| An extraordinarily creative intellect allowed Maximus to achieve a truly majestic synthesis of these two approaches. He insisted that it is the Eucharist that most fundamentally expresses the identity of the Church. For him the truth of the ecclesiology of individual purification lies in the transformation and the presentation in Christ of the entire tangible and intelligible world, and of all human relationships. There must be a process of purification by which all negative or worldly elements are driven out, but the purification itself is not the ultimate purpose of the Church. By lifting it and offering it to God, the Eucharist transforms all creation. The Church is the place in which this purification takes place, but rather than producing incorporeal angels, it brings about the salvation of this material world by giving it eternal communion with God. The process of purification must be understood as part of the eucharistic transformation of the world, not as rejecting or devaluing the material and bodily creation. Though at one time or another each of these two aspects has been given greater emphasis, the Church has always held to Maximus’ synthesis. Problems begin when theologians make one aspect bear too much weight. Unbalanced statements can be found in Saint Maximus himself, so some have seen him as a great exponent of the theology of self-purification. Among later Fathers, Saint Gregory Palamas in particular was promoted as a standard-bearer of Orthodoxy and representative of the theology of self-purification. Some scholars believe that there was a tension between those theologians who stressed individual spirituality, the ‘Hesychasts’, and other, eucharistic, theologians of the fourteenth century, such as Saint Nicholas Cabasilas of Thessaloniki (c.1323–c.1391). Saint Gregory Palamas has been commonly portrayed as representative of the ecclesiology in which the divine Eucharist is less important than individual spirituality. Nonetheless, I believe that, taken together, his treatises, doctrinal essays and sermons show that Palamas is agreement with Maximus in regarding the Eucharist as central. We are still waiting for studies that will show us where the other significant representatives of the Patristic tradition, in particular Saint Simeon the New Theologian, stand on this issue. |
| But is the purification of the individual really the fundamental purpose of the Church? Is man being called out of this material world and into a world of beings without material bodies? Is the incarnate Logos simply a means of accessing the disembodied Logos? Is the Church a collection of minds purified of all bodiliness? The Fathers wrestled with these questions, and they continue to be asked today. However, the Church settled on quite a different view of the body and materiality. It decided that in the Church we are being brought together as the recapitulation of the world, body and spirit, in the incarnate, materially embodied Logos. Although Origen’s views were no longer dominant, they have never entirely disappeared. The individual charismatic holy man, purified of all passion and selfhood, is an important figure for the Church in our age as much as any other, and the hymns and devotional literature of the Church still suggest that individual purification is what the Church is essentially about. However, when we look at the Eucharist, we see that it is Christ, the incarnate Word, who is the model of man. Christ has taken all material nature into his human nature, and this makes the event of the Eucharist, and is the source of the Church and of all who are made holy within it. It was the achievement of Saint Maximus the Confessor (580–662) to integrate the best insights of asceticism into the eucharistic theology of the Church. As a monk, Maximus was well acquainted with the views of Origen and the Platonist traditions that underlay them. His use of Plato’s conceptuality in his theology made it easy for scholars to align Maximus with Origen and other platonising Fathers. In his ‘Cosmic Liturgy’ (translated by Brian E. Daley, S.J., San Francisco: Ignatius Press 2003) Hans Urs von Balthasar initially identified Origenist elements everywhere in Maximus’ thought, but he was corrected by Polycarp Sherwood, and von Balthasar subsequently rectified his own account. Sherwood showed that Maximus had gone through an ‘Origenist crisis’ after which Maximus had drastically revised Origen. Maximus had an extensive knowledge of Origen and neo-platonism, as did most of the Eastern monks, but because he conformed his theology to the lived experience of the Church, he came down on the side of a eucharistic ecclesiology. |
| Catholicity, therefore, in this context, does not mean anything else but the wholeness and fulness and totality of the body of Christ “exactly as” (σπερ) it is portrayed in the eucharictic community. II. The Composition and Structure of the Eucharistic Community as Reflections of Catholicity With such a view of the eucharistic community in the background it would have been impossible for the composition and the structure of this community to be different from what it actually was in the first centuries. A different composition and structure would mean a different ecclesiology. It is, therefore, important for us in order to understand this ecclesiology, especially as it concerns the aspect of “catholicity,” to bear in mind this composition and structure. As a combination of the existent fragmentary liturgical evidence of the first centuries allows us to know, the “whole Church” 248 “dwelling in a certain city” 249 would “come together” 250 mainly on a Sunday 251 to “break bread.” 252 This synaxis would be the only one in that particular place in the sense that it would include the “whole Church.” 253 This fact, which is not usually noted by historians, is of paramount ecclesiological significance, for it immediately draws the line of demarcation between the Christian and the non-Christian pattern of unity at the time of the early Church. Coming together in brotherly love was certainly not a Christian innovation. In the Roman Empire it was so common to form “associations” that there was need for special laws concerning such associations signified under the name of collegia. 254 The brotherly love which prevailed among the members of the collegia was so strong and organized that each one of them would contribute monthly to a common fund and would address the other members by the title “brethren” (fratres, sodales, socii). 255 Apart from the pagans, the Jews who lived in the Roman Empire were also organized in special communities under their own ethnarch 256 and their brotherly love was so strong that in cases of special groups, like the Essenes, it was based on principles of common property. To speak, therefore, of the unity of the early Christians in terms of brotherly love would be to miss the unique point of this unity and perhaps even to expose it to a comparison from which it would certainly not gain much, especially in the light of such evidence as that provided by texts like Gal. 5:5, I Cor. 11:21, etc.! |
| For it is no longer possible to equate every eucharistic celebration with the local Church. But at the same time by so opting it has allowed for the hope to exist for the restoration of the communal nature of the local Church, according to which the local Church can be called κκλησα only when it is truly catholic, i.e. when it includes (a) the laymen of all cultural, linguistic, social and other identities living in that place, and (b) all the other orders of the Church as parts of the same community. Thus one can hope that one day the bishop will find his proper place which is the eucharist, and the rupture in eucharistic ecclesiology caused by the problem “parish-diocese” will be healed in the right way. 557 With the development of the metropolitan system and gradually of that of the patriarchates in the ancient Church the center of “local” unity was shifted from the episcopal diocese to larger geographical units comprising the dioceses of a province under the headship of the bishop of the metropolis of that province. This development, which survives only nominally today in Orthodoxy (cetrain bishops are called “metropolitans” but in fact the metropolis as an entity does not exist any longer, having disappeared together with the ancient Roman or Byzantine province), has not essentially altered the view of the local Church as identical with the episcopal diocese. The metropolitan system having developed in close connection with the synodal practice in the ancient Church represented an “occasional” or “casual” sort of Church “localization,” coinciding with the meetings of the synods. As the principle of the essential equality of all bishops became a basic feature in Orthodox canon law, neither the metropolitans nor the patriarchs ever reached the position of heads of particular ecclesial units representing structures above or besides the episcopal diocese. Permanent synods do exist in the Orthodox Churches, but they are never understood as separate ecclesial “bodies” which could be called “local Churches.” With the development of the famous theory of the pentarchy in Byzantium, a system emerged in Orthodoxy whereby the entire οκουμνη comprised five divisions (patriarchates). |
| However, for the Church to present this way of existence, she must herself be an image of the way in which God exists. Her entire structure, her ministries etc. must express this way of existence. And that means, above all else, that the Church must have a right faith, a correct vision with respect to the being of God. Orthodoxy concerning the being of God is not a luxury for the Church and for man: it is an existential necessity. During the patristic period, there was scarcely mention of the being of the Church, whilst much was made of the being of God. The question that preoccupied the Fathers was not to know if God existed or not – the existence of God was a “given” for nearly all men of this period, Christians or pagans. The question which tormented entire generations was rather: how he existed. And such a question had direct consequences as much for the Church as for man, since both were considered as “images of God.” To answer the question about the being of God, during the patristic period, was not easy. The greatest difficulty stemmed from ancient Greek ontology which was fundamentally monistic: the being of the world and the being of God formed, for the ancient Greeks, an unbreakable unity. That linked together the being of God and the being of the world, while biblical faith proclaimed God to be absolutely free with regard to the world. The Platonic conception of the creator God did not satisfy the Fathers of the Church, and this, precisely because the doctrine of creation from pre-existing matter limited divine freedom. So it was necessary to find an ontology that avoided the monistic Greek philosophy as much as the “gulf” between God and the world taught by the gnostic systems – the other great danger of this period. The creation of this ontology was perhaps the greatest philosophical achievement of patristic thought. The ecclesial experience of the Fathers played a decisive role in breaking ontological monism and avoiding the gnostic “gulf” between God and the world. The fact that neither the apologists, such as Justin Martyr, nor the Alexandrian catechetical theologians, such as the celebrated Clement and Origen, could completely avoid the trap of the ontological monism of Greek thought is not accidental: they were above all “doctors,” academic theologians interested principally in Christianity as “revelation.” By contrast, the bishops of this period, pastoral theologians such as St Ignatius of Antioch and above all St Irenaeus and later St Athanasius, approached the being of God through the experience of the ecclesial community, of ecclesial being. This experience revealed something very important: the being of God could be known only through personal relationships and personal love. Being means life, and life means communion. |
| It seems, therefore, that the question of priority between Christology and Pneumatology does not necessarily constitute a problem, and the Church could see no problem in this diversity of approach either liturgically or theologically for a long time. Thus there is no reason why things should be different today, as some Orthodox seem to suggest. The problem arose only when these two aspects were in fact separated from each other both liturgically and theologically. It was at this point in history that East and West started to follow their separate ways leading finally to total estrangement and division. Not only baptism and confirmation were separated liturgically in the West, but Christology tended little by little to dominate Pneumatology, the Filioque being only part of the new development. The East while keeping the liturgical unity between baptism and chrismation, thus maintaining the original synthesis on the liturgical level, did not finally manage to overcome the temptation of a reactionary attitude towards the West in its theology. The atmosphere of mutual polemic and suspicion contributed a great deal to this situation and obscured the entire issue. What we must and can see clearly now, however, is that so long as the unity between Christology and Pneumatology remains unbreakable, the question of priority can remain a “theologoumenon.” For various reasons which have to do with the idiosyncrasy of the West (concern with history, ethics etc.), a certain priority will always be given by it to Christology over Pneumatology. Indeed, there are reasons to suppose that this could be spiritually expedient, especially in our time. Equally, for the East Pneumatology will always occupy an important place given the fact that a liturgical meta-historical approach to Christian existence seems to mark the Eastern ethos. Different concerns lead to different emphases and priorities. As long as the essential content of both Christology and Pneumatology is present, the synthesis is there in its fulness. But in what does this “content” consist? From what exactly does ecclesiology suffer if the content of Christology or Pneumatology is deficient? |
| This is as far as the ancient Graeco-Roman world takes the idea of personhood. The glory of this world consists in its having shown man a dimension of existence which may be called personal. Its weakness lies in the fact that its cosmological framework did not allow this dimension to be justified ontologically. Πρσωπεον and persona remained pointers towards the person. But they consciously – and this is precisely what was demanded by the cosmological framework of a self-authenticating cosmic or state harmony – constituted a reminder that this personal dimension is not and ought never to be identical with the essence of things, with the true being of man. Other powers, not the quality of personhood, laid claim to the ontological content of human existence. How, then, could we have arrived at an identification of the person with the being of man? How could freedom have become identical with the “world,” the identity of the concrete man a product of freedom, and man in his very being identical with the person? For these things to have come about, two basic presuppositions were necessary: (a) a radical change in cosmology which would free the world and man from ontological necessity; and (b) an ontological view of man which would unite the person with the being of man, with his permanent and enduring existence, with his genuine and absolute identity. The first of these could only be offered by Christianity with its biblical outlook. The second could only be attained by Greek thought with its interest in ontology. The Greek Fathers were precisely those who could unite the two. With a rare creativity worthy of the Greek spirit they gave history the concept of the person with an absoluteness which still moves modern man even though he has fundamentally abandoned their spirit. 2. The concept of the person with its absolute and ontological content was born historically from the endeavor of the Church to give ontological expression to its faith in the Triune God. This faith was primitive – it goes back to the very first years of the Church – and was handed down from generation to generation with the practice of baptism. The constant and profound contact, however, between Christianity and Greek philosophy sharpened the problem of the interpretation of this faith in a manner which would satisfy Greek thought. What does it mean to say that God is Father, Son and Spirit without ceasing to be one God? The history of the disputes which broke out оп this great theme do not interest us here in detail. What is significant is that this history includes a philosophical landmark, a revolution in Greek philosophy. This revolution is expressed historically through an identification: the identification of the “hypostasis” with the “person.” How was this unforeseen revolution accomplished? What kind of consequences did it have for the concept of the person? These are questions that must occupy us briefly. |
| This study owes its completion and publication to the blessing of God, which is manifested through many people. The writing of it was made possible thanks to the abundant research material available at Harvard University which gave hospitality to the author for many successive years. The presence at that university of distinguished professors, in particular G.Florovsky, G.Williams and K.Stendahl, was a font of inspiration and encouragement during the entire course of the research. Again, the submission of this study as a doctoral dissertation at my own alma mater, the Theological School of the University of Athens, provided the opportunity for some valuable suggestions and comments from the faculty there. The author is, therefore, deeply grateful, both for the trouble they took with him as teachers, and for all they did particularly for the present work, according it the honor of unanimous approval. Warmest thanks are due especially to my adviser Professor Gerasimos Konidaris both for his kind introduction to the School and for all his invaluable help. Finally, the original publication of this work would not have been possible but for the generous and touching financial support of Metropolitan Panteleimon of Thessaloniki and of Metropolitan Dionysios of Servies and Kozani who ungrudgingly took great trouble reading the drafts and followed the progress of the study, giving invaluable help from his rich literary and theological resources. To all of these and many others who indirectly and in various ways contributed to the appearance of this work, the expression of my gratitude repays only a small part of an unpaid debt. J.D.Z. Preface to the Second Edition The reception accorded to the present work was such that it long ago went out of print. The repeated calls from various quarters for the book to be republished accorded with the author’s own desire to add some chapters to the study which he considered indispensable for its completion, and to furnish the whole work with a new bibliography. Unfortunately, because of the time such an undertaking would require, it was proving ever more impracticable, and became virtually impossible after the author took on ecclesiastical obligations and duties in addition to his academic responsibilities about three years ago. There was thus nothing to be done but to reprint the work as it was, merely with the correction of some printing errors and omissions in the original edition. |
| Two observations contributed decisively to the decision to reprint this work. The first is academic in nature, and consists in the fact that even though 25 years have passed since this study was first published and many other studies relating to its subject have appeared in the meantime, the basic theses of this work are still sound and need no revision. It could indeed be said that the whole course of research internationally since this study was written has confirmed its theses with the result that they have become quite widely and internationally known and are now often regarded as commonplace. This was an encouraging factor in the decision to reprint this book even in its original form. The second observation which contributed decisively to the reprinting of this work is ecclesiastical in nature. The Orthodox Church, particularly in Greece, is today going through a critical period which, if the necessary care is not taken by the Church leadership, will soon lead to a crisis in institutions with unforeseen consequences for the doctrinal purity and substance of the Orthodox Church in that country. The characteristics of this critical period could be summarized in the following points. Firstly, under the influence of the modern spirit of so-called “democratic” tendencies, the institution of episcopacy, which had in the past been identified with “despotism”, is today experiencing a severe crisis. Many priests, a large part of the lay faithful and many bishops, too, do not know what exactly the task and the institution of the bishop consists in, and how it is connected with the doctrinal substance of the Church. Unfortunately, many Orthodox have it firmly entrenched in their mind that the bishop is in essence an administrator, and that in his liturgical function, including indeed the Divine Eucharist, he is not a person constitutive of the Mystery but more or less decorative someone who is invited to “embellish” the whole service by his presence and his vestments. Precisely because of the weakening of the ancient conception which this work demonstrates in such detail, namely, that the bishop is in essence the only president of the Divine Eucharist and that no Divine Liturgy is thinkable without reference to the bishop in whose name it is celebrated, ordination as priest has come to be regarded by many as sufficient for someone to celebrate the Divine Eucharist and transmit grace to the people without any clear dependence on his bishop. |
| We have to examine the terminology and conceptuality of that period of history. The Fathers of the Church did not remain fixed to the letter of the New Testament. Although it does not change in essentials, the worship and life of the Church varies in form and emphasis so, for example, in some periods the Church experiences public martyrdoms, while in others worship and spirituality take a more interior form. We can see the influence of monasticism on the worship of the Church through observance of the canonical hours, and then gradual disengagement from this in the twentieth century. These shifts in the experience of worship and the ascetic life have consequences for the Church’s interpretation of doctrine. But interpretation of Scripture and doctrine also requires that we interpret our own situation. This means that we must analyse contemporary intellectual movements, and the challenges thrown up by economic, technological, ecological and other changes. But theological interpretation of doctrine demands that its relationship to other currents of thought, and thus to philosophy, must be established too. A theologian must be familiar with the intellectual climate of his or her own time. But he or she must also be a philosopher in the sense of being a truly enquiring mind, and in the wider sense of being sensitive to the deepest needs of human beings. The theologian must also be familiar with the liturgical experience and the life of the Church, including the institutional forms established by the canons of the Church. Perhaps no individual can be expert at all of these, but whoever aspires to be a theologian must be aware of each of these disciplines. Theology requires expertise at a range of disciplines, accompanied by a moral sensitivity and intellectual curiosity. We have said that theology is first worship of God and that the fundamental logic of theology is given in the event of baptism and eucharistic worship. The Creed sets out the confessional structure which corresponds to the relationship with Christ that God has provided for our salvation. Problems start to occur when the arrangement of the individual doctrines of God, Christology, salvation and so on, does not relate to the logic of public confession represented by the Creed. The structure of any work of theology has to be flexible enough to allow all the relationships between each doctrine to emerge. For example, the chapter on the triune doctrine of God must establish connections to the Church, the sacraments and the eschaton. We cannot examine each doctrine in isolation from the whole to which it belongs, or we would be reproducing the individualising approach to dogmatics of the Scholastics and rationalists. |
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