Apocalypse & Mystery

God always remains a Mystery. He expresses

His natural hiddeness in such a way that

He makes it the more hidden through revelation.

-Saint Maximos the Confessor

"Sudden" is that which, contrary to expectation, and out of the, as yet, un-manifest, is brought into the manifest. But with regard to Christ's love of man, I think that the Word of God suggests even this, that the Super-essential proceeded forth out of the hidden, into the manifestation amongst us, by having taken substance as man. But, He is hidden, even after the manifestation, or to speak more divinely, even in the manifestation, for in truth this of Jesus has been kept hidden, and the mystery with respect to Him has been reached by no word nor mind, but even when spoken, remains unsaid, and when conceived unknown.

-Saint Dionysios

 

Please visit my other Blog Phenomena & Logos if you are interested in exploring the Paradox of God's Mysteries and Theophanies.

 

  http://phenomenalogos.blogspot.com/2012/10/apocalypse-mystery.html

Truth and the Redeemer

 By Metropolitan John Zizioulas

When Christ says, that He is the truth and the life of the world at the same time, then he gives to the truth content with ontological extensions. If the truth saves the world, then this happens because it is life. The mystery of the Christology, as it is accepted by the term in Chalcedony, indicates, that the salvation as the truth and the life is made capable only on a true person and through it, that is, something to which nature, as we have seen, cannot offer because of its individualization. The only ability for a true person exists when the being and communion coincide. The triadic God offers this unique ability for an identification of the being with the communion in Himself; He is the revelation of the true person.

The Christology relies exactly on the presupposition that only the Triad can offer to the created being a real base on the person and thus, salvation. So, Christ has to be God to be a Savior; but this means something even more: he mustn't be an individual, but a true person. In the experience of the individualized existence is completely impossible for any analogy to be found with a being, which is entirely, and even in an ontological sense personal. Our experience on the person through communion and love transfers to us an idea of such an existence, but offers no ontological change. True life, lacking death, is not to us as persons possible without shaking the very foundations of our existence. Through the analogy of love we can reach to understanding the Christology from the viewpoint of the cross (a person, who loved us so much, died for us), but we cannot follow it to the point of the Resurrection (a person, that defeated death), the Christology does not contribute ontologically to that at all. Christ is the truth exactly because in himself does not show only the being, but the permanence, meaning the survival of the being. Through the resurrection, Christology shows, that the created being, is at such a grade real, so that not even the human freedom can wipe it out[i], as we tried to do on the cross. In the resurrection of the Christ existentially truth and being are identified and His freedom relieves from the fall and is no longer a threat for the being.

So it is, that Christology translocates the question concerning the truth from the place of the individual and nature to the level of the person. It would then be pointless to understand Christ, the truth, as "nature"[ii] or as an individual personality. In Him we can much more see a person, in which the division of "natures" has been transformed into dissimilarity and communion[iii]. Therefore, if the Christology is translocated from our own individual existence, this seems to lead to an image of the Christ, which is no more "human" and at the same time results from that has been said, that, even though such a "lift of the individualization" of Christ takes place in Christology, the existential sequences have no more any ontological importance.

If the individualization of the Christ creates in the Christology unsurpassable problems and if we link it to the allegation, that Christ is the truth, then this should be examined more thoroughly in reference to Ecclesiology. If the being of Christ takes place with the way of an individual, that is, as an individual situation, which lies above or below us, then the question that appears before us inevitably is this: how can man and the sum of creation be connected to this individual existentially, that is, not only with a psychological or moral way, but ontologically[iv]. This problem is closely connected to the relation between Christology and Pneumatology. We should then take a glance on it first; before we can then see what position the Church took in the presentation of the Christ as truth and communion.

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[i] Dostoyewskie reveals the ontological sequences of freedom, when he characterizes the effort of human freedom to be validated. With the words of Kirilov in «Demons», he can prove that there is a God, that is, the ultimate reference of existence, only when he can put an end to his very existence by committing suicide. The fact, that life goes on even though the ability of man to kill himself, constitutes the ontological proof on that man is not the ultimate cause of existence, even under the threat that he puts regarding the being by having the ability to destroy the beings through death. One should observe the importance of this thought on the ontological sequences of the cross and the resurrection of the Christ

[ii] D. M. Mackinnon, defends the use of the term «nature» in his Christology, «Substance» in Christology...(see above, footnote 58). The purpose of this defense is to suggest the immediate and direct presence of God in Christology and to answer to the basic question: «How can a particular action of him, who is connected to the Father, be identical to the Father, without it being in the nature of his relationship?» These words should be evaluated positively in the relevance of the western thought, which has the tendency to separate the being or the substance from the relationship or the person. However, that which we had wanted to indicate here, based upon the thought of the Greek Fathers (see above, Part II, 3), is the fact, that the being and the relationship have to be identified with one another, and that «nature» or the «substance» only in the «way of existing» are true.

[iii] The paterical term of the hypostatic union, as developed mainly by Cyril of Alexandria, creates by the person (hypostasis) and not by the natures the base for the existence of Christ. At this point exists a delicate but characteristic difference concerning the idea of a notification of idioms, which thought approaches, that the two natures could have by themselves an ontological situation.

[iv] The problem has certain difficulties of Reason and experience, which Christology cannot solve for modern day man, for as much as it perceives Christ as an individual. How can an individual, which lived in Palestine so many years ago have something to do with me «hic et nunc»? If we insert the Holy Spirit as some sort of «deus ex machina» to solve this problem, it creates more problems than the ones it solves and in no case does it seem convincing at an existential or an ontological level. The only reasonable alternative solution in the relevance of such an individualized Christology is to understand our relationship with Christ as an Imitatio (imitation) Christi or through the substituting theories of redemptology. All efforts to describe this relationship, as ontological, leads necessarily into quitting from an individualistic understanding of Christ (see the biblical sense «person-body»).

Truth and Person

by Metropolitan John Zizioulas The place in which in a completely direct way the overcoming of the fallen existence, as described previously, is the reality of the person. The importance of the person lies in the fact, that it states at the same time two things, which at first glance seem to contradict: the particularity and communion. Being a person is something completely different from being an individual or a "personality", because a person cannot be observed onto itself, but only in its relationship. Under the accusations of the fallen existence, we usually identify the person with the «ego» and in this way with all the characteristics and the experience that it holds. The philosophers remind us justly, that this is not what distinguishes a person. But what is the relationship of the person with the truth and especially from the view of the particularity as much as the society? The substance of the person lies in that the being is a revelation of the truth of being and rather not as "substance" or "nature", but as a "way of being"[i]. This deep perception of the Cappadoceans[ii] indicates, that the real knowledge is not knowledge of the substance or the nature of things but of the way, with which they refer to the fact of the communion. We saw previously, that the matter of ecstasy has a function-key in the understanding of the truth of the Greek Fathers. If one transfers it to the sense of the person, then it should be added from another matter, that of hypostasis. Ecstasy means that the person is the revelation of the truth and even more, by being in communion (relationship); hypostasis on the contrary means, that the person in communion (relationship) and through it validates its identity and individuality, "lies under its very nature" (hypostasis) in a special and unique way. In this sense the person is the horizon, on which the truth is revealed of being and not just a simple nature, subject to the individualization and the combination, but as a unique image on the completeness and "universality" of being. So, if we see a being as a person, then we see in it the entire human nature; but destroying a human person means reversibly a murder against the entire humanity, in a final analysis, against the truth of the human being. The mystery of the person lies in the fact, that in it differentiation and communion do not contradict but one encounters the other. The truth as communion does not lead to an abolishment of dissimilarity of the beings in the infinite ocean of being, but in its confirmation in love and through it. The difference between that and the truth of "nature itself" lies in this: Nature is subject to dismemberment, individualization, perception and understanding, etc.; love on the contrary is not it. Thus, in the relevance of communion, the opposite of difference is division[iii]. Naturally, this identification of difference and unity is incompatible with the fallen existence, in which we are born as beings with the clear tendency to perceive, dominate and possess the being. This individualized and individualizing Adam within us is our forefathers' sin and at the same time the cause for the fact that the "other", meaning each individual being next to us, becomes in the end our enemy and our "forefathers' sin" (Sartre)[iv]. If the human existence remains released into itself, then it cannot be a person. The ecstasy of the being towards the human or the created leads to the "being towards death"[v]. All efforts to define the truth as the "being towards life", should demand at the same time the sense of the being beyond the created being.  [i] On this subject see Chr. Yiannaras, Το οντολογικό περιεχόμενο της θεολογικής έννοιας του προσώπου, 1970. The differentiation he presents between substance and presence (ουσία and παρ-ουσία) is particularly illuminating. [ii] See above, Part II, 3. [iii] Maximus developed the discernment between «difference» and «division» on the base of the Christology of Chalkedon. On these terms and their synthesis on Maximus see L. Thunberg, Microcosm and Mediator. The Theological Anthropoogy of Maximus the Confessor, Lund 1965, p. 54 and on. See Yiannaras, as above, p. 73 and on. [iv] J.P. Sartre, L' etre et le Neant, 1949, p. 251. [v] This observation by M. Heidegger has a great importance on the ontology of the world in the exact situation in which it is, that is, without a reference to something more.

Truth and the Situation of the Fallen Existence

by Metropolitan John Zizioulas

The importance of sin for the understanding of the truth can be summarized in the following general observations.

By considering the self as the ultimate being, that is, having the demand to be God, man created a circle of existence, whose center is he. Thus, every being refers ultimately to man, who perceives it, surrounds it and understands it with his own mind, his own will and desire. In this way the creation becomes incompetent to get out of itself because it has to be self-confirmed in man and through man, that is, in a created being and through it. The relation of man and nature is overridden and «the entire creation grieves and aches (suffers along with him) to this day», waiting its salvation through the salvation of mankind (Romans 8,22). This overthrow of the relationship of man with nature, leads man to moments of weakness, when he admits the excellence of nature over him and identify existentially the truth to the existence of nature (idololatry). If he chooses to be released from that, then he has no other choice than return into himself and accept as the ultimate truth his ability to perceive and understand reality. This is how truth identifies itself to this, to which human reasoning cannot doubt: the «adequatio rei et intellectus» becomes the basic definition of knowledge and the truth has to be adapted to it[i].

The term «nature» in the sense of the substance or the thing appears in this way as the utmost form of truth[ii]. Because the human viewing of things becomes the key to knowledge, should the truth be objective to be understood or at least for man to be able to meet it[iii]. This meeting creates a correlation between the subject and object of knowledge and the truth then relies on the mutual proximity of the two «contracting parties»[iv]. This meeting or correlation between the subject and the object of knowledge has important results on gnoseology.

Another consequence can be discerned in the relation of truth and love. If the truth is connected to nature or the nature of things and therefore to the relevant understanding of this individualization of the being, then man can inevitably end up into a relation of communion with love under the presupposition, that he acquired the knowledge of the «object» of his love. The «other» -either it is a «person» or a «thing», it is presented as an object of knowledge, before a relationship of communion takes place. One can love only what he knows, because love comes from knowledge, according to Thomas of Aquinas[v]; of this is valid just on our own situation of fall and should not become an element in our own metaphysical anthropology and even less in our occupation with the theology regarding the Triad, as it happened with the Aquinate. The bisection of love and knowledge includes a distance not just between person and nature, but also between thought and action in the internal of the very human existence.

If now the ability of knowledge precedes the action of communion (love) and is independent of it, then man can separate his thought from his action and falsify the validity of truth. Man then becomes a hypocrite and, honestly, only human nature is capable of hypocrisy.

In the question on the relationship of truth with action, the practical, the consequences are clear. To «act the truth» is a biblical point. But this is exactly what for man is impossible, because in his fallen existence faith and action can only coincide for "one moment" and this "moment of existence" is no other than the revelation of that, which existence should basically be, but isn't. Kierkegaard revealed the authentic moment of existence and added in this way, into the relationship of subject-object of the truth the greatest strike in the West; but this led only to the identification of the truth with doubt[vi].

To the fallen man thus remains open as an only alternative, the identification of the truth with action, as it happened to Marxism; in this way the truth identifies with the activity of man in society[vii]. The problem of Greek ontology reappears in this way in its Aristotle form of dynamism and relevant evolution of the being (a "historical Darwinism", as one can characterize Marxism). This is rather encountered in the Judean perception of history as a development towards the future; through the new-testament understanding of the truth, however, it cannot harmonize itself. The inevitable collectivism in the Marxist understanding of the truth as action indicates clearly, that the whole problem concludes in this, which in this chapter we characterized as individualization of being. This happens because the being is cut into pieces and individualized, before it refers to the truth. The connection and the gathering of people is used as a form of an altered community and the truth effuses from this collectivistic confrontation of the being.

We can enumerate a lot more consequences on the truth coming from the individualization of the being in our fallen nature; the most tragic between them is the understanding of death. In the ontological level of the truth there is no more obvious falsification than the word concerning a «dying being». It is an exceptionally irrational contradiction of terms. The problem of death is connected to the truth in existence particularly through the identification of the truth to nature itself and at the same time with individualization and subdivision of this nature. If this means, that Adam had to die, because he had fallen with divinate himself, then this means exactly, that "self-divination", meaning the utmost reference point of being is not just a psychological thing, but something ontological. Death does not come as a resulting punishment on disobedience, but as a result if this individualization of nature, to which the whole world subordinates. In other words: there is an internal relationship between death and individualization. In this relationship we were all born through our current form of reproduction and this is exactly what means, that we have a life, which is not «real life».

Attaining salvation from fall actually means, that the truth is fully connected to being and in this way leads life to being real, meaning not to die.

This is why in the fourth Gospel eternal life, that is, a life without end and death is identified to the truth and knowledge. But this can only be done, if the individualization of nature is transferred to the community, if, in other words, community is identified to being. Therefore, community has to be the truth, in order to be life.

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[i] The cartesian philosophy gives a very good example on this subject. When Kant defines the «adaequatio» as an «agreement to the laws of the mind» (Kritik der reinen Vernuft, B 350) inserts the exceeding dimension of the truth. This, of course, does not eliminate the sense of truth from it, which we characterize as a situation of the fallen existence, because according to Kant the synthetic unity of the human experience at a final analysis defines that which truth is (as above, B 197).

[ii] See above, footnote 13.

[iii] E. Brunner, as above, wants to surpass the structure «subject-object», inserting the term «meeting». The problem certainly wants to exist for as long as the sense «communion» is not used decisively. The same observation can one make in the matter of the structure «I-You», which M. Buber processed.

[iv] See the extended use of the «theory of correlation» in modern day gnoseologies.

[v] See Thomas of Aquinas, Summ. Theol. I, II, 4. This returns to Augustine (De Trin. 10,1).

[vi] According to Kierkengaard the truth is the action of a person and its base is the being, but «acting the truth» is an existential paradoxology, which makes faith and Christianity a sum incompatible to the word.

[vii] According to Marx (see for example, the second position on Feuerbach) the truth emerges from action to its evolution along with society.

The perspective of the Icon

by Metropolitan John Zizioulas

If Christ acts in the history being true and in the truth participating in the evolution of history, and if this happens just because Christ is also the limits (the purpose) of history, Then the truth of history seems to lie in something paradox: it is defined through its end, while at the same time the end is part of its evolution. How can this be expressed theologically? For the interpretation might be enough a saying of Maximus: "Things in the Old (Testament) are shadow, while things in the New Testament are an image and the things to be are the truth"[i].

At first glance, this allegation is strange, for this is how the incarnation seems to be a reality less true than the Second Coming. With the usual understanding of reality according to rationalism and historicism, we have the tendency to consider as "truths" and "facts" just those things that can be verified through experience or those correlating to certain rules or beliefs that we recognize as true. But the used term "icon" does not mean in this case this specific kind of reality of the truth nor does it mean a loss of reality. In all the Greek Fathers, with exception the origenic tradition[ii], the icon always states something real and so true, as much as the truth. The long dispute on the place of the icons in the Church, during the eighth (8^th) and ninth (9^th) century, aimed exactly on the question of the possibility to present the truth in some way in the form of an icon. The discerning line between the two sides in this dispute lies exactly there in the acceptance or rejection of the truth of the incarnation in its relation to history and the creation[iii]. The iconoclasts gather their arguments from origenism, whose understanding of history we have just narrated; the iconolaters on the other hand rely on the fact, that the incarnation the conceivement of the truth as an icon makes it not only possible but inevitable as well[iv]. If of course the icon or the truth of history is no less true than the truth of eschatology, what sense has then, using the term "truth" on the eschats?

The term icon is understood often by the Greek Fathers through the prism of Platonism. The extract narrated though from Maximus shows clearly, that this is an error. In platonic thought the icon should not have its truth placed in the future; just what has come is much more of decisive meaning, because it builds from the truth an object of memory and mainly from the connection of the soul to the steady world of ideas. The authentic tradition of the Greek Fathers never accepted the platonic perception -as it was adapted among others from Augustin- according to which perfection belongs only to the original state of things. A psychological-retrospective understanding of memory also remained foreign to it; since the second in Trullo (692) the symbolism in iconography was rejected clearly. In this important extract Maximus shows once again, that the truth on the sum of the Greek Fathers is something radically different from that of Platonism. At this point we should look into the roots of the iconical language of the Fathers.

Of course this problem is complicated and cannot be exposed here thoroughly. Perhaps the suggestion that the iconical language of the Greek Fathers is understood better, if one sees it under the light of the ancient apocalyptic theology, as it was developed originally in the proto-christianic tradition of the Syrian-Palestinian location and from there infiltrated into the Eucharistic Liturgies of the East. In this tradition the truth does not appear as a product of the spirit but as a "visit" and "scene" (see John 1,14) of the eschatological and meta-historical reality, which infiltrates into history in order to open it to the fact of communion. This creates a vision of the truth, not in the sense of the platonic or mystical viewing, in which the soul or the mind of man link to the divine, but in the sense of reproducing new relations, a new world, the destination of which is taken up through a community.

By establishing onto the revelation, the iconical language relieves the truth from our own "under-standing" and protects it from the guidance and transformation into objectivity. It is translocated also in a relationship, in the sense, that the truth of a being cannot be understood differently rather than through the "mirror" of another being. One can use a remarkable explanation that Athanassius gave, for the sense icon, which refers to God: Christ is the icon of the father exactly because the Father sees Himself in him[v]. The iconical language appears exactly there, where the truth is identified with communion. This is an indication, that the truth remains always greater from our own perception; it is something relating to the future and requires faith, hope and love.

If we now want to summarize this effort of the synthesis for the understanding of the truth in the Greek Fathers, then we can say that the most important step of the Greek Fathers lies in the identification of the truth with society.

The word identification must be clearly underlined, because this synthesis should not be confused to other connections of the truth and society, like they appeared in the history of the Christian theology. If society is a sense, added to the being, then we no longer have the same icon. The decisive point rather lies in the fact, that the being consists as communion and only in this way can truth and society be identified.

That this identification sets for theology a particularly difficult problem becomes obvious, if one applies the truth in existence. Our situation, of the fallen existence, was mainly characterized through the fact that our approach to the truth of the being consists primarily from the communion. Salvation through truth depends in the end through the identification of the truth with society. The part that follows in our research will present certain aspects of this problem. The synthesis of the Greek Fathers, which we tried to present in this part, will be useful in the following two parts of this research.

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[i] Maximus, Comments in the eccl. Hierarcy 3,3,2.

[ii] See further up, footnote 28.

[iii] See. Meyendorff, Le Christ dans la theologie Byzantine, Paris 1969, 235-263.

[iv] For the sources, look at footnote 88.

[v] Athanassius, Κατά Αρειανών I, 20-21.

Sayings of Elder Porphyrios

The crucial thing is to enter the Church – to unite with our fellow beings, with everyone's joys and sorrows, to feel them as our own, to pray for all, to ache for their salvation, to forget about ourselves, to do everything for others, like Christ did for us. In the Church we become one with every sorrowful, aching and sinful person. Nobody should want to be saved alone, without the salvation of others. It is wrong for one to pray for himself to be saved. We must love others and pray that no one be lost; that everyone enters the Church. This is what matters. And it’s with this desire that one should leave the world to go to the monastery or the desert.

In the Church, which has the mysteries that save, there is no desperation. We may be extremely sinful. However, we confess, the priest reads the prayer over us and so we are forgiven and we move towards immortality, without any anxiety, without any fear.

Whoever lives in Christ, becomes one with Him, with His Church. He lives something crazy! This life is different to human life. It's joy, light, gladness, uplift. This is the Church's life, the Gospel's life, God's Kingdom. “The Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). Christ comes in us and we are in Him. And just like a piece of iron placed in fire becomes fire and light; outside the fire, again it turns to dark iron, darkness.

We need to pay attention to the basic part too. We need to live the mysteries, especially the mystery of Holy Communion. It’s in these that Orthodoxy is found. Christ is offered to the Church through the mysteries and primarily through Holy Communion.

For many, however, our religion is a struggle, agony and anxiety. For this reason  many “religious” people are considered unhappy, because others see their bad state. Indeed, if one is unable to see the depth of the religion and does not live it, the religion ends up a sickness and a terrible one. So terrible, that one loses control over his actions, becomes weak-willed and powerless, is in agony and under stress and behaves under the influence of an evil spirit (meaning demonic energy). He does prostrations, cries, shouts, is supposedly humble, and all this humility is a satanic act. For some of these people the religion is like a type of hell. In church they do prostrations, make the sign of the cross, they say “we are sinners, unworthy,” and as soon as they get out, start blaspheming all things holy when someone annoys them just a little. It is obvious that there is a demon in the middle.

In reality, Christianity transforms a person and heals him. The most important prerequisite, however, for someone to perceive and distinguish truth is humility. Egoism darkens one's mind, confuses him, leads him into deception, into heresy. It is very important for one to comprehend the truth.

Often, neither toil, nor repentance, nor the sign of the cross attract grace. There are secrets. The most important one is to avoid forms and go to the substance. Everything that happens must happen with love.

When you don't live with Christ, you live in melancholy, in sadness, in stress, in grief. You don't live correctly. So then many anomalies appear also in the body. The body gets affected, the endocrinous glands, the liver, the spleen, the pancreas, the stomach. You are told: “In order to be healthy, you must have some milk in the morning, an egg, butter and a couple of rusks.” And yet, if you live correctly, if you love Christ, you are just fine with an apple and an orange. The greatest of all medicine is to offer oneself in devotion to Christ. Everything gets healed. Everything functions properly. God's love transforms all; it alters, it sanctifies, it corrects, it changes, it modifies everything.

When you love Christ, despite all your weaknesses and their conscious acknowledgment, you still have the certainty that you have overcome death, because you reside in the communion Christ's love.

We need to feel Christ as our friend. He is our friend. He confirms this Himself when He says: “You are my friends...” (John 15:14). We need to look at Him and approach Him as a friend. Do we fall? Do we sin? We should run to Him with feelings of familiarity, in love and trust; not in fear of punishment but in courage granted by the sense of friendship. And say to Him: “Lord, I did it, I fell, forgive me”. But at the same time we need to feel He loves us, and tenderly accepts us with love and forgives us. We need not be separated by sin from Christ. When we believe that He loves us and we love Him, we will not feel estranged and divided, even when we sin. We have secured His love and no matter how we may behave, He loves us.

Angelos Sikelianos: αγραφον

Once at sunset Jesus and his disciples

were on the road outside the walls of Zion

when suddenly they came to where the town

for years had dumped its garbage.

Crowning the highest pike, its legs

pointing at the sky, lay a dog’s bloated carcass;

such a stench rose up from it that all the disciples, hands

cupped over their nostrils, drew back as one man.

But Jesus stood there, and He gazed

so closely at the carcass that one disciple

called out from a distance,

Rabbi, don’t you smell that dreadful stench?

How can you go on standing there?

Jesus, His eyes fixed on the carcass,

answered : If your breath is pure, you’ll smell

the same stench inside the town behind us, but

Look – that dog’s teeth glitter in the sun :

like hailstones, like a lilly, beyond decay,

a great pledge, mirror of the Eternal, but also

the harsh lightning flash, the hope of Justice!

And now, Lord I,

the very least of men, stand before You,

give me, as now I walk outside this Zion,

as I walk through this terrible stench,

one single moment of Your holy calm,

so that I may also pause

among this carrion and with my own eyes

somewhere see deep inside me,

beyond the world’s decay, like the dog’s teeth

at which, Lord, that sunset You gazed in wonder :

a great pledge, mirror of the Eternal, but also

the harsh lightning-flash, the hope of Justice! 

Άγγελος Σικελιανός (1884-1951)

(translated by Edmund Keeley & Philip Sherrard)