψυχήν μόνην, μήτε σώμα μόνον λέγεσθαι άνθρωπον, αλλά το συναμφότερον, ον δη και κατ’ εικόνα πεποιηκέναι Θεός λέγεται). The discerning between matter and spirit in Man portrays the discerning between the Essence and the Energies in God - that ineffable reality of the world's animation by the Grace of God. That is why the defenders of holy Icons would use the teaching of Saint Maximus the Confessor and Dionysios the Areopagite in order to envisage the image of God within natural reality overall; that effusion of uncreated Grace, which is the fulfiller of the overall function of the Logos within the material and spiritual universe. The cosmos constitutes an image of God, precisely because it is the manifestation and appearance of His uncreated energies.

This potential of an "actual" depiction of Godhood in matter is restored, by the rescinding of the natural division between created nature and the uncreated God in the Person of Jesus Christ.  That is why Saint John of Damascus would proclaim: «In the past, God - the uncreated and unformed - was in no way depicted. Now, having seen God in the flesh and mingling with people, I depict the visible aspect of God. I do not worship through matter; I do worship the Creator of matter, Who became matter for my sake and Who condescended to reside within matter, and Who forged my salvation through matter, and I shall not cease to respect matter, through which my salvation was forged.» (Πάλαι μεν ο Θεός, ο ασώματός τε και ασχημάτιστος, ουδαμώς εικονίζετο. Νυν δε σαρκί οφθέντος Θεού, και τοις ανθρώποις συναναστραφέντος, εικονίζω Θεού το ορώμενον. Ου προσκυνώ τη ύλη, προσκυνώ δε τον της ύλης δημιουργόν τον ύλην δι’ εμέ γενόμενον, και εν ύλη κατοικήσαι καταδεξάμενον, και δι’ ύλης την σωτηρίαν μου εργασάμενον, και σέβων ου παύσομαι τη ύλη, δι’ ης η σωτηρία μου είργασται).

Being opposed to this overall perception of salvation, iconoclasts are forever dualists. They show disbelief in the body; they locate the origin of sin in material nature alone; they determine spirituality by means of rationalistic notions of a formal idealism, and they deprive it of all participation in the truth of personal beauty. They deny the body, and yet their fear of it follows them and infects their life with subconscious complexes.  They surrender to marriage as though to a loveless compromise with the flesh; human and divine love (Eros) are both entirely incomprehensible to them. There is no mystical life to iconoclasts; only mimicry and self-discipline. They exorcise moral corruption in society by creating followers, on which they militarily impose uniform ways of life, thought, and even external appearance.

It is not symptomatic that Orthodoxy recognizes a triumph of hers in the reinstatement of holy Icons. An Icon is the measure and the criterion of the Orthodox phronema-conscience and experience; it is the immediate and tangible testimony of the faith of the Orthodox regarding Man, Salvation and the world.

Source: Magazine "SYNORO", Issue No.36, 1965
Source of Translation: http://www.oodegr.com/english/ekklisia/praktikes/iconoclasts1.htm

The "Christomonism" of the West and the Spirit Conditioned Christology of the East

The following is from the notes that were taken from the lectures of Professor I. Zizioulas (current Metropolitan of Pergamus and Chairman of the Athens Academy) at the Poemantic Division of the Thessaloniki University’s School of Theology, during the academic year 1984-1985.

In Western theology, one observes a tendency to over-accentuate Christology, to the detriment of Pneumatology (matters of the Holy Spirit), and this of course affects Ecclesiology.  This preference is attributed to the fact that Christology is chiefly preoccupied with historical realities: the Incarnation, the life of Christ, etc., and Western thought is inclined, as we have said, to focus on History.  The Holy Spirit, Pneumatology, on the other hand, is the opposite. The role of the Holy Spirit in Providence was to liberate the Son from the bonds of History, because the incarnated Son took upon Himself all of the consequences of man’s Fall: He became Adam and entered History with the negative aspect that the Fall bestowed upon it. He entered the History of Time and Space - the Son of God was born in Nazareth of Palestine; He was born during the rule of Caesar Augustus, during a specific point in Time; He was crucified during the time of Pontius Pilate, etc. In other words, He partook of History in exactly the same manner that we do, and He became a part of that History.

But History, the way that we are living it, has negative existential consequences, because it carries death inside it. For example, my own history, the way that I am living it, carries inside it the fact that there was a time that I did not exist; that my father used to exist but now no longer exists; that I shall not be alive after a certain number of years. Death is interwoven with historical existence; with Time. Consequently, the Son also entered this status with His Incarnation.

The Spirit did not become incarnate, nor of course did the Father. The Father does nothing but ‘favor’, because He is the source of every ‘gift of God’.  For example, when we say “Thou, the Father of Lights”, as quoted in the prayer that is cited behind the pulpit (which we priests incorrectly cite in front of the icon of Christ). This prayer is addressed to the Father. We must never confuse the Persons, as it is a dogmatic faux pas to do so.  The Father, therefore, has this role; He favors the Incarnation and the coming of the Spirit. The Son is the One Who is incarnated. The Spirit is not incarnated; hence the Spirit does not suffer the consequences of History, which contains decadence and death.  However, the Spirit also has a role; it is not merely that of non-incarnation – the Spirit is the One Who constantly stands by the Son, during the entire period of His Incarnation, in order to liberate Him from the negative consequences of the Incarnation.

We have here a very important fact, which we Orthodox constantly forget.  By assuming human flesh, the Son also assumed death as a part of History, and was crucified and suffered the pain of the Cross and death, however, He was not finally overcome by death; He was not conquered by death, as He overcame it with His Resurrection.  Many people forget that the Resurrection of Christ was accomplished through the Holy Spirit. The Father resurrects the Son, through the Holy Spirit. Instead of this, the idea prevailed that Christ’s divine nature had somehow overcome death.  This is not correct; not biblically (because we have clear testimonies that the Father raised the Son through the Holy Spirit), nor is it correct from the Patristic point of view, because no natures can act on their own; these were ideas that Pope Leo I had introduced in the 4^th Ecumenical Synod – the so-called “reciprocation of the characteristics of natures” – but Cyril had insisted more on the hypostatic union.  Whatever occurs in Christology is a matter of persons, and is not simply a matter of natures.

Thus, we should not forget that the Spirit has a significant role in Christology and that role is precisely to be at the side of the Son, during that adventure called Incarnation; He is at the Son’s side in the desert, when He goes to fast. He stands by Him in the garden of Gethsemane, where He is to make His decision. It is not by coincidence that the Spirit accompanies the Son in all of these instances. The major role that the Spirit has is, precisely, to provide the opening for History to move towards End Times; to free History from the limitations of the created. This is why the Spirit is also linked to Theosis as the perfection of the created. When the boundaries of the created and of death are transcended, then the Spirit is present and is in fact playing a main role. However, because the Spirit is not connected to History, i.e., it is not the Spirit Who leads Christ into submission to History, but on the contrary, it is the Spirit Who causes Him to be released from the clutches of History, then, when one has historically-based tendencies like the Westerners have (since they tend to see everything unilaterally, through the prism of History), it is to be expected that they will find something that interests them more, only in Christology.  And this is why they developed Pneumatology (matters pertaining to the Spirit) in retrospect; or, to be more correct, when they eventually developed Pneumatology, they did not connect it organically to Christology.  One of the basic repercussions this had on Ecclesiology was that they regarded the Church as a historical reality – i.e., the Body of Christ, in which, however, the role of the Holy Spirit is somehow only a decorative one.  This is like building the edifice of the Church with Christological material - a Body of Christ, a historical community which has its given form in the past – and then placing inside it the Holy Spirit to act. This is not a placing of the Holy Spirit in the very foundations of the Church and regarding that the Spirit is the One Who builds the Church. (This is within the basis of the Church). Thus, we have a deviation and a preference in Western theology, always towards Christology and at times towards Christomonism, i.e. the stressing of Christ only, while overlooking the Holy Spirit.

Consequently, when we refer to “Western theology” we must always bear in mind that, along with the over-accentuation of History, we also have an over-accentuation of Christology, to the detriment of Pneumatology.  Pneumatology at times has a secondary and decorative role. With Roman Catholics, this becomes apparent in their Ecclesiology, inasmuch as they overstress historical succession and the historical privileges of the hierarchy.  Their overall Ecclesiology, the Papist one, with the idea of a Pope at its center, is justified precisely by means of the argument of historical privileges.  They assume that the Pope has a historical succession that goes as far back as Saint Peter. This is of immense importance to them; if they can prove the historical succession, the historical link, then the Ecclesiological argument is definitely a convincing one for them. From an Orthodox viewpoint, this is not enough.  Even if it could be proved (and it cannot be), it would still not be enough, because for us, the Church is not merely a society that is perpetuated throughout Time historically; it is the charismatic element that permeates Her foundations and Her institutions.  Consequently, in our relations with Western theology, we have –and must always have- this issue in mind:  How do we synthesize Christology with Pneumatology properly in Ecclesiology?

By giving precedence to Christology, Western theology created the following situation as regards the Church: the Church basically became the Body of Christ for Roman Catholics. For the Protestants, it became a community that follows Christ and His teaching and listens to His word, the Gospel.  This creates a “long-distance relationship”, one could say.  The Head and the Body do not coincide; they do not fully connect, because the Holy Spirit was not introduced from the very first moment, to create that communion which liberates beings from the limitations of the individual.  The Holy Spirit creates persons, He creates a community.  When we place Pneumatology at the base of Christology, then we do not have Christ first, with a group that follows behind Him; instead, we have Christ as a Person that embraces all of us within Him.  The Church, therefore, is formed in this way: it is a community that has its identity, not in Herself but in Christ Himself, because She is so closely tied to Christ that one cannot refer to Her being, without a reference to Christ.  Thus, for example, we Orthodox speak of the sanctity of the Church; that sanctity is found in Her very nature, Her very being. Why?  Well, where does the Church draw this sanctity from? The answer is given in the Divine Liturgy, every time we cite: “The sanctified (gifts) unto the saints” …. “One is Holy, One is the Lord, Jesus Christ”.  The “saints”, to whom the sanctified gifts are given, are the members of the community.  The members of the community are sinful; and yet, they are addressed as “saints”; however, by being fully conscious that they are not per se holy, they respond with the words “One is Holy – Jesus Christ”.

source: http://www.oodegr.com/english/dogmatiki1/F3b.htm

The Role of the Holy Spirit in Salvation by Metropolitan John Zizioulas

In very broad terms, everything in Providence begins from the Father and everything returns to the Father. And the Church, as I also mentioned previously, was likewise “willed” by the Father.  The Person that wills in the Holy Trinity – the One Who commenced everything – was the Father.  So, the Father willed the Church. What does this imply? That the Father willed to unite the created to the Uncreated; to unite His world with His self. And not to unite it simply and at random, but to unite it in His Only-begotten Son. This was how the Father favored things to be. The Father favored the world to arrive at an eternal communion, so that it would be able to live, otherwise, Creation would have been unable to live on its own – to arrive at a communion with God Himself, and in His Son.  Therefore, the initiative for the existence of the Church is the Father’s.

Of course the Son and the Holy Spirit are also in favor of this, however, in saying this, we must not lose sight of the delicate distinction that it is one thing to co-favor something, and an entirely different thing, to have the initiative in favoring something. It is a very delicate, but also a very important distinction that exists between the roles –so to speak- of the Persons of the Holy Trinity. In other words, when referring to this “volition”, this “favoring”, we are in fact observing a certain movement taking place in the Holy Trinity: there is nothing static within the Holy Trinity, so that the volitions of the three persons would simultaneously (from the aspect of their eternicity) have to make their appearance, or relate to each other without discrimination. The Father favors; the Son and the Spirit co-favor. In other words, they say “yes”. There is a “yes” inside the Holy Trinity – a dialogue. The Son consents – let’s call it that --; He too favors; He co-favors, to be the one “in Whom” this favoring of the Father (for the union of the created to the Uncreated) will be realized.

The role therefore of the Son, His particular contribution, is: firstly, to acquiesce freely to the favoring of the Father and secondly, to become Himself the focal point, the center, upon which this union of created and Uncreated is to be realized. In other words, the union of the created to the Uncreated will NOT be realized with the Father as the focal point, nor will it be realized “in the Father”.  Creation will not be saved “in the Father”. The salvation of Creation does, of course, eventually end up with the Father; it will report to the Father, but only “in the Son.”

The Holy Spirit likewise has a particular contribution: to ensure that the incorporation of Creation “in the Son” is rendered possible, by offering with His presence the ability for Creation to open up – to open itself – to its incorporation “in the Son”.  Because Creation cannot on its own communicate with God, on account of its natural limitations and not only on account of its Fall, which entails a reaction towards God and hinders the incorporation “in the Son”. Creation has to overcome its boundaries; a finite thing cannot be a part of the infinite, if its boundaries aren’t transcended. Thus, neither is the Holy Spirit the one “in Whom” Creation will be united, nor is the Father. It is only the Son. This is why this entire plan, this whole “Providence” as we call it, is realized “in the Son”, and it is the Providence of the Son, of Christ. Of course the Son does not act without the presence of the Father and the Holy Spirit, but we mustn’t confuse the roles of each person.

The Church is located within this Triadic plan, where the Father favors, the Son is the One Who offers Himself so that Creation can become incorporated and be able to have a relationship with the Father, and the Holy Spirit is the One Who liberates Creation from its limitations, from the restrictions of being created.

Source: http://www.oodegr.com/english/dogmatiki1/F2c.htm

The Gospel, Acts of the Apostles, and the Synaxarion

O Theanthropos

Saint Justin Popovich once said:

Living by Christ, the saints can do the works of Christ, for by Him they become not only powerful but all-powerful: "I can do all things in Christ Jesus who strengthens me" (Phillip. 4: 13). And in them is clearly realized the truth of the All-True One, that those who believe in Him will do His works and will do greater things than these: "Verily, verily I say unto you: he that believeth in me, the works that I do he shall do also and greater works than these shall he do" (John 14: 12). And truly: the shadow of the Apostle Peter healed; by a word St. Mark the Ascetic moved and stopped a mountain... When God became man, then Divine life became human life, Divine power became human power, Divine truth became human truth, and Divine righteousness became human righteousness: everything which is God's became man's.

What are the "Acts of the Holy Apostles"? They are the acts of Christ which the Holy Apostles do by the power of Christ, or better still: they do them by Christ Who is in them and acts through them. And what are the lives of the Holy Apostles? They are the living of Christ's life which in the Church is transmitted to all faithful followers of Christ and is continued through them with the help of the holy mysteries and the holy virtues.

And what are the "Lives of the Saints"? They are nothing else but a certain kind of continuation of the "Acts of the Apostles." In them is found the same Gospel, the same life, the same truth, the same righteousness, the same love, the same faith, the same eternity, the same "power from on high," the same God and Lord. For "the Lord Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever" (Heb. 13: 8): the same for all people of all times, distributing the same gifts and the same Divine energies to all who believe in Him. This continuation of all life-creating Divine energies in the Church of Christ from ages to ages and from generation to generation indeed constitutes living Holy Tradition. This Holy Tradition is continued without interruption as the life of Grace in all Christians, in whom through the holy mysteries and the holy virtues, Jesus Christ lives by His Grace. He is wholly present in His Church, for She is His fullness: "the fullness of Him who filleth all in all" (Eph. 1: 23). And the God-man Christ is the all-perfect fullness of the Godhead: "for in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily" (Col. 2: 4). And Christians must, with the help of the holy mysteries and the holy virtues, fill themselves with "all the fullness of God" (Eph. 3: 19).

The Lives of the Saints show forth those persons filled with Christ God, those Christ-bearing persons, those holy persons in whom is preserved and through whom is transmitted the holy tradition of that holy grace-filled life. It is preserved and transmitted by means of holy evangelical living. For the lives of the saints are holy evangelical truths which are translated into our human life by grace and podvigs (asceticism). There is no evangelical truth which cannot be transformed into human life. They were all brought by Christ God for one purpose: to become our life, our reality, our possession, our joy. And the saints, all, without exception, live these Divine truths as the center of their lives and the essence of their being. For this reason the "Lives" of the Saints are a proof and a testimony: that our origin is in heaven; that we are not from this world but from that one; that a man is a true man only in God; that on earth one lives by heaven; that "our conversation is in heaven" (Phillip. 3: 20); that our task is to make ourselves heavenly, feeding ourselves with the "heavenly bread" which came down to earth. [16] And He came down to feed us with eternal Divine truth, eternal Divine good, eternal Divine righteousness, eternal Divine love, eternal Divine life through Holy Communion, through living in the one true God and Lord Jesus Christ. [17]

In other words, our vocation is to fill ourselves with the Lord Christ, with His Divine life-creating energies, to live in Christ and to make ourselves christs. If you set about this you are already in heaven although you walk on earth; you are already wholly in God even though your being has remained within the limits of human nature. The man who makes himself a christ surpasses himself, as man, by God, by the God-man, in Whom is given the perfect image of the true, real whole man in the image of God; and in Him are also given the all-vanquishing Divine energies, by the help of which man raises himself above every sin, above every death, above every hell; and this he does by the Church and in the Church, which all the powers of hell cannot overcome, because in Her is the whole wondrous God-man the Lord Christ, with all His Divine energies, His truths, His realities, His perfections, His lives, His eternities.

Prayer of the Spirit By Fr. Sophrony

Misfortune in the shape of reduced circumstances, illness or the death of a loved one often drives people to prayer. But if the situation alters for the better, not only does their impulse to pray abate- prayer itself may seem pointless. But there is a different kind of prayer, prayer of the spirit, fastened on eternity, and here no external well-being can heal the sufferings of the soul who sees herself falling short of the sought-for eternal. Then prayer becomes the normal state for the soul, and the grace of the Holy Spirit may visit her, suddenly, inscrutably, bringing a foretaste of eternity. For this visitation integrity and faithfulness are the essential prerequisites. I have before me a remarkable document, a letter from a former rabbi.

‘Why did I, a former rabbi, become a Christian?’ he writes. ‘The question sounds strange in my ears. Did I, of myself, become a Christian, following a plan, a purpose, after due consideration? No, the grace of God made me Christian. My conversion is a mystery to me before which I bow my head in awe. It was the Holy Spirit, He alone transfigured me. When I accepted Christ the laws of Deuteronomy ceased to be a means of drawing near to God…I feel myself all the time filled through and through with Divine love. Of a sudden, unexpectedly, independently of any effort of mine, light shone upon me- the light that in the old days when I was a devout Jew was only a far-off glimmer. All at once I beheld in myself the Holy One, the Mystery of Mysteries and yet the clearest of all that is clear… As for religious ethics, they are much the same in Judaism as in Christianity: the commandments concerning morals are often expressed in identical terms. In practice, however, they differ vitally. The Christian ethic is given from on High, by the Holy Spirit, Who came to us only after Christ’s resurrection. It is the same Spirit that pious Jews dream of to this day: they feel Him, see Him, but only from afar. But the true Christian lives in the Holy Spirit through faith in Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit captivates even our body with the sweetest love, liberating it from thralldom to the passions until the body itself longs to dissolve in the Spirit. And so it was not I of myself who became Christian- it was God Who sent down the grace of the Holy Spirit and made me so…The Spirit reposes within the true Christian and encircles him round about. And all this happens through faith in Christ. This is the process: faith attracts the Holy Spirit, while the Holy Spirit strengthens faith, cares for you, sustains you, encourages your ardent desire for the Kingdom of God…To those who have not yet savored true grace, my words will be unintelligible. The process of true conversion cannot be described or explained: it is something that the eye cannot see, that the ear cannot hear. Filled with Christian sentiments, I heard my soul speaking within me, telling me of my new birth in Christ; but she spoke in the language of silence which I cannot find words for. I do know, though, that my soul sang a new song, a sweet song of love which lifted the power of the past from me. And this song transfigured me and gave birth in me to a new will, to new yearnings. Now I am as it were in love with Christ, and, you know, a man in love with Christ has no desire to philosophize. He only wants one thing- to love for all eternity. Do you want to understand? Would you like to experience the grace of Christ? Then seek this grace from Him Who can bestow it. If it seems that it is not for you, since you cannot believe, my advice is to set your heart on believing and you will be able to believe. Through faith you arrive at faith. Persist in wishing for faith and it will be granted to you. When I was a Jew I, too, had God and knew it. But it was a God Whose attitude changed according to man’s conduct. But through Christ, through the Holy Messiah and Son of God, I was led into the sphere of unconditional, steadfast Divine love. This can only be understood if you already live in grace. Christianity is the richest of treasures equal to satisfying each and every soul.  ‘In Christ is Truth, to which the Holy Spirit bears witness. And all who believe heed His testimony.’

I have quoted this triumphant cry of a soul who found the Christ-God because, though many have had a similar experience, few find words to express the well-nigh inexpressible.

The Holy Spirit comes when we are receptive. He does not compel. He approaches so meekly that we may not even notice. If we would know the Holy Spirit we need to examine ourselves in the light of the Gospel teaching, to detect any other presence which may prevent the Holy Spirit from entering into our souls. We must now wait for God to force Himself on us without our consent. God respects and does not constrain man. It is amazing how God humbles Himself before us. He loves us with a tender love, not haughtily, not with condescension. And when we open our hearts to Him we are overwhelmed by the conviction that He is indeed our Father. The soul then worships in love.

St Gregory of Sinai goes so far as to say that prayer is God Himself acting in us. ‘Do Thou Thyself pray in me,’ was the constant appeal of Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow in the last century. We also have the witness of St Paul: ‘And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father’ (Gal. 4,6).

Fired by the vision of our high calling, we strain to accomplish our purpose – our yearning for Divine Love to dwell in us forever. Without this preliminary rapture of faith, without this fervent reaching towards the loving God Who continually inspires us, we cannot help falling beneath the massive pressure of the contemporary world which does not know prayer.

Life-giving faith consists in unquestioning belief in Christ as God. Only when Christ is accepted as perfect God and perfect Man does the plenitude of spiritual experience described by the apostles and fathers become possible. Christ is now the cornerstone on which we must construct our entire life, both temporal and eternal. The nature of the gifts which such faith entrains declares their supernal provenance.
The Lord said: ‘But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet and when thou hast shut the door, pray to thy Father which is in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly’ (Matt. 6.6). True prayer operates in our innermost depths which we learn to hide from outside eyes. If I now venture to touch on matters sacred for each of us, I am urged to do so by the tragic atmosphere of tension throughout the world, and, more especially, by my consciousness that we belong together in Christ. Let us, therefore, as true brethren, share what it has been given us to know by a gift from on High. (I would ask you to pray as you read, as I pray God to inspire me with words pleasing to Him.)

Christ gave us the word that He had received from the Father (cf. John 17.14). He spoke of Himself as the stone which will break all who fall on it and will grind to powder those on whom it falls (cf. Matt. 21.44). What then? Is it we who have fallen on this great and wondrous stone, or has the stone fallen on us? We do not know. But however that may be, we are precipitated into a world of realities whose existence we did not suspect before. In the old days when life for the majority flowed in the broad channels of established tradition, the word of Christ was so presented as not to disturb. But now, with the whole earth full fraught with man’s despair, with the protest of consciences outraged, with violence threatening to wipe out all life, we must make our voices heard. In our present peril decorous words which commit us to nothing are not enough. All of us today are in vital need of a firm faith in Christ’s eternal victory, that we, too, may become spiritually invincible. A very great deal depends on ourselves – to remember, for instance, that at the baptismal font we received new birth from on High, in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Those who are baptized ‘with the Holy Ghost and with fire’ (Luke 3.16) perceive in their prayer that every given moment of our life is enveloped in Divine eternity. At all times and in all places we are held in the invisible Hand of our Heavenly Father.

The Life of Saint John the Russian

The righteous John was born in a village in southern Russia, of pious Orthodox parents, for the blessed Russians have the same spiritual Mother as the Greeks-the Orthodox Church-and has given birth to many great saints. Saint John was born around 1690, during the reign of Peter the Great. When John was a brave lad he served as a soldier in the war which that daring Tsar was then waging against the Ottoman Empire in the year 1711. In this war, John was taken prisoner by Tartars along with thousands of other Russians. The Tartars sold him to a Muslim cavalry officer who lived in Prokopion in Asia Minor, near Caesarea of Cappadocia, and this Aga carried John to his village. At this time Turkey was filled with a multitude of Muscovite slaves who groaned under the harsh Muslim yoke. Sadly, the majority of these loathsome wretches, to lighten their burden, denied the Faith of Christ and embraced Islam.

John, however, had been nurtured from childhood " in the instruction and admonition of the Lord," and he loved God and the religion of his fathers exceedingly. Indeed, he was one of those young men whom the knowledge of God makes wise.

As the sage Solomon declared, "The just man is wise even in his youth. For honourable age is not that which standeth in length of time, nor that which is measured by number of years. But wisdom is the gray hair unto men, and an unspotted life is old age (Wisdom 4:8,9)." Possessing that knowledge which God imparts to those who love him, blessed John was patient in the ill-treatment of his master and the insults and annoyances of the Muslims who called him Kafir, which means unbeliever. To show their contempt and aversion. Prokopion was the site of an army camp of the Christian-hating Jannisaries, who were sons of Christians taken from their parents while young and raised as fanatical Muslim soldiers. John was a particular object of hatred to the Jannisaries because to his master and to all who urged him to deny his Faith he answered with conviction that he preferred to die rather than fall into such a fearful sin. To the Aga he said, "If you leave me free in my religion, I will be very eager to carry out your commands. But if you try to force me to change my faith, I will first surrender my head. I was born a Christian and a Christian I shall die."

Seeing John's faith and hearing his confession, God at length softened the Turk's hard heart so that at last the Aga relented. From then on John was left in peace without further threats from his Muslim lord who kept him in a stable to care for animals. In one comer of the stable John would lie his tired body down to rest. John thanked God for being deemed worthy to have as a bed a manger like the one in which our Lord Jesus Christ had likewise lain at his birth. Dedicated to his work, John affectionately cared for the animals; and they, perceiving the love that the saint had for them, would look for him expectantly whenever he was absent. When he petted them, they looked at him with love and whinnied with joy as though they were talking with him.

As time passed, the Aga and his wife came to love John and gave him a small room near the hayloft. Even so, John refused this continuing to sleep in his beloved stable to bring his body into subjection by privation and asceticism amid the reek of the animals and the stamping of their feet. At night, however, that stable was filled with the prayers of the saint, and the smell would become an odor of a spiritual fragrance. Blessed John made that stable a hermitage, living there according to the rule of the Fathers, kneeling and praying for hours at times taking a little rest by curling up on the hay with no covering except for an old coat. Often he took only a little bread and water, fasting on most days and quietly chanting psalms in Slavonic. "He that dwelleth in the help of the Most High shall abide in the shelter of the God of heaven. He shall say to the Lord: Thou art my helper and my refuge. He is my God, and I will hope in him. For he shall deliver thee from the snare of the hunters and from every troubling word (Ps. 90:1-3)." "They laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness and in the shadow of death (Ps. 87:6)." "Unto the Lord in mine affliction have I cried, and he heard me (Ps. 119:1)." "The Lord shall keep thy coming in and going out, from henceforth and forevermore (Ps. 120:8)." "Unto thee have I lifted up my eyes, unto thee that dwellest in heaven. Behold, as the eyes of servants look unto the hands of their masters, so our eyes look unto the Lord our God, until he take pity on us (Ps. 122:1,2)."

John would even silently chant psalms while he followed the horse of his master as hostler when the master rode in the country. The blessing that the saint brought to his master's house soon enabled that cavalry officer to grow rich and become powerful in Prokopion. The holy stable boy - besides the prayers and fasting which he carried on day and night, winter and summer, inside that stable while lying upon the dung like another Job - would go at night and keep vigil in the narthex of the Chapel of Saint George, which was built in the hollow of a rock near the house of his master. John would go there secretly at night, and every Saturday he partook of the immaculate Mysteries. Greek Orthodox clergy were living in Prokopion serving the local native Greek population as well as the Russian slaves of the Turks. The Lord, who examines the hearts and the reins, looked upon his faithful slave and caused John's fellow slaves and other believers who had previously done so to cease mocking and insulting him. The Lord continued to bestow riches on John's master, who understood from what source such blessings came and proclaimed this to his fellow citizens.

After the Aga had become wealthy, he determined to go on the annual pilgrimage to Mecca to give thanks to God for his blessings, which he actually received through the intercessions of Saint John and not from any devotion to the Islamic religion, and to offer sacrifice for his sins. The Hadj, the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, is commanded of Muslims to make at least once in their lifetime. After leaving Prokopion, and enduring the hardships suffered in those times by pilgrims, he arrived at the holy city of the Muslims. Meanwhile, some days after his departure, the Aga's wife gave a banquet, at which she invited her husband's relatives and friends to rejoice and to pray that he might return safe from his journey. Blessed John served at table. Pilaf, a dish favored by the Aga, was placed on the table. Then the mistress remembered her hus-band and exclaimed to John, "How much pleasure your master would have if he were here now and could eat this pilaf with us!" John then asked for a plate of the pilaf, saying that he would send it to his master in Mecca. Upon hearing these words, the guests laughed. The mistress told the cook to give John a plate of the food, thinking that he would either eat it himself or carry it to some poor Christian family as was his custom. Taking the dish, the saint went to the stable where he knelt and prayed from the depths of his heart that almighty God would send the food to his master in whatever manner he might choose. In his simplicity the blessed one had faith that the Lord would hearken to his prayer and that the food would arrive in Mecca by supernatural means. He believed "without doubting," according to the word of the Lord that God would perform this miracle. As the great ascetic Saint Isaac the Syrian writes, "These supernatural things will occur for those who are simple in mind and fervent in the hope." Indeed the plate of food vanished from before John's eyes. Then the holy one returned to the dining room and told his mistress that he had sent the pilaf to his master.

"Some time later the Aga returned from Mecca, and to the amazement of his household brought with him the very copper plate that had held the food. Only blessed John was not surprised. The Aga told his household, "On that exact day (that is, on the day of his wife's banquet in Prokopion) as I was returning from the Great Mosque to the house where I stayed, I found this plate filled with pilaf on the table in a room that I had locked. I stood pondering who could have brought it. Above all, I could not understand how the door which I had locked well had been opened. Not knowing how to explain this mystery, I examined the plate of steaming pilaf. I saw with amazement that my name was engraved in the copper just as all such vessels in our house. Despite confusion from that unexplainable circumstance, I sat down and ate the pilaf with great relish. Observe the plate which I have brought back. It is truly ours. For the sake of Allah, I do not understand how it came all the way to Mecca, or who brought it."

When the Aga's household heard this, they marveled. The wife told how John had asked for the plate saying that he would send it to Mecca, and how they had laughed to hear him say that he had sent it. Behold, what he had said was true! This miracle was soon made known to the whole village and surrounding area, and from now on John was considered righteous and beloved of God. No one any longer dared to bother the holy one but rather looked upon him with fear and reverence. His master and his master's wife esteemed him all the more, and entreated him again to leave the stable and occupy a more comfortable dwelling. Even so, John refused to change his residence and continued to live as an ascetic, laboring as before to care for the animals and eagerly obeying the commands of his master. Saint John spent his nights in prayer and psalmody, according to the word of the Lord who says, "Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the things which are God's."

John approached the end of his life after several years of fasting, prayer, and sleeping on the ground. Falling ill, he lay on the straw in the stable that he had sanctified with his supplications and privations for the love of Christ who became man for us and was crucified for our sake. Foreseeing his end, John called for a priest and asked to partake of the immaculate Mysteries. Because of the fanaticism of the Turks, the priest was afraid to openly bring the Holy Mysteries into the stable. He was made wise with divine enlightenment however, and, taking an apple, he dug the core out, lined the cavity with beeswax, and placed the divine Communion inside. Thus he went to the stable and gave Communion to blessed John. After receiving the immaculate Body and Blood of the Lord, John surrendered his holy soul into the hands of God whom he loved so much. The date of his falling asleep was May 27, 1730. In this manner, then, reposed Saint John the Russian, a new Job who passed his life upon a dung heap, a second Lazarus who endured the mockings of his fellow servants and whose wounds his master's dogs licked.

John was about forty years old at the time of his repose. Because he was beloved by God, the Lord brought John quickly near his throne that he might suffer no more torment in this sinful world, and that he might rejoice in the tents of the righteous where there is neither pain, nor sorrow, nor sighing, but the untroubled sound of those that keep festival and cry unceasingly, "O Lord, glory to thee!" We should recall the Prophet King Solomon's words on the death of a righteous man, "He pleased God, and was beloved of him: so that living among sinners he was translated. Yea, speedily was he taken away, lest that wickedness should alter his understanding, or deceit beguile his soul. For the bewitching of wickedness doth obscure things that are honest; and the wandering of concupiscence doth undermine the simple mind. He, being made perfect in a short time, fulfilled a long time: for his soul pleased the Lord; therefore, hasted he to take him away from among the wicked. This the people saw, and understood not, neither laid they up this in their minds, that his grace and mercy is with his saints, and that he hath respect unto his chosen (Wisdom 4:10-15)."

Yes, the world lives carnally seeking to please only the senses and eating, drinking, revelling, and caring only for "the things of vanity and the much afflicted flesh." The senses, together with tangible things and delights of this world, were fashioned by God so that it is no sin for a man to rejoice in this world. Even so, he should not be consumed wholly by material things, but should take care also for the things of the spirit, keeping in mind that in the temporary body there dwells an immortal soul that, in the Lord's words, is as much more honored and valued than the body as the body is held important than its clothing. If a man truly believes this, he will take care for his salvation and will be blessed in this would with the joy of a pure conscience, and in the next (which is eternal) he will rejoice in the bosom of Abraham. If he rejects God and his Word, he will become wretched and unhappy, even though he acquires many possessions, great worldly glory and honor. According to the words which the all-holy and truthful Lord: For what will it profit a man if he wins the whole world and loses his soul, or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?

Thrice-blessed therefore is the man who has treasured these words in the depths of his heart, hearkening to them until his last breath, conforming to them, and walking always according to them. Blessed and thrice-blessed therefore was the holy John, whose memory we celebrate today with great compunction and spiritual joy. He knew few letters and neither did he know the evils of the world. He lived far from complex systems of humanistic rationalism, remaining simple, poor in spirit, and therefore full of faith. The Holy Spirit dwelled in his heart. Within a disdained and tyrannized body, within a quiet and ragged slave, there burned the mystical spark of faith.

"The people saw, and understood not, neither laid they up this in their minds." For the carnal men around him were inwardly dark like extinguished lanterns, beholding the saint, they understood nothing because they saw only with bodily eyes, not having-wretched as they were-spiritual eyes for seeing the holy mystery of his life. They, with earthly pride, considered him insane for preferring to sleep with animals, for avoiding men, for fasting, for dressing in rags, for silently en-during abuses and insults, and for not lifting his eyes to the face of a woman. Who of the clever of this world would have surmised that this "insane" person, this fool for Christ, was the wisest of the wise because he possessed that foolishness in Christ that makes manifest the revelation of great and terrible mysteries to him who possesses such foolishness and bestows upon him the great hope of immortality?

As we celebrate the feast of the righteous John with psalms and hymns, we are assured that the saint is at this moment among us living and crying out, "Rejoice" in the midst of glory and effulgence. Where are those who saddened and despised our holy John? Where are the mighty of the earth? Where is the Muslim master of this slave who was yet free? Where are the fearsome Jannisaries? Where are the Tartars who bound him and beat him and sold him like an animal? They are dispelled like morning mist and "their bones are scattered in hades," according to David, the Prophet-King. The tombstone of oblivion has covered them.

In Jerusalem on high, the dwelling of the First-born where there are found the blessed souls of the saints who endured privation in this world as to pass through "the narrow and afflicted way that leadeth unto life," there rejoices also the humble John whom we celebrate today, brother to animals, new Job, and second Lazarus.

In the other life, those who grieved the saint and those who indulged their passions are groaning. Behold what the Prophet King Solomon says concerning the righteous man and his persecutors, when they open their eyes after death, then shall the righteous man stand in great boldness before the face of such as have afflicted him, and made no account of his labors. When they see it, they shall be troubled with terrible fear, and shall be amazed at the strangeness of his salvation, so far beyond all that they looked for. And they repenting and groaning for anguish of spirit shall say within themselves, "This was he, who we held sometimes in derision, and a proverb of reproach; we fools accounted his life madness, and his end to be without honour. Now is he numbered among the children of God, and his lot is among the saints! Therefore have we erred from the way of truth, and the light of righteousness hath not shined unto us, and the sun of righteousness rose not upon us. We wearied ourselves in the way of wickedness and destruction: yea, we have gone through deserts, where there lay no way, but as for the way of the Lord, we have not known it. What hath pride profited us, or what good hath riches with our vaunting brought us? All those things are passed away like a shadow, and as a post hasted by, and as a ship that passes over the waves of the water, which when it gone by, the trace thereof cannot be found, neither the pathway of the keel in the waves! Even so we in like manner, as soon as we were born, began to draw to our end, and had our wickedness. For the hope of the ungodly is like dust that is blown away with the wind, like a thin froth that is driven away with the storm, like as the smoke which is dispersed here and there with a tem-pest, and passes away as the remembrance of a guest that tarries but a day (Wisdom 5:1-14)."

These things will the lawless say in the other world where the right-judging Lord shall judge man. They will receive no benefit from their change of heart after death for in hades there is no repentance. Saint John the Russian reposed in the Lord and received the recompense of the labors and toils that he endured for Christ, whom he loved more than all corrupt and fleeting things so that now, wearing a crown in heaven, he rejoices with the choirs of the saints and beholds in glory the Prize-bestower, our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and dominion and worship unto the ages of ages. Amen.

Faith and Foundations: Orthodoxy, Catholicism, and Protestantism

The following is for those interested in exploring the differences between Orthodoxy, Catholicism, and Protestantism in an honest and non-polemical manner, particularly as it relates to foundations of faith and authority.  I hope you will enjoy and I would be interested in your comments. 

Catholicism- Reason and Revelation (scripture and tradition)

1)      Thomas Aquinas- CONTRA GENTILES, BOOK ONE: GOD

http://www.josephkenny.joyeurs.com/CDtexts/ContraGentiles1.htm#3

2)      Catholic Encyclopedia

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15006b.htm

Protestantism- Sola Scriptura

1)      Epitome of the Formula of Concord

http://bookofconcord.org/fc-ep.php

2)      Westminster Confession

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/creeds3.iv.xvii.ii.html

Orthodoxy- The Ecclesial Event

“But our opinion is in accordance with the Eucharist,

and the Eucharist in turn establishes our opinion.”

IRENÆUS, Against the Heretics: Book IV, Chapter XVIII

Christos Yannaras: Concerning “Source” and “Sources”

Elements of Faith, T&T Clark (Chapter 7)

In radically disputing the objectified “authority” of the papacy, Protestantism proposed the Bible as the exclusive source of Christian truth. The Bible contains the complete truth of the revelation of God in an objective and definitive way. It is a text which makes the word of God directly accessible to us as an objective given without our needing supplements to revelation or intermediaries for faith and the reception of the divine word. The Roman Catholic “counter-Reformation” objected to this absolutization of the authority of the Bible by Protestantism, proposing that there are two sources of Christian truth: the Holy Scripture and the Sacred Tradition. The “college of bishops” expresses and administers the Sacred Tradition, but only by means of its “infallible” head, the Pope of Rome, who is defined as the “visible head of the whole Church” (visibile caput totius Ecclesiae). By his sanction, the ecclesial Tradition acquires genuine authority. All those ways by which the revelation of God is formulated and interpreted constitute this Tradition: Ecumenical Councils, opinions of the Fathers, liturgical practice, creeds, and rules of life.

Whether the Scripture alone or the Scripture together with the Tradition, it is still a matter of the source or the sources by which the individual derives the truth “from the object”; it is a matter, that is, of the need for objective authority, the need of western man to be assured individually that he possesses an indisputable truth— even if this assurance is achieved by his submission to an idolized schematization of the “infallible”, to the authority of supernatural revelation, or to the authority of science, to the divine inspiration of the texts of Scripture or, later, of the texts of Marx or any other ideology, to the “infallibility” of the Vatican or to the “infallibility” of Moscow or any other “see”. The history of western man is a dialectic of submission and rebellion, where rebellion means in each case the choice of a different authority, consequently of a new submission, while the goal remains always the same— individual security, the protection of individual certainty about the truth to be believed.

Aside from the blood which was spilled (by the “holy wars”, the “Holy Inquisition”, the tortures which were established as an “investigative method in the trials of heretics”), enough ink was spilled to defend the authority of the Vatican, the “infallibility” of the Pope. Blatant forgeries of history were enlisted: that Peter was the first Bishop of Rome, that he exercised a primacy of power over the other Apostles and subsequently bestowed this power to his successor Bishops of Rome, that Constantine the Great assigned the government of the western Roman state to the Pope with imperial rights (“pseudo-Donation of Constantine”), that very ancient canons treated the Pope as the supreme head of ecclesiastical— and also of political— power (“pseudo-Isidorean Decretals”), that Cyprian already in the 3rd century preached the papal primacy (“pseudo-Cyprian writings”) and many others. But ample ink has been spent as well by Protestants to defend the inspiration of Scripture, the immediate revelation of God within the biblical text alone. It has been maintained that the writers of the Bible were simply passive instruments without their affecting the writing, even by influencing the style or punctuation of the texts; they merely lent their hand writing mechanically what the Holy Spirit dictated to them. And this because only such a rational inspiration could assure supernaturally and without contradiction the infallible authority of the texts and give to the faithful the certainty that the Bible could possess the truth.

Within such a climate, scientific dispute about the historical credibility of the Scriptures or the supports for the Tradition took away the foundation of “faith”, that is, of submission to authority. Western man had to choose between atheism and the emasculation of his reason, or to accept compromise with a censored version of the gospel narrative, stripped of every “supernatural” element, suitable only for morally uplifting use, or even for political exploitation.

The life and practice of the undivided Church, like its historical extension in the theology and spirituality of the Orthodox Churches, knew neither one nor two sources of infallible authority. This does not mean that it disregarded or underestimated the meaning and the authority of the Holy Scripture and the Sacred Tradition. But it refused to separate truth from the realization and experience of the truth, the realization of life “in truth”. Before any formulation, the truth is an event: the historical realization of the triadic mode of “real life”. It is the body of Christ, the Church. The event of life which is the Church precedes both Scripture and Tradition— as his divine-human hypostasis precedes the teaching of Christ, and without this hypostasis of life the gospel word remains, perhaps, a wonderful teaching, but unable to save the human race from death.

Scripture and Tradition define the truth and revelation of God to people without exhausting them. The words “truth” and “revelation” do not mean for the Church some “supplement” to our knowledge unattainable by our scientific or other reasonable method; they are not some “articles of faith” which we must accept without contradiction because they have been given to us in a “supernatural” way, such that no one would dare to dispute them. For the Church, truth and revelation refer to God who reveals himself to people as “real life”. And life cannot be revealed with concepts “about” life, but only as an existential realization accessible to man. God’s mode of being incarnate in an historical person— in the Person of Christ who realizes life free from death— is the truth and revelation of life. Christ is “the way and the truth and the life” (Jn 14.6) and remains “yesterday and today the same” (Heb 13.8) as the way and mode of existence of his body, the Church. We know, consequently, the truth and revelation not simply by reading the Holy Scripture and the “credal” texts of the Tradition, but we verify these texts with our participation in the Church’s mode of existence, in the way of the triadic prototype of life. We transform our individual approach to the texts into an ecclesial communion of the truth which the texts mark out. Outside of this communion, the ecclesial mode of existence, there exists neither truth nor revelation, but only some religious knowledge better or worse than other analogous knowledge. In order for us to know the word of the Holy Scripture, we must study it incarnate in the ecclesial Body of Christ, in the persons of the saints, of our spiritual fathers who “give us birth” into the life of the ecclesial communion.

The reading of the Holy Scripture in the undivided Church and afterwards in the Orthodox Church constitutes an act of worship: that is, an act of communion of the ecclesial body. We communicate with the word of the Apostles who became 11 witnesses” and “observers” of the “manifestation” of God (they heard and saw and handled his historical revelation), we communicate with them by reading their texts, not as historical information, but accepting their testimony as a confirmation of life and unity of the Eucharistic body. Every Eucharistic gathering is also a revelation in practice of the gospel word; it is the realization of the life of people, living and dead, according to the model of the triadic unity, beyond corruption and death. This is the Gospel, which we celebrate every time in the Eucharist by accepting the reading of the word of the Apostles as confirmation of our direct experience there.

The gospel word of the Apostles is a word and revelation of Christ, not because Christ dictated it to them by some form of mechanical “inspiration”, but because the Apostles wrote down the relationship of life which they realized with Him, the same relationship of life which constitutes the Eucharistic body in unity. They wrote down the word and revelation of this relationship which means as much the events or “signs” which reveal the mode of existence which this union renews as the didactic indication of the limits and presuppositions of God’s union with man.

When the Church in the Eucharist lives the miracle of life freed from every natural necessity, then the miracles of Christ which the gospel narrative recounts are nothing but particular manifestations and details of this miracle itself. If the initial miracle is true— if the created can exist in the mode of the uncreated— then no other miracle is impossible, then “ the limits of nature are conquered”, the limitations and necessities which govern the created are lifted. Then “the blind see again, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, deaf hear, the dead are raised” (Lk 7.22). For the Church, the gospel narratives of the miracles of Christ were never apologetic proofs which coerce reason and demand faith in the divine-humanity of Christ. But they were “signs”, signs which point to that event which the Church experiences every time “in the breaking of the bread”: Life becomes imperishable and the mortal immortal in a manner “most becoming of God”.