lessons on christian dogmatics

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Lessons on Christian Dogmatics

Contents

These are the notes that were taken from the lectures of Professor I. Zizioulas (currentMetropolitan of Pergamus and Chairman of the Athens Academy) at the Poemantic Division ofthe Thessaloniki Universitys School of Theology, during the academic year 1984-1985.

They are published with the blessing and the permission of the reverend Metropolitan.

The notes were published with the caring and the responsibility of the students, for useduring their examinations.

Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki

Published by : Publication Services

Because of its size, this series of Dogmatics will be presented by us in segments, in the hope

that the entire text that we have in hand will be made available very soon.It is with immense joy, that we are hosts to this significant piece of work in our website.We consider this presentation an honor, and acknowledge the extremely significant opus ofthe reverend Metropolitan of Pergamus.We are referring to the hand-typed notes of the reverend Metropolitans lessons at theUniversity of Thessaloniki, which benefited us so much, that we wished to make them morebroadly accessible.It is our fervent desire that you study these notes, which exude the fragrance of the Orthodoxfaith and are delivered with scientific precision, in a simple and comprehensible manner.

We wish to thank with all our heart those who toiled and participated in the acquisition ofthese notes for us.May the blessing of God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ be with every person who seeksHim.

Professor Metropolitan of Pergamus and Chairman of the Athens Academy I. Zizioulas

Contents

. ON DOGMATICS AND DOGMAS

1. Definition Sources Content and Method of Dogmatics:1a. Form and character of Dogmatics1b. Dogmatics as Hermeneutics (Interpretational)1c. The Dogmatics method2. The term: Dogma and its significance3. The affiliation of dogmas to the Holy Scriptures4. The work of the Holy Spirit in the phrasing of the dogmas5. The work of the Church in the phrasing of the dogmas

6. The prestige and the authority of the dogmas. ON COGNIZANCE AND FAITHI. On cognizance:


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1a. Cognizance of things1b. Cognizance of God1c. Cognizance through the Son and Logos1d1. Cognizance in person part 1: The element of Freedom1d2. Cognizance in person part 2: The element of Love

II. On faith

C. ON GOD1. The biblical premises2. Basic principles of Patristic teaching:

2a. Up to the Cappadocian Fathers2b. The contribution of the Cappadocians2c. Augustines views2d. Discerning between "Theology" and "Providence"2e. Existential interpretation

D. SUPPLEMENT1. Discernments of the Cappadocians on the being of God:

1a. The whatever, the what and the how of God1b. Essence, energy and person

2. The transferral of the terms essence, Energy and Person into Theology (The problemof freedom)

2a. The prerequisites of the Patristic Synthesis

2b. The contribution of the Cappadocian Fathers The patristic notion of the person2c. Augustins theology and the problem of the Filioque2d. The theological problem of the Filioque2e. The Filioque in Theology and in Providence2f. The dogma of creation - the problem of Gnosticism2f2. The correction of Platonic ideas by the Christian faith

. ON CREATION, SALVATION, CHRISTOLOGY AND ECCLESIOLOGY

1. The dogma regarding Creation2. Creation from nil3. Existential consequences of the dogma on Creation4. The consequences of mans downfall5. Christology6. Salvation7. EcclesiologyF. ECCLESIOLOGICAL TOPICS

IntroductionQuestions2. Orthodox Ecclesiology topics:

2a. The eschatological identity of the Church2b. Therapeutic or Liturgical Ecclesiology: the synthesis of Saint Maximus the

Confessor - Questions


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2c. The Trinitarian basis of Ecclesiology2d. Imagery in ontology - Questions2e. Formation and structure of the Church2f. The Local and worldwide Church The Synodic institution2g. The functions of the Church Questions

3. Commentary on Western Ecclesiology

3a. The dialectics of the one and the many. The priority of a universal Church3b. The problem of priority between Christology and Pneumatology (of the Spirit)Ecclesiological consequences

3c. History and Eschatology QuestionsG. ORTHODOXY AND WESTERN THEOLOGY

Texts by Rev. John Zizioulas (Addendum)

(Dogmatics Therapy - Theology Filioque Ecclesiology Christology Pneumatology)

1 Introductory, basic characteristics of Western thought1b. Western Ethicism and Dostoevsky2. Theology and Providence (Oekonomia) in Western thought2b. Sickness and healing in Orthodox Theology3. The problem of the Filioque4. The existential repercussions of the Filioque - Questions5. Ecclesiology, Christology, Pneumatology

A ON DOGMATICS AND DOGMAS

1. Definition, Sources, Content and Method of Dogmaticsa. Forms and character of Dogmatics

() Adorational and mostly Eucharist

() Baptismal

() Anti-heretic

(V) Synodic

(V) Empirical

b. Dogmatics as Hermeneutics (Interpreting)

c. The Dogmatics method

a. Forms and character of Dogmatics

Dogmatics as a particular branch and lesson of Theology appeared in the West for thefirst time and was introduced in the Orthodox Theological Schools during later times. A majorcharacteristic of this branch, as compared to other lessons of Theology, is its systematic


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and especially the Ecumenical Councils (Synods), which originated from a combination ofanti-heretic theology (=the exclusion of heresies), and the baptismal-symbolic theology.Thus, the terms and the symbols of the Synods -as well as many of their Canons- likewisecomprise fundamental forms of dogmatic theology.

(V) Empirical

This is a form of theology that originated in the ascetic (mainly) experience of the Fathers,which is of special significance to the Orthodox. Here, the maxims of the desert Fathers, theworks of Saint John of the Ladder, Maximus the Confessor, Simeon the Young Theologian, theEsychasts and especially Gregory Palamas, all express dogmatic theology through asceticexperience.

Because of all these elements, Dogmatics is basically an experience, an empirical issue, andnot a matter of intellectual perception or the presentation of logical proposals. It is not amatter of approving and confessing truths that are merely directed at ones mind and logic,but are empirically experienced relations between man and God.

From this last point it can be surmised that the meaning of empirical experience should notbe understood as reverential (=a psychological experience of the person), or as ethical (=aspecific behavior of the person - certain actions of his); it should be understood existentially,in the broader sense of the term, which relates to ontology. In other words, Dogmaticsinvolves issues that relate to the very being of a person (=to exist or not to exist), and suchissues are for example- the naught (non-being) (=creation), life and death as terminalpoints of existence, the created and the uncreated as an issue of freedom (of being), theperson and love as the borderline distinctions between man and animal (=the moment duringwhich man is either elevated as a man, or falls), in other words, the problem of evil and sin and generally everything that touches on fundamental and ontological matters, and notmerely on matters of life improvement (i.e., the organizing of social life in a more productive

way etc.. Certain theologians preoccupy themselves mainly with this, in the West).A result of all these positions is that Dogmatics always pertains to vital issues, of salvificsignificance; the Church always dogmatizes in order to save, and not in order to enrich ourknowledge of God, the world etc.. Each dogma of the Church and each synodical dogmaticdecision always pertains to a specific problem of salvation; this means that our entirerelationship with God and the world changes in a dangerous way if a certain dogma is notaccepted, or, in the opposite case, it will be formulated in a salvific way for us and the world,if the dogma becomes accepted. Consequently, in Dogmatics we must always seek the salvificsignificance of the dogmas and not just present them dryly, like logical formulas. This iswhat we mean by existential comprehension of the dogma or empirical theology in its truesense.

Thus, Dogmatics has to always strive to interpret the dogmas, and not preserve them orpresent them as expressed in their original form. This subject is huge and extremelysensitive, and needs to be analyzed.

b. Dogmatics as Hermeneutics (Interpretation)

1. The problem of hermeneutics (interpretation) is of timely importance, not only for thedogmas, but for the Holy Bible itself. I would say that hermeneutics itself is essentially the

problem. Just as the Bible is a dead letter when not interpreted, thus the dogmas becomefossilized and museum items archaeological objects which we simply preserve anddescribe if we dont proceed to interpret them. One could say that the dogmas are essentiallythe interpretation of the Bible.


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2. The interpretation of the dogmas or the Bible involves two limbs:

a. The attempt to comprehend faithfully (not anachronistically which is a difficult thing, as itneeds good historians) the historical reality, in the framework of which the dogma (or theScripture) was expressed. This involves the following questions:

. What kind of problems did the Church have to confront during that historical period?

. What means did it resort to, to solve these problems ? In other words:

. What kind of written and verbal tradition did the Church have at its disposal? (Holy Bible,Tradition etc.)? (Every Synod would always take into account any previous tradition).

. What kind of vocabulary and meanings did the cultural environment of that era have at itsdisposal? (for example, the 4th century uses the word homoousios of the same essence-which the New Testament doesnt have, while the 14th century includes other meanings etc.)

C. What kind of experiences (worship, ascetic living etc.) did it have? (for example,martyrdom in the New Testament, the icons in the 7th Ecumenical Council/synod, Esychasm,etc.)

All of the above must be taken into account, in order to form an idea of the historicalenvironment. Without an accurate historical basis, every interpretation would be a risky one.The interpretation of the Bible is not possible, unless there is previously an accurate andsubjective (as much as possible) research into the historical background, as with the dogmas.We need to see which problems led to the drafting of a dogma; what kind of literary andphilosophical material the Fathers utilized, and from what experience (worship, ascetic etc.)the formulation of the dogma sprang. An able dogmatist must also be an able historian.

b. The attempt to locate and to define contemporary problems that demand evaluation, forexample:

. Possible new heresies or new, agonizing questions of mankind, always of a fundamentalcharacter (nowadays the so-called Jehovahs Witnesses etc.; also technology, ecology etc.)

. The vocabulary and the categorizing of that time (we saw how the Fathers were alsocontemporaries of their time, yet without remaining fixed to the letter of the New Testament see reference on homoousios)

. The adorational and ascetic lifestyle of the Church (which cannot essentially differ fromthe old one, but is possible for it to have varying forms and emphasis, for examplemartyrdom, mental prayer in the specific Hesychastic form, the influence of monkhood on thesecular services of the Church Hours, etc. and the gradual disengagement from it - albeitincomplete and inconsistent, as observed for example in our days. All these are indications ofa shift in emphasis in the adorational and ascetic experience, which cannot but affect theinterpretation of a dogma.

In order to provide a good interpretation, the dogmatician must not only be a good historian,but a good philosopher as well (with philosophical thought and a knowledge of contemporaryphilosophy), and he must also have a poemantic disposition (love towards mankind, leaningover their problems etc.). He is also obliged to be familiar with the liturgical experience and

the life of the Church and its Canonic structure, because these elements also express thedogmatic faith of the Church. (Of course all of the above cannot be concentrated in oneperson in a unique way - in other words, a unique researcher of all the above but he must,if he desires to be a good dogmatician, be kept informed of the latest positions of the


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specialists in those individual areas).

c. The Dogmatics method

As you can see, Dogmatics has a broad spectrum of research and presupposes a manifold

knowledge as well as sensitivity and creative thought. It is for this reason, that the Dogmaticsmethod must include:

A. A very general plan or structure, which would be the Symbol of Faith (Creed) as it hadalways prevailed in Baptismal and Eucharist worship. The reason this structure isrecommended, is that it was basically upheld during the Patristic era, and also, because it islinked to the very structure of relations that God through Christ and in the Holy Spirit hadprovided for our salvation. You must observe here that, when the subdivision by theoreticalmaterial of topics such as Triadology, Christology, Salvation, Sacraments, eschatological, etc.is not directly linked to the structure of the Symbol of Faith (Creed), it becomes dangerous.This was developed in the West and was copied by the Orthodox, with the Russians and

Androutsos at the lead.

. This plan has to be very general, so that it may accommodate the various components. Forexample, in the sector on the Holy Trinity, reference can be made to the Church and viceversa. Or, on the Sacraments, to End Times etc.. In this way, Scholastic Dogmatics that camefrom the West is avoided. However, analogies must always be maintained, as we shall see inthe respective chapters.

C. Verification and a faithful presentation of the significance of dogmas in their era areimperative, i.e.: What kind of problems did they have in mind, and what means (literary-philosophical) did they use, to confront those problems? In other words, Orthodox Dogmatics

must always contain an element of history; if it lacks a solid dogmatic history, then it cannotbecome part of Orthodox Dogmatics.

D. Attempts should be made to interpret each dogma, with the following as guides:

. By linking it to the adorational and ascetic experience of the Church (e.g., Christ, as theSon of God: how He is worshipped and how He is experienced within the Church?).

. By linking it to mankinds most fundamental existential problems during each era, suchas: the quest for freedom, love, the transcendence of death etc. (example: the significance offaith in a Trinitarian God in each of these cases).

. By linking it to mankinds current problems. This is mainly the field of Ethical Poemantics,but it should be prepared at least with cues- by dogmatic theologians. (for instance, currentday social problems, issues that are raised by technology, ecology, etc.)

V. By linking it to the broader problems of Knowledge nowadays, as posed by NaturalSciences etc.

2. The term dogma and its significance

The origin and the evolution of the term

The term in the Old Testament

The affirmative meaning by the Church


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According to the first apostolic fathers

The technical, contemporary meaning

The term is derived from the (Greek) verb dokein (= seeming, believing) and originally, itsliteral meaning was that which seems good or proper to someone; it also pertains to belief,ideology, principle, opinion, faith, and other related meanings. (Platos Soph.256C: bymaking use of the many dogmas and words).

From its original meaning of a personal opinion, the term was transposed to the field ofphilosophical positions; in other words, it became a knowledge belonging to a (philosophical)School. (e.g. Plutarch, Ethica 14B: the dogmas pertaining to souls or the Stoic philosophersdogmas, etc.) The transposing over to this meaning is justified, by the fact that ancientthought demanded eclecticism in philosophy.

Later on, this term was transposed to public life (the state) and it signified decisions ordecrees bearing state authority (Platos Laws, 644D: the city dogma, also in Luke, 2:1: adecree (dogma, in the Greek text) was issued by Caesar Augustus to conduct a census of thepopulation. Thus, the term took on the meaning of something compulsory, somethingcharacterized by authority and prestige.

It afterwards took on a religious meaning, through the Old Testament and Judaism, with alegal-compulsory character. This is why it had a rather negative inference in Apostle Paul(Colossians, 2:14), where Christ is said to have erased the manuscript of dogmas that wereagainst you and in (Ephesians, 2:15), where Christ abolished the enmity in His Body, byabolishing the dogma of the Law of the Commandments).

In Luke, however, they specifically adopted the initial, affirmative meaning that was to prevailfrom then onwards in Christian usage. Acts, 16:4: as they passed through the cities, theydelivered unto them the decrees (dogmas in Greek text) that were validated by the apostlesand the elders. We thus arrive at the dogmas of the Church, as being the authenticdecisions pertaining to faith, that are delivered for compulsory acceptance, and are linked tothe presence and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

A classical example is in Acts, 15:28: it seemed proper (refer above, to the origin of theword dogma) to the Holy Spirit and to us (=us the Apostles)

The usage of the term with its contemporary, technical meaning is rare, in the Fathers of theChurch. Whenever it appears, it has the following characteristics:

A) For the original, Apostolic Fathers, the term is most likely linked to practice rather thantheory (ref. Ignatius, Megnesians 13:1, Barnabas, etc.)

B) It is equally used in instances pertaining to the Church and heretics (Vasilios the Great, ToEsychasts: possible to destroy the heterodox dogmas ; also, in John The Chrysostom:the devil has sown these deceitful dogmas of irreverence; in the Menaion of January as forthe dogmas of the infidel, they are justly drowned

C) Very important: the dogma is linked to worship, contradistinguishing it to kerygma

(teaching, sermon). This is expressed in a monumental proposal by Vasilios the Great, in hiswork on the Holy Spirit: ..for, dogmas are hushed, whereas sermons are publicized.... Thispassage gave rise to younger patrologists to interpret Vasilios hushing as pertaining to thedivinity of the Holy Spirit. But for our present topic of discussion, this phrase of Vasilios has


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the following significance: Dogmas are those things that the Church (as a worshippingcommunity) confesses, and not those things that it promulgates to others, who are outsidethe Church. The deeper meaning of this viewpoint will preoccupy us again later on, but forthe time being, we can just make a note that according to Vasilios the Great, the meaning ofdogma has the community of the Church as a prerequisite, along with a participation in itsworship, otherwise it bears no authority.

This basic position of the Fathers - which we often forget is also expressed by Gregory theTheologian, in the familiar phrase of his Address to Eunomians: let us philosophize, withinour own boundaries. As testified by these words, the meaning inferred is: within the holyterritory (and not in Egypt and Assyria), in other words, within the Church.

From this, we surmise that the authority of a dogma does not belong to the sphere of logic,nor to a blind obedience to -and resignation from- logic, but to a new logic, which isgenerated from the relations between the people of the ecclesiastic community. But we shalltalk more about this later on.

Summary: Dogma is that which an ecclesiastic community embraces as an (existentially)

salvatory truth that applies to every man, and requires its members to accept it (throughpersonal experience) as authoritative, because of the specialized relations that it ordainsbetween members, as well as towards the world and God. The kerygma (sermon) on the otherhand is whatever is addressed to all persons, publicly, in order that they may becomemembers of the Church, and only then (as members of the Church) confess it as a dogma,having experienced it personally.

The truth does not become a dogma, unless it has been experienced and certified from withinthe Church. From this, it is obvious that the dogmas of the Church are not limited in number;new dogmas can be formulated in every era, because the Church is a living organism and theHoly Spirit is not associated to certain isolated periods of history. But, for a truth to become

a dogma of the Church (and not a personal opinion), it must necessarily go through thecommunity of the Church in its totality, and not only through a few people be theytheologians in the current (academic) sense, or saints. This point needs clarifications,because two important issues are posed:

1st: How the dogma is linked to the Holy Bible

and

2nd: The authority of a dogma in general and in respect to Dogmatics itself.

3. The affiliation of dogmas to the Holy Scriptures

The fake concerns of the West

The means of revelations

The superior revelation of the New Testament

Memorandum on the event of Christ

The affiliation of dogmas to the Scriptures is a hermeneutic one. The problem posed byWestern theologians, after the Reform Era, as to whether we have one or two sources of


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divine revelation as they were named, denotes the specific concern between Roman Catholicsand Protestants, given that the latter had rejected the authority of the Tradition of theChurch, and had introduced the principle of sola scriptura (=only the scripture). InOrthodox Theology, the problem was posed through the so-called Orthodox Confessions ofthe 17th century (prev.ref.). Thus, depending on the deviation of these confessions(Mogilas=Roman Catholicism, Cyril Loukaris=Calvinism, etc.), the answer was and continuesto be- provided by the Orthodox. The West was led into this concern for two reasons, which

do not apply in Orthodoxy:

1. The West lacked the element that a revelation is always something personal, and neversomething logical or intellectual. God revealed Himself to Abraham, to Moses, to Paul, to theFathers, etc.. Consequently, it is never an issue of a new revelation, or an addition to arevelation, or even a case of Johns Revelations being incremented, as suggested even byOrthodox theologians.

2. In the West, an objectification of the Scriptures and the Church had become prevalent tosuch an extent, that expressions such as treasuries of the truth were coined. But inOrthodox tradition, both the Scripture and the Church are considered to be testimonies of

experience of the truth, and not merely masterminds that perceive, record and transmittruths. This is because the truth in Orthodox Tradition is not a matter of objective, logicalproposals; the truth consists of (personal) stances and relations between God, mankind andthe world. (For example, I do not become acquainted with the truth by intellectually knowingand finally accepting that God is Triune; it is only when I am personally involved existentiallyin the Triadic existence of God, through which my entire being as well as the worldsacquires a meaning. In this way, any ordinary, everyday woman who is however a propermember of the Church, can know the dogma of the Trinity. The same applies forChristology etc.). But we shall go into this topic of Gnosiology in more detail, later.

Consequently, if the Revelation of God is a matter of personal experience and a broader

implication of man in a lattice of relations with God, with fellow-man and the world, and if itpours new light onto overall existence, then the Scripture that testifies to this Revelation isconsidered complete, both from the aspect of the Revelations content, as well as for everyother similar kind Revelation pursuant to the composing of the Bibles Canon. We must addthe following clarifications here:

Even though in every case of such personal and existential revelations, the revelations are ofthe One and Only God, the means by which they are revealed differ; for instance, on MountSinai we have a revelation of God Himself, which is revealed to us in Christ, but not in thesame way. With Christ, we are enabled not only to see or hear God, but to actually touch Him,to feel Him, to commune with Him physically: Who was from the beginning, Whom we heard,Whom we saw and Whom our hands touched. (John I, 1:1). The divine epiphanies of the OldTestament, and subsequently in the New Testament, while having the same content, are notrevealed in the same way. And, because a Revelation as we said is not a matter of objectiveknowledge but a personal relationship, the form of a Revelation is of vital importancebecause it introduces new relationships, or in other words, new existential ways.

(The matter of relations between Old and New Testaments is historically very old in PatristicTheology, and it was solved through the Theology of saint Irineos, who dramatically corrected

Justins teaching on the Logos, and was later formulated excellently by Saint Maximus theConfessor, in his principle that stated: the contents of the Old Testament are the shadow,the contents of the New Testament are the image, and the (contents of) the things to come isthe truth.)

Consequently, in the person of Christ we have a unique form of revelation that ischaracterized by communion with the senses (vision, touch, taste, etc., as per the passage of

John I, 1:1 where we read: and Whom our hands touched), and not only with the mind or


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the heart. This is why this way was judged by the Fathers as being the supreme and fullestway. Nothing is superior to Christophany (Christ being revealed): Whomsoever has seen me,has seen the Father. Thus, the New Testament in which is recorded the experience of thosepeople who had this physical communion with God (Whom we saw and Whom our handstouched) gives meaning to both the Theophanies (God being revealed) in the OldTestament, as well as those that followed, after the Bible. In fact, the Fathers (Irineos andothers) maintain that after the Incarnation of the Logos, we have a fuller and newer form of

revelation than that of the Old Testament. In respect to the Disciples, this superiority isattributed to their tangible and physical association with Christ; in respect to the subsequentChurch, this superiority is attributed to the Sacraments and especially in the Eucharist, whichhas preserved this physical communion (see Ignatius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Cyril of Alexandriaetc.). Those who participate deservedly in the Divine Eucharist, can see God much betterthan Moses.

Thus, the entire life of the Church draws the revelation of God from the event of the historicalChrist, as recorded in the New Testament. And that is why the New Testament has the statusof an exceptional and primeval dogma, compared to which, all other revelatory means(including the Old Testament and subsequent dogmas) comprise renditions of it, in the more

profound, existential sense of the word, i.e. the means of experiencing existence, as a newrelationship between God, mankind and the world.

Conclusion: Neither the rendering of the New Testament or the dogmas can circumvent theevent and the person of Christ, because that would require the insertion of a new kind ofrevelation, fuller and superior to that of Christ. We can draw a great number of individualconclusions from this, but I will note only the following:

. The Divine Eucharist, as the exceptional form of tangible communion and thereforecognizance- of God, remains forever the highest and most perfect form of Gods revelation,in its personal, existential sense (and Whom our hands touched).

. The viewings of God (every form of Theophany), whether through holy icons or through theascetic experience, are viewings of the Uncreated Light, always in the form that it is revealedin Christ, and not independent of it; in other words, they are essentially Christophanies. (Thisshould be stressed, in order to avoid misunderstandings that are unfortunately beginning toincrease in number). As proof of this, it suffices to mention that, as regards the icons, theentire argumentation of saints John the Damascene, Theodore the Studite etc Iconophiles is:that Christs incarnation imposes the veneration of icons as forms of Gods revelation; and asfor the Uncreated Light, that this light was understood by the holy Esychasts to be theTaborian Light, in other words, as a partaking of the light that radiated from the historicalbody of Christ.

Getting back to the association between Scripture and dogmas, we therefore note that everydogma, regardless to what it pertains (even the issue of the Holy Trinity), is essentially amemorandum to the event of Christ, through which God is revealed as an existentialexperience of a relationship, in other words, as truth. It is not by chance, that, for instance,the 1st Ecumenical Council (Synod), while founding the Trinitarian theology, also did this onthe pretext and the basis of the truth regarding the Person of Christ. The same was done byall the pursuant Ecumenical Councils, even though they were also preoccupied with all otherissues.

This indicates that the Apostolic experience that is recorded in the Bible comprises the firstdogma, which is then interpreted by all the other dogmas. It is therefore impossible for any

dogma to impinge on this experience; it can only interpret it. The Apostolic experience andtradition is of decisive importance for the dogma. In this way, we have a consecutiveness ofdogmas, a sequence of dogmas, which resemble icons of Christ that are painted by differentpeople in different eras, and with the means that every era had at its disposal.


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This sequence is both external (= a fidelity to the preceding tradition and finally to the Bible),and also internal (= a preservation of the same existential relationship between God,mankind and the world, as fulfilled and revealed in Christ).

4. The function of the Holy Spirit in the formulation of dogmas

Present and future dimension

Comprehending the function of the Holy Spirit

Who is equipped to theologize?

The ecclesiological action of the Holy Spirit

The charismatic persons of the Church

Love and variety within the Church

Theophany (the manifestation of God) as Christophany (the manifestation of Christ), whichcomprises the basis of the dogma, contains two basic problems. The one problem is that, oneneeds to cover the period of time that intervenes between the historical Christ and His (=theApostolic) era, with the pursuant generations; these are the eras in which the dogma isformulated. So, How is it possible to bridge this time chasm?

The second problem is that, within that same historical Theophany in Christ, there is thedimension of already, and not yet: in the historical Christ and the experience of the firstapostles, we have Gods revelation as an inner reflection and an enigma and not assomething seen face to face. The fulfilled, face to face revelation is an eschatologicalreality. Christ bears a pre-portrayal and a pre-savoring of the Kingdom, in other words, thecomplete and direct, personal cognizance (knowledge) of God. Until that last day has come,no prophet or saint has a full cognizance of God, in a stable and unchangeable form. How isit possible for this pre-savoring of paradise, this complete cognizance of God to be attainedfrom now, with a complete certainty that the proclaimed dogma expresses this pre-portrayal,and that it formulates it faithfully and accurately?

In other words, the dogma -as a faithful portrayal of Christ who reveals God- has to befaithful in the following two dimensions:

A. The faithful portrayal of the historic Christ (= past), and

B. The faithful portrayal of the future, eschatological Christ and His Kingdom. (ref. Byzantineicons they are not limited to historical representations, but they also portray the futuresituation, for example the icon of the Pentecost). This task of bridging the present (=dogma)with the past (historical Christophany) and the future (=Second Coming), is the exceptionaltask of the Holy Spirit in Divine Providence.

It seemed proper to the Holy Spirit and to us (Acts 15), is the decision reached by the

Apostolic Synod. It comprises the fixed conviction of the Church that the dogmas are of theHoly Spirits inspiration, as is the Scripture (every divinely inspired scripture..) (Timothy II,3:16). But this requires serious attention, because it can be understood in different ways;thus:


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The presence of the Holy Spirit and His action can be misconstrued as a kind of magical andmechanical intervention of God. This reminds us of the divine inspiration of the ancientHellenes (divination, oracles etc.), where personal freedom was excluded: the authors of theBible and the Fathers of the Councils (Synods) were thus involuntary instruments of the Spirit.This is a perception that prevailed in the West (from where it also originated), in the form ofso-called Fundamentalism.

The presence and the effect of the Spirit can be comprehended as being the result of moralchanges in man. When we say moral changes, we imply a broader meaning of mans everyimprovement that is attributed to his own striving. (for example, catharsis from vices;acquiring virtues etc.)The effect of the Holy Spirit can be perceived as being the result of a community event, inboth its perpendicular and its lateral dimensions, in other words, as a result of thecommunion within an ecclesiastic community.Of these possibilities, the first one must be excluded altogether. The Holy Spirit is a Spirit offreedom, and does not force man. Besides, the event of Christ, the very nature ofChristophany, is such that it fully respects a persons freedom.

The second possibility has more value and gravity and is more fitting to the prerequisites ofascetic experience, which, as we saw, must always be taken into consideration. Withoutcatharsis from vices, it is not possible for anyone to see God (for example, whoever hates hisbrother cannot see God ref. John I). In this same spirit, saint Gregory the theologianrebutted the Eunomians, who had created an entirely different, intellectual theology thatallowed anyone to theologize, even after horseracing events and singing andfeastingwhich (theology) deemed equally a part of enjoyment, by pointing out to them thatit is not for everyone to philosophize on God. not for everyone, but only by those whohave been tested and who have spent their life in theory (of God), and prior to this- have acleansed soul and body, or are at least cleansing them. However, if ascetic living is taken asan isolated and self-sufficient prerequisite, then it is suffering from two serious faults: that of

individualism and moralism. In other words, we shall be in danger of believing that Godreveals Himself to isolated individuals and under certain conditions of human achievement.

This is why the second possibility must necessarily be combined with the third one, which theecclesiastic form of action of the Holy Spirit.

In order for this to be comprehended, we must first of all rid ourselves of a faulty perceptionthat we have; i.e., that the Holy Spirit acts upon isolated persons. This perception is sowidespread, that it might seem strange to refer to it as faulty. Those who defend this vieware overlooking a fundamental distinction between the action of the Holy Spirit in the OldTestament and the action in the New Testament. In the Old Testament, the Spirit is given tocertain people (prophets, kings, etc.) and not the entire nation of Israel. During the Messianicera however, when the Holy Spirit is introduced in the New Testament with the arrival of theMessiah, it was expected that the Spirit would be given to the entire nation of God. This iswhy Luke in his narration of the Pentecost uses the phrase of the prophet Joel: in the lastdays I shall pour forth from My Spirit over every flesh..says the Lord Almighty

As a result of this, all baptized Christians -in the New Testament- were considered as havingthe Holy Spirit and possessing various charismas. If we examine chapter 12 of Corinthians I,we can see how, for the apostle Paul, being a member of the Church is equivalent topossessing a certain charisma of the Spirit. Given that the Corinthians were under theimpression that some people can be more charismatic than others, Paul refutes thisperception vehemently, and stresses that everyone has some sort of charisma, even those

who perform a simple task such as administration etc. Paul thus strikes back at every form ofspiritual elitism, stressing that even if someone has adequate knowledge or faith to movemountains, he will be nothing, if he has no love.


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What does love signify here? If we take a look at this text as a whole (chapters 11 14) andnot as isolated verses, we can see that for Paul, love therein- signifies the communion thatthe community of the Church creates. Love here is not about the feelings of a certain person(good intentions etc.), but the inter-dependence of the members of the church, as one body.Love means not saying that I am the head and I dont need the legs etc This is what Paulwas stressing here: the inter-dependence of the assorted charismas.

It is precisely for this reason, that Paul ends his Epistle by naming the Holy Spiritcommunity. In Corinthians II, 13:13, it actually appears to be an expression that existedprior to Paul in the liturgical usage of the first Churches, and one that has remained a basicelement of the Divine Eucharist ever since. Wherever the Spirit drifts, It creates a community,and destroys individualism. We must understand this thoroughly. This was how all the Fathersof the Church had also perceived the Holy Spirit. One could present a multitude of quotesfrom the Fathers of the first centuries, for example Gregory of Nazianzo, who especiallyfocuses on personal theory (= viewing), hence endowing a special significance to the wayhe refers to the Holy Spirit. In his 12th Address, he compares the desire for theory with theSpirit as follows: On the one hand, there is the desire for theory, that is, the tendency forsolitude, a catharsis of the mind and theory; but, this is not where the Spirit leads to. The

Spirit moves within (the congregation of the church), leading it and making it fruitful (theecclesiastic community), in the desire to benefit it, that they may benefit each other, andmake public the (Spirits) enlightenment. This is why the prepared (congregated) church is to saint Gregory- so much more superior than the experience of theory, as the skies are bycomparison to a star, or a garden to a plant, or a whole body to a body member. To theFathers, this is the chief work of the Spirit: to lead towards the overall Church, and nottowards isolated, personal experiences.

Consequently, all the charismas of the Church are necessary for the revelation of God; notjust the few and far between ones. The reason for this is that no charisma can be imaginable,without its inter-dependence with the other ones. The Church has a variety of charismas; not

everyone possesses knowledge, not everyone has healing abilities, or the gift of speakinglanguages, or administrative abilities etc.. They are not all god-seers in the same way. Atany rate, no-one can see God on his own and independently of the other charismas. TheSpirit acts as a community, and that means: within the body of the Church.

Thus, we reach the conclusion with regard to the dogmas, that the revelation of the truthalways presupposes a communion and a community of the Church in order for the dogma tobe a truth. What exactly does this mean?

5. The task of the Church in the formulation of dogmas

Gods revelation within the Church

The association between the Churchs members

The leadership of the Church in the bishop

Ecumenical Councils (Synods)

The acceptance by the laity

What is the Church, and how does it act in the formulation of dogmas?


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We shall speak more of the Church in the respective chapter, but as far as the dogmas areconcerned, we can make note of the following:

Church means the communion and the community through which -and within which- thenew existential relations between God, mankind and the world (as manifested and realized inthe person of Christ) are revealed and realized. In other words, in the Church, the entireworld, with the new Adam (Christ) at its head, acknowledges God as Father and is thus

saved from alienation and deterioration. The cognizance and the revelation of God is thusan empirical reality within the body of the Church, which has the form of a paternal-filialassociation wherein the entire world is embodied, thus constituting the body of Christ.Consequently, the Church as the body of Christ is, in this sense, the only proper andcomplete existential form of cognizance of God, through the lattice of relations that arerealized within the community.

In order for the Church to comprise the full revelation of this existential form of cognizanceof God, it must have the following elements, which arise from the aforementioned definition:A. It must be a community-congregation that consists of all the Church members. All of the

baptized members of the Church (who continue to preserve the association between God-mankind-people, as manifested and realized in Christ) are necessary, for the constituting ofthe body that will reveal Christ. Consequently, the lay people who remain faithful to thebaptismal relationship between God and the world are of an opportune significance to therevelation of the truth of the Son as the new association between God and the world.

B. It must have at the head of the community a ministry that will express the presence ofChrist and the Apostles as the ones who will constantly judge the communitys preservationof the original form of the body of Christ as revealed and experienced in the Old Testamentera (see above). This ministry cannot be anything other than the prelate bishop of theEucharist community as an image of Christ, surrounded by the presbyters, as images of the

Apostles. This prevailed from the 2nd century A.D. onward (Ignatius of Antioch) withoutinterruption (until the Reform in the West), because in the Eucharist, the community of theChurch exceptionally lives and reveals this Christ-centered association-revelation betweenGod and the world. The cognizance of God there is experienced as the revealing of the new,salvatory association between God and the world as manifested in Christ (more in therespective chapter).

Consequently, the leadership of the Eucharist community, in the person of the bishop,expresses the faith of that community with one mouth and one heart, as cited during theDivine Eucharist; in other words, it is expressed as a unanimity and not a dissent.

C. Given that the Church is not comprised of one only community but of many, theexpressing of the entire Churchs faith throughout the world becomes a reality, when all ofthe communities through their prelate bishops- coincide in the same faith; or, as SaintIgnatius of Antioch says: when the bishops in every corner of the world are of the (same)opinion as Jesus Christ. It was thus, that the synods (councils) of the prelate bishops -as themeans of expressing the unanimity of their communities- came to be the mostcomprehensive expression of the proper faith of the Church. Therefore, the dogmas of theChurch that are expressed by such synods (councils) and especially when these synodsinclude or represent all of the prelate bishops (these are the ecumenical councils) are thosethat express the faith of the Church and reveal the cognizance of God within His associationto the world through Christ, in the fullest manner.

D. In order for the dogma to be a living reality and not a simple logical or expressiveformulation, it must continuously be filtered through the community of the Church, to all ofits members, as a perpetual confirmation and reception of it, in the conscience of the entirebody of the Church. This reception does not have any legal status in the Orthodox Church


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(that is, no specific procedures for the reception of dogmas by church members areforeseen), instead, reception acts in a positive way as the liturgical Amen of the laity,without which the bishops cannot authentically perform anything liturgically, or proclaim andexpress anything dogmatically. It also acts negatively, in cases where there is a disagreementbetween bishops and the crew of the Church (for example, the Council of Florence). But,above all, the passing, the circulation of the dogma within the body, inside the veins of theentire community, is effected through the experiencing of the dogma, which we referred to

above (with the variety of charismas).

Thus, the entire church, the clergy with the bishops at the head, and the populace, allparticipate in the shaping of the dogmas as living and empirical truths that reveal God as theFather of Jesus Christ, and through Him, of the entire world, with Jesus Christ the God-man at its head. Bishops have the special ministry-charisma (and responsibility) of conveningsynods (councils), through which the faith-dogma can be confessed as a common andunanimous cognizance of God for all the Churches. That is why it is up to them to formulatethe dogmas.

But, the completion of a dogma demands the circulation, the reception and the experiencing

of it by the entire body of the Church.

6. The prestige and the authority of dogmas

The prestige of constancy

The prestige of the community

The infallibility of the Church

Patristic errors

Patristic interpretation of dogmas

From what we have said so far, it has become obvious that:

A. Dogmas acquire their prestige from the constancy that they display towards the initial formof existential relationship between God and the world, which is not only revealed as a noeticknowledge, but is realized as a communion between God, the world and mankind in Christ;also in the experience of the first Disciples and apostolic communities, and as recorded in theNew Testament.

. In order for the dogmas to have prestige and authority, it is imperative that the eucharistcommunity functions properly; in other words, it must be built properly, with the elementsthat we mentioned previously, and it must function as a community that consists of all thecharismas and all the social classes. Consequently, the prestige of the dogmas is notimposed from on high, in the name of an authority that is perceived juridicially (=as alreadyexistent by definition in an institution), but is made evident and is consolidated as the Amenof the entire community. Thus, from the moment that the dogma has been completed in thismanner and is consolidated in the conscience of the Church, its prestige becomes

irrevocable, and the only thing that is permissible from then on, is the experiencing and theinterpretation of that dogma (by dogmatic theology, by ascetic living, by hymnography,hagiography, etc..).


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Thus, whatever was decreed (in the above sense) as a dogma has absolute prestige andauthority, and no pursuant synod or theology is allowed to rescind it, only to interpret it,perhaps formulating new dogmas, which, however, in order to become dogmas with prestigeand authority of an equal stature to the preceding dogmas, must fulfill the same prerequisitesthat we mentioned above.

C. From the above, we can comprehend the meaning of infallibility in the dogmas (and the

Church). To the Orthodox, infallibility is not contained in any institution per se (for examplein synods or in bishops), not even in any moral perfection or individual experience, or itsacknowledgement through experience. The saints or the fathers, as individuals, are notautomatically and by definition infallible. Infallibility is the result of the communion of theHoly Spirit, Who composes the wholeness of the institution of the Church. Therefore, no-one as an individual can be infallible; in other words, on his own, without any reference to theother charismas and functions of the Church. But, each individual can empirically express thetruth of the Church as formulated by the synods of the bishops in an infallible way,provided the individual is faithful to this truth (as, for example, a hymnographer, or ahagiographer or an ascete or a martyr or an ordinary Christian who lives faithfully andhumbly as a member of the eucharist body of the Church.)

D. Especially in the case of dogmatic theology, it is obvious that it cannot claim infallibility inthe same sense that the decreed dogmas do. Many theologians confuse the dogmas with thetheology of the Fathers when speaking of authority: This was stated by Father so-and-so,therefore it must be infallible. This can lead to a dangerous confusion. In order for apatristic position to acquire full authority, it must be passed through the furnace of thecommunion of the Holy Spirit that we described above, and neither the holiness nor thepersonal prestige of that Holy Father qualify enough to make it of an equal stature to thedogmas. For example, Athanasios the Great had correctly phrased the faith of the Church,before the 1st Ecumenical Synod (Council) had convened to dogmatize. But it was only whenthe teaching of the 1st Ecumenical Synod was established in the Church, that Athanasios

theology was rendered an infallible dogma, with a compulsory, overall acceptance.Of course the question is raised, as to what happens in those periods when ecumenicalsynods are inoperative and dogmas are not decreed. In this case, the Church continues tolive and confess the truth of Gods Christophany, through various forms of experience andconfessions, through the its contemporary Fathers (the Church always has Fathers); thePatristic era did not come to an end in the 9th century, as was predominantly believed by theWest.

However, these Fathers interpret the existing dogmas without producing any new ones; inother words, without expecting the overall acceptance by the Ecumenical Church of whateverthey say. Thus, in the case of Dogmatics (for all of us who are preoccupied with the holydogmas as teachers or as students), what we strive for is an (existential) interpretation of thedogmas, which is something that cannot demand any kind of prestige.

It would be somewhat excessive if not audacious for a theologian to expect his owninterpretation to be the one that fully and validly expresses the interpretation of the dogmas.Every one of us is capable of erring, and that is why we must all be humble enough to listento each others views. Without this humility, we are at risk of proclaiming ourselves infalliblepopes, which is something that often appears in Orthodoxy, whereby each theologian tendsto become a pope. The truth is revealed and is consolidated (=becomes infallible) onlythrough our humble incorporation in the body of the Church, and by resigning ourselves tothe communion and the community of the Holy Spirit.

Because God, after all, is recognized only in the Spirit, through Love. But we shall speak ofthis in the next chapter on Gnosiology.


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B. ON COGNIZANCE AND FAITH

I. On cognizance

1. Cognizance of things

The Western dilemma on revelationThe relating of things. by exclusion. definitionC. descriptionThe origin of attributes

The utilitarian aspectTime-Space and definition

The theories on supposed natural revelation maintain that man has an inbuiltcognizance (knowledge) of God, which man then further cultivates. In other words, man isborn having knowledge of God. Other theories say that there is no natural revelation, only adirect revelation on Gods part. This is a dilemma that developed chiefly among Protestantsand Roman Catholics. A leading upholder of the theory that natural revelation does notexist, was and continues to be - in the West : he is Karl Barth.

Like all other issues, this problem does not exist within our Orthodox tradition and mentality.Before we start to talk specifically about the patristic views the views of Orthodox traditionon the subject of knowing God - I would like to first define the problem: what is cognizance.And we shall begin by approaching the subject entirely objectively lets say, not astheologians, but as ordinary thinking people, or as scientists, if you wish.What is cognizance (knowledge) ?

1. Cognizance of thingsWhen we say that I know something, for instance: the table, it means that I am behaving inthe following way: I am pointing out this table in order to relate it to my person. Aristotlehad introduced this basic principle, which became familiar as the this here of Aristotle.When you point towards something and you identify it, saying: this (thing) is this one andnot something else, you are in fact saying that you know (recognize) it. In other words,knowing always has something to do with some kind of identification. From the moment thatthe objects identity is lost, then the knowledge of it is also lost. If this table is not this tablebut another one, then I dont know it. To be unable to identify it means I cannot recognizeit. Consequently, the identity of an object or a being is a necessary prerequisite forcognizance (knowledge).Now, how do we identify various objects? (This has to do with the gnosiology of every

science. We are not speaking as theologians here, but in general, as we already said). Andso, in order to simplify matters, I pose the following question: In what way do I identify thistable, and consequently say that I know it?


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A. This includes a negative action to begin with; in other words, I identify this table and Isay that it is a table, thus ruling out that it is something else; I am saying that A is A andthat it is not B. Therefore, in defining A, I try to define what is not A, i.e., by excludinganother being. When I say it is this, it means it is not that.

B. The second basic action that is contained in the act of cognizance (knowing) is that Iam obliged precisely because I am excluding other objects to somehow encompass the

object of my cognizance; I have to define it. (Pay attention, how the use of words is veryimportant). What is the meaning of the word define? The word define contains theinference of boundaries, or limits, or terms, which I place around the object. I am indicatingit by excluding other objects, but: I am also placing limits around it.

C. The third action that I perform, which is a consequence of the second action, isthat I am describing it. (here we have another term of gnosiology, which, however, signifiesprecisely the relating of an object by the method of isolating it) To describe an object meansthat I inscribe (write) things around that object and thus create a frame around it. I say thatA is A and not B, and in this way, I identify it. Now, how do I go about describing it? Inorder to describe, I utilize certain properties that the object has; for instance, in order to say

that I am describing this table, and that I am identifying it by describing it, I need to give it aform. If it loses its form ( as conceded to me by space and time ), I will say that this table isanother one and not that one. I identify it as being another. Imagine, if space and time werenon-existent, and likewise the ability to isolate and to describe on the basis of the tablesform, thus rendering this table united to the other table to an absolute degree, then, I wouldno longer be able to know (discern) the specific table. Identity is lost and there will be aconfusion of objects. Cognizance (knowledge) will disappear. Consequently, description (usage of the limits that space and time place between two objects ) is a necessary elementand is accomplished on the basis of the objects attributes (for example its form); this isadvanced even further (Aristotle analyzed all of this), with the attributes of objects, whichoriginate from a judgment expressed by the object of cognizance. In other words, I say that

this table is square in shape; as cognizance of the table progresses, I can now define its formand say it is square.

But where did I obtain the concept of square? It is a concept. Plato would havesaid it is an idea that we draw from the permanent cosmos of ideas and then apply totangible objects. Aristotle says that it is not an idea, but merely attributes that the objectitself possesses. In other words, the attribute of squareness already resides within the table.At any rate, for me to say that something is square, I must use a logical shape, which canapply everywhere, and not only to a table. It must also be applicable to other objects. It isnot the table only that has a square shape. If we supposed that in all the world, only thetable is square in shape, then I could not call it square. I have borrowed the concept ofsquare from my experience of another object. We shall examine this eventually; (and youwill see how opportune it is, when we apply it to God, which is a very serious issue. )

In any case, we are now at a point where we describe the object by using its differentattributes, which, apart from its shape, include thousands of other things. The moreattributes that I add, the more I know the object. For example, it is square; then I go to thecolour. It has that colour. Then I go to various other attributes. And, based on all of these, Iend up ( and this is our next element ) with the ability to utilize the object. And I can nowdefine the object on the basis of its usefulness. I say that it is a table, because I use it forwriting on. Thus, we always have a latent utilitarian aspect to this cognizance, whichoriginates from the identification of an objects attributes, because these attributes are

automatically available for usage. This usage may be aesthetic (i.e. it is beautiful), or theobject may be altogether exploitable from a realistic aspect, in which case, I use it for aspecific purpose.


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So, to summarize: For the cognizance (knowledge) of an object, so that we may knowit, relate it, we must have an exclusion of another object and a description based on theattributes that the object possesses, with the help of time and space.

This is because we do not only relate objects that we perceive with our eyes, but alsoobjects that we dont see. I can relate my father; I know him. He is no longer alive. However,time has made it possible for him to be isolated from me, otherwise, there would have been

confusion between my father and myself. If things were totally indistinct, I would never haveknown my father. I know him, thanks to the distance that time and space have allotted, as inthe case of the table. Therefore, this description that I am making with the aid of time andspace, is what helps me distinguish that A is A and not B. I can therefore know things,on the basis of this procedure of description, which leads me to the detection of attributes.And because of this detection of attributes, I am led as I said to their evaluation and theirutilization. I can say that this table is larger than the other one; it is better than the otherone, etc., etc.. This ability to compare, also offers the possibility to utilize it later; to say: Iwant a larger table now; this one is not suitable. All this procedure of knowing residesinside that which we call scientific knowledge, which is very much dependent on the culturallevel and the cultural era in which one lives, so that one can see which of those attributes

comprise useful attributes. For instance, in ancient Greek times, when beauty was important,the attribute of form, of beauty, was the basic attribute by which one could get to knowsomething. In our age, and especially in the West, (where we can see how much theoreticalsciences suffer), knowledge is accompanied by usage. If you dont provide something alongwith knowledge that will be useful and will produce results, you are not providing anything.It is as though you know nothing. This knowledge is of no interest. Why should we speak ofGod, or of art? What can it give us? What are the results? And nowadays, in England,theoretical Schools are in danger of being closed down, because the prevailing philosophy ishow is the industry benefiting from these Schools? Give the money to Schools thatproduce results. But how is a result produced? From that very procedure of knowledge,which defines and describes and consequently provides the possibility of usage and the

benefit through that usage.Well, that is basically the method one uses in science. Although we must stress here

that after Einstein and chiefly after the recent quantum theory, we definitely have a change inthe perception that the researcher the one who knows distances himself from the objectof his knowledge. Because, as you are aware, natural sciences today believe that theresearcher is somehow entangled in the procedure of knowing his object and affects thatknowledge. In other words, to know that this table is square is not simply a matter ofdetecting the tables attribute of squareness; it is as though the experimenter is affecting theresult of the experiment. Therefore, the experiment is not simply the object that has certainattributes. We too allot certain attributes. And knowledge is an interaction of ourinvolvement within this procedure, to the point that knowledge is entirely changed. We cantexpand on this right now of course. This is just a parenthesis. I would like to say however,that the basic perception, the classical perception prior to Einstein, in short, the commonperception of knowledge (cognizance), has those elements that I just described.

2. Cognizance of God

Inadequacy of comparisonInadequacy of distance

Inadequacy of relating attributesPaternal anthropomorphism and atheismUtilitarian prayerNegation and mysticism


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Beyond

I have expanded on this description, in order to pose the following question:If everything that I said which is necessary for the cognizance of an object is applied tothe cognizance (knowledge) of God, what will happen straight away?-An absolute failure to apply it at all, and, for the following reasons:

A. Because first of all, we apply the exclusion method, that A is not B. This means that inorder to know A, it is presupposed that there is something else nearby, which I mustexclude. Therefore, we are obliged to accept that along with God, something else always co-exists. Even if that something is nothing. Be careful! We are looking at very profoundnotions here. Notions like creation out of nothing. It is a huge issue. When we say thatGod creates something from nothing, what is that nothing, if it isnt His self? To many,(Thomas Aquinatus and Karl Barth) this nothing is a thing that God repulses. In otherwords, it is as though the nothing already exists, and God then says: No, the nothing shallnot act. Let the world come into being! The nothing is rejected. So, you are repulsingsomething in a certain sense- in order to relate God. If you do apply this method to God,

you must suppose that God is that which is not God. And what is that which is not God? It isimpossible to compare God to other things, because you lose the meaning of God. In orderfor God to be God, He must be so unique, that He does not co-exist with anything else.Hence, I cannot know Him, by the method of excluding something else.B. The second element that we mentioned description which has the prerequisites ofspace and time (remember, I cannot relate something, without describing it within a spaceand time), again cannot be applied to God. We cannot describe God, because in order todescribe God, we must introduce His Existence into time and space. But if you do introducetime and space, then God becomes a creation that has a beginning, just as time and spacepresuppose a certain beginning; hence the distance between objects, this void. We cannot

say that God is describable. Even the Fathers referred to Him as indescribable. You cannotdescribe God. Indescribable means that not only is it impossible to say anything about God,but it is also impossible to inscribe limits (boundaries) around Him. You cannot saysomething about God as you would say of the table, i.e., that the table has this shape.Consequently, we cannot apply this method of cognizance either.And here we also have a very delicate issue. We are accustomed mainly from ScholasticTheology onward to saying that we can know God, through His attributes; for example, inevery dogmatic area, we have a complete analysis of His attributes: God is Benign, Almighty,Powerful, etc. There is a grave danger here, and I had stressed it, when I said that in order toknow an object on the basis of its attributes, it is necessary to draw those attributes from anexperience of other objects. I am not supposed to detect them, exclusively within my object.For instance, if I say that this table is strong, and this attribute of strength exists only withinmy table, I am not truly specifying it. I often give my students the example of the clock.Take a clock, and show it to a native, a primitive person who has never seen a clock, and askhim to relate it to something, as soon as he sees it in motion. He will throw it down and saythat it is some kind of animal. You see, it reminds him of something (else): an animal. Hecannot know it as a clock, because he has never seen a clock before. He has only seenanimals, which are capable of motion. We see how his basic method of cognizance was touse familiar things, in order to recognize the new. This indicates that knowing is alwayslinked to a prior experience; in other words, objects are classified on the basis of existingexperience.

For example, I know that a clock is that thing, which has those characteristics. That is when Irecognize it as a clock. If I dont recognize it, if I have never seen a clock before, then I cantstate that it is a clock. Thus, I reach the conclusion that the attributes that I allocate to anobject during the course of cognizance (knowledge) have all been taken from attributes that


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relate to other objects and are never unique to that, one, single object.(Imagine someone so unique from the aspect of physical anatomy that one cannot know himby relating him to the experience one has from other people. It will be impossible for adoctor to examine him; in order for the doctor to recognize his ailment, he must be identicalto other people. A doctor can never truly know anything, if it is unique. All our knowledgeis dependent precisely on the hypothesis that the objects of our knowledge resemble each

other; that they have common characteristics).So, if this is true, then what can we do about God? From where can we draw the attributes ofGod? For instance, so that I can say that He is benevolent. From where did I draw thisattribute of benevolence? From experience of course; I know that so-and-so is a benevolentperson. I know Gods power. I draw this from the experience I have of powerful people.Thus, after this projection of my experience, I can reach God. God is thus a creation of yourown imagination, your own experience. But those attributes arent exclusive to God; othershave them also. And that is why so many people replace God with those objects. Why shouldI be afraid of God and not be afraid of lightning? After all, both of them are powerful.

Attributes - even the most affirmative ones, such as benevolent are still attributes that weborrow from our knowledge and experience of other things, which God isnt.

I am characteristically underlining the notion of God as Father, which is one of the mostdifficult meanings, for the reason that anthropomorphism penetrates this theme veryprofusely. We teach our children from their early years to refer to God as our Father, but inwhat sense? It is on the basis of the childrens experience of their father at home. Theybestow their father certain attributes, for instance: that he is stronger than them; that he cando things that they cant; that he protects them, etc.. So, with all of these amassed together,the child forms an idea of God, the way that we have given it to the child. The child embracesit, and then what happens? When puberty arrives, and freedom starts to set in, and the child

wants to rid itself of the guardianship of the father in the house, that is when the crisis of itsfaith in God appears, because all this patronizing that the youth wants to shake off, isentangled in its conscience along with God, and the revolution - the reaction againstauthority in general - leads the youth towards a revolution against God.And this is the precise moment that the crisis of atheism appears; whether one views it at apersonal level, or at a level of civilizations history. In cultural eras, where we find exactlythis emphasis on freedom that opposes authority, that is when the idea of God is discarded.Why? Because we came to know God; we related Him, on the basis of experiences andattributes that we acquired from our family. It is therefore impossible, if you correctlypreserve the idea of God and wish to relate God ( because this is what its all about), to avoidall those dangers and not give God any attributes that can be found in other objects.And that is why this route that I described ( which reaches the point of using familiar objects )if applied to God, will have ugly consequences. The cognizance of God is very often confusedwith the results that this cognizance offers. Do you know how many people lose their faith inGod, because He doesnt answer their prayers? Just as I choose to reject this table if it is ofno use to me and I ignore it altogether, thus, in the same way, if God is a useless object, Ichoose to ignore Him. And the word ignore does not simply imply that He doesnt exist, butthat He doesnt exist for me; it is I who do not know Him; it is I who ignores Him. There issuch a thing as a conscious ignorance a willed ignorance. You can see what kind of dangerthe cognizance of God gnosiology contains, when it is based on the attributes of God. Itcan lead to an outright atheism, because by definition, God cannot be fitted into these molds,

neither can He become an object of exploitation. If this were the case, then at any givenmoment, just as I push a button to start up a machine, I could likewise push the prayerbutton and wait for the answer to come. This would be an objectification of God, and what isworse, it is the demoting of God, down to the status of an object.


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Thus, we cannot speak of Gods attributes and then attain cognizance based on theseattributes, because that would be dangerous. And of course we cannot also resort to anycategorizing that includes place and time, because we already said that time and space cameinto being during Creation and are therefore not applicable to God. So, the question israised: How then can I relate God? Is there anything to be found in experience that couldshow me the way?

Is it possible to relate something, without going into all this procedure of objectification, ofexclusion, of attributes and of utilization? Can I relate something, without doing all this? If Ican, then there is a chance that I can also relate God. If I cant, then one of the following twois happening: either I cannot relate God at all, and consequently I cannot say that I knowGod, or, I withdraw from this attempt to express Him on the basis of experience, i.e., I knowGod, but I cannot express it, I cannot give a meaning to it. Therefore I cannot applygnosiology; I cannot say anything about God.These two forms of response to the question posed, have already been expressed, repeatedand are still heard in our times. The one reply takes on the name of negation, which signifies

that you cannot say anything about God there is absolute silence; we may have cognizanceperhaps, but without any possibility of actually putting cognizance into words. The otherreply is a form of mysticism that allows a phrasing of cognizance of God, provided that weare referring to emotions and experiences which, in an extreme form of mysticism, obliteratethe distinction between the one who knows (the recognizer) and the one who is known (therecognized). This is why religions applied these two Gnosiologies to a broad extent, andcreated a certain confusion to us Orthodox; because Negation was developed by the GreekFathers in a certain way, while mysticism was also present.This combination of mysticism and negation became the subject of a special expounding, andespecially in our times, by a renowned Russian theologian, Vladimir Lossky, who wrote The

Mystic Theology of the Eastern Church, that caused some confusion. So, the problem indeedarose: if this is the way, if this is gnosiology, i.e., through a negation that claims I do notknow God at all, the question eventually remains: What can I say affirmatively about God,and how can I form an affirmative Gnosiology and not just a negative one? It is easy to say Icant say anything about God. It is easy to say what God is not. But, when we reach thepoint of asking: What affirmative thing can I say about God?, the problem is, not to fall intothe trap and say things that I have borrowed from prior experience of other things, becausethose other things cannot be placed on the same level as God, otherwise they becomeanthropomorphic projections. I must therefore say something about God, which, however,must not be derived from the method that I use in order to know things.Negation made its appearance in history as a problem of contrast between God and theworld. In order to know God, you must go beyond the world; you must leave the worldbehind. This is a method that we find in neo-Platonism: the principle of beyond theessence. With Dionysios Areopagitis, this method took on the form of using expressionswith the prefix hyper (=super, beyond). For example, whatever affirmative thing we sayabout this world, we should use the prefix hyper when we refer to God. We refer to God asbenevolent, but, because this expression is taken from the experience we have of people,this could result in anthropomorphism. In order therefore to avoid anthropomorphism, wesay that God is hyper-benevolent. Hyper-benevolent does not imply (in this usage) that Heis exceedingly benevolent, which is a superficiality of benevolent; it implies rather asurpassing. It is the same as when we say that God is not essence, but hyper-essence(Greek: yper-ousios) : beyond the essence.

This is why the terminology of Negational Theology which commences from DionysiosAreopagitis refers to God as hyper-god; he means to stress that all the categorizing thatwe use from our experience of the world, contains the danger of anthropomorphism. That is


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why we go beyond; and the term hyper is precisely that which implies beyond.

3. Cognizance through the Son and Logos

The gnostic mind according to Justinian

The Platonic dangers of this viewMakarios' correction with the heartThe Scriptural notion regarding the heartThe gnostic heart according to MaximusThe Logos according to MaximusThe Logos as the image of the FatherThe cognizance of God through the LogosMind and heartCognizance through loving of the person

In order to comprehend the Fathers viewpoint on the problem of the cognizance of God, wemust bear in mind the following, historical sequence of events:

Initially, there was a belief, which sprung from the meaning of the term Logos as introducedby Justinian, around the middle of the 2nd century A.D.. This belief elaborated that thehuman mind was an instrument intended for comprehending. After Origens time however,this line of thought evolved into the form that Evagrios gave to the overall subject ofgnosiology, as well as Evagrios subsequent influence on monks, which according to theprinciples already set down by Justinian was characterized by the cleansing of ones mind ofall perceptible things According to this theory, God and the human mind have somethingin common. One could say that they are related ontologically, but they differ and are

opposite to, anything material. God is a spiritual being, non-material and non-corporeal, asis the human mind. Therefore, the link between God and man - and logically, the path or theinstrument for acquiring cognizance would be the mind.

However, this doctrine contained the danger, firstly, of excluding from the cognizance of Godanything that is perceived by the human senses. This of course may seem quite natural atfirst; but, remember what we said in previous lessons pertaining to the incarnation: thatChristology upholds that Christ is the path that leads to the cognizance of God; that Godreveals Himself through Christ in a perceptible way, and that He also makes Himselfaccessible, to the human senses. This is not the only problem generated by this doctrine.The greater difficulty is that the human mind appears to be able to interpret God, and in acertain way becomes the ground which God touches upon (this being the ancient Greekperception, and mainly Platos).

This entire doctrine - which resulted in a heresy with Origens followers, who were eventuallycondemned by the 5th Ecumenical Synod was duly corrected by yet another monks doctrinewhich took on the name of Makarios the Egyptian, whose doctrine introduces anotherelement in the cognizance of God: instead of the mind being the instrument forcomprehending, he introduces the heart. The heart is now acknowledged as the cognitiveinstrument, and no longer the mind. But, because this may be classified by classicalpsychology as being mans cognitive instrument in which his emotions are situated, it is quitepossible that we may be led to misinterpret this doctrine of Makarios. But, it has nothing todo with emotions versus logic, but another thing altogether. What is this other thing, which

is neither emotion, nor logic? What do we mean, when we say the term heart?

We have already said that, according to the Semitic perception as apparent in the Bible, wherethe heart is presented as being the cognitive instrument for of God, (.a clean heart within


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me); where the heart is that which recognizes God (the clean in heart shall look uponGod....) and with a typical Semitic mentality that naturally permeates the Bible, the heartsignifies mans realm of obedience. It is there, that the yes or the no is decided on. It is theplace of freedom, where man decides to concede or refuse, where he says the yes or the noto anothers request, and of course to Gods. This perception, whereby man executes Godswill with his heart, is the Bibles practical way to the cognizance of God. The cognizance ofGod is neither a notional nor an emotional issue; to actually do what God wants is a practical

and an ethical issue. While this could have satisfied Semitic mentality, it could not satisfyGreek mentality, through which the Bible had to be interpreted. To a Greek, knowledge hadto have an ontological content. It had to point towards an identity: i.e., that somethingexists, and that I acknowledge it as existing; as an entity. I do not recognize it merely as amoral obligation, or as something to which I reply with my yes or no; it is an entity, anidentity. The interpretation of this viewpoint of Makarios that the heart is the cognitiveinstrument must necessarily contain ontological elements. Elements that will lead me tothe possibility of relating it to something; to say that it exists, that it actually is. Because if itis not, then I do not recognize it.

The answer to this question can be found, as early as the time of the Fathers, in one of the

great I would say the greatest theologians of that time, as regards the conception and thelatitude with which he conceived and connected all the major problems: Maximus theConfessor. It is there, that all of Makarios doctrine is utilized, to correct Evagrios theory.Besides, Maximus does this to Origenism in general, and completely changes its appearanceand content in a positive manner. Not with aggressiveness, wherein we often believe thatthings can be changed by fighting. It is not so. During the Patristic period, changes weremade without generating any fuss. Origen had so much authority; that is why Athanasios andthe Cappadocians - mainly Maximus - amended him radically, but without actually wagingwar against him. One of the changes that Maximus made was to amend the meaning of theterm Logos. With the help of Makarios doctrine, Maximus situates the cognitive instrumentwithin the heart, but, with the following content:

To Maximus, the Logos is basically the Logos of God; in other words, it is the person ofChrist. And it its through Gods Logos, that one recognizes God. Maximus also develops theidea that the Logos has cosmological extensions; i.e., that all beings have their own logos,within the one Logos of God. But the important thing is, that Maximus perceives this Logosof God as a person, with whom God the Father has a loving relationship. And here now isthe way that the heart as a seat of love is transformed into that instrument which does notmerely provide emotions as the means of recognizing God; it actually provides a personalrelationship, a relationship between two parties, which Maximus named a loving relationship.In other words, only the Logos of God can basically recognize God, because only the Logos isin an eternal loving relationship with God which actually reveals, discloses, makes known, theidentity of God as that of a Father, of a person. Subsequently, the Gospel of John says, no-one knows the Father, except for the Son, and only through the Son can you know theFather. But the fact that the Son knows the Father, is an issue - according to Maximus thathas to do with the loving relationship that exists between the Father and the Son eternally, inwhich relationship God is related to the Father-figure and is revealed, recognized - call itwhat you will by the words: You exist as my Father. Within this Father-Son relationship,God is revealed and is acknowledged as veracity. Athanasios the Great had already madesimilar observations when he refuted the Arians, saying that the Son was forever with theFather, and that it was impossible for the Father to have existed without His Son, because he said the Son is the Fathers veracity. The Son is the Image and the Veracity of the Father.Image and Veracity are one and the same thing.

This is a significant topic of gnosiology: that the Father also recognizes Himself, by looking at

His Image, which is His Son. You can never recognize yourself on your own. You need arelationship - lets say, a sort of reflective relationship, a mirror. Gods mirror is the Son.That is why He is called the Image of God and His veracity, as analyzed by Athanasios theGreat in his speech opposing Arians. This is approximately the perception that underlies


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Maximus the Confessors viewpoint. A relationship, therefore - a personal, loving one -reveals the truth, and it makes known an entity in a way that no-one would recognize itotherwise.

God, therefore, is basically recognized through His Son, and this is why the Son is His Logos.But not because He is the Logos in the notional sense with the mind which is theenormous trap that Augustine later fell into, when he incorrectly envisaged the Logos as

being Gods logic, Gods intellect (i.e., God has Logos means that God has intellect). TheGreek Fathers avoided this. It has nothing to do with the Logos of God in the intellectualsense. We therefore abandon Origenism and Evagrianism altogether: all those doctrines,which upheld that the mind is the cognitive instrument. The Logos is a person, who lovesand is loved, and through this loving relationship, it recognizes and ontologically relates tothe other person. Hence, God is eternally recognized; there is an eternal cognizance of God.We do not wait for the world to be created, in order for God to become known. He is madeknown through His Son, in His Son, and through the love that exists between the two of them.

We shall see what gnosiological consequences this hypothesis has, when we analyze it evenmore; but we will need to digress a little from the Patristic doctrines in order to interpret it.

So, these are the Patristic doctrines. Of course, when we approach the 14th century, at thetime when this entire topic is discussed with Saint Gregory Palamas, we are free to once againinvolve the mind in gnosiology, given that Maximus doctrine no longer exists, and we are nolonger in danger of espousing Origenism again (just as saint Gregory Palamas didnt espouseOrigenism, precisely because he didnt pursue Maximus tradition). Thus, the mind is nolonger the intellectual instrument that it was for Origen and Evagrios; however, whencoordinated with the heart, can it become a unified instrument. In other words, the heartessentially acquires intellectual abilities: the heart is able to recognize, but the mind is alsoable to love, in order to recognize. The mind -on its own- does not recognize. In moretechnical terms, this meeting of the heart and the mind is referred to as the descent of themind into the heart. It is a Gnosiology, which ultimately takes us far away from Origenism.

However, it must never be interpreted without recalling the previously mentioned elementsthat were introduced by Maximus: that the supreme logos, the mind, the love of God Himself- by which God is eternally recognized - is the Son, and that we too attain cognizance of Godthrough the Son, and only the Son, and not with exercises of the mind or the heart, (asthough it were a Buddhist exercise), which make us believe that we know God. You cannotcome to know God, outside of the Christ.

And what does that mean? It means precisely that the only true revelation, the cognizance ofGod, is the one that is seated in the loving relationship of the Father and the Son. The Son isthe Logos of God; He is the Only-begotten Son, in the sense that He is the one that isuniquely and eternally loved by God, who is likewise revealed through this loving relationship,in which He also recognizes Himself, through the other.

This is where the question of interpretation of all these issues, arises. How is it possible for aloving relationship to comprise the knowledge of, or the revelation of the identity, or therelating of a being?

In our previous lesson, we examined the way in which we recognize objects. Remember,however, that we said that this method could not be applied, when attempting to recognizeGod, given that there are certain prerequisites for recognizing those objects, which woulddirectly abrogate the meaning of God. We also said that there is another way, which is alwaysdirectly linked to o

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