Eastern Orthodoxy

colinlindsay · Aug 1, 2007

Can anybody point me to a good critical article about this?
Preferably one that's had some response from the Orthodox.

Thanks

Iosias · Aug 1, 2007

Unfortunately not but I can point you to this.

colinlindsay · Aug 1, 2007

Thanks for this.
I've read 2 very provocative and yet heart-warming books by evangelicals who have converted to Orthodoxy.
But why are reformed people (the link you posted) so sympathetic and generaous towards Orthodoxy?
The latest 'conversion book' by Michael Gallatin carries some fairly scathing assessments about the impossibility of the reformed project succeeding.
Is this really 'compatibility'?

Iosias · Aug 1, 2007

colinlindsay said:
But why are reformed people (the link you posted) so sympathetic and generaous towards Orthodoxy?

It would depend what you mean by "generous". Those in the Reformed camp can see the attraction of EO. We look upon the current state of evangelicalism and are dismayed at the post-modernist approach to worship and so we can understand why people are drawn to established ways that are unchanging for this offers stability which evangelicalism does not.

That we condone the errors of the EO is another thing entirely.

colinlindsay said:
The latest 'conversion book' by Michael Gallatin carries some fairly scathing assessments about the impossibility of the reformed project succeeding.

What does he say?

Christiangal01 · Aug 1, 2007

are you familiar with Michael Butler?
Supposedly he wrote a few articles on Eastern orthodoxy

Cajun Huguenot · Aug 1, 2007

Eastern Christians are paedo-communionists and that appeals to some in the Reformed Community. They also use leavened bread in communion which is practised by some Reformed Christians also. They are an ancient Church and have strong differences with Rome over the authority of the Bishop of Rome. These are things that may also appeal to some Reformed Christians.

Franky Schaeffer went over to the Orthodox Communion some years back, but he has not been very nice to Reformed Christians since his conversion to Eastern Christianity.

In Christ,
Kenith

colinlindsay · Aug 1, 2007

There's a book I've read detailing the contacts and understandings that have been made between the Evangelical Alliance and the Orthodox, with a lot of mutual appreciation. Nothing like the approach the Catholics tend to get!
Anyway, Gallatin's book is called "Thirsting for God"
He seems to regard evangelicalism the same way Paul regarded his training and background as a Pharisaical Jew. Now they have both fallen in love with Jesus, with the offer of real permanent fellowship with Him in sacramentalism, rather than the occasional fillip you get from a good sermon or worship experience. The conversion couldn't be more profound.
He argues that Protestantism's methodology is rationalism and relativism, and is a cul-de-sac against the unity of tradition and scripture.
True experience of the living Christ through sacramnetal living leads to true understanding of doctrine. The protestant insistence on head knowledge leading to heart knowledge is just the wrong way round.

SaintPhotios · Aug 3, 2007

As a former Calvinist (Reformed Presbyterian), perhaps I can provide some insight in Orthodox/Calvinist relations.

I know that I left Calvinism and converted to traditional Roman Catholicism because Calvinism strayed from the teachings of all the early Church Fathers and ultimately what the whole Church taught for nearly 12 centuries with few exceptions. Calvinism instilled in me a sense of tradition... but it was the tradition of the Reformers and the Westminster Confession that I was adhering to. So I ran towards Roman Catholicism.

However, even in the traditional sects of Roman Catholicism that detested the modernism of the Second Vatican Council, when looking to the teachings that the Church had always espoused, the Church of Rome was inherently innovative on such doctrines as purgatory, immaculate conception, the filioque, and as I eventually realized, even Papal primacy. So I took the next logical step and joined the only Church that I could find that adhered strictly to early Church doctrines... I found that in Orthodoxy.

I think that Reformed circles find some kinship in Orthodoxy due to the fact that they were both fighting the corruptions of the same enemy. The Reformers fought the sales of indulgences and other ecclesiastical power trips of the Roman clergy. Rome left the Orthodox communion over 1,000 years earlier because Rome's arrogance led to them butchering the Nicene Creed by inserting the filioque clause and asserting universal jurisdiction of the Roman Pontiff.

However, I think this is where similarities end. As I ventured through all three groups, I've noticed that above Rome simply being the wild tyrant, there is a sharp distinction between Western and Eastern thought. And only after I left Calvinism and finally embraced Orthodoxy did I realize that Roman Catholicism and classical Reformed theology shared one mind... and that it was internal issues that caused the divisions. When you read Calvin and Luther, and then more modern Reformed theologians like Van Til, there is an overwhelming air of Thomastic scholasticism that is utterly absent in Eastern thought. Ultimately, while they differ in position, the methods of Reformed systematic theology and argumentation are direct decendants of Thomas Aquinas, Thomas More, and a host of otherwise rabidly anti-Protestant Roman theologians.

arunma · Aug 3, 2007

AV1611 said:
It would depend what you mean by "generous". Those in the Reformed camp can see the attraction of EO. We look upon the current state of evangelicalism and are dismayed at the post-modernist approach to worship and so we can understand why people are drawn to established ways that are unchanging for this offers stability which evangelicalism does not.

That we condone the errors of the EO is another thing entirely.

Yes, I think that is it exactly. To be sure there are some great things about the EO church, and it is far better than apostate Roman Catholicism. Unfortunately they don't emphasize the sovereignty of God very much, nor do they seem to emphasize preaching at all, and they don't have a very evangelical spirit.

Iosias · Aug 3, 2007

SaintPhotios said:
I know that I left Calvinism and converted to traditional Roman Catholicism because Calvinism strayed from the teachings of all the early Church Fathers and ultimately what the whole Church taught for nearly 12 centuries with few exceptions.

CHAPTER 1. OF PREDESTINATION

CHAPTER 2. OF REDEMPTION.

CHAPTER 3. OF ORIGINAL SIN, THE IMPOTENCE OF MANS FREE WILL, ETC.

Iosias · Aug 3, 2007

CHAPTER 4. OF EFFICACIOUS GRACE

CHAPTER 5. OF PERSEVERANCE.

colinlindsay · Aug 3, 2007

Come on - surely we are being far too easy-going on Orthodoxy as reformed people.
They don't believe in the atonement or an angry God that 'was pleased to wound His son" (John Piper) They repudiate St Augustine, blaming him for our guilt neuroses and paving the way for schizophrenia between justification and sanctification. They kiss icons, see images as venerable and sacramental (opening up our spirits to God), they venerate Mary, they have a hierachy, private interpretation is frowned on, the priest has moral jurisdiction over his flock, and they have an unbending liturgy. They insist that the church is the ground and pillar of the truth, and that true doctrine is what the church has always believed at all times and in all places (apparently contrary to the observed chaos of church history)
Surely the major pillars of refomed thought are undermined (maybe justifiably) - sola scriptura, eternal assurance, legal justification, effective priesthood of all believers.
It just seems that if Orthodoxy is to given this easy ride so why do we get apoplectic over protestant things like Alpha and the Toronto blessing?

Iosias · Aug 3, 2007

colinlindsay said:
Come on - surely we are being far too easy-going on Orthodoxy as reformed people.
They don't believe in the atonement or an angry God that 'was pleased to wound His son" (John Piper) They repudiate St Augustine, blaming him for our guilt neuroses and paving the way for schizophrenia between justification and sanctification. They kiss icons, see images as venerable and sacramental (opening up our spirits to God), they venerate Mary, they have a hierachy, private interpretation is frowned on, the priest has moral jurisdiction over his flock, and they have an unbending liturgy. They insist that the church is the ground and pillar of the truth, and that true doctrine is what the church has always believed at all times and in all places (apparently contrary to the observed chaos of church history)
Surely the major pillars of refomed thought are undermined (maybe justifiably) - sola scriptura, eternal assurance, legal justification, effective priesthood of all believers.
It just seems that if Orthodoxy is to given this easy ride so why do we get apoplectic over protestant things like Alpha and the Toronto blessing?

You are correct that there are a great deal of errors in Orthodoxy however there is a correct way to deal with them through gently showing them the error of EO and not being like a bull in a china shop.

SaintPhotios · Aug 3, 2007

Despite having the irrelevant part of my post taken due to some petty bone of contention, it begs a response.

I won't post the entire list, but you can refer to the posts by AV1611. These are supposed to be lists of Patristic works arguing in favor of Calvinism. And I understand the temptation, as I read lists like these with quite a bit of enthusiasm. But to put it lightly, if these butchered, out-of-context soundbites of Patristic works were in the realm of journalism, they would be Fox News.

You posted the exerpts on predestination, which we Orthodox totally accept, but left out the thousands of quotes blatantly advocating free will. You did this with all of the topics. You take one half of the mystery, which we Orthodox accept more or less, and leave out the other side of the mystery. That's why I likened you to Fox News... slicing and dicing the facts to report what fits your agenda. Not to mention, you leave out some of the most crucial doctrines while reporting on perseverance such as almost every single Father showing the real presence in the eucharist, the liturgy, and most damning in this case, apostolic succession which Protestantism does not claim. If you're just searching "defense of Calvinism" on Google, then please quit wasting your time. I bought the Fathers Set after leaving Calvinism. While I am by no means anywhere close to finished (Fathers Set is massive), I have read many of the Church Fathers, and the deception of these silly internet sources is very apparent. So I ask you to read the Church Fathers. You don't have to buy the set, you can get most of them for free on newadvent.com (beware, it's Romanist).

We Orthodox are perfectly content with accepting mysteries, Divine truths above our understanding. The Trinity is both one and three simultaneously, it is a mystery. The incarnation is simultaneously man and God undivided, it is a mystery. However, Protestantism inherited the Scholastic mind from Romanism that leaves no room for mystery in the great mind of man. This is why Protestants have been doomed from the beginning to scrurry around to polarized extremes while never stopping to consider the balance of those extremes wrapped in the acceptance of mystery found in Orthodoxy.

They repudiate St Augustine, blaming him for our guilt neuroses and paving the way for schizophrenia between justification and sanctification.

No... we actually venerate St. Augustine as one of the great saints. He was wrong on the filioque, and he took predestination to an extreme (although he never denied free will). But he is venerated in the East nonetheless.

They kiss icons, see images as venerable and sacramental (opening up our spirits to God), they venerate Mary, they have a hierachy, private interpretation is frowned on, the priest has moral jurisdiction over his flock, and they have an unbending liturgy. They insist that the church is the ground and pillar of the truth, and that true doctrine is what the church has always believed at all times and in all places (apparently contrary to the observed chaos of church history)

What you've just described is the beliefs of the early Church and all of the Church Fathers my friend.

Ceridwen · Aug 3, 2007

colinlindsay said:
Come on - surely we are being far too easy-going on Orthodoxy as reformed people.
They don't believe in the atonement or an angry God that 'was pleased to wound His son" (John Piper) They repudiate St Augustine, blaming him for our guilt neuroses and paving the way for schizophrenia between justification and sanctification. They kiss icons, see images as venerable and sacramental (opening up our spirits to God), they venerate Mary, they have a hierachy, private interpretation is frowned on, the priest has moral jurisdiction over his flock, and they have an unbending liturgy. They insist that the church is the ground and pillar of the truth, and that true doctrine is what the church has always believed at all times and in all places (apparently contrary to the observed chaos of church history)
Surely the major pillars of refomed thought are undermined (maybe justifiably) - sola scriptura, eternal assurance, legal justification, effective priesthood of all believers.
It just seems that if Orthodoxy is to given this easy ride so why do we get apoplectic over protestant things like Alpha and the Toronto blessing?

They believe that they will be deified.

cygnusx1 · Aug 3, 2007

my experience of othodoxy was through two advocates , i eventually gave up with debating the first with these posts ;

I too give men the benefit of the doubt , unless shown otherwise I accept all who say they Love The Lord as Brothers and Sisters in Christ ........

but ,
the problem arises when you are speaking with Christians who cannot do that ....
here is an extract from a very productive article , wish I had read this weeks ago , it really helps explain what has been a trying time over the last few weeks for me in Soteriology ........

Traditional Orthodox Christian Elitist Exclusivism

The Bible says:

John 13:35 "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." 1 John 3:14,15 "We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him."

The problem is that Traditional Orthodox Christianity doesn't reckon anyone outside of its own organization as being brethren in Christ, and thus contemptuously rejects as heretics multitudes of true believers. I'm speaking not of the modernistic variety of Orthodox Theology, which is ecumenical, but of the Traditional type. They reject mutitudes of Christians who believe in Jesus, and who have been baptized and walk as Jesus walked. But by doing so, the Bible calls into question whether they themselves have passed from death to life. And even in the early church there existed elitist exclusivists reflected today in "Orthodox" Christianity.

3John 9-11 I wrote to the church, but Diotrephes, who loves to be first, will have nothing to do with us. So if I come, I will call attention to what he is doing, gossiping maliciously about us. Not satisfied with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers. He also stops those who want to do so and puts them out of the church. Dear friend, do not imitate what is evil but what is good. Anyone who does what is good is from God. Anyone who does what is evil has not seen God.

The Orthodox refer to those Christians outside of the Orthodox institutional church as "Heterodox" of whom they say, "we would say that the heterodox cannot be seen as Her members (members of Christ's true Church), because they have not been grafted into the one true Body of Christ through Holy Baptism." *** And they recognize no Christian baptism outside of the "Orthodox" church as legitimate.

http://www.bcbsr.com/topics/orthodox.html

It will help all who post here to read the entire article , otherwise you too may spend weeks 'banging your head against a brick wall '

Greetings in Christ
Cygnus

Soj , all i can say is there is far too much disagreement for us to continue debating this anymore ........ I find your comments extremely rude arrogant and devoid of any real understanding of where I and many who are Christians but who are not Orthodox are in the Lord , all I can sense is out and out attacks ........

the final straw was in your statement

Quote:
Scripture is simply a book and has no authority. Soj

so I leave you as I found you , and will not even attempt at any further interaction as it has proved utterly pointless ........... have a fruitfull life.

Cygnus

http://www.christianforums.com/t1694349&page=13

SaintPhotios · Aug 3, 2007

cygnusx1,

hah, I'm not sure who wrote that article, but I assure you that they are utterly ignorant of Orthodox theology.

The problem is that Traditional Orthodox Christianity doesn't reckon anyone outside of its own organization as being brethren in Christ, and thus contemptuously rejects as heretics multitudes of true believers. I'm speaking not of the modernistic variety of Orthodox Theology, which is ecumenical, but of the Traditional type.

the first serious mistake is saying that "modernistic" Orthodoxy is ecumenical. First of all, Orthodoxy rejects modernism in the proper sense of the word. You separate Traditional Orthodox Christianity and Ecumenical Orthodox Christianity into two schools. But I assure you, even liberal Orthodox Christians consider non-Orthodox believers to be outside the Church -- heretics or schismatics. They may be more candy-coated in presentation, but the belief is the same. The only thing ecumenical about the second group is how far they're willing to go to talk with heretics and schismatics... but the belief that non-Orthodox believers are heretics or schismatics is universal in Orthodox theology. I dare say, that if someone fails to believe that, then they're hardly Orthodox themselves.

cygnusx1 · Aug 4, 2007

and as a result both Orthodox and Roman Catholic each claim that they are exclusively the only true Church .........

it's all just a power struggle ..... read between the lines

"we are in charge here"

"no we are"

"no WE ARE!!!!!"

doesn't sound much like Jesus at all does it ?

The true authority resides not in man but in God , and not in the Body (Church) but in the Head (Christ) , and not in man's word (church fathers etc) but in God's Word... (Scripture)

The Church is built upon the Apostles and Prophets Christ being the Chief cornerstone , this is still the case and has been the case since the beginning ......... where do we then find this authority because the Apostles Prophets and Christ Himself are in heaven ?

The Answer is The Sacred Scriptures alone.... as these are totally sufficient and represent all the teaching of Christ His Prophets and Apostles .

those who tell you scripture is inadequate to govern Christians and only Church voted positions of power have authority , have replaced the real and only foundation of Christian authority .

SaintPhotios · Aug 4, 2007

It's no different than the Early Church battling the early heresies such as Gnosticism, Arianism, etc... The fact that Romanism and Orthodoxy both claim to be the one two Church isn't an argument against either of them.

where do we then find this authority because the Apostles Prophets and Christ Himself are in heaven ?

Click to expand...

That's easy... apostolic succession. It's interesting that the two oldest bodies in Christendom, despite their rabid opposition of one another, both share this doctrine in common. Even some Protestants admit this doctrine. In fact, the primary argument defeating Gnosticism was not anything in Scripture. The primary argument against Gnosticism was Apostolic Succession. The Gnostics didn't have a successive lineage of bishops that they could trace back to the Apostles. So arguably the oldest of all heresies was defeated not by Scriptural proof texts, but by what you refer to as authority of man.

cygnusx1 · Aug 4, 2007

SaintPhotios said:
It's no different than the Early Church battling the early heresies such as Gnosticism, Arianism, etc... The fact that Romanism and Orthodoxy both claim to be the one two Church isn't an argument against either of them.

That's easy... apostolic succession. It's interesting that the two oldest bodies in Christendom, despite their rabid opposition of one another, both share this doctrine in common. Even some Protestants admit this doctrine. In fact, the primary argument defeating Gnosticism was not anything in Scripture. The primary argument against Gnosticism was Apostolic Succession. The Gnostics didn't have a successive lineage of bishops that they could trace back to the Apostles. So arguably the oldest of all heresies was defeated not by Scriptural proof texts, but by what you refer to as authority of man.

Apostles (and prophets) are foundational , not needing repetition or succession , we have now a more sure word ; scripture.....

which church father is an apostle ?

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