The 2 vs 3 fingers controversy Western/Orthodox

[Nazaroo]

Can anyone actually tell me what this 'controversy' is really all about?

Or explain how it could have become a bone of contention between Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox believers?

What is the making of the 'sign of the cross' even supposed to do?

Why does it matter how many fingers you hold up while doing it?

Is this a primitive form of 'Christian Magic', or a superstition?

Totally confused on this:
What's it all about Alfie?

Sincerely, Nazaroo.

 

[IgnatiusOfAntioch]

Can anyone actually tell me what this 'controversy' is really all about?
Or explain how it could have become a bone of contention between Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox believers?

What is the making of the 'sign of the cross' even supposed to do?

Is this a primitive form of 'Christian Magic', or a superstition?

You are incredibly misinformed. I wonder, have you even made any effort whatsoever to find out the truth about this? It doesn't take any effort at all to find this information out.

Here are the facts:

Praying in words and actions:
The Sign of the Cross

This ancient Christian prayer is modeled after the prayer of Jesus. Like His, it should come from the heart. When He prayed Jesus used words and signs and sometimes cries, as expressions of his heart. And so do we when we pray; our hearts too look for an outward voice.

The words and signs that Jesus used when he prayed often came from his own Jewish tradition, from what he learned in his family and from others. As for ourselves, we turn to our Christian tradition for guidance in prayer. We believe it is a tradition inspired by the Holy Spirit, and it is also an outgrowth of the Jewish tradition of prayer that nourished Jesus himself.

The Christian tradition of prayer has a wisdom all its own, with many different forms and expressions. Some basic prayers of our Christian tradition, however, have a special place. The Sign of the Cross is one example. In the Catholic and Orthodox church and other Christian churches the Sign of the Cross is an important part of personal and public prayer. It originated in the earliest days of Christianity and so it is thousands of years old. It is know that the martyrs in the Colosseum would make the Sign Of The Cross, an action carrying a sentence of death.

A Blessing of the Triune God
Tracing with our hand the figure of the cross on our forehead, our breast, our shoulders, we cross ourselves: In the name of the Father,
and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

The Sign of the Cross expresses blessing. It symbolizes God blessing us, God embracing us with blessings. And in this same sign we express our belief in God from whom all our blessings flow. In the Sign of the Cross we embrace our all good God with mind and heart and all of our strength.

This Christian tradition of praises the One who blesses for another incomparable blessing: the blessing of Jesus Christ. "Blessed be God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has bestowed on us in Christ every spiritual blessing." ( Eph 1,3 ) He is "the Word who made the universe, the Savior sent to redeem us." In Jesus Christ God appears as our Friend and Brother. With the Father he sends the Holy Spirit upon us "to complete his work on earth and bring us the fullness of grace." In Jesus, God has revealed to us the source of all blessings. When we make the Sign of the Cross we remember the One who blesses us: the triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

With the Sign of the Cross we recall in particular the blessing of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We trace a cross on ourselves, the cross of Jesus. His death on the Cross was an outpouring of love for us. The Sign of the Cross is a reminder of his love, a love found not only in the past, but here and now, as we make this sign upon ourselves; for the love of Jesus Christ abides forever. The Sign of the Cross is a wonderful daily expression of our relationship with God. God is the One who blesses. This prayer reminds us that each day, in good times and bad, in danger and sorrow, God's care and blessings are never far from us. Tracing this holy sign on our forehead, our hearts and our shoulders, we remember we are blessed in mind and heart and all our being. We can approach God with confidence through Jesus Christ whose ever present love this holy sign recalls. "Come to me," God says through this prayer, "do not be afraid. Before you take one step, I reach to embrace you with blessings in my hands."


I hope this will dispel any myths and erroneous notions you seem to have held.

May the peace of Christ be with you.

Your brother in Christ.

 

[in2Nas]

Is this a primitive form of 'Christian Magic', or a superstition?

No. There isn't any border skirmishes between the RCC and Eastern Orthodox of how the sign of the cross is done. It's just a symbol, another form of Catholic culture and tradition, not "Christian Magic."

I don't think I've heard of "Christian Magic" before though, can you elaborate on this? I read somwhere there was this one guy that could turn water in to wine and cure sick people and stuff like that, is that what your talking about? As far as superstition goes, I heard people sometimes pray before they sleep. Crazy.

 

[Globalnomad]

There's no controversy, Nazaroo. They're just different traditions, all of them with their own symbolism, all of them valid. I mean, what's right and what's wrong between the European handshake and the Indian namaste?

Of course, there are some people (very few, thank God!) who will make a bone of contention out of everything and yell themselves hoarse about the rightness of their way and the wrongness of another. But they are a small minority. No authoritative teaching, in any of the Churches, has ever made an issue out of this.

 

[Theophorus]

The cross is different in the east and west. In the east we go right to left. In the west it done left to right. It is an ancient symbol. Ignatius of Antioch wrote some nice things. I would add this.

All Orthodox use the sign of the cross in the form of blessing. In the spirit of the priesthood of believers mentioned in 1st Peter. I'm sure it is the same for Catholics.

The cross is a sign that destroys the devil. It represents the destruction of death, by the death of the incarnate word. It also represents humility. The humble assuming of flesh and blood by our Lord, and all of its implications, including birth and death. Humility is the greatest virtue along with love.

It is not magic, but a part of praxis. We do not seperate the spiritual from the physicall, in a way that many protestants do. We see the rubrics of worship, including the sign of the cross, as an incorpoaration of the spiritual into our physicall lives and world, for we are comprised of both, and Christ came to redeem all of man.

 

[Nazaroo]

Of course I am wholly ignorant of any such traditions. I was raised an atheist by the Western school system, and found Jesus and the bible while hitchiking across the Americas. I have only a brief experience of services inside a few churchs. As a young Christian that bored me. As an older Christian I found no need or desire.

What prompted the question was that I was reading my bible in a Greek greasyspoon restaurant, and some Greeks there noticed me and began a discussion. They explained the 2 fingers versus 3 fingers, and between their bad English, and my bad modern Greek, I really understood little of their arguments.

They had mistaken me for a Catholic, because I had a bible. I could not explain what I was at all, since I knew even less about the Reformation than I knew about Catholics. In summary, I expressed surprise and shock that there could be any argument or discussion about two versus three fingers, because the whole thing appeared to me as some kind of primitive superstition.

Obviously within any large church or denomination there will be those who know what they are talking about and those who don't. I rarely meet anyone who knows what they are talking about on anything. Perhaps that is why I have stayed misinformed.

Even now, I hardly know more about this than when I posed the question. Perhaps someone could explain further.

Peace, Nazaroo

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

What you have experienced is not uncommon. The Orthodox use our first two fingers with our thumb on the right hand to create the symbol of the Trinity.... the last two fingers are held flat within the palm to represent the two natures of Christ.

We touch our forehead, stomach area, then our right shoulder and ending with the left.

Yes, it was changed in the west... around 1100 - 1200 AD. However I don't think it makes any real differnece at all.

I have been told two different things that might explain how this change may have happened.

1st is the idea that the Clergy was praying in Latin with those who did not understand the language and mistakenly reversed the crossing while attempting to watch the Priest who was "facing" them at the time.

The other is the difference in language itself. The phrase "In the Name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit" comes out differently in Latin than Greek... and for the emphasis to be on the correct wording, the direction was reversed... to accomodate the proper meaning.

These language differences caused many difficulties during the first 1000 years.

Other differences are of FAR greater importance.

Forgive me....

 

[Theophorus]

Of course I am wholly ignorant of any such traditions. I was raised an atheist by the Western school system, and found Jesus and the bible while hitchiking across the Americas. I have only a brief experience of services inside a few churchs. As a young Christian that bored me. As an older Christian I found no need or desire.

What prompted the question was that I was reading my bible in a Greek greasyspoon restaurant, and some Greeks there noticed me and began a discussion. They explained the 2 fingers versus 3 fingers, and between their bad English, and my bad modern Greek, I really understood little of their arguments.

They had mistaken me for a Catholic, because I had a bible. I could not explain what I was at all, since I knew even less about the Reformation than I knew about Catholics. In summary, I expressed surprise and shock that there could be any argument or discussion about two versus three fingers, because the whole thing appeared to me as some kind of primitive superstition.

Obviously within any large church or denomination there will be those who know what they are talking about and those who don't. I rarely meet anyone who knows what they are talking about on anything. Perhaps that is why I have stayed misinformed.

Even now, I hardly know more about this than when I posed the question. Perhaps someone could explain further.

Peace, Nazaroo

Well, it is very presumptious of them to approach you in this manner. There are a few who hold to every little difference between the east and west. Including the rosary vs the prayer rope. This is not a huge controversy, except for a very small minority.

 

[Maximus]

Here are a few passages about the sign of the Cross I was able to find in a quick search of my Early Church Fathers CD-ROM.

"Premising, therefore, and likewise subjoining the fact that Christ suffered, He foretold that His just ones should suffer equally with Him--both the apostles and all the faithful in succession; and He signed them with that very seal of which Ezekiel spake: "The Lord said unto me, Go through the gate, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set the mark Tau upon the foreheads of the men." Now the Greek letter Tau and our own letter T is the very form of the cross, which He predicted would be the sign on our foreheads in the true Catholic Jerusalem, in which, according to the twenty-first Psalm, the brethren of Christ or children of God would ascribe glory to God the Father, in the person of Christ Himself addressing His Father; "I will declare Thy name unto my brethren; in the midst of the congregation will I sing praise unto Thee." For that which had to come to pass in our day in His name, and by His Spirit, He rightly foretold would be of Him (Tertullian, Five Books Against Marcion, Book III).

Now, inasmuch as all these things are also found amongst you, and the sign upon the forehead, and the sacraments of the church, and the offerings of the pure sacrifice, you ought now to burst forth, and declare that the Spirit of the Creator prophesied of your Christ (Ibid).

At every forward step and movement, at every going in and out, when we put on our our clothes and shoes, when we bathe, when we sit at table, when we light the lamps, on couch, on seat, in all the ordinary actions of daily life, we trace upon the forehead the sign (Tertullian, De Corona, Chapter 3).

21. That in the passion and the sign of the cross is all virtue and power.
22. That in this sign of the cross is salvation for all who are marked on their foreheads (St. Cyprian of Carthage, Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews, Book Two).

14. Let us, therefore, not be ashamed of the Cross of Christ; but though another hide it, do thou openly seal it upon thy forehead, that the devils may behold the royal sign and flee trembling far away. Make then this sign at eating and drinking, at sitting, at lying down, at rising up, at speaking, at walking: in a word, at every act. For He who was here crucified is in heaven above. If after being crucified and buried He had remained in the tomb, we should have had cause to be ashamed; but, in fact, He who was crucified on Golgotha here, has ascended into heaven from the Mount of Olives on the East. For after having gone down hence into Hades, and come up again to us, He ascended again from us into heaven, His Father addressing Him, and saying, Sit Thou on My right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool (St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Lecture 4).

 

[Maximus]

Here are a couple of passages from St. Basil the Great.

Moreover we worship even the image of the precious and life-giving Cross, although made of another tree, not honouring the tree (God forbid) but the image as a symbol of Christ. For He said to His disciples, admonishing them, Then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in Heaven, meaning the Cross. And so also the angel of the resurrection said to the woman, Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth which was crucified. And the Apostle said, We preach Christ crucified. For there are many Christs and many Jesuses, but one crucified. He does not say speared but crucified. It behoves us, then, to worship the sign of Christ. For wherever the sign may be, there also will He be. But it does not behove us to worship the material of which the image of the Cross is composed, even though it be gold or precious stones, after it is destroyed, if that should happen. Everything, therefore, that is dedicated to God we worship, conferring the adoration on Him.

The tree of life which was planted by God in Paradise pre-figured this precious Cross. For since death was by a tree, it was fitting that life and resurrection should be bestowed by a tree. Jacob, when He worshipped the top of Joseph's staff, was the first to image the Cross, and when he blessed his sons with crossed hands he made most clearly the sign of the cross. Likewise also did Moses' rod, when it smote the sea in the figure of the cross and saved Israel, while it overwhelmed Pharaoh in the depths; likewise also the hands stretched out crosswise and routing Amalek; and the bitter water made sweet by a tree, and the rock rent and pouring forth streams of water, and the rod that meant for Aaron the dignity of the high priesthood: and the serpent lifted in triumph on a tree as though it were dead, the tree bringing salvation to those who in faith saw their enemy dead, just as Christ was nailed to the tree in the flesh of sin which yet knew no sin. The mighty Moses cried, You will see your life hanging on the tree before your eyes, and Isaiah likewise, I have spread out my hands all the day unto a faithless and rebellious people. But may we who worship this obtain a part in Christ the crucified. Amen (St. Basil the Great, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, Book 4, Chapter 9).

Of the beliefs and practices whether generally accepted or publicly enjoined which are preserved in the Church some we possess derived from written teaching; others we have received delivered to us "in a mystery" by the tradition of the apostles; and both of these m relation to true religion have the same force. And these no one will gainsay;--no one, at all events, who is even moderately versed in the institutions of the Church. For were we to attempt to reject such customs as have no written authority, on the ground that the importance they possess is small, we should unintentionally injure the Gospel in its very vitals; or, rather, should make our public definition a mere phrase and nothing more. For instance, to take the first and most general example, who is thence who has taught us in writing to sign with the sign of the cross those who have trusted in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ? What writing has taught us to turn to the East at the prayer? Which of the saints has left us in writing the words of tim invocation at the displaying of the bread of the Eucharist and the cup of blessing? For we are not, as is well known, content with what the apostle or the Gospel has recorded, but both in preface and conclusion we add other words as being of great importance to the validity of the ministry, and these we derive from unwritten teaching. Moreover we bless the water of baptism and the oil of the chrism, and besides this the catechumen who is being baptized. On what written authority do we do this? Is not our authority silent and mystical tradition? Nay, by what written word is the anointing of oil itself taught? And whence comes the custom of baptizing thrice? And as to the other customs of baptism from what Scripture do we derive the renunciation of Satan and his angels? Does not this come from that unpublished and secret teaching which our fathers guarded in a silence out of the reach of curious meddling and inquisitive investigation? (St. Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit).

 

[Tonks]

They had mistaken me for a Catholic, because I had a bible.

Does anyone find this statement as amusing as I do - particularly in GT? lol.

 

[IgnatiusOfAntioch]

What prompted the question was that I was reading my bible in a Greek greasyspoon restaurant, and some Greeks there noticed me and began a discussion. They explained the 2 fingers versus 3 fingers, and between their bad English, and my bad modern Greek, I really understood little of their arguments.

They had mistaken me for a Catholic, because I had a bible. I could not explain what I was at all, since I knew even less about the Reformation than I knew about Catholics. In summary, I expressed surprise and shock that there could be any argument or discussion about two versus three fingers

Actually, both forms are used by Catholics. For example those of the Antiocene, Melkite and Byzantine, Coptic, etc. Eastern rites use the three finger, right sholder to left sholder form; those of the Latin, Maronite, Mozarabic rites use the left to right sholder form. There is no dispute.

May the peace of Christ be with you.

Your brother in Christ.

 

[repentant]

Yeah I never heard this be a big issue keeping Orthodox and Catholics apart. Who ever those uniformed people at that restaraunt were, really had no idea what they were saying. Will I ever make the sign of the Cross like the Catholics with 2 fingers? No. But, I don't have any issues with it.

 

[WhenFinallySetFree777]

You are incredibly misinformed. I wonder, have you even made any effort whatsoever to find out the truth about this? It doesn't take any effort at all to find this information out.

That was a bit unkind, considering the whole point of this thread was that he was asking those who would know for that information. You're right - it can be easily found out, can be done so on CF, and he is making an effort to find out the truth about this subject - hello, that's why he started the thread in the first place, because he didn't know.

 

[Nazaroo]

That was a bit unkind, considering the whole point of this thread was that he was asking those who would know for that information. You're right - it can be easily found out, can be done so on CF, and he is making an effort to find out the truth about this subject - hello, that's why he started the thread in the first place, because he didn't know.

You really *are* kind.
I was a bit hurt by that remark, but let it slide. I thought I was doing the right thing by asking about it, here where I knew there were many Catholics and Orthodox. Thank you for noticing and caring.

Peace to you, especially in my heart for this.

Does anyone find this statement as amusing as I do - particularly in GT? lol.

"Paul, thou almost persuadest me to be a Catholic!" (cf. Acts 26:28)

Interestingly, my only real exposure to Christianity as a youth, which did much to make my ears more friendly to consider it, was through a Catholic woman who had eight children of her own, and who instantly adopted me as number nine when I was thrown out of the house by my own father at fourteen. She kept me for a year or more and kept me in school for the same period. That house was small and full of fighting, but there was something else there that was noticably lacking in my own home: love in deed and in living.

After this experience, no amount of Catholic-bashing had any real meaning for me, in spite of my initial involvement as a hard-core protestant in North America. All that hate fell on deaf ears. I was never in any danger of obeying the pope, but I would have risked my life for that woman who was as a second mother to me.

 

[+RubiesFire+]

.
I would have risked my life for that woman who was as a second mother to me.

May God Bless You!!