www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Hi, I'm Orthodox, and I believe in the IC.

I thought it was the Latins who lived by the precept, "That which is not explicitly permitted is prohibited"? The onus is on you to point out anything that would preclude believing in the doctrine of immaculate conception.

Which, for those keeping score at home, I once more reiterate that I do not personally hold and consider to be irrelevant in light of Eastern Christian anthropology.

The prayer you are looking for is "O God of spirits and of all flesh..." which is read three times during a Panikhida.

"... Pardon every transgression which they have committed,
whether by word or deed or thought.... because there is no man
who liveth and doth not sin, for Thou only art without sin..."

A message or two back you accused the 1895 Synod of Constantinople of not being true to the liturgical texts. Will you then faithfully adhere to the text above?

Dear Stuart,

If you run up a couple of messages or so, you have accused the Patriarch and Bishops of the Synod of Constantinople of being untrue to the liturgical text in what they wrote to Pope Leo XIII.

I rather think the onus is on you to take the text for the Feast of the Conception and substantiate your accusation. If there is any Orthodox teaching of the Immaculate Conception, it will be in the service which honours the conception of the Mother of God.

I'm saying they were talking past each other, accepting for themselves what they rejected in the Latin doctrine. They cannot be false to the liturgical texts in that matter because the texts say both Christ and Mary are all-pure and sinless. Obviously, they assumed that the different "quality" of those traits in each did not need expression, but they never considered that it might also be present in the Latin doctrine. Besides, if the Latins said, it, it must be wrong. Right?


That's not what I said, and I think you know that. I said that the text does not affirm immaculate conception, but neither does it preclude it. You are making an argument from silence: if immaculate conception is not specifically mentioned, then it must be precluded. On the other hand, nowhere does the text say that Mary was endowed with some supernatural grace at the Annunciation (and there is nothing in the text of that feast to indicate otherwise). As you say, there is no set doctrine in Orthodoxy, therefore anything that does not contradict the Tradition regarding Mary's sinlessness is pretty much acceptable as a theologumenon.

I'll overlook both Patriarch Bartholemew's theory that Mary became endowed with supernatural grace at the Annunciation--and I will overlook as unnecessary the Latin doctrine of immaculate conception. But I will defend to the death the right of both the Patriarch and the Latin Church to indulge in such speculations--as long as they don't try to ram them down anybody's throat.

And yet Mary is without sin. So obviously Someone was looking out for her from the moment she was capable of sinning--which is to say, from the moment of her birth.

?

I have, though I submit my reasoning was perhaps too subtle for you to apprehend? I said that Christ is sinless by nature, and Mary is sinless by grace. Mary's sinlessness is contingent upon her cooperation with the saving grace of her Son, whereas her Son's sinlessness is inherent in his divinity.

Dear Stuart,

I am not very good at forums. And am a little confused trying to keep up with all the ideas being expressed. I am looking for some clarification. You stated
"Beyond that, Father, as I pointed out, there is an inherent contradiction in Orthodox liturgical texts (which, I hope you will agree, must be the font and touchstone of or theology) that mirrors the inherent contradiction to which the Synod pointed in the 1895 letter; i.e., we commemorate the Theotokos as "all-pure", "all holy", "without stain" (a nice circumlocution of the word "immaculate"), sinless, etc., while at the same time our Paschal hymn, tells us "Let us adore the holy Lord Jesus, who alone is without sin".

What liturgical texts are you speaking about? If it is the DL I guess your are referring to the prayer "Commemorating our most holy, most pure and most blessed and glorious Lady.." If this is the prayer is there a reason why mine says Most and yours says ALL? Because Most does not equate to all in my mind. I am not saying mine is correct and yours is wrong I am trying to locate the texts of which you speak.

Secondly, Even if there was a disagreement or if it was implied or said in the Liturgy that the Theotokos was sinless or born without sin. Do we believe Liturgical texts to be infallible? I understand that usually we express our theology through our liturgical texts hence the study of that facet of theology but if it disagrees with the New Testament does not the NT trump anything that may be inaccurately expressed in liturgical texts. is there no Taxis?
Thanks

There are far more liturgical texts applying to the Theotokos than just those found in the Divine Liturgy. Look at Vespers and Orthros for all the Marian feasts. For instance, at Vespers on the Feast of the Presentation of the Theotokos (21 November), at the Lamplighting Psalms:


And later:


Or you can look at the Kontakion of Feast of the Nativity of the Theotokos (8 September):


And of course, one cannot look at the Akathistos Hymn without running into the same sort of language. Finally, while the formal name for that enameled medallion of the Theotokos worn by a bishop is "engolpion", it is more common name is "panagia", or "All Holy".


Regarding translations, words are fraught with baggage, and so translators tend to choose words that meet their purpose. From a purely semantic point of view, in English there is no significant difference between "all holy" and "all pure", and "most holy" and "most pure"; there can be nothing more superlative than a superlative (super-duper, extra-special pure, perhaps?), and the Greek and Slavonic texts will support either.

My own preference is not to use words that have a theological burden attached to them, so I don't mind when Orthodox translators use the term "without stain" instead of the word "immaculate" (which means "without stain"). But they cannot hide from the plain meaning of the text.



Tradition is a seamless garment. It is nothing less than the Word of God expressed in various means. As Christ the Word is One, so the Tradition which expresses the Word is also one, and one element of Tradition cannot contradict another; any apparent contradictions are the result of faulty understanding on our part, and it is our duty to discern the harmony within the Tradition.

That said, before there was Scripture, there was Liturgy, the Church's rule of faith. It was through that rule of faith that the Church determined which books should be in the canon of Scripture. The Councils referred continually to all elements of Tradition even as they clarified and enhanced the Tradition. It is through Liturgy, though, that the Church most perfectly expresses what it believes, and the Liturgy is therefore the touchstone and the font of theology. Byzantine theology is grounded in the Liturgy; it is the Western Church that removed theology from its liturgical foundation and treated it as a series of abstract propositions. Today, the Catholic Church acknowledges the primacy of liturgy (Sacrosanctum concilium, the Instructions for Implementation of the Liturgical Provisions of the CCEO), following in the footsteps of great Orthodox theologians going back to Maximos the Confessor and Nikolaus Kabasilas, and forward to Schmemann, Meyendorff, and Lossky. Liturgical theology is at the heart of all theology, because at the end of the day, Liturgy is what the Church does, and how it manifests its true nature.

Lex orandi, lex credendi. If we don't believe what we pray, we are being untrue to God and to ourselves.

Stuart Thanks so much. That will take some time to digest. I guess my question would be in relation to "You entered the Temple of God in your infancy,To be brought up in the Holy of Holies," This seems to be from the Protoevangelium? Which the church does use but it is not a historical book meaning not based on real events that had to occur, it is a theological writing. Anyone is free to believe in it if they want but it is highly unlikely that the Theotokos ever entered the Holy of Holies in the Temple. The truth is we do not know much about the Theotokos period. She is not written about much in the NT and books like the Protoevangelium while helpful cannot give us the facts.

You've got a bit of a problem, because even though the Church does not consider the Protevangelion of James to be a canonical book, it does accept it as divinely inspired, and has used it as the foundation for a number of its major feasts, as well as the doctrine of Mary's perpetual virginity. Other feasts, such as the Dormition of the Theotokos, are taken out of the oral tradition with no documentary foundation at all. The Church teaches all these things dogmatically--you can't opt out of the Feast of the Presentation, or the Feast of the Dormition (to say nothing of the Dormition Fast), because the Church has assimilated and received all of these as truth, and fully integrated them into the Tradition--which, as I said, is a seamless garment.

Interesting points. I actually was pretty much qouting Fr Hopko. I had listed several hours of Podcasts he did on the Theotokos. It would appear no one can agree as to what is dogma and what is not. (regardless of which tradition) I will have to do some more in depth research on all of this. I thank you for answers.

In The Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Kallistos notes that dogma, properly understood, applies only to the Church's kerygma (public teaching)--and thus principally to matters pertaining to the nature of God, the nature of Christ, and the economy of salvation. Mariology, on the other hand, to the extent that it goes beyond being an extension of Christology, belongs to the "inner life" of the Church--family stuff, so to speak. That does not mean, however, that it is not fully integrated into the Tradition. As a general rule, if it is part of the liturgy (the full liturgy of the Church, not merely the Divine Liturgy), if it is part of the festal cycle, then it is indeed part of the Tradition, and not really open for debate. You might have your own ideas about the significance of that particular aspect of the Tradition, or how much weight to apply to a specific feast or practice, but you really cannot deny it without placing yourself on the outside.

Stuart, I note that the critical point that you make has not really been addressed. Let me, therefore, play Devil's Advocate. While it is certainly true that consensual Orthodoxy affirms the life-long purity and sinlessness of the Theotokos, is it the case that it also affirms that she was "preserved" by a special act of divine grace from sin?

The counter-argument that I have advanced by some Orthodox is that Mary's sinlessness was the fruit of her own ascetical struggles and training in the exercise of her free-will. No special act of divine grace was necessary. Mary merely cooperated with the grace that is given to every human being, as did some of the prophets before her, e.g., John the Baptist--hence the superfluousness--and indeed heresy--of a doctrine of the Immaculate Conception.

To affirm the necessity of a special supernatural act of divine grace--either to preserve her from sin or to enable her not to sin--would make Mary into the great exception. If God can preserve one person from sin, why doesn't he preserve all of us from sin?

Any thoughts?

Dear Stuart,

As you have noted, the liturgical texts, both at Matins and in the Panikhida, teach us that Christ only is without sin.

For example, at Matins after the Gospel reading:

"Having beheld the resurrection of Christ, let us adore the holy Lord Jesus, the only sinless One..."

and

"... for Thou only art holy, Thou only art the Lord..."

The Panikhida

"... Pardon every transgression which they have committed,
whether by word or deed or thought.... because there is no man
who liveth and doth not sin, for Thou only art without sin..."

As you have sagely observed: lex orandi, lex credendi.

Dear Stuart,

If the teaching of the Immaculate Conception is to be found anywhere in Orthodox liturgical texts, it will be in the Feast of the Conception of the Mother of God. Can you please quote.

If it is absent, then we may say that the adage of lex orandi, lex credendi shows that it is not prayed and not believed in Orthodoxy.