ON THE NATURE OF MAN (THE ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN VIEW OF MAN) by V.Rev. Dr. George Papademetriou synaxispress.ca The Canadian Orthodox Publishing House 37323 Hawkins Road, Dewdney, B.C. Canada V0M 1H0 FOREWORD At least a century ago, one could notice how far many Orthodox Christians had diverged from an authentic Orthodox Christian anthropology — the doctrine of man. Clearly, a combination of the Latin understanding was being mixed with a Gnostic concept about man, the relationship between soul and body and a supposed fulness of independence of the soul without the body. Such ideas, as they occurred in the Latin world were based not only in neo-Platonism, but taken more directly from Plato’s Phaedo and other of his writings. It is notable that Plato was involved in Orphic Gnosticism, and this affected many of his ideas about the body and the soul of man. During discussions about the Aerial Toll House myth, it became clear that even among more educated Orthodox clergy and hierarchs, there had been little attention given to the teachings of the holy fathers on this subject. Among the Gnostics, there was the notion that the soul is imprisoned in the body, and when it is “liberated” from the body, it can soar freely and function perfectly well without the body. This is something that the holy fathers repeatedly condemned, particularly in their writings against the Manicheans and other Gnostics. Moreover, we see how far down the path of Gnosticism the West has gone with strange ideas that when a person dies, his or her soul immediately becomes an angel. No longer is any real credence given to that most basic Christian doctrine, the resurrection of the body. Aside from undermining the doctrine of the Resurrection, this Gnosticism also has lead many to forget about the judgment, and the presumption is that anyone and everyone who dies becomes an angel, or at least is in Paradise — a “better place” as the more saccharine speakers say. Generally, this is meant to include only those who are at least nominally Christian, but it depends on little else. This short book by a leading expert and teacher about St Gregory Palamas is, therefore, of considerable importance in the effort to restore an authentic Orthodox Christian anthropology — doctrine of man. In addition to this work, we would urge the Orthodox reader to carefully study the writings of the holy fathers on this subject, and pay especial attention to those who specifically wrote against the Manicheans and other Gnostic sects. Any corruption of our Orthodox Christian anthropology automatically corrupts our understanding of God and of the work of redemption by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Archbishop Lazar Puhalo PREFACE In our modem context, we as Orthodox Christians are in great need of instruction in the Orthodox faith that we received from our ancestors - that is, our Holy Fathers. This knowledge has motivated me to publish this study, which is based on the traditional Orthodox understanding of the human person. I made every effort to clarify Christian anthropology as manifested in the writings of the Church Fathers and modern Orthodox theologians. My intention is to help our people better understand the doctrine of Orthodox anthropology. The original texts were printed in Theologia, a scholarly journal published by the Church of Greece and the theological faculty of the University of Athens, and the Greek Orthodox Theological Review. The present format is made available through the generosity of Archbishop Lazar Puhalo, for which I am grateful to him. Feast of Saint Nicholas (December 6, 2002) Rev. Dr. Protopresbyter Professor George C. Papademetriou Hellenic College/Holy Cross Greek Orthodox Theological School Brookline, Ma. Chapter 1: THE NATURE OF MAN One of the most fundamental problems which every thinker is faced with is mans being, his destiny, his relation to the world and to God. Early Christianity was influenced by Jewish and Greek philosophical and theological understandings of man. The Greek view of man was expressed in Platonic and Neo-Platonic terms. Greek Philosophy makes a sharp distinction between body and soul, the immaterial rational and the irrational material realms of existence. The Jewish perspective is reflected in the sharp distinction made between God and creation, for the Hebrews carefully avoided philosophical dualism. These two traditions were simultaneously developed in early Christian thought. These two trends complement each other. It is evident that the Christian perspective of man is that he is a being and a creature of God capable to become like God, that is, able to attain theosis. The Orthodox Christian view of man is understood in terms of the New Testament and the Church Fathers. The Patristic interpretation of man is the basis for Orthodox Theologians to expound the doctrine of man founded on the Holy Bible, and the experience of the Fathers. The meaning of Christs revelation is closely connected to the life of the Church. Therefore, the Orthodox interpretation of man is that of the New Testament as expounded by the Holy Fathers. The creation of man is a special act of God within His creation. Creation itself is an act of God resulting from His love. Z. Rhosse, a Greek theologian, states that the result of the creative and providential energy of God is the world, an ordered whole ordained to a definite end. God created the world with a definite end and purpose. The crown of Gods creation is the rational being, man. There is nothing un-Holy in the world. According to a Greek Orthodox theologian: Man consisting of body and soul, was created, between the natural and spiritual world, as the key and crown of creation. Rhosse agrees with him, stating: Man is the link joining the spiritual and material orders of the world ... The body is related to the material world and the soul to the spiritual. In the words of Rhosse, [man is] the capstone and end of the material creation, belonging in body to the physical order, and in the soul or spirit to the spiritual order. Creation does not mean perfection; it means that God made man with all the possibilities to become perfect. God created man and by Grace man attains Immortality. It is emphasized that only God is by nature Eternal, and it is also pointed out that man at creation was innocent but not perfect. He was created with certain potentialities which had to be developed and transformed into actualities in the course of time. He had to take part in his own creation by the use of his free will. Original goodness was innocence, not matured development and fully spiritual maturity. Man is Gods creation ex nihilo as is attested to in the first chapter of Genesis. The doctrine of Creation, ex nihilo, contradicts the classical Greek philosophical view that nothing derives from nothing. Yet the Scriptures and Orthodox theology insist that man was created by God out of nothing to become like Him. Another aspect of man is the soul, which is part of the whole human being. The Platonic influence on Augustine compelled him to regard the body and the material aspect of man as evil; thus salvation is to destroy the corporeal existence of man. Yet later he abandoned this view but could not free himself completely from his Platonism, and regarded the soul as the essence of man, as the vivifying principle. St. Gregory of Nyssa agrees with Augustine that the soul is a lifegiving principle, but St. Gregory of Nyssa insists that the soul and body were created at the same time to evolve toward perfection: The survival cause of our constitution is neither a soul without a body, nor a body without a soul but that from animated and living bodies it is generated at the first as a living and animate being, and that our humanity takes it and cherishes it like a nursling with the resources she herself possesses and it thus grows on both sides and makes its growth manifest correspondingly in either part. This body and soul as understood in Orthodox theology are two aspects of the same being. Androutsos rejects the two extremes of spiritualism and materialism as incompatible with the Orthodox Christian Faith. The definitions given by Augustine and St. Gregory of Nyssa express the attitudes of some Christians concerning the soul. The following definition of Augustine is closely related to that of Plato. He defines the soul as to be a certain kind of substance sharing in reason, fitted to rule the body. The human soul is a substance which participates in reason and is adapted to govern the human body. Also, St. Gregory of Nyssa defines the soul as a created essence has a peculiar nature which is spiritual, and in a sense, ineffable. He states that: The soul is an essence created, living, and intellectual, transmitting from itself to an organized and sentient body of the power of living and grasping objects of sense, as long as there is a natural constitution capable of holding this together. The definitions quoted above from the two representative thinkers tend towards the dualistic conception of man. Orthodox Theologians, however, follow the traditional conception of man as both body and soul. John Papadopoulos in his Dogmatics argues that man consists of body and soul; and that the body is the dwelling place for the soul. The soul is the vivifying power of the body. The body and soul are inseparable in that being which is called man. The prominent Greek Orthodox Theologian Androutsos rejects the doctrine of the Platonizing philosophers who claim that the body is a shadow of the soul, the enslavement of the spirit. Some theologians conceive man as being tri-composite, that is, consisting of three elements: body, soul and spirit. An exponent of this theory is A. Makrakis. He argues that two natures are generated in the soul, the carnal and the spiritual, as the result of its union with the flesh and spirit; this has been proved and confirmed by the testimony of consciousness and the corroboratory testimony of reason. In another article, he goes into grammatical and logical detail to prove that the statement in Genesis 2:7 supports the doctrine of the tri-compositeness of man. But this position is rejected by the Orthodox theologians as being alien to the Orthodox Greek Patristic doctrine and to the true understanding of this doctrine by the Church. According to Rhosse and Androutsos (professors of Dogmatics, University of Athens), man is a unity of body and soul; not a dualistic being. They both reject the tri-compositeness of man, and point out that the spirit in man is the energy of the Holy Spirit which illuminates and sanctifies the intellectual and spiritual faculties of man. According to Gavin, the above-mentioned theologians regard man as a unity consisting of body and soul, the latter called spirit in its higher aspects. John Papadopoulos refers to the Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon and to the Fathers to show that man consists of body and soul... He rejects the tri-compositeness of man as a misunderstanding of the terms body, soul, and spirit used by the Scriptures and the Fathers to describe the nature of man. John Romanides also rejects this doctrine and quotes P. Chrestou that Origen and Apollinaris of Laodicea probably were the only two ancient ecclesiastical writers to advocate this doctrine. The majority of Orthodox theologians follow the Patristic doctrine that man is a unity of body and soul. Man is a creature, created by God in His own Image. Concerning the origin of the individual soul Orthodox theologians have to choose between traducianism and creationism. Augustine was troubled by the nature of the soul and confessed that the origin of the soul is a profound mystery. Now there are three theories concerning the origin of the soul. The first is that the soul pre-exists in God and that the body is an enclosure and enslavement. This theory was held by Plato and Origen in the Christian era, and is incompatible with Christian Orthodoxy. It was condemned by the Fifth Ecumenical Council. The second theory, called traducianism, is that the offspring is a generative act of the parents. This theory was defended by Athanasios, Gregory of Nyssa, and Augustine with some reservations. The generation of the organism is originated in God, who creates through the cooperation (synergy) of man with Gods Providence. The third theory is of creationism, that is, the soul is created by God in principle or as idea in the beginning. In other words, every soul that comes into being is a special act of God. Orthodox theologians seem to be in disagreement as to which theory is acceptable since there is no dogmatic pronouncement concerning the origin of the soul. Papadopoulos accepts traducianism because the continuation of mans relation to Adam and Eve is not interrupted Androutsos rejects this theory because the soul is a product of natural generation which is not compatible to the spirituality of mans soul and also leads to determinism. Androutsos accepts a combination of the two theories, creationism and traducianism, that is, man is a product of the Divine and human activity. In essence, the creative power of God cooperates in the creative generation of each man. He states that: The right view of the origin of the soul lies rather in a combination of the theories of creationism and traducianism so that man would be a result of both Divine and human activity, and Gods creative power be involved and exercised in the generation of each individual. It is obvious from the Scriptures that the soul has its origin in God. We must guard against the error that God created us by engendering the soul from His Essence. Man, being a special creation of God is the crown of creation, created in His Image and destined to become like God. The Image and likeness of God in man was a special doctrine of the Church Fathers, and remains so with modern Orthodox theologians. The most accepted doctrine of the Image and likeness is that the Image is the freedom that man was endowed with and the likeness is the moral perfection of man. According to St. Basil, the Image is the potential likeness. This distinction between Image and likeness is attributed to St. Irenaeus, who influenced the Orthodox doctrine of man. He states that man was not created perfect from the beginning, but was endowed with all the gifts that were necessary to become perfect. The perfection and maturity of man is not only a moral one but also physical and intellectual as well, because this is the will of God. The nature of man is his reason, his freedom and the potentiality to become perfect and participate in Immortality. It is a moral perfection in doing good. Man is not the Image of the universe or only microcosm because the macrocosm is not Eternal. Man is the Image of God. A great Father of the Church speaks the following words on this point: There is nothing remarkable in wishing to make of man the Image and likeness of the universe, for the earth passes away, the sky changes and all that they contain is as transitory as that which contains them. People said, man is a microcosm... and thinking to elevate human nature with this grandiloquent title, they did not notice that they had honoured man with the characteristics of the mosquito and the mouse. Man - as a creature of God in His Image - is destined to attain His likeness. This was taught by the Fathers and is held by the Church. The Image, as interpreted by some theologians, is the freedom and reason that man received at the time of creation. According to Father Romanides, in interpreting the Church Fathers it is suggested that Immortality is the Image of God in man and this is what man lost in the fall. It is not Immortality of the soul as taught by the Ancient Greek philosophers, but the Hebrew concept of Immortality of the whole man. It seems to me that the viewpoints mentioned above, that is, freedom and reason on one side and Immortality on the other, should be emphasized. Both freedom, reason and Immortality make up the Image of God. Those who stress the rational aspect of man point to the rational faculty as the element that gives superiority to man over the other creatures. This is summarized in the following statement: Man alone of all creatures had the capacity for thinking, knows of reality of moral nature and enjoys the ideas of truth, beauty and righteousness, that few would deny. The Image of God is not located in any particular part or aspect of man, but the whole man is the Image of God. St. Gregory Palamas said: The word man (anthropos) is not applied to either soul or body separately, but to both together, since they have been created in the Image of God. ENDNOTES:
Posted on: Tue, 12 Aug 2014 05:04:36 +0000