|
http://www.romanity.org/cont.htm
Brecon Political and Theological Discussion
Group
'Neither the Bible nor the writings of the Fathers are revelation or the word of God. They are about the revelation and about the word of God.'
The Bible as a record of experience The Fathers did not understand theology as a theoretical or speculative science, but as a positive science in all respects. This is why the patristic understanding of Biblical inspiration is similar to the inspiration of writings in the field of the positive sciences. Scientific manuals are inspired by the observations of specialists. For example, the astronomer records what he observes by means of the instruments at his disposal. Because of his training in the use of his instruments, he is inspired by the heavenly bodies, and sees things invisible to the naked eye. The same is true of all the positive sciences. However, books about science can never replace scientific observations. These writings are not the observations themselves, but about these observations. This holds true even when photographic and acoustical equipment is used. This equipment does not replace observations, but simply aids in the observations and their recordings. Scientists cannot be replaced by the books they write, nor by the instruments they invent and use. The same is true of the Orthodox understanding of the Bible and the writings of the Fathers. Neither the Bible nor the writings of the Fathers are revelation or the word of God. They are about the revelation and about the word of God. Revelation is the appearance of God to the prophets, apostles, and saints. The Bible and the writings of the Fathers are about these appearances, but not the appearances themselves. This is why it is the prophet, apostle, and saint who sees God, and not those who simply read about their experiences of glorification. It is obvious that neither a book about glorification nor one who reads such a book can ever replace the prophet, apostle, or saint who has the experience of glorification. The writings of scientists are accompanied by a tradition of interpretation, headed by successor scientists, who, by training and experience, know what their colleagues mean by the language used, and how to repeat the observations described. So it is in the Bible and the writings of the Fathers. Only those who have the same experience of glorification as their prophetic, apostolic, and patristic predecessors can understand what the Biblical and Patristic writings are saying about glorification and the spiritual stages leading to it. Those who have reached glorification know how they were guided there, as well as how to guide others, and they are the guarantors of the transmission of this same tradition. [.....]
The heart as an instrument of knowledge Similar to today's sciences, Orthodox theology also depends on an instrument which is not identified with reason or the intellect. The Biblical name for this is the heart. Christ says, "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God." [Matthew 5.8.] The heart is not normally clean, i.e., it does not normally function properly. Like the lens of a telescope or microscope, it must be polished so that light may pass through and allow man to focus his spiritual vision on things not visible to the naked eye. In time, some Fathers gave the name 'nous' to the faculty of the soul which operates within the heart when restored to normal capacity, and reserved the names 'logos' and 'dianoia' for the intellect and reason, or for what we today would call the brain. In order to avoid confusion, we use the terms noetic faculty and noetic prayer to designate the activity of the nous in the heart. The heart, and not the brain, is the area in which the theologian is formed. Theology includes the intellect as all sciences do, but it is in the heart that the intellect and all of man observes and experiences the rule of God. [.....]
Experience of the knowledge of God Glorification is the vision of God in which the equality of all men and the absolute value of each man is experienced. God loves all men equally and indiscriminately, regardless of even their moral status. God loves with the same love, both the saint and the devil. To teach otherwise, as Augustine and the Franks did, would be adequate proof that they did not have the slightest idea of what glorification was. (2) [.....] God himself is both heaven and hell, reward and punishment. All men have been created to see God unceasingly in His uncreated glory. Whether God will be for each man heaven or hell, reward or punishment, depends on man's response to God's love and on man's transformation from the state of selfish and self-centered love, to Godlike love which does not seek its own ends. One can see how the Frankish understanding of heaven and hell, poetically described by Dante, John Milton, and James Joyce, are so foreign to the Orthodox tradition. [.....] Since all men will see God, no religion can claim for itself the power to send people either to heaven or to hell. This means that true spiritual fathers prepare their spiritual charges so that vision of God's glory will be heaven, and not hell, reward and not punishment. The primary purpose of Orthodox Christianity then, is to prepare its members for an experience which every human being will sooner or later have. While the brain is the center of human adaptation to the environment, the noetic faculty in the heart is the primary organ for communion with God. The fall of man or the state of inherited sin is: a.) the failure of the noetic faculty to function properly, or to function at all; b.) its confusion with the functions of the brain and the body in general; and c.) its resulting enslavement to the environment. Each individual experiences the fall of his own noetic faculty. One can see why the Augustinian understanding of the fall of man as an inherited guilt for the sin of Adam and Eve is not, and cannot, be accepted by the Orthodox tradition. [.....] When the noetic faculty is not functioning properly, man is enslaved to fear and anxiety and his relations to others are essentially utilitarian. Thus, the root cause of all abnormal relations between God and man and among men is that fallen man, i.e., man with a malfunctioning noetic faculty, uses God, his fellow man, and nature for his own understanding of security and happiness. Man outside of glorification imagines the existence of a god or gods which are psychological projections of his need for security and happiness. That all men have this noetic faculty in the heart also means that all are in direct relation to God at various levels, depending on how much the individual personality resists enslavement to his physical and social surroundings and allows himself to be directed by God. Every individual is sustained by the uncreated glory of God and is the dwelling place of this uncreated creative and sustaining light, which is called the rule, power, grace, etc. of God. Human reaction to this direct relation or communion with God can range from the hardening of the heart (i.e., the snuffing out of the spark of grace) to the experience of glorification attained to by the prophets, apostles, and saints. This means that all men are equal in possession of the noetic faculty, but not in quality or degree of function. [.....]
The Church as a hospital The role of Christianity was originally more like that of the medical profession, especially that of today's psychologists and psychiatrists. Man has a malfunctioning or non-functioning noetic faculty in the heart, and it is the task especially of the clergy to apply the cure of unceasing memory of God, otherwise called unceasing prayer or illumination. Proper preparation for vision of God takes place in two stages: purification, and illumination of the noetic faculty. Without this, it is impossible for man's selfish love to be transformed into selfless love. This transformation takes place during the higher level of the stage of illumination called theoria, literally meaning vision - in this case vision by means of unceasing and uninterrupted memory of God. Those who remain selfish and self-centered with a hardened heart, closed to God's love, will not see the glory of God in this life. However, they will see God's glory eventually, but as an eternal and consuming fire and outer darkness. In the state of theoria the noetic faculty is liberated from its enslavement to the intellect, passions, and environments, and prays unceasingly. It is influenced solely by this memory of God. Thus continual noetic prayer functions simultaneously with the normal activities of everyday life. It is when the noetic faculty is in such a state that man has become a temple of God. Saint Basil the Great (3) writes that "the indwelling of God is this - to have God established within ourself by means of memory. We thus become temples of God, when the continuity of memory is not interrupted by earthly cares, nor the noetic faculty shaken by unexpected sufferings, but escaping form all things this friend of God [the noetic faculty] retires to God, driving out the passions which tempt it to incontinence and abides in the practices which lead to virtues." [Epistle 2] Saint Gregory the Theologian (4) points out that "we ought to remember God even more often than we draw our breath; and if it suffice to say this, we ought to do nothing else... or, to use Moses' words, whether a man lie asleep, or rise up, or walk by the way, or whatever else he is doing, he should also have this impressed in his memory for purity." [Theological Oration 1.5.] Saint Gregory insists that to theologize "is permitted only to those who have passed examinations and have reached theoria, and who have been previously purified in soul and body, or at least are being purified." [Ibid. 1.3] [.....] There is no metaphysical criterion for distinguishing between good and bad people. It is much more correct to distinguish between ill and more healthy persons. The sick ones are those whose noetic faculty is being cleansed and illumined. These levels are incorporated into the very structure of the four Gospels and the liturgical life of the Church. the Gospels of Mark, Matthew, and Luke reflect the pre-baptismal catechism for cleansing the heart, and the Gospel of John reflects the post-baptismal catechism which leads to theoria by way of the stage of illumination. Christ himself is the spiritual Father who led the apostles, as He had done with Moses and the prophets, to glorification by means of purification and illumination. One can summarize these three stages of perfection as a.) that of the slave who performs the commandments because of fear of seeing God as a consuming fire; b.) that of the hireling whose motive is the reward of seeing God as glory, and c.) that of the friends of God whose noetic faculty is completely free, whose love has become selfless and, because of this, are willing to be damned for the salvation of their fellow man, as in the cases of Moses and Paul.
(1) John Romanides (1927-2001), professor in the University of Thessaloniki. Franks, Romans, Feudalism and Doctrine was published in English by the publishing house of the Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology in 1981. Back (2) Romanides saw a large part of the history of Christianity in terms of a conflict between 'Franks' and 'Romans'. The Romans were the original Christians of the united Roman Empire from Syria to Wales. The Western part of this great Christian unity was taken over by the Franks, Teutons and Normans who finally gained control of the patriarchate of Rome (the Papacy) in the eleventh century. Their theology, he argued, was an intellectual construction built on the writings of Augustine of Hippo who had written independently of the authoritative work of the Greek fathers. Although Orthodoxy in general does not recognise Augustine as a saint (he was very recently, in the time of the colonels, added to the Greek calendar) not all Orthodox authors are as hostile as Romanides. In particular he has been vigorously defended by the highly respected American monk, Blessed Seraphim Rose. Back (3) St Basil the Great (c330-79). Together with St Gregory of Nyssa (his brother) and St Gregory of Naziansus he was one of the great fourth century 'Cappadocian fathers' (Cappadocia is in modern Turkey). They defended the doctrine agreed at the First Council of Nicaea (325). St Basil is particularly associated with the formulation of the practises prevalent in Orthodox monasticism. Back (4) St Gregory of Naziansus (329-89). One of only three saints (the others are the apostle St John and St Simeon the New Theologian) to be honoured with the title 'theologian'. He was involved in the final formulation of the Nicene creed at the Council of Constantinople (381) and in particular fought for recognition of the Holy Spirit's full equality in the Trinity with the Father and the Son. Back |