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"Likoudis was citing historical fact, pertaining to the pre-Bolshevik era church. As to where they are today, that is another question."

Yes but this is really quite trivial. The fact that the Russian Orthodox Church became somewhat wedded to philosophy and Westernization after Peter the Great leaves quite untouched the authentic Russian heritage that NEVER KNEW Aristotle or Plato or Plotinus or any other Greek classical philosopher simply because they never needed them to do theology (unlike Scholasticism and the later Byzantine Scholastics). To say that Palamas was removed from the Synodikon is a bit disingenuous and ignores these historical facts that led to such a rejection. For the question of Russia returning to 'its glory' is precisely its return to its pre-Peter the Great theology and culture, which has already started to happen with great theologians like Vladimir Lossky.

Photios

Dear Photios,

However, Russian aristocracy always revelled in the Baroque era as it connected them with European culture and civilization etc.

In addition, while in France, it was the Russian emigre love of the Baroque that led to Russian veneration for the penitential spirituality of La Salette, Lourdes and even the Little Flower.

The Russian Revolution with its complete disdain for the Russian religious and cultural achievement as a whole is what further solidified the chasm between the two perspectives.

And the Russian Orthodox Church has had to learn to live with both of them.

For example, when complaints were lodged in the 19th century against the Baroque embellishments at Pochaiv Lavra by the great Greek-Catholic benefactor (who did love Orthodoxy) Count Myron Pototsky (whose good works are mentioned without being named in the Akafist to the Theotokos of Pochaiv), the Russian Synod reviewed the complaints and then delivered its decision to leave the embellishments alone - and they are there to this day.

Russian culture is very rich and its ability to blend various strands in both church and secular life is an expression of its vitality.

Alex

Dear Friends,

I enjoy a thoroughly intellectual discussion as much as anyone, but the above magnificently worded posts lead one to break a smile . . .

A lot of these issues have already been dealth with by official Catholic/Orthodox theological commissions . . .

I can see the headlines now:

"Roman Catholic and Orthodox theologians reach final agreement that could lead to full communion with each other: 'Not so fast!' say some members of the Byzantine Forum . . ."

Alex

Photios,

I agree with your assessment of the situation. Thus, just as it is important that the Eastern Catholic Churches recover their own spiritual, liturgical, and doctrinal traditions, when these have been compromised by Latinization; so too, the Eastern Orthodox Churches must restore their own theological traditions when they have been influenced by Latin Scholasticism. On this very point I remember reading an article in the Greek Orthodox Theological Review a few years ago that dealt with the problem of Scholastic ideas in theological manuals of the Orthodox East, and which spoke about the recovery of a Patristic outlook over the last 50 years in the Orthodox world. Clearly, the process of de-Latinization is vital to both the Eastern Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches.

Yes, I agree with much of what you are saying, because if you read the text of the most recent agreement on theological matters issued by the North American Orthodox / Catholic Theological Consultation, you will immediately note that the recommendations in the document imply a rejection of the binding nature of both the Council of Florence and the Second Council of Lyons, since the document says that the doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit, "still awaits full and final ecumenical resolution." [The Filioque: A Church Dividing Issue?, Section IV] Moreover, that document calls on the Latin Church to remove the filioque from the creed and from all catechetical materials. Now this hardly sounds like a recommendation that could be made if Florence and Second Lyons are dogmatically binding on all Christians. To read the whole document click the link below the USCCB website:

The Filioque: A Church Dividing Issue? [usccb.org]

Perhaps Mr. Likoudis should inform the U.S. Bishops Conference that the filioque is a dogma.

Fr. Deacon,

You do not see a conflict because you subscribe to the Latin theological tradition, which confuses essence and energy. The vision of God entails a participation in the energies of God, not His essence, because His essence, as St. Basil said, "remains beyond our reach." [St. Basil the Great, Letter 234]

I am a Byzantine Catholic, and because I am a Byzantine I am also a Palamite. I gave up Thomism when I changed sui juris Churches.

Blessings to you,
Todd

Dear Todd,

That is a good point - but there will always be those who will disagree with their Church's official theologians et alia.

Sounds to me like the RC's are moving closer to the notion that their later Councils are, in some sense, not as "universal" as made out to be originally . . .

So if Florence and Lyons and any other later Latin Council that affirmed the Filioque is NOT infallible on the same scale as the 7 Ecumenical Councils, then we really do have a "gap" in the wall of separation to go through.

And I thought all BC's were Palamites!

Alex

Todd,

So what do you see are the requirements for a council to be regarded as ecumenical?

Gordo

The decisions of a truly ecumenical council must reflect the pre-existing faith of the Church. That being said, as an Eastern Christian I reject the notion that there can be "doctrinal development." Thus, a decree (horos) of a council is not a development of doctrine, but is instead the reaffirmation of a truth already believed by the Church with the intention of excluding an erroneous viewpoint. Along with the agreement of a decree (horos) with the faith once delivered to the saints, it is necessary that the five Patriarchal Sees accept the teaching proclaimed at the council (this is expressive of both primacy and synodality); and finally, in the Byzantine tradition this is reflected in the commemoration of the seven councils in the divine liturgy.

Dear Todd,

This kind of Forum is not readily conducive to formal discussion in the history of theology, but I will tell you that the 20th century saw a major corrective in the history of theology among scholars in the Catholic Church. One of the results of that corrective for nearly 200 years of theological scholarship and spiritual understanding is the understanding that Aquinas and Palamas are not at odds in their understanding of the prayer of union. In the western Church the reformed saints of Carmel kept that understanding alive in their praxis and in their teachings.

You might google Jordan Auman, a Dominican, who, I believe has a brief synopsis of that history on the Domninican homepage, and then follow through with a survey of some of the more recent studies of Aquinas and Palamas that demonstrate that their teachings are not at all incompatible much less diametrically opposed.

I am always bemused at the fact that these great advances of the 20th century in correcting errors that emerged through the Protestant Reformation and carried through to the late 19th century, that flowered in the teachings of Occam, for example, have been such a well kept secret in U.S. university departments of theology and in seminaries all across the country. On the other hand it may just be that students find it easier not to challenge the formulaic responses one finds in these discussions of East VS West.

It should have reached the point some time ago where this kind of ignorance is no longer excusable, nor acceptable.

Eli

A. N. Williams also posits the idea that Aquinas and Palamas are not at odds theologically in her book Ground of Union, but sadly she reduces the distinction between essence and energy to an epistemic distinction, and I cannot agree with that.

Nor do I accept the Aristotelian / Thomist idea that essence and existence in God are identical, because that proposition leads to Sabellian modalism. God is tri-existent, i.e., the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are true and distinct subsistences (hypostases), and not merely oppositional relations within the divine essence as Aquinas taught.

Now of course there are other areas within Thomas' thought that cannot be conformed to the teaching of the Cappadocian Fathers in addition to the one I just mentioned, but as you have indicated, this forum is not conducive to a detailed examination of those differences.

Blessings to you,
Todd

P.S. - I will look into what Jordan Aumann has to say, but if my past experience is any clue, he -- like most Western authors -- will be unable to grasp the fact that there can be real distinctions in God without opposition.

Is it possible to say more here about your understanding of the Williams work, and also why it is you cannot accept what you call her reduction of essence and energies to an "epistemic" distinction?

What is the source of your knowledge of Palamas's theology of essence and energies?

It seems to me that you have done a bit of oversimplification by generalization here.

What Aquinas does teach that is relevant to this discussion is that, in man, the intellect is a power of the soul. In God, the intellect is the divine essence. He is omniscient. He is not possessed of, with or by omniscient powers. What man possess as a power of the soul is a share in the divine intellect or the divine essence that comes to us as a POWER.

That is quite different in kind and in specificity from your own reduction above.

Now the connection between Aquinas and his "share in the divine essence" AS A SHARE IN POWER!! and Palamas and his "uncreated energies" is us...God's human creatures.

Knowledge is given in the mode of the receiver. A very good principle in physics and in theology. It is axiomatic.

In Aquinas it is POWER. In Palamas it is ENERGIES.

Eli

Aquinas in the Summa says the following:

"Thence it follows that in God essence is not really distinct from person; and yet that the persons are really distinguished from each other. For person, as above stated (29, 4), signifies relation as subsisting in the divine nature. But relation as referred to the essence does not differ therefrom really, but only in our way of thinking; while as referred to an opposite relation, it has a real distinction by virtue of that opposition. Thus there are one essence and three persons." [Summa Theologica, Prima Pars, Q. 39, Art. 1]

This is nothing more than a reduction of the hypostases of the Trinity to relations of opposition, and I reject this notion as a form of modalism. The hypostases are not distinct through some form of "relations of opposition"; instead, they are distinct by their mode of origin (tropos hyparxeos). Thomas' views fall under the condemnation of St. Basil in his letter number 236, where he says that those who confess the identity of essence and hypostasis in God are forced to accept only a prosopic distinction, and this is not sufficient in safeguarding the doctrine of the Trinity.

Dynamis and energeia are not identical.

The Capita Physica, the Triads, and various other primary texts, and of course secondary writings by Lossky, Papademitriou, Hussey, Pentecost, Bradshaw, Papadakis, and other authors.