The Reformation as Ockham’s Revenge

“Another doctrinal current made its appearance in the Middle Ages, Duns Scotus being its outstanding exponent. He taught that the acts of the penitent-contrition, confession, satisfaction-though integral, are not essential parts of the sacrament of penance.  The only essential is the absolution in respect of the sins, the three acts of penitence being only the signs of it. Futhermore, he understood the efficacy of the sacrament in the sense of a remission of the fault and of the penalty. The forgiveness of sins does not result immediately from absolution; absolution provokes a certain disposition, and it is this disposition which, through God’s promise, calls forth forgivness.

Concerning contrition, he shows that there exist two ways of justification (in the scholastic sense): one, contrition (superior attrition), can dispense with the sacrament; the other, attrition, suffices for the remission of sins in the sacrament.  In connection with the discipline of confession he is less strict concerning its obligatory nature, holding that it is obligatory, by divine precept, only in the case of those in danger of death and as a preparation for certain duties requiring purity.

Another Anti-Western Orthodox Bigot (Sigh)

“For the rest, Augustine’s conception of the oneness of Christ is shown, although with more or less clarity, in the various, likewise traditional ways of describing the incarnation: as an event (fieri), a taking on (susceptio) or assumption (assumptio), a drawing close (accedere), or even a mingling without confusion (mixtio sine confusione). Although in using those terms Augustine is clearly starting from the teaching of the faith according to which only the Son became a human being, he does not yet arrive at the technical formulation of the dogma. That is, he does not use the epxression ‘the one person of Christ’ in order to describe the starting point of theincarnation.  In his thinking, ‘the one person of Christ’ is rather the result of the ineffable union between the godhead and the humanity in Jesus Christ.”

 Basil Studer, The Grace of Christ and the Grace of God in Augustine of Hippo: Christocentrism or Theocentrism?, trans. Matthew J.O. Connell, Liturgical Press, 1997, p. 34.

To the Mast!

In case any readers are wondering where I stand, this post pretty much sums up my thoughts, though Fr. Jacobse is much more polite than I am. I say throw the Sodomites out.

What Would Mr. Newman Do?

“Yesterday, the eighteenth of the month, which was holy Mid-Pentecost, the patriarch sent me a message, saying,: ‘What church do you belong to? Constantinople? Rome? Antioch? Alexandria? Jerusalem? Look here, all of them are united together with the provinces subject to them. If, therefore, you belong to the catholic church, be united, lest perhaps you devise a strange path by your way of life and you suffer what you don’t expect…’Listen, then,’ they said. ‘The master and the patriarch have decided, following an instruction from the pope of Rome, that you will be anathematised if you do not obey, and that you will be sentenced to the death they have determined.’”

The Letter of Maxmus to Anastasius, His Disciple (CPG 7701)

The Open Door

I unlocked the door and pushed it aside as the damp air from the morning seemed to sweep past me. It was a bit chilly. I was still a bit groggy since I hadn’t had my morning coffee. It took me a few seconds to get a handle on who was at my door at 8:45 on a Saturday morning. Needless to say I wasn’t especially happy to be bothered. But there they were, two well dressed older women of some minority descent. We exchanged greetings “Good morning” they said and I replied in kind.

“We’re going through your neighborhood visiting folks with the news of God’s Kingdom.” Before I could open my mouth she continued with a set of rapid questions. “Do you think there is too much violence in the world? Don’t you believe that the world’s governments have failed to solve mankind’s basic problems?” “Uh…yeah I guess so. That seems pretty obvious to me.” I replied. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. I tried to work my face into something like a presentable appearance of interest. It was difficult.

Then came the pitch. “Well, God’s Kingdom is coming where He will set right all the wrongs that earthly governments have done. We have an article on this very subject that we’d like to leave with you. Maybe we can come back and discuss it with you at another time? We’d be happy to answer any questions you have about it” By now I had my sea legs. “Well, I was thinking as you were talking just now about a question I’ve had for a good while about a part of the Bible. But I don’t want to hold you up so maybe it is better if we talk about it whenever you come back.”  

Atonement in the Church Fathers

Below is a link to an article by Derek Flood which appeared in the April 2010 issue of the Evangelical Quarterly. The article is a review of Pierced for Our Transgressions, which aims to give a historical and biblical defense of the doctrine of the penal theory of the atonement. I myself haven’t read the book or I should say, I didn’t bother to read the book.  It didn’t seem to warrant it for a few reasons. First, the book was published by Crossway which isn’t, so far as I know a peer reviewed press.  Second, there didn’t seem to be anything particularly new with respect to the argument so far as I could tell. And third, the arguments claiming various church fathers held the theory were prima facia comical. But since the book is making the rounds among Protestants, I figured readers would find Flood’s review article helpful.

The Other Side

Below is a dialog written by a friend of mine, Russ Mansion. Russ had in his home an apologetic disucssion group that ran once a month for twenty one consecutive years. The group consistend mainly of Chritians of from a variety of traditions, which ensured that we always had something to discuss and argue about. I began attending as a young teenager.

The dialog itself has appeared in a shorter and older version before in other locations, but to my knowledge the full version has never been made available. Since it was written in 1993, it could use tweaking in a few places, principally in metaethics due to developments there concerning projectivism and the Frege–Geach problem. Reading Alexander Miller’s, An Introduction to Contemporary Metaethics, and Sinnott-Armstrong’, Moral Skepticisms I think will bring the reader up to date and put them in a position to see how the dialog’s criticisms of moral projectivism can be extended. Other than that, I do not think in principle the problems for metaphysical Naturalism in epistemology and ethics have changed. I believe readers will find it helpful in blowing through the sophmoric proposals by the likes of Sam Harris and others of that ilk. Feel free to afflict your local villiage atheist with it

Here is your musical accompaniment.

THE OTHER SIDE:
METAPHYSICS AND MEANING

by R. M. Manion
November 1993

Reboot

For a some time now I have taken more of a back seat to the running and posting on EP. I’ve been very happy to see some of the other contributors step in to fill the gap to keep the blog moving in terms of postings.

Pascha is a good time for new beginings and so I am doing something of a reboot for the blog. I have been doing a few things with the blog behind the scenes. I have expanded the Recommended Reading page considerably and will continue to do so. (Hint-That means go and take a look.) I am in the process of updating the blog links and re-arranging them as well as looking for another blog template to help in restructing the blog.  I have also been working on some very long posts concerning a variety of topics ranging from issues in the metaphysics of causation in Late Antiquity to Reformed and Medeival Latin Christology.  I have also been working to secure a number of interviews with mostly Orthodox academics, which will apear at fairly regular intervals during the remaining course of this year. So far here are some of the persons for future interviews. David Bradshaw, Edward Siecienski, and Archemandrite Cyril Hovorun. For the remainder of the year, there should be six interviews in all.

Along with Harvey the Rabbit, the blog owner, I’ve been kicking around ideas on how to make the blog financially self supporting through a place for small donations to cover the cost of maintaning it, as well as linking the Recommended Reading page through Amazon or some other seller for a part of the selling price for books sold here. In short, there is more coming down the slot.

FLASH!: Florovksy Symposium at Princeton

Topic: The Patristic Doctrine of the Atonement.

Speakers include:  Fr. John Behr,

Fr. John McGuckin

Fr. George Dragas

Dr. George Parsenios

Matthew Baker

Dr. Alexis Torrance

I am planning on going with a few other EP readers. If you are interested in co-ordinating with us, please contact me via acolyte4236 AT sbcglobal dot net.

More details are available here.

Life in a Windowless Monad

 

(Your Musical Accompaniment)

“These questions, however, have to be answered, from the point of view of systematic theology at least, by placing them within a much more radical framework, namely that of the fundamental question: Is the structure of the Christian Church in light of the gospel, monarchial or collegial? This question is undoubtably radical because it is asked, on the one hand, with the whole Christian people in mind and, on the other, from the point of view of what the Lord himself taught, that is, in the light of the gospel of Christ as a whole.

We may go further and say that, if the structure of the Church is conditioned by and subject to the norm of the gospel of Christ, we must base our argument less on the isolated descriptions or ideas of the Church which occur almost accidentally in the New Testament…and more on the general spirit of the words of the Lord as the origin of those images of the Church. That essentially new elemnt in the teaching of the Lord which distinguishes it from teaching contained in all the religions and ideaologies that have so far arisen in the history of man is the doctrine of the Trinity. This is the differentia specifica of Christianity.

In light of this faith in the Trinity, the Christian teaching about God’s being, the creation of the world and the cosmic mestaphysical order of the universe has always been different from that of other religions or ideaologies. It has, in a word, been trinitarian.  The idea of the Trinity is central, not only in the doctrine of the Christian Church, but also-and in the first place-in the teaching of the Lord himself. If this is so, then surely it is bound to inspire the whole task of the Christian Church to give a new structure to the created world. This brings us to the question of the relationship between the doctrine of the Trinity and Christology.

At the most holy moment of his life on earth and just before he left this world, Christ prayed to his Father and at the same time expressed his most fervent desire: ‘I do not pray for these only, but also for those who believe in me through their word, that they may be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee.’ (John 17.20f.)

It is perhaps symptomatic that, in an attempt to stress the holiness of the ecumenical intention, these words are quoted nowaday at almost every meeting between Christians of different denominations. yet we usually think very little about these important words afterwards. The phrase ‘that they may be one’ expresses the practical and immediate aims of ecumenism better than the idea which follows, namely ‘as thou Father, art in me…’. But these words become even more meaningful perhaps if we remember that this exemplary mode of unity within the Trinity is the basic presupposition for the unity of the Church which we hope will be achieved. the importance of the whole passage is even further emphasized by the fact that Christ did not have a definite gorup of people, such as the apostles in mind when he spoke these words, but rather all those who believed in him and would believe in him throughout history.  It is this universal validity of the moral principle that is expressed here which gives it its distinctive and normative character.  This is why it must constitute the basic and first ecclesiolgy premise for all theological thinking at all times.

It is clear therefore that there must be a direct relationship between the doctrine of the Trinity and ecclesiology, a relationship expressed in fact in the striking parallel that exists between the fundamental theological questions of the Church’s Trinitarian and ecclesiological teaching. If the inner interrelationships that exist in the historical development of dogma in the Church have existed since the earliest times are borne in mind, it is not difficult to recognize that the main problem confronting all theological thinking throughout the history of the Church has always been the same-the fundamental question of the relationship between unity and multiplicity.