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How are we to reconcile the declarations made at the Council of Florence on the filioque with the Greek patristic formula, "through the Son." Florence states that the Son also is cause (aitia) and source/principle (arche) of the substinence of the Holy Spirit, and also that the Spirit receives His essence and subsistent being from the Son. It doesn't sound like Florence is simply saying that the Son has a mediating role in the procession of the Holy Spirit, which is what that Greek Fathers and Council of Blachernae taught.

Eric,

First of all, welcome to the Byzantine Forum!

I think the simple answer is that they cannot be reconciled. The real solution to the problem has to be sought in the fact that by Eastern standards, the Council of Florence was not a true Ecumenical Council.

Consider this:

• Florence had been convoked as a joint council of the Roman and Byzantine Churches
• The decrees of Florence were quickly rejected by the people of the Byzantine Church
• In the Byzantine tradition, a council is not considered "ecumenical" until its teachings become part of the life of the Church

Rome, of course, continued to regard Florence as ecumenical, however:

• It was never formally declared so to be
• Some have disputed its ecumenicity, and were never censured for doing so

In other words, even though Florence has never been formally declared *not* to be ecumenical, there are serious reasons for considering it not to be.


Peace,
Deacon Richard

Welcome, brother Eric.

To clarify:

(1) While Florence taught that the Son was aitia (cause), it never taught that the Son was arche (source). In another place in the Decree, it explicitly states that the Father is the arche (source) of both the Son and the Spirit.

(2) The Latins had a different understanding of aitia(cause) than the Greeks. To the Latins, the term was used in a very general sense to refer to ANY cause (first cause, second cause, third cause, etc.). That was according to their philosophical tradition. However, the Greeks, while understanding the same philosophical tradition, had a very restrictive understanding of aitia in the realm of theology. To the Greeks, in the realm of theology, the term aitia refers ONLY to the First Cause or Source - i.e., God the Father. I hope you can see the inherent problem this caused. The Latins did not conceive of the Son as Source or First Cause of the Holy Spirit when they used the term aitia, and the Greek Fathers who signed the decrees probably understood this. But can you imagine what your average Greek Christian would think reading that decree, without being privy to the discussions at Florence? If the average Greek Christian read it, he would think the decree was stating that the Son is the Source, like the Father, of the Holy Spirit. St. Mark of Ephesus would not be able to shed any light on the matter because IIRC, he left the Council without having heard all the deliberations. Hence, even though the Decree of Florence explicitly distinguishes between aitia and arche (referring to the Son as aitia, and the Father as arche, we have St. Mark of Ephesus in his letter against the Union accusing the Council of making the Son "cause and source."

I hope that helps.

Blessings,
Marduk

Although presented here (see below) in an English translation (one should verify the key words in the original texts), I find the actual decrees of Florence both irenic and a reasonable beginning, at the least, for achieving some reconciliation. Pope Eugene labels Florence ecumenical:He speaks fondly of the Emperor and of his "brother" the Patriarch of Constantinople:
As he describes the situation:
So I present here the text of the final decree, what Florence officially declared, what it said about Latin and Greek theological expressions and terminology. I do not find these words corroborating the appraisal of the original post.
[Source: Session 6—6 July 1439 [Definition of the holy ecumenical synod of Florence] [ewtn.com] ]

Your understanding of the Florentine decree coordinates well with the official Greek text of the document. The Son is declared (in the document) to be both "cause" (αἰτίαν) and "principle" (άρχήν) of the subsistence of the Holy Spirit, and that position is contrary to the teaching of the Council of Blachernae, and of Orthodox tradition in general.

Dear brother Todd,

I just read the Decree of Florence and you are correct. The Decree does refer to the Son as aitia and arche, but we are both mistaken for translating arche as "source." Before I was just going off of memory. I knew that Florence distinguished the Father as Source, and never called the Son the Source, but, just going off of memory, I did not quote the Decree correctly.

Concisely, the Decree distinguishes the Father as "source and principle," while the Son is "cause and principle." The Decree actually does not use the Greek word arche to mean the First Cause or source, but rather another Greek word pege, which means the fount/source/first cause (Greek poets used the term to mean the fountain from which the FULLNESS of abundance springs)

So my main point still stands - that the Latins and Greeks did not use nor understand the same terms in the same way. It is obvious that the Latins did not understand arche nor aitia to mean source or first cause, while the Greeks did. Arche(Latin principaliter) and aitia(Latin causa) were understood by the Latins in the very general, philosophical sense, while the Greeks understood those same terms in a very limited, theological sense.

It should be noted that when Latins use the terms 'principle" and "cause" in reference to the Father, they will add necessary qualifiers to the term - i.e., the Father will be called "principle without principle" or "First cause." In distinction, Greeks would not need these qualifiers, but use those words AS IS as a reference to the Father. One can see the obvious problems this would cause in translation, from the Greek perspective.

To repeat, the Latins never intended at Florence to claim that the Son is Source or First Cause, like the Father, of the Spirit. It is merely that Latins and Greeks used the SAME words to mean different things, and thus a very unfortunate misunderstanding ensued that has lasted centuries down to this day.

Blessings,
Marduk

The Father alone is both "cause" (αιτία) and "principle" (άρχή) of the hypostasis of the Son by generation (γέννησιν) and of the hypostasis of the Spirit by procession (ἐκπόρευσιν). The terms αιτία and άρχή are proper to the person of the Father and consequently cannot be applied to the Son (or the Spirit) within the inner life of the Trinity.

I did not translate the term άρχή as source. I hold that the Father alone is the sole principle (άρχή), source (πηγή), and cause (αιτία) of divinity.

Yes, that's what I stated in my post above. But the Latins had a different understanding of the terms aitia and arche. They attached a more philosophical meaning to the terms, rather than the restrictive theological meaning common to the Eastern Tradition. The Latins did, however, admit to the same thing that the Greeks meant by aitia and arche by assigning the term pege to the Father alone, not the Son.

Blessings

Oh OK. It was the OP who understood arche to mean "source." So I think your response to him is a bit misleading, as he plainly understood "principle" and "source" to mean the same thing. It might lead him to conclude that Florence was indeed assigning to the Son the role of being "Source," like the Father, which is not true.

Blessings

In what scholarly literature is this proposition argued and defended that the Latins understood these terms in a more "philosophical" sense, while the Greeks understood these terms in a more "theological" sense?

I personally have never seen any scholarly work which argues this, and I would be interested to see some works which defend this view.

I believe the original poster used the term "source/principle" to refer to the word άρχή, and of course that Greek word can be translated into English in a number of different ways (e.g., principle, source, origin, etc.). So I do not think I said anything misleading in my post; instead, I simply agreed with the original poster's point that Florence is giving a mediating role to the Son in the hypostatic origin of the Holy Spirit, and that this notion is foreign to the Orthodox tradition.

But the Orthodox apply all three of those terms to the Father alone.

What else can principle possibly mean in this context? Both words primarily connote the idea of a beginning (hence John 1:1 begins in Greek with "ἐν ἀρχῇ" and in Latin with "in principio"), but then they cannot have this meaning in Trinitarian theology, and so they instead should be taken to mean logical priority (indeed, both words are also translated as 'origin,' something which anybody could confirm by picking up a copy of any Greek or Latin lexicon), which is exactly what it means to say that the Father is 'source' of the Son and the Holy Spirit, for it cannot be that the Father is said to be 'source' with respect to some type of matter (for God is immaterial) or with respect to some locality (for God is uncircumscribed) or with respect to time (for God is without beginning), and therefore it is with respect to causality and logical priority that the Father is said to be 'source' of the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Isn't it a common Eastern complaint that the Latins unnecessarily intruded philosophy into theology? How can the philosophical vs. theological distinction of the terms not be considered from your pov?

Do you or do you not admit that philosophically, "principal" and "cause" have a much wider connotation than the theological sense in which Easterns attach to it (as a reference only to the primordial Cause of all)?

I understand, Cavaradossi, that you are asking for support that this was actually the case. But I'm asking you to consider that the "intrusion" of philosophy into theology by the Latins has (according to many Easterns anyway) always distinguished the two paradigms. Why would not that distinguishing factor be relevant here?

Blessings