QUESTIONS FROM ORTHODOX TO
LATINS AND EVANGELICALS

© 2000 by Orchid Land Publications

[12-3-00]

I. TO LATIN UPHOLDERS OF THE PAPACY

Concerning 2 Philp. 2:13, Gal. 5:6, and many, many verses in the New Testament:  What happened to the Biblical concept of energy in Latin thinking?  Think of the dýnamis : enérgeia relation in the creation of human beings--according to the Eikón of God vs. the (H)omoíosis to God?   Why do the Latins harp on validity--e.g. of their Apostolic succession--when validity is but a dýnamis --perhaps (as the Orthodox say) one that is impotent (not actualized or realized)  till unenergized--when outside of the true Christian Church--the home of Grace?

Concerning Mat. 16:18:  How can something in a radically new paradigm invented a dozen centuries later (on the basis of the "Muslim Aristotle") be a development of something in an earlier, radically different paradigm?  After breaking off from the patriarchal consensus of early Christianity and being divorced from it for 750 years. and then obtaining a new paradigm from Islamic Cordova, how can Latin theology be other than anachronistic in claiming development from the Greek-language Christianity of the Apostolic writings?  Anyhow, why does not Antioch--where St. Peter was bishop before moving to Rome--not have the same prerogatives in Roman Catholicism claimed for Rome by the Papists?  

Transferable guilt or merits?  How something non-physical like Adam and Eve's sin and guilt--pass (as a reatus or charge of guilt) "by natural generation,"--that is, physically--to their descendents?   How can guilt or merit of any individual be transferred to any other individual-=except where the two share one Life-giving Energy--as Christ's members do with Him?  And how can humans be united with God's Essence, when it is acknowledged to be imparticipable?  Without the concept of Energies, how can Roman Catholicism lead to anything but contradictions?

Concerning John 15:26:  How can the Filioque doctrine, based on an unacceptable parallelism between the uncreated processions of the unknowable divine Essence and the created mission of the Holy Spirit . . . and other untenable considerations--not to speak of the words of John 15:26 . . . .be acceptable?  How can finite human reason analyse the infinite Mystery of the inner Essence of God except aphophatically.  How can one accept the idea that relations are substantial--the Augustinian teaching which the Filioque rests on--when anyone knows that, since beings and relations of beings are both real, it is the former than create the latter--and that the latter depend on the former? 

II. TO EVANGELICALS WHO CLAIM TO 
INTERPRET THE BIBLE "LITERALLY"

Concerning John 16:13:  We don't have to pretend that the Holy Spirit failed, for a millennium and a half (till the Reformers came on the scene),  to maintain Christ's promise that He would guide the Church to all truth (John 16:13).  

Concerning 1 Pet 1:20:  How can one defend the right of an individual to interpret Scripture in opposition to a collective tradition inspired by the Holy Spirit that has been inspired to sift out of many errors the truth that has been able to last up to two millenniums?  How can one know the Bible is infallible, unless one claims to be an infallible judge of what is infallible?  Certainly not by quoting its own claims!  How can Evangelical "truth" be true when it reverses its tenets every two or three generations in our time?

Concerning John 1:1,3:  However convenient to the Reformation's focus on the Word (the Bible, preaching)--something so great as to efface the "sacraments" and require an accompanying sermon for a "sacrament" to be efficacious, IF a "sacrament" is  more than a mere "ordinance" that does no more than "seal" a Salvation already received through preaching of the Bible--how can one believe that a "Word" created "all that has been made"?  How can one square such a ludicrous belief with what is known of the Greek language in the Apostolic Age?

Concerning John 6:53-54:  How can a "literalist" be honest when claiming that these words do not mean what they literally say?  (Many other verses could be cited, including many attributions of human bodily parts to God..)

Any individual claiming the Bible that one knows the Bible to be infallible is claiming oneself to be infallible, since only an infallible judge can determine what is infallible.  We Orthodox don't face that Protestant dilemma when we accept (see John 6:13) as infallible the  Bible compiled by a body (the Orthodox Church) that Protestants have got to view as fallible--if their own theology is right.   We likewise don't have to accept virtual reality--either the Reformers' teaching that God became wrathful for the sins of humans that He Himself allegedly imputed from Adam to them, so that newborn babies are guilty of the sins of our first ancestors--or the virtual reality of God's mercifully attributing Christ's merits to believers, who are then virtually righteous according to the divine will while remaining really sinners.  We do not have to accept the anachronistic fiction that Greek-speakers in the Apostolic age could have subscribed to the Muslim-derived  fifteenth-century via moderna that  constituted the  Reformers' will-based framework of thought--in which will and juridical concepts are cut off from being and reason (cf. Muslim and Reformation  predestination).   As for the Muslim and Reformation objection to images, The Orthodox don't have to reject the rôle of created matter (sacraments) and time (tradition) in Salvation.  Finally, the Orthodox haven't replaced Worship accorded to God (on His Altar), not to speak of the holy Mysteries, with human-addressed words (the Pulpit). 

Concerning Jas. 3:9:  How can God be good when He is wrathful at sins He has allegedly imputed from Adam to all of His newborn descendents?  What kind of vengeful (unloving) Nature do we ascribe to One that gets so jealously wrathful at every violation of His Law--an insult to His Glory--that he condemns the non-honorant to eternal hell?  Is the eternal God more petty than humans?  Are the consequences of the Fall juridical and penal, as the West says. Or are they not rather ontological, as Eastern Orthodoxy understands the matter--viz. a lack that is due to the loss of the Energy of Grace, the omoíosis Theõ--a loss that renders the dynámeis of the Eikón of God (viz. the potentials of reason [lógos] and free choice [aftexousía]) to please God  unrealized and impotent to please God)?  An ontological separation from God is certainly no juridical penalty; isn't it rather the negative ontological result of losing the energization (omoíosis Theõ; omoíosis is an energy deverbative noun in Greek) of the Life-Giving Grace of the all-holy Trinity--that the Orthodox maintain?

Concerning Where is the Greek Bible's understanding of the relation of dýnamis and energy in Protestant theology?  This verse clearly speaks of a synergy in which Christ is Agent and a member of His body is the one consenting to let the Energy of His Grace produce good works?  Where does one find the conflict between Grace and a believer's good works that Protestants accept as self-evident?

Concerning Rom. 11:6 (Gal. 2:16), Eph. 2:9,Tit.3:5:  Do these passages negate the synergy of Philp. 2:13 (in Greek!)?  Hardly, unless they are read in an paradigm alien to the Greek-language Christians of the East (including the Greek-speaking Christians in Rome during the first two centuries after the Resurrection)?

Concerning Mat. 28:19:   Why have doctrine (e.g. the Trinity) and even the "sacraments" in some instances, receded among Evangelicals in favor of good works?  Why has the Reformation insistence on "faith" (volitionally interpreted) been effaced by an emphasis on doing in current Evangelicalism.  Perhaps more basically, why does Evangelicalism change its view every few generations--on the separation of Church and State (and school prayers), on the prohibition against crosses on or in church houses, on the requirement to substitute wine for grape juice (or some other beverage in some places) in the Lord's Supper (and otherwise), on the prohibition against when Sabbath shopping and movies (though one could have a servant cooking dinner while one attended a religious service), on prayers for the dead,  etc.?