/lit/ - Literature

>>18733583
>the Divine Will replaces our temporal will at a certain stage of perfection
Quietism is one of the big dangers here. Once you become God, or at least your will is Gods, then you are incapable of sin. Everything you will is now God's will, and you are only one step away from the divine orgies of a Rasputin or Messalian perfecti, of a de facto antinomianism where your will, which is now Gods will, is liberated and above all laws, as God's will is the source and being of divine law.

>>18733583
The lives of the Saints dont show this tendency at all. Saints are still sinners just like us, they still fight the passions all the way up til their dying day.

>>18733583
>There has been some speculation as to why Porete was considered controversial. Growing hostility to the Beguine movement among Franciscans and Dominicans, the political machinations of Philip IV of France, who was also busy suppressing the Knights Templar, and ecclesiastical fear at the spread of the anti-hierarchical Free Spirit movement have all been suggested
makes you hmmm

>>18733583

>Divine will replaces our temporal will

The Orthodox doctrine is that even in the highest stages of spiritual perfection our will freely co-operates with God's will, because Christ's human will fully co-operates with his Divine will.

This heresy of the divine will replacing the human will is called monothelitism, and has already been condemned at the 6th ecumenical council.

The problem with this view, is that in practice, it prompts a person to give up their free will to something that is willing to take it over - making spiritual life a practice in opening yourself up for demonic possession, rather than spiritual freedom. Christ sets us free from sin, and free in unconfused union with God, rather than overriding our free will, like assimilating us into a God-borg cube.

These pantheistic heretical ideas, along with similar pantheistic ideas like Meister Eckhart, are a natural dialectic counter-reaction to what became Roman Catholic dogma after the schism of 1054, which is effectively deism.

Deism & Pantheism are two sides of the same coin, when God is an absolutely simple monad - either God is an absolutely simple monad, and either creation is not part of this monad, and therefore God is locked away from our direct experience forever (Roman Catholic dogma), or all of creation is part of the God-monad, and then God is secretly creation and you just have to do enough occult rituals to "transcend the illusion" that you are seperate from God.

This wasn't a problem for the Church prior to 1054, where the mystic Saints like the Egyptian Desert Fathers in the 300s were reaching high levels of deification, without confusing creation for the creator.

>>18733583
Pretty much these >>18733833 >>18734758

>>18733833
That's prelest rather than quietism though, in that the danger is that you believe you are in a Perfect state and you're being moved to commit sin by the Divine Will when you're actually just deluded. In theory someone who is Established is not capable of committing sin

>>18734118
That's a reasonable point. Porete makes a big claim that you basically ditch the bondage of the virtues once you reach that state, because you literally are moved by God's will and so you will never will to sin. That doesn't seem to be the case in saints writings

>>18734306
Robert Lerner makes this argument, that she basically got fucked by political manouvering between Philip and the Pope. He makes little enough argument about her orthodoxy though which seems like a big omission

>>18734758
The deism vs pantheism view makes sense, it seems more fluid at one point, iirc Eriugena basically argued for pantheism of some sort

So in short, after the schism the Catholic position became that God is separate from us and the gap is unbridgable, whereas the Orthodox position is something like the opposite, is that right? Or is the Orthodox position similar

>>18734758
Monotheletism relates to Christs will rather than ours, though I think I see what you're getting at. If Christ had two wills that came together in one hypostasis that would imply that our human will is not an aberration, but something necessary, which would mean that God's will basically replacing ours but retaining our faculties wouldn't make sense. That's an interesting argument

I always thought the mono/dyotheletist argument was such a hair-splitting thing, but in this case it has an effect on what you view the end goal of Christianity to be.

I'm sure an Orthodox theologian would argued Marguerite was in prelest and actually possessed by a demon or something (although the Mirror was initially certified as orthodox). Iirc the guy they arrested with her who supported her claimed to be the Angel of Philadelphia on a mission, so there's that

>>18735099

The Orthodox position is that while the Essence of God is unknowable(the unknowable transcendence of God), we can directly experience the persons of the Holy Trinity personally, in their immanent divine energies(actions, operations, attributes).

Christ became incarnate so that we could experience these divine energies through the created energies of Christ's human nature, hence why Christ says that unless you eat the Eucharist you do not have life in you - because the eucharist is Christ's deified flesh and blood, fully created and fully uncreated.

So, God is knowable personally by his actions, and unknowable in his essence - both categories are retained, in their rightful place, with the distinction between God's essence and his energies.

>>18735143

I know what you mean about the hair-splitting, I've found that to understand them properly, I've had to relate every metaphysical doctrine to its practical effects on our spiritual life on the ground level.

Since Christ fully assumed human nature, any Christological heresy will distort our understanding of human nature.

Here's an article about how actus purus relates to our understanding of human nature, since any doctrine about God will affect our understanding of the *image* of God, which we are made in: https://mindofthefathers.wordpress.com/2021/06/19/the-scholastic-bojack-horseman/

>>18735099
>That's prelest rather than quietism though, in that the danger is that you believe you are in a Perfect state and you're being moved to commit sin by the Divine Will when you're actually just deluded.
The point is that all quietism is inherently prelest and delusion, hence why they got proscibed whenever questism and their freelove God-orgies have ever turned up in the West.
>In theory someone who is Established is not capable of committing sin
Yes, it's antinomianism where the Perfecti can not commit any sin, no matter how many orgies they trick the peasant wives into committing.

>>18735255
This was the Palamist position, right? Shame that never translated to Catholicism

>>18735274
That's a good approach. On occasion I've resorted to what St. Therese de Lisieux described (basically just stop reading theology when it makes your head hurt and read the gospels instead, you'll get more out of it), but relating it to practical effects on our perception of human nature is an interesting approach

I sometimes feel like in the middle ages the Church overdid it with the scholastic autism and now we have no room for different ideas, we've dogma'd ourselves into a corner. On the other hand, insisting on a definite line on every position is what's held it together so long, so there's that

>>18735461
>they got proscibed whenever questism and their freelove God-orgies have ever turned up in the West.

Molinos was an inside job, the Jesuits got pissed that he said the Exercise were useful at the early stages before Contemplation began, but a hindrance after this point

>>18734758
Why did it become a problem after the schism?

>>18735255
Are the persons energies? The Holy Ghost is more related to this conception isn't it? Like he is more akin to an operation. But this means we can know the HG, did we know the Son with Christ, too, didn't we? What about the Fatehrw

>>18733583
I just think it was politically impossible for the Catholic Church to admit that the goal of Christianity is Union with the Holy Spirit. For this reason saintly people who were outspoken had to die to maintain the Medieval system.

It's not possible to rest a single doctrine of the Medieval Nobility on Christ. This was a huge problem for the Catholic Church because the Nobility actually did the fighting. But they did the fighting doctrinally on the made up idea of just war, and the pagan concept of Chivalry.

In this political arrangement, it is impossible to outright say to the Nobility that they are heretics, because Christ's love is unconditional, and not based on a person's imagined worth or honour, or where they fit in the feudal system. Doing so would make the Nobility into something like the untouchables of India, which they would never tolerate due to the circular power arrangement with the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor.

If you don't believe me that it was entirely political, notice that when the feudal system was collapsed in the 16th century, and the power of the Nobility was at a low ebb, the Protestant Reformers universally pushed towards a works-free understanding of justification (i.e. a theology that entirely excluded the ideals of fighting men).

>>18736688

>This was the Palamist position, right?

Right, but "Palamist" is a misnomer. If you read the pre-schism Church Fathers, and compare them to the writings of St Gregory Palamas, then it's clear that the only thing St Gregory is doing is being loyal to the tradition of the 1st millenium.

>I sometimes feel like in the middle ages the Church overdid it with the scholastic autism and now we have no room for different ideas

The opposite problem is actually true - scholastic autism results in *too much* fracturing into different ideas.

The fundamental problem is nominalism - the logical conclusion after saying that we can't personally know God, that the only things we can know about God are the logical inventions of our own mind. It's not much of a stretch to think, because we cannot personally know God, we also cannot personally know God's design in creation, and so there is no inherent meaning in anything - just the meaning we invent in our minds. Does this sound familiar? This is the foundation of postmodernist dogma, which is permeating everywhere now.

https://www.mediafire.com/file/cggvs6grwvhozwx/Palamas%252C_Gregory_-_Dialogue_Between_and_Orthodox_and_a_Barlaamite.pdf/file <- Here's a work that's a debate between St. Gregory Palamas, and a Barlaamite Scholastic Nominalist. Do you know what the Filioque is? It's a heresy regarding the Trinity, saying that the Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son, instead of just the Father alone - Roman Catholics committed to this heresy as one of the main reasons for the great schism of 1054, along with the papacy. I won't go into details about it, but the nominalist in this linked debate has a very telling approach to it: He says that the theological question does not matter and cannot be settled, precisely because it is impossible to have a direct experience of God, and verify if the filioque is true or not.

So then, the doctrine that you are actually able to personally experience God, results in the stability of doctrine that Orthodoxy has had for the past 2000 years, whereas after diverting from Orthodoxy in 1054, the Roman Catholic Church has given birth to innumerable superficially different, and fundamentally contradictory philosophies within its Church, which one reason why Protestantism fractured off of the Roman Catholic Church (Orthodoxy never had a Protestant reformation), and that Protestantism fractured into millions of different sects - each with their own equally valid possible interpretation of the bible & tradition, because they're all based on equally invalid foundations.

A work that goes deeper into the history of the West after the Roman Catholic Church adapted nominalism, is this one, "Orthodox Survival Course" by Fr. Seraphim Rose, a transcribed series of lectures. It's 1000 years of Christian history, traced from the perspective of the results of the errors of Roman Catholicism: http://orthodoxaustralia.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/course.pdf

>>18736753

This post covers it >>18738476

The flip between Deism and Pantheism became a problem after the schism precisely because of the Roman Catholic commitment to the absolutely simple monad God, which is can only logically either be completely inexperiencable to us, or identical with creation.

>>18737364

The persons are not energies - Person is a distinct ontological category from energy. However, you have a right intuition - the Holy Spirit is the most energy-like person of the Holy Trinity, since the Holy Spirit is the person that is the principle of energy.

St Maximus the Confessor writes that the Holy Trinity, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are the three persons which are the eternal principles of Essence, Personhood, and Energy. It's not that the Son or Spirit lacks an essence, that the Father and Spirit lack personhood, or that the Father and Son have no energy, but that these principles are perfectly shared across the three persons, due to sharing the same essence with the Father. The three persons have one undivided essence, and one common energy, therefore the three persons have one will.

The person of the Holy Trinity we know the most about and relate to the most is Christ, since he became man, the person we know the second most about is the Holy Spirit, since we receive the Holy Spirit in baptism and chrismation, and are guided by him into all truth. The one we know least personally is the Father, but through the Son we come to know the Father, since the Son is the Image of the Father, and has everything the father has.

>>18738476
Yo orthanon, quick question on a different topic: how is one supposed to pray an akathist? I know you are supposed to do it standing up but Im not sure what an ikos and kontakion are, if Im supposed to do bows or prostrations, or what

>>18738588

For bowing and prostrating, the prayer book should tell you when to do bows and prostrations. As far as I know, during akathists themselves, they don't really have many set places to do bows or prostrations, you'll be doing them during the rule of prayer before and after the akathist.

Do you have a prayer book? The Jordanville prayer book has the rule for doing a canon or an akathist on page 359 (at least in my edition).

An ikos, kontakion, and troparion are effectively the same thing as for figuring out what to do with them - you sing them according to the accompanying tone. ie, Kontakia, tone 4, you would sing the lines of the kontakia in the 4th tone.

Since you probably don't know the tones, you shouldn't worry about learning all of them yet, since there are a lot. If you do learn just one tone, then you could at least just do your kontakias/ikos/troparia in those.

Generally, whenever you see "Glory to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit", you should cross yourself.

If you see "Come let us worship God our king...", or "Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us..." you cross yourself and bow with each one of those three repetitions.

If you can't find the rule for serving a canon
or akathist somewhere, I'll just write it out for you in my next post.

Is there a specific way to cross yourself for Catholics and Orthodox Christians or is it universal?
I'm from a Mormon background and I'm interested in Nicene Christianity but it feels very different than what I'm used to, both in doctrine and in liturgy. The nearest Orthdox congregations are both two hour drives one way so I haven't been able to see what their worship services are like yet.

>>18738716

Note: Before a bow, cross yourself.

"Before commencing any rule of prayer, and at its completion, the following reverences are made (prostrations or bows), called "The Seven Bow Beginning."

O God, be merciful to me, a sinner. (bow)
O God, cleanse me a sinner, and have mercy on me. (bow)
Having created me, O Lord, have mercy on me. (bow)
I have sinned immeasurably, O Lord, forgive me. (bow)
My sovereign, most holy Mother of God, save me, a sinner. (bow)
O Angel, my holy Guardian, protect me from all evil. (bow)
Holy martyr/father/apostle [Name] pray to God for me. (bow)

Then,

Through the prayers of our holy fathers, O Lord Jesus Christ, our God, have mercy on us. Amen.

Glory to Thee, our God, glory to Thee.

[Heavenly King prayer from your morning prayers]
[Trisagion from the morning prayers]
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
[Most Holy Trinity, have mercy on us... prayer from your morning prayers]
Lord have mercy x 3
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
[Our Father, who art in heaven, prayer]
Lord have mercy x 12
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, both now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
[O come let us worship God our king... prayer from the morning prayers]
[Psalm 50]
[The Nicene Creed]

Then here, you do the akathist. Do not do the post-akathist prayer yet.

After it's done,

[It is meet and right to bless thee, the ever blessed and pure Mother of our God... prayer]
[Post-akathist prayer goes here]
[Trisagion from the morning prayers]
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
[Most Holy Trinity, have mercy on us... prayer from your morning prayers]
Lord have mercy x 3
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
[Our Father, who art in heaven, prayer]
Lord have mercy x 3
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
[More honorable than the cherubim... prayer to the theotokos]"

If you do use this, print it out and replace all the placeholders with the actual text you use - reading off of phones is too distracting/stimulating.

>>18738761

They cross themselves differently - pic related is how we Orthodox do the sign of the cross. We cross ourselves on the forehead, stomach, right shoulder, left shoulder.

I don't know which hand position is the norm in Catholicism right now, but their crossing direction is inverted - up, down, left, right.

>>18738799
>>18738716
Thank you very much. I dont have a prayer book yet, and unfortunately I dont live alone so singing out loud, especially at night, is not really an option. Looking to get my own place soon.

>>18738929

So don't worry about singing out loud for the time being - you can keep your voice low, and since you're really new, you don't have to stress about needing to know a tone to do the akathist. You can just read it all straight through without chanting - it's not the end of the world, the important part is praying.

>>18738487
What's the Orthodox view on God as monad? Is it just not defined?