Orthodox Liturgical Music and Concerns about Formalities

[ArmyMatt]

What difference would that make? Unless you want to say all the English versions are wrong, which would also make most of the lexicons wrong as well? It still doesn't answer why the angel said, "Don't do that, you must only [insert word] God."

well, it does if you know what John was doing at the time the angel visited him.

and it doesn’t mean the lexicons are wrong, but languages have nuance and idioms that never perfectly translate.

 

[ArmyMatt]

Again, that does not explain why the angel said, "Don't do that for me. Do that for God." So even if you want to say the meaning of the word is broad, here it clearly seems to mean worship. It's like saying the word for virgin in the NT for Mary is wrong since where it is quoted from in the OT is a broad meaning.

right, so something else is going on which is why the angel reacted the way he did and rebuked John as opposed to when Moses did the same act to his father-in-law and wasn’t rebuked.

 

[Jesse Dornfeld]

right, so something else is going on which is why the angel reacted the way he did and rebuked John as opposed to when Moses did the same act to his father-in-law and wasn’t rebuked.

Please, open my mind to the scriptures. If you can explain the Greek, that would be beneficial to me. I stand before the Word of God. I submit to it. So if you can show that John was making a sacrifice at the time he did that (or whatever else it would be, IDK) then please tell me. But I am asking you to be explicit since ambiguity in this is not good. There is far too much ambiguity in the Church now. We need to be intentional and clear about what the Bible says.

 

[ArmyMatt]

Please, open my mind to the scriptures. If you can explain the Greek, that would be beneficial to me. I stand before the Word of God. I submit to it. So if you can show that John was making a sacrifice at the time he did that (or whatever else it would be, IDK) then please tell me. But I am asking you to be explicit since ambiguity in this is not good. There is far too much ambiguity in the Church now. We need to be intentional and clear about what the Bible says.

well, what was John doing when the angel approached him?

 

[Jesse Dornfeld]

well, what was John doing when the angel approached him?

It does not say what he was doing.

 

[ArmyMatt]

It does not say what he was doing.

sure it does

 

[Jesse Dornfeld]

sure it does

Please tell me what he was doing. I see what he was told to write. I do not see what he was actually doing.

 

[ArmyMatt]

Please tell me what he was doing. I see what he was told to write. I do not see what he was actually doing.

it says at the very beginning when he has his vision, that he was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day.

 

[Jesse Dornfeld]

it says at the very beginning when he has his vision, that he was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day.

I don't see your point. John was in Patmos, an isolated island, where you say that Christians cannot worship outside of the communion of the Church (as I pointed to an example of a lone Christian living in Afghanistan).

 

[prodromos]

Again, that does not explain why the angel said, "Don't do that for me. Do that for God." So even if you want to say the meaning of the word is broad, here it clearly seems to mean worship. It's like saying the word for virgin in the NT for Mary is wrong since where it is quoted from in the OT is a broad meaning.

In Orthodox culture, when meeting a priest, it is customary to kiss the priest's right hand ( I won't go into the historical and cultural reasons behind it).
When I was living in Greece, I had let my beard grow quite long, and as a result many people mistakenly assumed I was a priest and would try to kiss my hand, despite the fact that I was not wearing a ράσο. My response to them was pretty much the same as the angel’s response to the Apostle John. In John's case the angel is saying, don't venerate me, I am a servant just like yourself. In my case, I was just a lay person with a beard, just like them (minus the beard).

 

[prodromos]

I don't see your point. John was in Patmos, an isolated island, where you say that Christians cannot worship outside of the communion of the Church (as I pointed to an example of a lone Christian living in Afghanistan).

John was not alone on the island. He had Prochorus who was his scribe, as well as a small Christian community around him.

 

[The Liturgist]

But adoring God is not worship to you.

No, adoration is an integral part of worship which differentiates worship from veneration. We adore God, and only God. But we also offer God the bloodless and rational sacrifice of the Eucharist in memory of Christ’s passion on the Cross, which consists of, to quote the Divine Liturgy, “a mercy of peace, a sacrifice of praise” and the bread and wine which are offered to God for consecration by the Holy Spirit, who causes them to become the actual Body and Blood of our Lord, offered to us. This is why the priest intones in the Eucharist “Thine Own of Thine Own, We Offer Unto Thee, On Behalf of All and For All,” because this recapitulation of the one atoning sacrifice of our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ on the Cross, where He offered Himself a ransom for our sins, and thus defeated the devil and despoiled Hades, has replaced the animal sacrifices in the Temple of Judaism, as those sacrfices were of a prophetic nature, preparing us to understand the concept of Sacrifice so we could appreciate what God has done for us, and in turn how to make a proper remembrance of that sacrifice in our worship of God.

Thus adoration, while inseparable from worship, and unique to worship, does not constitute worship in its entirety, for the sacrifice of the Eucharist and the other sacraments, or sacred mysteries as we prefer to call them in the Orthodox Church, are also integral parts of worship of God. In addition, worship should also extend into aspects of our every day life, as everything we do should be consecrated to God. This is particularly the case in Hesychasm, which is the practice of continuous prayer by learning to say the Jesus Prayer “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, Have Mercy on Me, A Sinner” or a variation thereof, such as “Lord Have Mercy”, at all times, thus fulfilling the instruction of God to pray without ceasing.

But a prayer is by itself a petition, and thus we seek the intercession of the saints by asking them to pray with us, but we do not worship but venerate the saints in same manner in which we venerate our beloved family and friends.

 

[ArmyMatt]

I don't see your point. John was in Patmos, an isolated island, where you say that Christians cannot worship outside of the communion of the Church (as I pointed to an example of a lone Christian living in Afghanistan).

he wasn’t alone. he was there with other Christians, one of whom was his disciple St Prochorus. so he wasn’t like your example. Patmos was a penal colony where some Christians were sent.

 

[The Liturgist]

So if there is a Christian living in Afghanistan, for example, who is going solo, they have no way to worship God?

No, but it is tragic he can’t access the Eucharist or other sacraments, but if he persists in his faith that is good. And for people isolated from physical participation in the Eucharist the church prays, and God extends grace to help; I know, having recently been ill and having missed several church services until three weeks ago. But I was sick again this Sunday.

This does not mean I worship God any less, it is just that because I have been ill, I missed out on the joys of the Eucharist in person. But for the very ill, our clergy bring the Eucharist to them. Indeed that was the original function of deacons in the Early Church.

 

[The Liturgist]

he wasn’t alone. he was there with other Christians, one of whom was his disciple St Prochorus. so he wasn’t like your example. Patmos was a penal colony where some Christians were sent.

And today it is the Monastery of St. John the Theologian, the Beloved Disciple, whose members include the recently reposed Metropolitan Kallistos Ware, may his memory be eternal, a great teaching bishop whose lectures along with those of Fr. John Behr were instrumental in persuading me that the Orthodox Church that had fascinated me since my early childhood was the Church where I belonged, and whose books, especially The Orthodox Way, were instrumental in my formation as an Orthodox Christian.

 

[ArmyMatt]

And today it is the Monastery of St. John the Theologian, the Beloved Disciple, whose members include the recently reposed Metropolitan Kallistos Ware, may his memory be eternal, a great teaching bishop whose lectures along with those of Fr. John Behr were instrumental in persuading me that the Orthodox Church that had fascinated me since my early childhood was the Church where I belonged, and whose books, especially The Orthodox Way, were instrumental in my formation as an Orthodox Christian.

praise God!

 

[The Liturgist]

praise God!

Indeed. The monastery and the island has flourished under the hegumen who received Metropolitan Kallistos, memory eternal, as a novice, for whenever local farmers came to him for confession he made them plant trees; he said to be Orthodox requires a love of trees, and a result of his arboreal approach to Orthodox theology is that while Patmos was a dry desert when Metropolitan Kallistos first arrived, today it is lush and verdant, through the grace of God in synergy with his pious monks, who were inspired to love God’s creation and in the process turned a desert island into a garden island.