A ON DOGMATICS AND DOGMAS 1. Definition, Sources, Content and Method of Dogmatics a. Forms and character of Dogmatics Dogmatics as a particular branch and lesson of Theology appeared in the West for the first time and was introduced in the Orthodox Theological Schools during later times. A major characteristic of this branch, as compared to other lessons of Theology, is its systematic character. While other branches of Theology are preoccupied with the dogmatic belief of the Church, Dogmatics approaches this faith by theme, and systematically expounds it. The Churchs systematic preoccupation with the faith appears during the patristic period for the first time, especially with Origen (his work On Principles), and in a strictly organized way with Saint John the Damascene (Exposition of the Orthodox Faith). Ever since that time, this subject has continued to develop in the West during Medieval times (Thomas Aquinatus, SUMMA) and during the post-Reform period, with the blossoming of Confessional Theology, in which Orthodoxy (wrongly) participated (Mogila Confession, Cyril Lucareus, Dositheos etc). In later times (after Eugene Vulgaris), this phenomenon blossomed in the 19th century (Athanasios Parios Epitome 1806. Moschopoulos Epitome of dogmatic and ethical theology, 1851. Especially among the Russians, we note the Metropolitan Anthony, Makarios of Moscow both widely acknowledged). In the 20th century, Z. Rossis is in the lead in Greece, with Ch. Androutsos as the central persona; I. Karmiris and P. Trembelas follow, basically correcting Androutsos but still maintaining the same method and division. This branch was successfully cultivated in the Theological School of Chalki, by the Metropolitan of Myra, Chrysostom Constantinides. A new boost to Dogmatics was given by John Romanides, with his persistence that the character of the dogma entails the experience of it, and also his search for the patristic roots of the dogmas, as opposed to Western Theology. However, systematic preoccupation is not the only form of dogmatic theology. This species didnt exist in the Bible or in the Fathers of the first century; instead, a circumstantial dogmatic theology prevailed, in the following forms: () Adorational and mostly Eucharist: Christological hymns in the New Testament, which Paul discovered in the first communities (i.e., Philippians 2). These comprise theological-dogmatic elements for his entire line of thought. The same applies with the literary content of Johns Gospel (Johns Gospel is considered by many as a Eucharist-liturgical text; if not entirely, then at least in its basic core. As for the Gospels prologue, it most probably comprises liturgical material that John found to be used in worship). Peters literary work also: (Peters Epistle A is quite possibly a baptismal Liturgy), etc. The same applies to the Eucharist references of the first centuries, which comprise forms of prophetic-charismatic theology by the bishops that headed the Eucharist congregations (who by the way- were initially free to improvise, as testified in Justin, the Teaching, etc.)

() Baptismal The baptismal form, along with the catechist preparation that preceded it. This is also the chief source of Symbolic Theology (i.e., the Symbols of Faith). All Symbols were Baptismal and they remained thus during the first centuries. For example, the 1st Ecumenical Council (Synod) uses as the basis of its Creed the baptismal symbols of the local Churches. () Anti-heretic This form boosted the development and expansion of the initial baptismal symbols to a broader range of symbols, in order to confront the dangers of heresies (i.e. Gnosticism, Arianism, etc.). In this context, Patristic Theology (Irenaeus, Athanasios, Cyril of Alexandria, Maximus the Confessor etc.) attained special importance and evolved as opposition, and were not intended as a positive exhibition of faith. (V) Synodic and especially the Ecumenical Councils (Synods), which originated from a combination of antiheretic theology (=the exclusion of heresies), and the baptismal-symbolic theology. Thus, the terms and the symbols of the Synods -as well as many of their Canons- likewise comprise fundamental forms of dogmatic theology. (V) Empirical This is a form of theology that originated in the ascetic (mainly) experience of the Fathers, which is of special significance to the Orthodox. Here, the maxims of the desert Fathers, the works of Saint John of the Ladder, Maximus the Confessor, Simeon the New Theologian, the Esychasts and especially Gregory Palamas, all express dogmatic theology through ascetic experience. Because of all these elements, Dogmatics is basically an experience, an empirical issue, and not a matter of intellectual perception or the presentation of logical proposals. It is not a matter of approving and confessing truths that are merely directed at ones mind and logic, but are empirically experienced relations between man and God. From this last point it can be surmised that the meaning of empirical experience should not be understood as reverential (=a psychological experience of the person), or as ethical (=a specific behavior of the person - certain actions of his); it should be understood existentially, in the broader sense of the term, which relates to ontology. In other words, Dogmatics involves issues that relate to the very being of a person (=to exist or not to exist), and such issues are for example- the naught (non-being) (=creation), life and death as terminal points of existence, the created and the uncreated as an issue of freedom (of being), the persona and love as the borderline distinctions between man and animal (=the moment during which man is either elevated as a man, or falls), in other words, the problem of evil and sin and generally everything that touches on fundamental and ontological matters, and not merely on matters of life improvement (i.e., the organizing of social life in a more productive way etc.. Certain theologians preoccupy themselves mainly with this, in the West).

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A result of all these positions is that Dogmatics always pertains to vital issues, of salvational significance; the Church always dogmatizes in order to save, and not in order to enrich our knowledge of God, the world etc.. Each dogma of the Church and each synodical dogmatic decision always pertains to a specific problem of salvation; this means that our entire relationship with God and the world changes in a dangerous way if a certain dogma is not accepted, or, in the opposite case, it will be formulated in a salvational way for us and the world, if the dogma becomes accepted. Consequently, in Dogmatics we must always seek the salvational significance of the dogmas and not just present them dryly, like logical formulas. This is what we mean by existential comprehension of the dogma or empirical theology in its true sense. Thus, Dogmatics has to always strive to interpret the dogmas, and not preserve them or present them as expressed in their original form. This subject is huge and extremely sensitive, and needs to be analyzed. b. Dogmatics as Hermeneutics (Interpretation) 1. The problem of hermeneutics (interpretation) is of timely importance, not only for the dogmas, but for the Holy Bible itself. I would say that hermeneutics itself is essentially the problem. Just as the Bible is a dead letter when not interpreted, thus the dogmas become fossilized and museum items archaeological objects which we simply preserve and describe if we dont proceed to interpret them. One could say that the dogmas are essentially the interpretation of the Bible. 2. The interpretation of the dogmas or the Bible involves two limbs: a. The attempt to comprehend faithfully (not anachronistically which is a difficult thing, as it needs good historians) the historical reality, in the framework of which the dogma (or the Scripture) was expressed. This involves the following questions: . What kind of problems did the Church have to confront during that historical period? . What means did it resort to, to solve these problems ? In other words: . What kind of written and verbal tradition did the Church have at its disposal? (Holy Bible, Tradition etc.)? (Every Synod would always take into account any previous tradition). . What kind of vocabulary and meanings did the cultural environment of that era have at its disposal? (for example, the 4th century uses the word homoousios of the same essence- which the New Testament doesnt have, while the 14th century includes other meanings etc.) C. What kind of experiences (worship, ascetic living etc.) did it have? (for example, martyrdom in the New Testament, the icons in the 7th Ecumenical Council/synod, Hesychasm, etc.) All of the above must be taken into account, in order to form an idea of the historical environment. Without an accurate historical basis, every interpretation would be a risky one. The interpretation of the Bible is not possible, unless there is previously an accurate and subjective (as much as possible) research into the historical background, as with the dogmas. We need to see which problems led to the drafting of a dogma; what kind of literary and philosophical material the Fathers utilized, and

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from what experience (worship, ascetic etc.) the formulation of the dogma sprang. An able dogmatist must also be an able historian. b. The attempt to locate and to define contemporary problems that demand evaluation, for example: . Possible new heresies or new, agonizing questions of mankind, always of a fundamental character (nowadays the so-called Jehovahs Witnesses etc.; also technology, ecology etc.) . The vocabulary and the categorizing of that time (we saw how the Fathers were also contemporaries of their time, yet without remaining fixed to the letter of the New Testament see reference on homoousios) . The adorational and ascetic lifestyle of the Church (which cannot essentially differ from the old one, but is possible for it to have varying forms and emphasis, for example martyrdom, mental prayer in the specific Hesychastic form, the influence of monkhood on the secular services of the Church Hours, etc. and the gradual disengagement from it - albeit incomplete and inconsistent, as observed for example in our days. All these are indications of a shift in emphasis in the adorational and ascetic experience, which cannot but affect the interpretation of a dogma. In order to provide a good interpretation, the dogmatician must not only be a good historian, but a good philosopher as well (with philosophical thought and a knowledge of contemporary philosophy), and he must also have a poiemantic disposition (love towards mankind, leaning over their problems etc.). He is also obliged to be familiar with the liturgical experience and the life of the Church and its Canonic structure, because these elements also express the dogmatic faith of the Church. (Of course all of the above cannot be concentrated in one person in a unique way - in other words, a unique researcher of all the above but he must, if he desires to be a good dogmatician, be kept informed of the latest positions of the specialists in those individual areas). c. The Dogmatics method As you can see, Dogmatics has a broad spectrum of research and presupposes a manifold knowledge as well as sensitivity and creative thought. It is for this reason, that the Dogmatics method must include: A. A very general plan or structure, which would be the Symbol of Faith (Creed) as it had always prevailed in Baptismal and Eucharist worship. The reason this structure is recommended, is that it was basically upheld during the Patristic era, and also, because it is linked to the very structure of relations that God through Christ and in the Holy Spirit had provided for our salvation. You must observe here that, when the subdivision by theoretical material of topics such as Triadology, Christology, Salvation, Sacraments, eschatological, etc. is not directly linked to the structure of the Symbol of Faith (Creed), it becomes dangerous. This was developed in the West and was copied by the Orthodox, with the Russians and Androutsos at the lead. . This plan has to be very general, so that it may accommodate the various components. For example, in the sector on the Holy Trinity, reference can be made to the Church and vice versa. Or, on the Sacraments, to End Times etc.. In this way, Scholastic Dogmatics that came from the West is avoided. However, analogies must always be maintained, as we shall see in the respective chapters.

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C. Verification and a faithful presentation of the significance of dogmas in their era are imperative, i.e.: What kind of problems did they have in mind, and what means (literary-philosophical) did they use, to confront those problems? In other words, Orthodox Dogmatics must always contain an element of history; if it lacks a solid dogmatic history, then it cannot become part of Orthodox Dogmatics. D. Attempts should be made to interpret each dogma, with the following as guides: . By linking it to the adorational and ascetic experience of the Church (e.g., Christ, as the Son of God: how He is worshipped and how He is experienced within the Church?). . By linking it to mankinds most fundamental existential problems during each era, such as: the quest for freedom, love, the transcendence of death etc. (example: the significance of faith in a Trinitarian God in each of these cases). . By linking it to mankinds current problems. This is mainly the field of Ethical Poemantics, but it should be prepared at least with cues- by dogmatic theologians. (for instance, current day social problems, issues that are raised by technology, ecology, etc.) V. By linking it to the broader problems of Knowledge nowadays, as posed by Natural Sciences etc.

2. The term dogma and its significance The term is derived from the (Greek) verb dokein (= seeming, believing) and originally, its literal meaning was that which seems good or proper to someone; it also pertains to belief, ideology, principle, opinion, faith, and other related meanings. (Platos Soph.256C: by making use of the many dogmas and words). From its original meaning of a personal opinion, the term was transposed to the field of philosophical positions; in other words, it became a knowledge belonging to a (philosophical) School. (e.g. Plutarch, Ethica 14B: the dogmas pertaining to souls or the Stoic philosophers dogmas, etc.) The transposing over to this meaning is justified, by the fact that ancient thought demanded eclecticism in philosophy. Later on, this term was transposed to public life (the state) and it signified decisions or decrees bearing state authority (Platos Laws, 644D: the city dogma, also in Luke, 2:1: a decree (dogma, in the Greek text) was issued by Caesar Augustus to conduct a census of the population. Thus, the term took on the meaning of something compulsory, something characterized by authority and prestige. It afterwards took on a religious meaning, through the Old Testament and Judaism, with a legalcompulsory character. This is why it had a rather negative inference in Apostle Paul (Colossians, 2:14), where Christ is said to have erased the manuscript of dogmas that were against you and in (Ephesians, 2:15), where Christ abolished the enmity in His Body, by abolishing the dogma of the Law of the Commandments). 5

In Luke, however, they specifically adopted the initial, affirmative meaning that was to prevail from then onwards in Christian usage. Acts, 16:4: as they passed through the cities, they delivered unto them the decrees (dogmas in Greek text) that were validated by the apostles and the elders. We thus arrive at the dogmas of the Church, as being the authentic decisions pertaining to faith, that are delivered for compulsory acceptance, and are linked to the presence and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. A classical example is in Acts, 15:28: it seemed proper (refer above, to the origin of the word dogma) to the Holy Spirit and to us (=us the Apostles) The usage of the term with its contemporary, technical meaning is rare, in the Fathers of the Church. Whenever it appears, it has the following characteristics: A) For the original, Apostolic Fathers, the term is most likely linked to practice rather than theory (ref. Ignatius, Megnesians 13:1, Barnabas, etc.) B) It is equally used in instances pertaining to the Church and heretics (Vasilios the Great, To Esychasts: possible to destroy the heterodox dogmas ; also, in John The Chrysostom: the devil has sown these deceitful dogmas of irreverence; in the Menaion of January as for the dogmas of the infidel, they are justly drowned C) Very important: the dogma is linked to worship, contradistinguishing it to kerygma (teaching, sermon). This is expressed in a monumental proposal by Vasilios the Great, in his work on the Holy Spirit: ..for, dogmas are hushed, whereas sermons are publicized.... This passage gave rise to younger patrologists to interpret Vasilios hushing as pertaining to the divinity of the Holy Spirit. But for our present topic of discussion, this phrase of Vasilios has the following significance: Dogmas are those things that the Church (as a worshipping community) confesses, and not those things that it promulgates to others, who are outside the Church. The deeper meaning of this viewpoint will preoccupy us again later on, but for the time being, we can just make a note that according to Vasilios the Great, the meaning of dogma has the community of the Church as a prerequisite, along with a participation in its worship, otherwise it bears no authority. This basic position of the Fathers - which we often forget is also expressed by Gregory the Theologian, in the familiar phrase of his Address to Eunomians: let us philosophize, within our own boundaries. As testified by these words, the meaning inferred is: within the holy territory (and not in Egypt and Assyria), in other words, within the Church. From this, we surmise that the authority of a dogma does not belong to the sphere of logic, nor to a blind obedience to -and resignation from- logic, but to a new logic, which is generated from the relations between the people of the ecclesiastic community. But we shall talk more about this later on. Summary: Dogma is that which an ecclesiastic community embraces as an (existentially) salvatory truth that applies to every man, and requires its members to accept it (through personal experience) as authoritative, because of the specialized relations that it ordains between members, as well as towards the world and God. The kerygma (sermon) on the other hand is whatever is addressed to all persons, publicly, in order that they may become members of the Church, and only then (as members of the Church) confess it as a dogma, having experienced it personally. 6

The truth does not become a dogma, unless it has been experienced and certified from within the Church. From this, it is obvious that the dogmas of the Church are not limited in number; new dogmas can be formulated in every era, because the Church is a living organism and the Holy Spirit is not associated to certain isolated periods of history. But, for a truth to become a dogma of the Church (and not a personal opinion), it must necessarily go through the community of the Church in its totality, and not only through a few people be they theologians in the current (academic) sense, or saints. This point needs clarifications, because two important issues are posed: 1st: How the dogma is linked to the Holy Bible and 2nd: The authority of a dogma in general and in respect to Dogmatics itself. 3. The affiliation of dogmas to the Holy Scriptures The affiliation of dogmas to the Scriptures is a hermeneutic one. The problem posed by Western theologians, after the Reform Era, as to whether we have one or two sources of divine revelation as they were named, denotes the specific concern between Roman Catholics and Protestants, given that the latter had rejected the authority of the Tradition of the Church, and had introduced the principle of sola scriptura (=only the scripture). In Orthodox Theology, the problem was posed through the so-called Orthodox Confessions of the 17th century (prev.ref.). Thus, depending on the deviation of these confessions (Mogilas=Roman Catholicism, Cyril Loukaris=Calvinism, etc.), the answer was and continues to be- provided by the Orthodox. The West was led into this concern for two reasons, which do not apply in Orthodoxy: 1. The West lacked the element that a revelation is always something personal, and never something logical or intellectual. God revealed Himself to Abraham, to Moses, to Paul, to the Fathers, etc.. Consequently, it is never an issue of a new revelation, or an addition to a revelation, or even a case of Johns Revelations being incremented, as suggested even by Orthodox theologians. 2. In the West, an objectification of the Scriptures and the Church had become prevalent to such an extent, that expressions such as treasuries of the truth were coined. But in Orthodox tradition, both the Scripture and the Church are considered to be testimonies of experience of the truth, and not merely masterminds that perceive, record and transmit truths. This is because the truth in Orthodox Tradition is not a matter of objective, logical proposals; the truth consists of (personal) stances and relations between God, mankind and the world. (For example, I do not become acquainted with the truth by intellectually knowing and finally accepting that God is Triune; it is only when I am personally involved existentially in the Triadic existence of God, through which my entire being as well as the worlds acquires a meaning. In this way, any ordinary, everyday woman who is however a proper member of the Church, can know the dogma of the Trinity. The same applies for Christology etc.). But we shall go into this topic of Gnosiology in more detail, later. Consequently, if the Revelation of God is a matter of personal experience and a broader implication of man in a lattice of relations with God, with fellow-man and the world, and if it pours new light onto overall existence, then the Scripture that testifies to this Revelation is considered complete, 7

both from the aspect of the Revelations content, as well as for every other similar kind Revelation pursuant to the composing of the Bibles Canon. We must add the following clarifications here: Even though in every case of such personal and existential revelations, the revelations are of the One and Only God, the means by which they are revealed differ; for instance, on Mount Sinai we have a revelation of God Himself, which is revealed to us in Christ, but not in the same way. With Christ, we are enabled not only to see or hear God, but to actually touch Him, to feel Him, to commune with Him physically: Who was from the beginning, Whom we heard, Whom we saw and Whom our hands touched. (John I, 1:1). The divine epiphanies of the Old Testament, and subsequently in the New Testament, while having the same content, are not revealed in the same way. And, because a Revelation as we said is not a matter of objective knowledge but a personal relationship, the form of a Revelation is of vital importance because it introduces new relationships, or in other words, new existential ways. (The matter of relations between Old and New Testaments is historically very old in Patristic Theology, and it was solved through the Theology of saint Irineos, who dramatically corrected Justins teaching on the Logos, and was later formulated excellently by Saint Maximus the Confessor, in his principle that stated: the contents of the Old Testament are the shadow, the contents of the New Testament are the image, and the (contents of) the things to come is the truth.) Consequently, in the person of Christ we have a unique form of revelation that is characterized by communion with the senses (vision, touch, taste, etc., as per the passage of John I, 1:1 where we read: and Whom our hands touched), and not only with the mind or the heart. This is why this way was judged by the Fathers as being the supreme and fullest way. Nothing is superior to Christophany (Christ being revealed): Whomsoever has seen me, has seen the Father. Thus, the New Testament in which is recorded the experience of those people who had this physical communion with God (Whom we saw and Whom our hands touched) gives meaning to both the Theophanies (God being revealed) in the Old Testament, as well as those that followed, after the Bible. In fact, the Fathers (Irineos and others) maintain that after the Incarnation of the Logos, we have a fuller and newer form of revelation than that of the Old Testament. In respect to the Disciples, this superiority is attributed to their tangible and physical association with Christ; in respect to the subsequent Church, this superiority is attributed to the Sacraments and especially in the Eucharist, which has preserved this physical communion (see Ignatius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Cyril of Alexandria etc.). Those who participate deservedly in the Divine Eucharist, can see God much better than Moses. Thus, the entire life of the Church draws the revelation of God from the event of the historical Christ, as recorded in the New Testament. And that is why the New Testament has the status of an exceptional and primeval dogma, compared to which, all other revelatory means (including the Old Testament and subsequent dogmas) comprise renditions of it, in the more profound, existential sense of the word, i.e. the means of experiencing existence, as a new relationship between God, mankind and the world. Conclusion: Neither the rendering of the New Testament or the dogmas can circumvent the event and the person of Christ, because that would require the insertion of a new kind of revelation, fuller and superior to that of Christ. We can draw a great number of individual conclusions from this, but I will note only the following:

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. The Divine Eucharist, as the exceptional form of tangible communion and therefore cognizance- of God, remains forever the highest and most perfect form of Gods revelation, in its personal, existential sense (and Whom our hands touched). . The viewings of God (every form of Theophany), whether through holy icons or through the ascetic experience, are viewings of the Uncreated Light, always in the form that it is revealed in Christ, and not independent of it; in other words, they are essentially Christophanies. (This should be stressed, in order to avoid misunderstandings that are unfortunately beginning to increase in number). As proof of this, it suffices to mention that, as regards the icons, the entire argumentation of saints John the Damascene, Theodore the Studite etc Iconophiles is: that Christs incarnation imposes the veneration of icons as forms of Gods revelation; and as for the Uncreated Light, that this light was understood by the holy Esychasts to be the Taborian Light, in other words, as a partaking of the light that radiated from the historical body of Christ. Getting back to the association between Scripture and dogmas, we therefore note that every dogma, regardless to what it pertains (even the issue of the Holy Trinity), is essentially a memorandum to the event of Christ, through which God is revealed as an existential experience of a relationship, in other words, as truth. It is not by chance, that, for instance, the 1 st Ecumenical Council (Synod), while founding the Trinitarian theology, also did this on the pretext and the basis of the truth regarding the Persona of Christ. The same was done by all the pursuant Ecumenical Councils, even though they were also preoccupied with all other issues. This indicates that the Apostolic experience that is recorded in the Bible comprises the first dogma, which is then interpreted by all the other dogmas. It is therefore impossible for any dogma to impinge on this experience; it can only interpret it. The Apostolic experience and tradition is of decisive importance for the dogma. In this way, we have a consecutiveness of dogmas, a sequence of dogmas, which resemble icons of Christ that are painted by different people in different eras, and with the means that every era had at its disposal. This sequence is both external (= a fidelity to the preceding tradition and finally to the Bible), and also internal (= a preservation of the same existential relationship between God, mankind and the world, as fulfilled and revealed in Christ). 4. The function of the Holy Spirit in the formulation of dogmas Theophany (the manifestation of God) as Christophany (the manifestation of Christ), which comprises the basis of the dogma, contains two basic problems. The one problem is that, one needs to cover the period of time that intervenes between the historical Christ and His (=the Apostolic) era, with the pursuant generations; these are the eras in which the dogma is formulated. So, How is it possible to bridge this time chasm? The second problem is that, within that same historical Theophany in Christ, there is the dimension of already, and not yet: in the historical Christ and the experience of the first apostles, we have Gods revelation as an inner reflection and an enigma and not as something seen face to face. The fulfilled, face to face revelation is an eschatological reality. Christ bears a pre-portrayal and a pre-savoring of the Kingdom, in other words, the complete and direct, personal cognizance (knowledge) of God. Until that last day has come, no prophet or saint has a full cognizance of

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God, in a stable and unchangeable form. How is it possible for this pre-savoring of paradise, this complete cognizance of God to be attained from now, with a complete certainty that the proclaimed dogma expresses this pre-portrayal, and that it formulates it faithfully and accurately? In other words, the dogma -as a faithful portrayal of Christ who reveals God- has to be faithful in the following two dimensions: A. The faithful portrayal of the historic Christ (= past), and B. The faithful portrayal of the future, eschatological Christ and His Kingdom. (ref. Byzantine icons they are not limited to historical representations, but they also portray the future situation, for example the icon of the Pentecost). This task of bridging the present (=dogma) with the past (historical Christophany) and the future (=Second Coming), is the exceptional task of the Holy Spirit in Divine Providence. It seemed proper to the Holy Spirit and to us (Acts 15), is the decision reached by the Apostolic Synod. It comprises the fixed conviction of the Church that the dogmas are of the Holy Spirits inspiration, as is the Scripture (every divinely inspired scripture..) (Timothy II, 3:16). But this requires serious attention, because it can be understood in different ways; thus: 1. The presence of the Holy Spirit and His action can be misconstrued as a kind of magical and mechanical intervention of God. This reminds us of the divine inspiration of the ancient Hellenes (divination, oracles etc.), where personal freedom was excluded: the authors of the Bible and the Fathers of the Councils (Synods) were thus involuntary instruments of the Spirit. This is a perception that prevailed in the West (from where it also originated), in the form of so-called Fundamentalism. 2. The presence and the effect of the Spirit can be comprehended as being the result of moral changes in man. When we say moral changes, we imply a broader meaning of mans every improvement that is attributed to his own striving. (for example, catharsis from vices; acquiring virtues etc.) 3. The effect of the Holy Spirit can be perceived as being the result of a community event, in both its perpendicular and its lateral dimensions, in other words, as a result of the communion within an ecclesiastic community. Of these possibilities, the first one must be excluded altogether. The Holy Spirit is a Spirit of freedom, and does not force man. Besides, the event of Christ, the very nature of Christophany, is such that it fully respects a persons freedom. The second possibility has more value and gravity and is more fitting to the prerequisites of ascetic experience, which, as we saw, must always be taken into consideration. Without catharsis from vices, it is not possible for anyone to see God (for example, whoever hates his brother cannot see God ref. John I). In this same spirit, saint Gregory the theologian rebutted the Eunomians, who had created an entirely different, intellectual theology that allowed anyone to theologize, even after horseracing events and singing and feastingwhich (theology) deemed equally a part of enjoyment, by pointing out to them that it is not for everyone to philosophize on God. not for everyone, but only by those who have been tested and who have spent their life in theory (of God), and prior to this- have a cleansed soul and body, or are at least cleansing them. However, if ascetic living is taken as an isolated and self-sufficient prerequisite, then it is suffering from two 10

serious faults: that of individualism and moralism. In other words, we shall be in danger of believing that God reveals Himself to isolated individuals and under certain conditions of human achievement. This is why the second possibility must necessarily be combined with the third one, which the ecclesiastic form of action of the Holy Spirit. In order for this to be comprehended, we must first of all rid ourselves of a faulty perception that we have; i.e., that the Holy Spirit acts upon isolated persons. This perception is so widespread, that it might seem strange to refer to it as faulty. Those who defend this view are overlooking a fundamental distinction between the action of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament and the action in the New Testament. In the Old Testament, the Spirit is given to certain people (prophets, kings, etc.) and not the entire nation of Israel. During the Messianic era however, when the Holy Spirit is introduced in the New Testament with the arrival of the Messiah, it was expected that the Spirit would be given to the entire nation of God. This is why Luke in his narration of the Pentecost uses the phrase of the prophet Joel: in the last days I shall pour forth from My Spirit over every flesh..says the Lord Almighty As a result of this, all baptized Christians -in the New Testament- were considered as having the Holy Spirit and possessing various charismas. If we examine chapter 12 of Corinthians I, we can see how, for the apostle Paul, being a member of the Church is equivalent to possessing a certain charisma of the Spirit. Given that the Corinthians were under the impression that some people can be more charismatic than others, Paul refutes this perception vehemently, and stresses that everyone has some sort of charisma, even those who perform a simple task such as administration etc. Paul thus strikes back at every form of spiritual elitism, stressing that even if someone has adequate knowledge or faith to move mountains, he will be nothing, if he has no love. What does love signify here? If we take a look at this text as a whole (chapters 11 14) and not as isolated verses, we can see that for Paul, love therein- signifies the communion that the community of the Church creates. Love here is not about the feelings of a certain person (good intentions etc.), but the inter-dependence of the members of the church, as one body. Love means not saying that I am the head and I dont need the legs etc This is what Paul was stressing here: the inter-dependence of the assorted charismas. It is precisely for this reason, that Paul ends his Epistle by naming the Holy Spirit community. In Corinthians II, 13:13, it actually appears to be an expression that existed prior to Paul in the liturgical usage of the first Churches, and one that has remained a basic element of the Divine Eucharist ever since. Wherever the Spirit drifts, It creates a community, and destroys individualism. We must understand this thoroughly. This was how all the Fathers of the Church had also perceived the Holy Spirit. One could present a multitude of quotes from the Fathers of the first centuries, for example Gregory of Nazianzus, who especially focuses on personal theory (= viewing), hence endowing a special significance to the way he refers to the Holy Spirit. In his 12th Address, he compares the desire for theory with the Spirit as follows: On the one hand, there is the desire for theory, that is, the tendency for solitude, a catharsis of the mind and theory; but, this is not where the Spirit leads to. The Spirit moves within (the congregation of the church), leading it and making it fruitful (the ecclesiastic community), in the desire to benefit it, that they may benefit each other, and make public the (Spirits) enlightenment. This is why the prepared

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(congregated) church is to saint Gregory- so much more superior than the experience of theory, as the skies are by comparison to a star, or a garden to a plant, or a whole body to a body member. To the Fathers, this is the chief work of the Spirit: to lead towards the overall Church, and not towards isolated, personal experiences. Consequently, all the charismas of the Church are necessary for the revelation of God; not just the few and far between ones. The reason for this is that no charisma can be imaginable, without its inter-dependence with the other ones. The Church has a variety of charismas; not everyone possesses knowledge, not everyone has healing abilities, or the gift of speaking languages, or administrative abilities etc.. They are not all god-seers in the same way. At any rate, no-one can see God on his own and independently of the other charismas. The Spirit acts as a community, and that means: within the body of the Church. Thus, we reach the conclusion with regard to the dogmas, that the revelation of the truth always presupposes a communion and a community of the Church in order for the dogma to be a truth. What exactly does this mean? 5. The task of the Church in the formulation of dogmas What is the Church, and how does it act in the formulation of dogmas? We shall speak more of the Church in the respective chapter, but as far as the dogmas are concerned, we can make note of the following: 1. Church means the communion and the community through which -and within which- the new existential relations between God, mankind and the world (as manifested and realized in the person of Christ) are revealed and realized. In other words, in the Church, the entire world, with the new Adam (Christ) at its head, acknowledges God as Father and is thus saved from alienation and deterioration. The cognizance and the revelation of God is thus an empirical reality within the body of the Church, which has the form of a paternal-filial association wherein the entire world is embodied, thus constituting the body of Christ. Consequently, the Church as the body of Christ is, in this sense, the only proper and complete existential form of cognizance of God, through the lattice of relations that are realized within the community.

2. In order for the Church to comprise the full revelation of this existential form of cognizance of God, it must have the following elements, which arise from the aforementioned definition: A. It must be a community-congregation that consists of all the Church members. All of the baptized members of the Church (who continue to preserve the association between God-mankindpeople, as manifested and realized in Christ) are necessary, for the constituting of the body that will reveal Christ. Consequently, the lay people who remain faithful to the baptismal relationship between God and the world are of an opportune significance to the revelation of the truth of the Son as the new association between God and the world. B. It must have at the head of the community a ministry that will express the presence of Christ and the Apostles as the ones who will constantly judge the communitys preservation of the original 12

form of the body of Christ as revealed and experienced in the Old Testament era (see above). This ministry cannot be anything other than the prelate bishop of the Eucharist community as an image of Christ, surrounded by the presbyters, as images of the Apostles. This prevailed from the 2 nd century A.D. onward (Ignatius of Antioch) without interruption (until the Reform in the West), because in the Eucharist, the community of the Church exceptionally lives and reveals this Christcentered association-revelation between God and the world. The cognizance of God there is experienced as the revealing of the new, salvatory association between God and the world as manifested in Christ (more in the respective chapter). Consequently, the leadership of the Eucharist community, in the person of the bishop, expresses the faith of that community with one mouth and one heart, as cited during the Divine Eucharist; in other words, it is expressed as a unanimity and not a dissent. C. Given that the Church is not comprised of one only community but of many, the expressing of the entire Churchs faith throughout the world becomes a reality, when all of the communities through their prelate bishops- coincide in the same faith; or, as Saint Ignatius of Antioch says: when the bishops in every corner of the world are of the (same) opinion as Jesus Christ. It was thus, that the synods (councils) of the prelate bishops -as the means of expressing the unanimity of their communities- came to be the most comprehensive expression of the proper faith of the Church. Therefore, the dogmas of the Church that are expressed by such synods (councils) and especially when these synods include or represent all of the prelate bishops (these are the ecumenical councils) are those that express the faith of the Church and reveal the cognizance of God within His association to the world through Christ, in the fullest manner. D. In order for the dogma to be a living reality and not a simple logical or expressive formulation, it must continuously be filtered through the community of the Church, to all of its members, as a perpetual confirmation and reception of it, in the conscience of the entire body of the Church. This reception does not have any legal status in the Orthodox Church (that is, no specific procedures for the reception of dogmas by church members are foreseen), instead, reception acts in a positive way as the liturgical Amen of the laity, without which the bishops cannot authentically perform anything liturgically, or proclaim and express anything dogmatically. It also acts negatively, in cases where there is a disagreement between bishops and the crew of the Church (for example, the Council of Florence). But, above all, the passing, the circulation of the dogma within the body, inside the veins of the entire community, is effected through the experiencing of the dogma, which we referred to above (with the variety of charismas). Thus, the entire church, the clergy with the bishops at the head, and the populace, all participate in the shaping of the dogmas as living and empirical truths that reveal God as the Father of Jesus Christ, and through Him, of the entire world, with Jesus Christ the God-man at its head. Bishops have the special ministry-charisma (and responsibility) of convening synods (councils), through which the faith-dogma can be confessed as a common and unanimous cognizance of God for all the Churches. That is why it is up to them to formulate the dogmas. But, the completion of a dogma demands the circulation, the reception and the experiencing of it by the entire body of the Church. 6. The prestige and the authority of dogmas

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From what we have said so far, it has become obvious that: A. Dogmas acquire their prestige from the constancy that they display towards the initial form of existential relationship between God and the world, which is not only revealed as a noetic knowledge, but is realized as a communion between God, the world and mankind in Christ; also in the experience of the first Disciples and apostolic communities, and as recorded in the New Testament. . In order for the dogmas to have prestige and authority, it is imperative that the eucharist community functions properly; in other words, it must be built properly, with the elements that we mentioned previously, and it must function as a community that consists of all the charismas and all the social classes. Consequently, the prestige of the dogmas is not imposed from on high, in the name of an authority that is perceived juridicially (=as already existent by definition in an institution), but is made evident and is consolidated as the Amen of the entire community. Thus, from the moment that the dogma has been completed in this manner and is consolidated in the conscience of the Church, its prestige becomes irrevocable, and the only thing that is permissible from then on, is the experiencing and the interpretation of that dogma (by dogmatic theology, by ascetic living, by hymnography, hagiography, etc..). Thus, whatever was decreed (in the above sense) as a dogma has absolute prestige and authority, and no pursuant synod or theology is allowed to rescind it, only to interpret it, perhaps formulating new dogmas, which, however, in order to become dogmas with prestige and authority of an equal stature to the preceding dogmas, must fulfill the same prerequisites that we mentioned above. C. From the above, we can comprehend the meaning of infallibility in the dogmas (and the Church). To the Orthodox, infallibility is not contained in any institution per se (for example in synods or in bishops), not even in any moral perfection or individual experience, or its acknowledgement through experience. The saints or the fathers, as individuals, are not automatically and by definition infallible. Infallibility is the result of the communion of the Holy Spirit, Who composes the wholeness of the institution of the Church. Therefore, no-one as an individual can be infallible; in other words, on his own, without any reference to the other charismas and functions of the Church. But, each individual can empirically express the truth of the Church as formulated by the synods of the bishops in an infallible way, provided the individual is faithful to this truth (as, for example, a hymnographer, or a hagiographer or an ascete or a martyr or an ordinary Christian who lives faithfully and humbly as a member of the eucharist body of the Church.) D. Especially in the case of dogmatic theology, it is obvious that it cannot claim infallibility in the same sense that the decreed dogmas do. Many theologians confuse the dogmas with the theology of the Fathers when speaking of authority: This was stated by Father so-and-so, therefore it must be infallible. This can lead to a dangerous confusion. In order for a patristic position to acquire full authority, it must be passed through the furnace of the communion of the Holy Spirit that we described above, and neither the holiness nor the personal prestige of that Holy Father qualify enough to make it of an equal stature to the dogmas. For example, Athanasios the Great had correctly phrased the faith of the Church, before the 1st Ecumenical Synod (Council) had convened to dogmatize. But it was only when the teaching of the 1st Ecumenical Synod was established in the

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Church, that Athanasios theology was rendered an infallible dogma, with a compulsory, overall acceptance. Of course the question is raised, as to what happens in those periods when ecumenical synods are inoperative and dogmas are not decreed. In this case, the Church continues to live and confess the truth of Gods Christophany, through various forms of experience and confessions, through the its contemporary Fathers (the Church always has Fathers); the Patristic era did not come to an end in the 9th century, as was predominantly believed by the West. However, these Fathers interpret the existing dogmas without producing any new ones; in other words, without expecting the overall acceptance by the Ecumenical Church of whatever they say. Thus, in the case of Dogmatics (for all of us who are preoccupied with the holy dogmas as teachers or as students), what we strive for is an (existential) interpretation of the dogmas, which is something that cannot demand any kind of prestige. It would be somewhat excessive if not audacious for a theologian to expect his own interpretation to be the one that fully and validly expresses the interpretation of the dogmas. Every one of us is capable of erring, and that is why we must all be humble enough to listen to each others views. Without this humility, we are at risk of proclaiming ourselves infallible popes, which is something that often appears in Orthodoxy, whereby each theologian tends to become a pope. The truth is revealed and is consolidated (=becomes infallible) only through our humble incorporation in the body of the Church, and by resigning ourselves to the communion and the community of the Holy Spirit. Because God, after all, is recognized only in the Spirit, through Love. But we shall speak of this in the next chapter on Gnosiology.

I. On cognizance 1. Cognizance of things The theories on supposed natural revelation maintain that man has an inbuilt cognizance (knowledge) of God, which man then further cultivates. In other words, man is born having knowledge of God. Other theories say that there is no natural revelation, only a direct revelation on Gods part. This is a dilemma that developed chiefly among Protestants and Roman Catholics. A leading upholder of the theory that natural revelation does not exist, was and continues to be - in the West : he is Karl Barth.

Like all other issues, this problem does not exist within our Orthodox tradition and mentality. Before we start to talk specifically about the patristic views the views of Orthodox tradition on the subject of knowing God - I would like to first define the problem: what is cognizance. And we shall begin by approaching the subject entirely objectively lets say, not as theologians, but as ordinary thinking people, or as scientists, if you wish.

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What is cognizance (knowledge) ?

1. Cognizance of things

When we say that I know something, for instance: the table, it means that I am behaving in the following way: I am pointing out this table in order to relate it to my person. Aristotle had introduced this basic principle, which became familiar as the this here of Aristotle. When you point towards something and you identify it, saying: this (thing) is this one and not something else, you are in fact saying that you know (recognize) it. In other words, knowing always has something to do with some kind of identification. From the moment that the objects identity is lost, then the knowledge of it is also lost. If this table is not this table but another one, then I dont know it. To be unable to identify it means I cannot recognize it. Consequently, the identity of an object or a being is a necessary prerequisite for cognizance (knowledge). Now, how do we identify various objects? (This has to do with the gnosiology of every science. We are not speaking as theologians here, but in general, as we already said). And so, in order to simplify matters, I pose the following question: In what way do I identify this table, and consequently say that I know it? A. This includes a negative action to begin with; in other words, I identify this table and I say that it is a table, thus ruling out that it is something else; I am saying that A is A and that it is not B. Therefore, in defining A, I try to define what is not A, i.e., by excluding another being. When I say it is this, it means it is not that. B. The second basic action that is contained in the act of cognizance (knowing) is that I am obliged precisely because I am excluding other objects to somehow encompass the object of my cognizance; I have to define it. (Pay attention, how the use of words is very important). What is the meaning of the word define? The word define contains the inference of boundaries, or limits, or terms, which I place around the object. I am indicating it by excluding other objects, but: I am also placing limits around it. C. The third action that I perform, which is a consequence of the second action, is that I am describing it. (here we have another term of gnosiology, which, however, signifies precisely the relating of an object by the method of isolating it) To describe an object means that I inscribe (write) things around that object and thus create a frame around it. I say that A is A and not B, and in this way, I identify it. Now, how do I go about describing it? In order to describe, I utilize certain properties that the object has; for instance, in order to say that I am describing this table, and that I am identifying it by describing it, I need to give it a form. If it loses its form ( as conceded to me by space and time ), I will say that this table is another one and not that one. I identify it as being another. Imagine, if space and time were nonexistent, and likewise the ability to isolate and to describe on the basis of the tables form, thus rendering this table united to the other table to an absolute degree, then, I would no longer be able to know (discern) the specific table. Identity is lost and there will be a confusion of objects. Cognizance (knowledge) will 16

disappear. Consequently, description ( usage of the limits that space and time place between two objects ) is a necessary element and is accomplished on the basis of the objects attributes (for example its form); this is advanced even further (Aristotle analyzed all of this), with the attributes of objects, which originate from a judgment expressed by the object of cognizance. In other words, I say that this table is square in shape; as cognizance of the table progresses, I can now define its form and say it is square. But where did I obtain the concept of square? It is a concept. Plato would have said it is an idea that we draw from the permanent cosmos of ideas and then apply to tangible objects. Aristotle says that it is not an idea, but merely attributes that the object itself possesses. In other words, the attribute of squareness already resides within the table. At any rate, for me to say that something is square, I must use a logical shape, which can apply everywhere, and not only to a table. It must also be applicable to other objects. It is not the table only that has a square shape. If we supposed that in all the world, only the table is square in shape, then I could not call it square. I have borrowed the concept of square from my experience of another object. We shall examine this eventually; (and you will see how opportune it is, when we apply it to God, which is a very serious issue. )

In any case, we are now at a point where we describe the object by using its different attributes, which, apart from its shape, include thousands of other things. The more attributes that I add, the more I know the object. For example, it is square; then I go to the colour. It has that colour. Then I go to various other attributes. And, based on all of these, I end up ( and this is our next element ) with the ability to utilize the object. And I can now define the object on the basis of its usefulness. I say that it is a table, because I use it for writing on. Thus, we always have a latent utilitarian aspect to this cognizance, which originates from the identification of an objects attributes, because these attributes are automatically available for usage. This usage may be aesthetic (i.e. it is beautiful), or the object may be altogether exploitable from a realistic aspect, in which case, I use it for a specific purpose. So, to summarize: For the cognizance (knowledge) of an object, so that we may know it, relate it, we must have an exclusion of another object and a description based on the attributes that the object possesses, with the help of time and space. This is because we do not only relate objects that we perceive with our eyes, but also objects that we dont see. I can relate my father; I know him. He is no longer alive. However, time has made it possible for him to be isolated from me, otherwise, there would have been confusion between my father and myself. If things were totally indistinct, I would never have known my father. I know him, thanks to the distance that time and space have allotted, as in the case of the table. Therefore, this description that I am making with the aid of time and space, is what helps me distinguish that A is A and not B. I can therefore know things, on the basis of this procedure of description, which leads me to the detection of attributes. And because of this detection of attributes, I am led as I said to their evaluation and their utilization. I can say that this table is larger than the other one; it is better than the other one, etc., etc.. This ability to compare, also offers the possibility to utilize it later; to say: I want a larger table now; this one is not suitable. All this procedure of knowing resides inside that which we call scientific

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knowledge, which is very much dependent on the cultural level and the cultural era in which one lives, so that one can see which of those attributes comprise useful attributes. For instance, in ancient Greek times, when beauty was important, the attribute of form, of beauty, was the basic attribute by which one could get to know something. In our age, and especially in the West, (where we can see how much theoretical sciences suffer), knowledge is accompanied by usage. If you dont provide something along with knowledge that will be useful and will produce results, you are not providing anything. It is as though you know nothing. This knowledge is of no interest. Why should we speak of God, or of art? What can it give us? What are the results? And nowadays, in England, theoretical Schools are in danger of being closed down, because the prevailing philosophy is how is the industry benefiting from these Schools? Give the money to Schools that produce results. But how is a result produced? From that very procedure of knowledge, which defines and describes and consequently provides the possibility of usage and the benefit through that usage. Well, that is basically the method one uses in science. Although we must stress here that after Einstein and chiefly after the recent quantum theory, we definitely have a change in the perception that the researcher the one who knows distances himself from the object of his knowledge. Because, as you are aware, natural sciences today believe that the researcher is somehow entangled in the procedure of knowing his object and affects that knowledge. In other words, to know that this table is square is not simply a matter of detecting the tables attribute of squareness; it is as though the experimenter is affecting the result of the experiment. Therefore, the experiment is not simply the object that has certain attributes. We too allot certain attributes. And knowledge is an interaction of our involvement within this procedure, to the point that knowledge is entirely changed. We cant expand on this right now of course. This is just a parenthesis. I would like to say however, that the basic perception, the classical perception prior to Einstein, in short, the common perception of knowledge (cognizance), has those elements that I just described. 2. Cognizance of God I have expanded on this description, in order to pose the following question: If everything that I said which is necessary for the cognizance of an object is applied to the cognizance (knowledge) of God, what will happen straight away? -An absolute failure to apply it at all, and, for the following reasons: A. Because first of all, we apply the exclusion method, that A is not B. This means that in order to know A, it is presupposed that there is something else nearby, which I must exclude. Therefore, we are obliged to accept that along with God, something else always co-exists. Even if that something is nothing. Be careful! We are looking at very profound notions here. Notions like creation out of nothing. It is a huge issue. When we say that God creates something from nothing, what is that nothing, if it isnt His self? To many, (Thomas Aquinatus and Karl Barth) this nothing is a thing that God repulses. In other words, it is as though the nothing already exists, and God then says: No, the nothing shall not act. Let the world come into being! The nothing is rejected. So, you are repulsing something in a certain sense- in order to relate God. If you do apply this method to God, you must suppose that God is that which is not God. And what is

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that which is not God? It is impossible to compare God to other things, because you lose the meaning of God. In order for God to be God, He must be so unique, that He does not co-exist with anything else. Hence, I cannot know Him, by the method of excluding something else.

B. The second element that we mentioned description which has the prerequisites of space and time (remember, I cannot relate something, without describing it within a space and time), again cannot be applied to God. We cannot describe God, because in order to describe God, we must introduce His Existence into time and space. But if you do introduce time and space, then God becomes a creation that has a beginning, just as time and space presuppose a certain beginning; hence the distance between objects, this void. We cannot say that God is describable. Even the Fathers referred to Him as indescribable. You cannot describe God. Indescribable means that not only is it impossible to say anything about God, but it is also impossible to inscribe limits (boundaries) around Him. You cannot say something about God as you would say of the table, i.e., that the table has this shape. Consequently, we cannot apply this method of cognizance either.

And here we also have a very delicate issue. We are accustomed mainly from Scholastic Theology onward to saying that we can know God, through His attributes; for example, in every dogmatic area, we have a complete analysis of His attributes: God is Benign, Almighty, Powerful, etc. There is a grave danger here, and I had stressed it, when I said that in order to know an object on the basis of its attributes, it is necessary to draw those attributes from an experience of other objects. I am not supposed to detect them, exclusively within my object. For instance, if I say that this table is strong, and this attribute of strength exists only within my table, I am not truly specifying it. I often give my students the example of the clock. Take a clock, and show it to a native, a primitive person who has never seen a clock, and ask him to relate it to something, as soon as he sees it in motion. He will throw it down and say that it is some kind of animal. You see, it reminds him of something (else): an animal. He cannot know it as a clock, because he has never seen a clock before. He has only seen animals, which are capable of motion. We see how his basic method of cognizance was to use familiar things, in order to recognize the new. This indicates that knowing is always linked to a prior experience; in other words, objects are classified on the basis of existing experience. For example, I know that a clock is that thing, which has those characteristics. That is when I recognize it as a clock. If I dont recognize it, if I have never seen a clock before, then I cant state that it is a clock. Thus, I reach the conclusion that the attributes that I allocate to an object during the course of cognizance (knowledge) have all been taken from attributes that relate to other objects and are never unique to that, one, single object.

(Imagine someone so unique from the aspect of physical anatomy that one cannot know him by relating him to the experience one has from other people. It will be impossible for a doctor to examine him; in order for the doctor to recognize his ailment, he must be identical to other people.

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A doctor can never truly know anything, if it is unique. All our knowledge is dependent precisely on the hypothesis that the objects of our knowledge resemble each other; that they have common characteristics). So, if this is true, then what can we do about God? From where can we draw the attributes of God? For instance, so that I can say that He is benevolent. From where did I draw this attribute of benevolence? From experience of course; I know that so-and-so is a benevolent person. I know Gods power. I draw this from the experience I have of powerful people. Thus, after this projection of my experience, I can reach God. God is thus a creation of your own imagination, your own experience. But those attributes arent exclusive to God; others have them also. And that is why so many people replace God with those objects. Why should I be afraid of God and not be afraid of lightning? After all, both of them are powerful. Attributes - even the most affirmative ones, such as benevolent are still attributes that we borrow from our knowledge and experience of other things, which God isnt. I am characteristically underlining the notion of God as Father, which is one of the most difficult meanings, for the reason that anthropomorphism penetrates this theme very profusely. We teach our children from their early years to refer to God as our Father, but in what sense? It is on the basis of the childrens experience of their father at home. They bestow their father certain attributes, for instance: that he is stronger than them; that he can do things that they cant; that he protects them, etc.. So, with all of these amassed together, the child forms an idea of God, the way that we have given it to the child. The child embraces it, and then what happens? When puberty arrives, and freedom starts to set in, and the child wants to rid itself of the guardianship of the father in the house, that is when the crisis of its faith in God appears, because all this patronizing that the youth wants to shake off, is entangled in its conscience along with God, and the revolution - the reaction against authority in general - leads the youth towards a revolution against God. And this is the precise moment that the crisis of atheism appears; whether one views it at a personal level, or at a level of civilizations history. In cultural eras, where we find exactly this emphasis on freedom that opposes authority, that is when the idea of God is discarded. Why? Because we came to know God; we related Him, on the basis of experiences and attributes that we acquired from our family. It is therefore impossible, if you correctly preserve the idea of God and wish to relate God ( because this is what its all about), to avoid all those dangers and not give God any attributes that can be found in other objects. And that is why this route that I described ( which reaches the point of using familiar objects ) if applied to God, will have ugly consequences. The cognizance of God is very often confused with the results that this cognizance offers. Do you know how many people lose their faith in God, because He doesnt answer their prayers? Just as I choose to reject this table if it is of no use to me and I ignore it altogether, thus, in the same way, if God is a useless object, I choose to ignore Him. And the word ignore does not simply imply that He doesnt exist, but that He doesnt exist for me; it is I who do not know Him; it is I who ignores Him. There is such a thing as a conscious ignorance a willed ignorance. You can see what kind of danger the cognizance of God gnosiology contains, when it is based on the attributes of God. It can lead to an outright atheism, because by definition, God cannot be fitted into these molds, neither can He become an object of exploitation. If this were the case, then at any given moment, just as I push a button to start up a

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machine, I could likewise push the prayer button and wait for the answer to come. This would be an objectification of God, and what is worse, it is the demoting of God, down to the status of an object. Thus, we cannot speak of Gods attributes and then attain cognizance based on these attributes, because that would be dangerous. And of course we cannot also resort to any categorizing that includes place and time, because we already said that time and space came into being during Creation and are therefore not applicable to God. So, the question is raised: How then can I relate God? Is there anything to be found in experience that could show me the way? Is it possible to relate something, without going into all this procedure of objectification, of exclusion, of attributes and of utilization? Can I relate something, without doing all this? If I can, then there is a chance that I can also relate God. If I cant, then one of the following two is happening: either I cannot relate God at all, and consequently I cannot say that I know God, or, I withdraw from this attempt to express Him on the basis of experience, i.e., I know God, but I cannot express it, I cannot give a meaning to it. Therefore I cannot apply gnosiology; I cannot say anything about God. These two forms of response to the question posed, have already been expressed, repeated and are still heard in our times. The one reply takes on the name of negation, which signifies that you cannot say anything about God there is absolute silence; we may have cognizance perhaps, but without any possibility of actually putting cognizance into words. The other reply is a form of mysticism that allows a phrasing of cognizance of God, provided that we are referring to emotions and experiences which, in an extreme form of mysticism, obliterate the distinction between the one who knows (the recognizer) and the one who is known (the recognized). This is why religions applied these two Gnosiologies to a broad extent, and created a certain confusion to us Orthodox; because Negation was developed by the Greek Fathers in a certain way, while mysticism was also present.

This combination of mysticism and negation became the subject of a special expounding, and especially in our times, by a renowned Russian theologian, Vladimir Lossky, who wrote The Mystic Theology of the Eastern Church, that caused some confusion. So, the problem indeed arose: if this is the way, if this is gnosiology, i.e., through a negation that claims I do not know God at all, the question eventually remains: What can I say affirmatively about God, and how can I form an affirmative Gnosiology and not just a negative one? It is easy to say I cant say anything about God. It is easy to say what God is not. But, when we reach the point of asking: What affirmative thing can I say about God?, the problem is, not to fall into the trap and say things that I have borrowed from prior experience of other things, because those other things cannot be placed on the same level as God, otherwise they become anthropomorphic projections. I must therefore say something about God, which, however, must not be derived from the method that I use in order to know things.

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Negation made its appearance in history as a problem of contrast between God and the world. In order to know God, you must go beyond the world; you must leave the world behind. This is a method that we find in neo-Platonism: the principle of beyond the essence. With Dionysios Areopagitis, this method took on the form of using expressions with the prefix hyper (=super, beyond). For example, whatever affirmative thing we say about this world, we should use the prefix hyper when we refer to God. We refer to God as benevolent, but, because this expression is taken from the experience we have of people, this could result in anthropomorphism. In order therefore to avoid anthropomorphism, we say that God is hyper-benevolent. Hyperbenevolent does not imply (in this usage) that He is exceedingly benevolent, which is a superficiality of benevolent; it implies rather a surpassing. It is the same as when we say that God is not essence, but hyper-essence (Greek: yper-ousios) : beyond the essence.

This is why the terminology of Negational Theology which commences from Dionysios Areopagitis refers to God as hyper-god; he means to stress that all the categorizing that we use from our experience of the world, contains the danger of anthropomorphism. That is why we go beyond; and the term hyper is precisely that which implies beyond.

3. Cognizance through the Son and Logos In order to comprehend the Fathers viewpoint on the problem of the cognizance of God, we must bear in mind the following, historical sequence of events: Initially, there was a belief, which sprung from the meaning of the term Logos as introduced by Justinian, around the middle of the 2nd century A.D.. This belief elaborated that the human mind was an instrument intended for comprehending. After Origens time however, this line of thought evolved into the form that Evagrios gave to the overall subject of gnosiology, as well as Evagrios subsequent influence on monks, which according to the principles already set down by Justinian was characterized by the cleansing of ones mind of all perceptible things According to this theory, God and the human mind have something in common. One could say that they are related ontologically, but they differ and are opposite to, anything material. God is a spiritual being, non-material and non-corporeal, as is the human mind. Therefore, the link between God and man - and logically, the path or the instrument for acquiring cognizance would be the mind. However, this doctrine contained the danger, firstly, of excluding from the cognizance of God anything that is perceived by the human senses. This of course may seem quite natural at first; but, remember what we said in previous lessons pertaining to the incarnation: that Christology upholds that Christ is the path that leads to the cognizance of God; that God reveals Himself through Christ in a perceptible way, and that He also makes Himself accessible, to the human senses. This is not the only problem generated by this doctrine. The greater difficulty is that the human mind appears to be able to interpret God, and in a certain way becomes the ground which God touches upon (this being the ancient Greek perception, and mainly Platos). 22

This entire doctrine - which resulted in a heresy with Origens followers, who were eventually condemned by the 5th Ecumenical Synod was duly corrected by yet another monks doctrine which took on the name of Makarios the Egyptian, whose doctrine introduces another element in the cognizance of God: instead of the mind being the instrument for comprehending, he introduces the heart. The heart is now acknowledged as the cognitive instrument, and no longer the mind. But, because this may be classified by classical psychology as being mans cognitive instrument in which his emotions are situated, it is quite possible that we may be led to misinterpret this doctrine of Makarios. But, it has nothing to do with emotions versus logic, but another thing altogether. What is this other thing, which is neither emotion, nor logic? What do we mean, when we say the term heart? We have already said that, according to the Semitic perception as apparent in the Bible, where the heart is presented as being the cognitive instrument for of God, (.a clean heart within me); where the heart is that which recognizes God (the clean in heart shall look upon God....) and with a typical Semitic mentality that naturally permeates the Bible, the heart signifies mans realm of obedience. It is there, that the yes or the no is decided on. It is the place of freedom, where man decides to concede or refuse, where he says the yes or the no to anothers request, and of course to Gods. This perception, whereby man executes Gods will with his heart, is the Bibles practical way to the cognizance of God. The cognizance of God is neither a notional nor an emotional issue; to actually do what God wants is a practical and an ethical issue. While this could have satisfied Semitic mentality, it could not satisfy Greek mentality, through which the Bible had to be interpreted. To a Greek, knowledge had to have an ontological content. It had to point towards an identity: i.e., that something exists, and that I acknowledge it as existing; as an entity. I do not recognize it merely as a moral obligation, or as something to which I reply with my yes or no; it is an entity, an identity. The interpretation of this viewpoint of Makarios that the heart is the cognitive instrument must necessarily contain ontological elements. Elements that will lead me to the possibility of relating it to something; to say that it exists, that it actually is. Because if it is not, then I do not recognize it. The answer to this question can be found, as early as the time of the Fathers, in one of the great I would say the greatest theologians of that time, as regards the conception and the latitude with which he conceived and connected all the major problems: Maximus the Confessor. It is there, that all of Makarios doctrine is utilized, to correct Evagrios theory. Besides, Maximus does this to Origenism in general, and completely changes its appearance and content in a positive manner. Not with aggressiveness, wherein we often believe that things can be changed by fighting. It is not so. During the Patristic period, changes were made without generating any fuss. Origen had so much authority; that is why Athanasios and the Cappadocians - mainly Maximus amended him radically, but without actually waging war against him. One of the changes that Maximus made was to amend the meaning of the term Logos. With the help of Makarios doctrine, Maximus situates the cognitive instrument within the heart, but, with the following content: To Maximus, the Logos is basically the Logos of God; in other words, it is the persona of Christ. And it its through Gods Logos, that one recognizes God. Maximus also develops the idea that the Logos has cosmological extensions; i.e., that all beings have their own logos, within the one Logos of God. But the important thing is, that Maximus perceives this Logos of God as a persona, with whom God the Father has a loving relationship. And here now is the way that the heart as a 23

seat of love is transformed into that instrument which does not merely provide emotions as the means of recognizing God; it actually provides a personal relationship, a relationship between two parties, which Maximus named a loving relationship. In other words, only the Logos of God can basically recognize God, because only the Logos is in an eternal loving relationship with God which actually reveals, discloses, makes known, the identity of God as that of a Father, of a persona. Subsequently, the Gospel of John says, no-one knows the Father, except for the Son, and only through the Son can you know the Father. But the fact that the Son knows the Father, is an issue - according to Maximus that has to do with the loving relationship that exists between the Father and the Son eternally, in which relationship God is related to the Father-figure and is revealed, recognized - call it what you will by the words: You exist as my Father. Within this Father-Son relationship, God is revealed and is acknowledged as veracity. Athanasios the Great had already made similar observations when he refuted the Arians, saying that the Son was forever with the Father, and that it was impossible for the Father to have existed without His Son, because he said the Son is the Fathers veracity. The Son is the Image and the Veracity of the Father. Image and Veracity are one and the same thing. This is a significant topic of gnosiology: that the Father also recognizes Himself, by looking at His Image, which is His Son. You can never recognize yourself on your own. You need a relationship - lets say, a sort of reflective relationship, a mirror. Gods mirror is the Son. That is why He is called the Image of God and His veracity, as analyzed by Athanasios the Great in his speech opposing Arians. This is approximately the perception that underlies Maximus the Confessors viewpoint. A relationship, therefore - a personal, loving one - reveals the truth, and it makes known an entity in a way that no-one would recognize it otherwise. God, therefore, is basically recognized through His Son, and this is why the Son is His Logos. But not because He is the Logos in the notional sense with the mind which is the enormous trap that Augustine later fell into, when he incorrectly envisaged the Logos as being Gods logic, Gods intellect (i.e., God has Logos means that God has intellect). The Greek Fathers avoided this. It has nothing to do with the Logos of God in the intellectual sense. We therefore abandon Origenism and Evagrianism altogether: all those doctrines, which upheld that the mind is the cognitive instrument. The Logos is a persona, who loves and is loved, and through this loving relationship, it recognizes and ontologically relates to the other persona. Hence, God is eternally recognized; there is an eternal cognizance of God. We do not wait for the world to be created, in order for God to become known. He is made known through His Son, in His Son, and through the love that exists between the two of them. We shall see what gnosiological consequences this hypothesis has, when we analyze it even more; but we will need to digress a little from the Patristic doctrines in order to interpret it. So, these are the Patristic doctrines. Of course, when we approach the 14 th century, at the time when this entire topic is discussed with Saint Gregory Palamas, we are free to once again involve the mind in gnosiology, given that Maximus doctrine no longer exists, and we are no longer in danger of espousing Origenism again (just as saint Gregory Palamas didnt espouse Origenism, precisely because he didnt pursue Maximus tradition). Thus, the mind is no longer the intellectual instrument that it was for Origen and Evagrios; however, when coordinated with the heart, can it become a unified instrument. In other words, the heart essentially acquires intellectual abilities: the heart is able to recognize, but the mind is also able to love, in order to recognize. The mind -on its own- does not recognize. In more technical terms, this meeting of the heart and the mind is referred 24

to as the descent of the mind into the heart. It is a Gnosiology, which ultimately takes us far away from Origenism. However, it must never be interpreted without recalling the previously mentioned elements that were introduced by Maximus: that the supreme logos, the mind, the love of God Himself - by which God is eternally recognized - is the Son, and that we too attain cognizance of God through the Son, and only the Son, and not with exercises of the mind or the heart, (as though it were a Buddhist exercise), which make us believe that we know God. You cannot come to know God, outside of the Christ. And what does that mean? It means precisely that the only true revelation, the cognizance of God, is the one that is seated in the loving relationship of the Father and the Son. The Son is the Logos of God; He is the Only-begotten Son, in the sense that He is the one that is uniquely and eternally loved by God, who is likewise revealed through this loving relationship, in which He also recognizes Himself, through the other. This is where the question of interpretation of all these issues, arises. How is it possible for a loving relationship to comprise the knowledge of, or the revelation of the identity, or the relating of a being? In our previous lesson, we examined the way in which we recognize objects. Remember, however, that we said that this method could not be applied, when attempting to recognize God, given that there are certain prerequisites for recognizing those objects, which would directly abrogate the meaning of God. We also said that there is another way, which is always directly linked to our experience. (because if there is no link to our personal experience, we are unable to interpret. It is easy to stop at whatever the Fathers had said. If, however, we attempt to interpret them, we need a link to that experience; it cannot be done in any other way. There can be no knowledge, without some link to experience). And what is that experience of knowledge, which could be applied in Gods case, without encountering the problems that we observed the other time, with objects? It is exactly that which we called a personal relationship. 3. Cognizance in persona Part 1 : The element of Freedom Now let us focus on analyzing what the term persona means. What is significant is that the persona is of course seated within a personal relationship. It cannot be imagined on its own, but solely within a relationship. One persona equals no persona. However, that which characterizes the persona is that it is unique and that it cannot be repeated, subsequently, when defining it, it does not allow for any possibility of comparison, of substitution or incorporation - within the lattice of our experiences - which is the case with all objects. Subsequently, we cannot recognize God based on His attributes, because attributes can also be applied to other objects, to things other than God. As we said, this is the way we can know things, not persons. You cannot come to know a persona based on its attributes. You would essentially be relating it in spite of its attributes, and it is then that you realize it is indeed a persona. In other words, someone can be a bad person, but because you love him, you acknowledge him as being unique, without taking this attribute into account. On the contrary, if you relate a good person to his goodness, then you are not relating to the persona per se. If you likewise identify God on

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account of His goodness, you are not identifying Him as a persona; you are identifying Him as you would an object, or a thing, which, if tomorrow it proves it is not as you expected from the aspect of His attributes, your faith will instantly be shaken and you will lose your relationship with Him. God is not recognized by His attributes, the way that objects are; it is precisely because He is a persona, that He is recognized without the need to associate His identity with His attributes. This therefore is the basic characteristic of a persona. The other characteristic is that the persona ontologically comprises an irreplaceable element of our existence; that is, if the persona were to disappear, then our entire existence would collapse. It is then that we perceive the persona ontologically, in the profoundest ontological sense: in other words, that He exists, and that we exist thanks to Him; and furthermore, that the interruption or rather the non-existence of the one affects the existence of the other. Theologically, this means that if the Son ceases to exist, the Father ceases to exist. If the Father ceases to exist, so does the Son. There is a personal relationship here. This loving relationship is ontological because from it, hangs the existence of each of the parties of this relationship. Thus, we do not recognize God simply as a kind Being or whatever else, but instead, as an element from which our existence hangs. And we shall now see the special meaning it carries, in the realm of Christian knowledge. This personal relationship in Christ the one between Christ and the Father is also given to us in Christ, thus enabling us to recognize God as sons of God, and to address Him as Father. You must be aware that our addressing God as Father originates exclusively, one hundred percent, from this relationship, from the right that Christ bestowed on His disciples, to address God as Father. The concept of Gods paternity was of course also common outside of Christianity, before the Bible. To the ancient Greeks, Zeus was the father of gods and mankind. But this concept has nothing in common with the concept of God as Father in the New Testament, in the Bible. In the New Testament, only the Son has the right to address God as Father; only Christ. But He bestowed this right upon His disciples, when He pointed out to them how they should pray; and this was the meaning of the Lords Prayer, when Christ says: for I instruct you to pray thus, by saying : Our Father Addressing God as Father does not involve an inherent religiousness. It involves a personal relationship, which only the Son the exclusive, only-begotten Son had. God has no other Son that could address Him as Father; God has only one Son. Well, it is this same Son who bestows this right; not in a judicial way, but, by relating Himself to us, and our relating ourselves to Him, we too become sons of God the Father, thus creating a relationship and subsequently able to know God. What does it mean, to know God? As what do we know Him? As someone good? As someone powerful ? We could surmise all these, without Christ. What Christ gives us as Gods identity, is that He is the Father. This is what creates a personal affiliation, a filial relationship. This relationship that God has with His Son eternally is the one that is relayed to us, and it is thus that we know the Father; that we know God as Father. Th