The World's Christians. Douglas Jacobsen

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СКАЧАТЬ is watching; Mary is watching; the angels are watching. And the saints are watching too. Orthodox icons – which are often displayed in homes as well as in churches – are understood to be not merely spiritual representations but observers of humankind. The eyes of an icon are always painted last, and when they are in place the icon becomes, in a sense, alive – a living portal connecting the earthly community with the spiritual community of God and the saints.

      The most revered figure in the Orthodox tradition, apart from Jesus and the Trinity, is Mary, who is called Theotokos (“God‐bearer” or “Mother of God”) because she bore God incarnate in her womb when she was pregnant with Jesus. Mary is venerated not only because she is the woman through whom God entered the world, but also because she models how every Christian should live. When the Archangel Gabriel told Mary that God had selected her to be Theotokos, she replied simply: “Let it be done to me, as I am your servant.” God comes to people gently offering life in its fullness and, like Mary, each person must respond. In addition to modeling obedience, Mary also models holy suffering, since she endured watching her son being crucified. Finally, she is considered the most compassionate of all the saints, and icons of Mary communicate her desire to comfort all those who seek help in times of pain and distress.

      An emphasis on the visual and the communal is the key to understanding Orthodox theology. For non‐Orthodox Christians, “theology” usually refers to the philosophical analysis of Christian beliefs. For Orthodox Christians, “theology” is much more experiential. It focuses on experiencing the presence of God as much as (or more than) it focuses on the explanation of belief. The purpose of Orthodox theology is not the achievement of intellectual understanding; the goal of Orthodox theology is to live in the holiness of God’s presence, in the fire and warmth of the “Divine and Uncreated Light” of God.

The Orthodox tradition tends to favor an apophatic style of theology. Apophatic theology describes who God is not – the many ways in which God can be misunderstood – rather than attempting the impossible task of capturing God’s character in human words. From the Orthodox perspective, the highest and best “theology” is a wordless expression of mystical communion with God that bypasses entirely the mediation of thoughts or ideas. Individuals cannot enter this encounter by thinking their way into it, but only through contemplation, by clearing the mind of all thoughts and distractions in a way that results in receptivity to the divine. The fourteenth‐century Orthodox theologian Gregory Palamas explains: “Contemplation … is not simply abstraction and negation; it is a union and a divinization which occurs mystically and ineffably by the grace of God, after the stripping away of everything from here below which imprints itself on the mind, or rather after the cessation of all intellectual activity.”¹ Orthodox Christians do not deny that there is a place for words and thought – a time to try to explain the spiritual realities of life insofar as they can be translated into human discourse – but any theology of words is clearly secondary to theology embodied in the experience of God (see Voices of World Christianity 1.1).

Orthodox spirituality focuses on the higher world – the invisible world of God, the angels, and the saints – but Orthodox spirituality also holds the earthly world in high regard. The Orthodox tradition teaches that human beings have both an earthly, material nature and a spiritual, divine nature, and both natures are good because both come from God. This is God’s world, and it was created to be both appreciated and enjoyed. Ordinary life is honored in the Orthodox tradition. Time together with family and friends is considered a blessing, and the church itself is an extended family. Living together in the fellowship of the church requires times to fast, but also times to feast. There are times for repentance and sorrow, but also times for celebration, including the enjoyment of good food and wine. Rather than conflicting with the other‐worldly emphases of Orthodox spirituality, this earthly spirituality grounds it in the here and now. Orthodox spirituality is deeply life‐affirming and simultaneously nurtures an awareness that all of life is lived in God’s holy presence.

Voices of World Christianity 1.1 Vladimir Lossky on Orthodox Theology and Prayer

       Vladimir Lossky (1903–58) was one of the most important Orthodox theologians of the twentieth century. Born in Russia into a Russian Orthodox family, Lossky left home after the Communist Revolution and headed to Paris to study and eventually teach. Many members of the expatriate Russian community in Paris clung tightly to their religious and cultural heritage, but Lossky was more outward looking. Engaging in dialogue with non‐Orthodox western Christians, he explained and defended Orthodox beliefs and practices. In the following excerpt from his writing, Lossky argues that while the western Christian traditions tend to separate theology (thinking about faith) from mysticism (the personal experience of faith), Eastern Orthodoxy holds them together. Lossky also thought that typical western practices of prayer were not sufficiently God‐centered, a deficit that could be remedied by praying the Jesus Prayer.

      Excerpt from The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (1944):

      In a certain sense all theology is mystical, inasmuch as it shows forth the divine mystery … On the other hand, mysticism is frequently opposed to theology as a realm inaccessible to understanding … If we adopted this conception unreservedly, resolutely opposing mysticism to theology, we would be led in the last resort to the thesis of [western Christianity which] distinguishes … the “static religion” of the Churches from the “dynamic religion” of the mystics, the former social and conservative in nature, the latter personal and creative … The eastern tradition has never made a sharp distinction between mysticism and theology; between personal experience of the divine mysteries and the dogma affirmed by the Church … Far from being mutually opposed, theology and mysticism support and complete each other. One is impossible without the other …

      The mystical experience which is inseparable from the way towards union [with God] can only be gained in prayer and by prayer. In the most general sense, every presence of [a person] before the face of God is a prayer; but this presence must become a constant and conscious attitude – prayer must become perpetual, as uninterrupted as breathing or the beating of the heart. For this a special mastery is needed, a technique of prayer which … is known by the name of “hesychasm” … [Hesychasm] has only one object in view: that of assisting concentration. The whole of the attention must be given to the words of the short prayer: “O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner.” This prayer, continually repeated at each drawing of breath, becomes to a monk as it were a second nature … This is what all those who seek the fire of grace must do; as to words or positions of the body during prayer, these have only a secondary importance. God is concerned with the heart.

      Vladimir Lossky, The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1976), pp. 7–9, 209–11.

Salvation

      Compared to the Christian world as a whole, Orthodoxy holds a view of salvation that is broad and expansive. In non‐Orthodox circles, salvation is often ascribed to the individual and to that person’s reconciliation with God. For Orthodox Christians, salvation is something that happens to groups of people – no one is saved alone, but only in community – and the goal of salvation is more than mere reconciliation. Within Orthodoxy, the point of salvation is theosis, the divinization or deification of individuals, of humanity as a whole, and ultimately of all creation. In keeping with this broad and active sense of theosis, Orthodox Christians would never claim that they have been “saved.” Salvation is a process that draws one further and further into communion with God and others. Orthodox СКАЧАТЬ