Posted on 11/05/2009 8:59:31 AM PST by Mr Rogers
He is trying to convince people that the Church Fathers were inconsistent or did not comprehend what they were teaching at times by saying their writings conflict with each other.
He does not use the writings that completely shuts the door on this theory of his.
The Church teaches that the Word (who is God) by the Holy Spirit (the his own Power of God and Mary's flesh) enfleshed himself and became man. At least that's what the Creed says (in Slavonic and by all accounts in Greek too). There is no word "made" anywhere in there.
Thus, the Word (who is God) took on human nature (one person, two natures). It doesn't say that God by his word "made" Jesus, as Justin Martyr believed. Christological dogma of the Church did not yet exist, and one finds all sorts of Christological variants among even Church Fathers.
Even the Church did not know the "exact" formula, but "worked" on it. Thus in 325 AD (1st Ecum. Council) the Creed simply stated:
But by the Second Ecum. Council in 381 AD (one generation later) it was edited to read:
PS I suspect the the "making" error apparently started with the Latin translation which uses the word "factus" (from facio, to make) in the Creed.
Interesting that the same objection you write was also written in the Gospel of John Ch. 6, made by some of Christ’s followers, who left Him because of His statement; they thought it was cannibalism, and they were disgusted.
Protestantism begins with a rejection of transubstantiation and the sacerdotal priesthood. I find it interesting, though, that both Luther and Calvin come closer to the Catholic position than the more radical reformers, who don’t even require a learned ministry. And I wonder what Schaff says about the Arian controversy that results in the Council in 325. There the term “substance,” hitherto a philosophical term rejected by it (in another context) was “baptized” by the Church. No Father before that is likely to have used a term that was not defined until the Council used it to define the relation of the Son to the Father. I am pretty sure of this: that Cyprian would never have looked at the whole issue the same way as the Reformers since they began their argument by dismissing out of hand a doctrine that had developed for 1500 years.
"Καί είς ενα Κύριον, Ίησούν Χριστόν, τόν Υιόν του Θεού τόν μονογενή, τόν εκ του Πατρός γεννηθέντα πρό πάντων τών αιώνων. Φώς εκ φωτός, Θεόν αληθινόν εκ Θεού αληθινού γεννηθέντα, ού ποιηθέντα, ομοούσιον τώ Πατρί, δι ού τά πάντα εγένετο.
Τόν δι ημάς τούς ανθρώπους καί διά τήν ημετέραν σωτηρίαν κατελθόντα εκ τών ουρανών καί σαρκωθέντα εκ Πνεύματος Αγίου καί Μαρίας τής Παρθένου καί ενανθρωπήσαντα."
"σαρκωθέντα", became enfleshed
"ενανθρωπήσαντα", became man
There's nothing in the original Creed which speaks of Christ being "made" by anyone or anything. And the problem, Kosta is right, is the Latin "...et homo factus est."
Because the Protestants take their Nicene Creed from the Latins, the error compounded and we see quasi Arian and outright Nestorian thought being regularly preached by Protestants who simply don't understand what the difference is.
Yes.
Good post.
Is it irony, or have you adopted Protestant heresies on top of your own?
Actually, I need to show nothing of the sort. Remember - I’m a Protestant. Scripture takes precedence.
However, having taken part in many threads over the last 6 months, I can state that Catholics DO read transubstantiation into the Church Fathers. I’ve been told more times than I could count that it is explicitly taught, just not named.
Denial is simple: The scripture quite explicitly states that the sacrifice of Jesus is PAST. Not present, not perpetual, not always before God, but PAST.
It also states “once for all”.
It has no Priests, except in the sense of a universal priesthood of believers who offer a sacrifice of praise and good deeds.
The Church Fathers were NOT united in teaching the Eucharist was / is a sacrifice for atonement, nor did they consistently teach ‘real presence’ in the later sense.
This article points out some of the places they do not. It also points out the difference between devotional language and logical language, and cautions one to look for context before assuming a sentence means anything.
Your developing theology first forced out the Orthodox and later the Reformers. Far from keeping unity, the Bishop of Rome has shattered it.
Eucharist is a thanksgiving, not an atonement. As kosta50 pointed out on another thread, the type is the Passover. The first Passover put blood on the lintels so the Angel of Death would pass over. Subsequent Passovers were remembrances, not recreations. They were proclamations. As is the Eucharist, IAW scripture and many passages in the Church Fathers.
Another knee-slapper.
To what, therefore, do you attribute the constantly splintering world of the custom-made Protestant "church"? Is this the model of "unity" to which we're supposed to aspire?
The clear and unavoidable lesson of the last 500 years is that rupture with Rome leads to an unrestrained and ongoing proliferation of every form of heterodox Christian sect and do-it-yourself theology imaginable. Since the "Reformers" (read innovators) got out from under Rome, all hell has broken loose.
Peddle that half-baked drivel elsewhere.
***If Jesus was “made” through the word of God, then Jesus is a creature. I don’t have to tell that this is not what the Church teaches.***
Actually, that’s not how I read the quotation or Kolo’s question. Jesus Himself was not ‘made’; the flesh was made.
These statements you make cannot be backed up with writings showing the Church Fathers were in debate with each other and thus not united in historical church teaching on Eucharist.
You and your sources pick a writing out of context here and there and every time you use it to try and say the ECF's did not believe in the True presence you're proven wrong with clear writings that show they did believe Our Eucharistic Jesus was Truly present Body Blood Soul and Divinity in Eucharist!
***The Church Fathers were NOT united in teaching the Eucharist was / is a sacrifice for atonement, nor did they consistently teach real presence in the later sense.***
One must differentiate between debate and scholarly discussion and Church doctrine. The Eucharist was understood as sacrifice for atonement; the balance between worship / supplication and sacrifice is slightly different between East and West, but the doctrine still exists. Again, the consistency of the Church does not reflect the debates of the Church Fathers. It is declared and the Church moves on. If a great Church Father cannot accept the Consensus Patrum, he is evicted - in the case of Origen, in disgrace.
***It has no Priests, except in the sense of a universal priesthood of believers who offer a sacrifice of praise and good deeds.***
I believe that kosta has posted some good information above on the role of priests versus bishops versus deacons versus the laity.
***Your developing theology first forced out the Orthodox and later the Reformers. Far from keeping unity, the Bishop of Rome has shattered it.***
The only differences between Orthodox and Latin is in the furniture. The filioque is, when one looks at it and defines it correctly, immaterial. The bishops will handle it during any unification methodology talks that arise.
***Eucharist is a thanksgiving, not an atonement. As kosta50 pointed out on another thread, the type is the Passover. The first Passover put blood on the lintels so the Angel of Death would pass over. Subsequent Passovers were remembrances, not recreations. They were proclamations.***
That’s the type of its initial conception, sure, but the Church soon worked on developing the doctrine as they settled down and tried to understand just what they were taught. Remember that the formulation of the Trinity took hundreds of years to get their arms around and still to this day, many if not most Christians really don’t have a clue as to what the Trinity is.
And annalex has posted some more over on http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2370551/reply?c=222.
One thing that many Protestants accuse us of is being an unthinking monolith; the debates of the Church Fathers and the debates that go on to this day in the Church should indicate otherwise.
What a crock! Islam didn't arrive until the 15th century, and all the while the works of Islam, let alone asleep theologically, and neither was Greece or Serbia, or any other eastern Orthodox nation. It is historically untrue, if not deceptive, to suggest the Church in the East was hibernating.
Since the 15th century, the Orthodox Church had several very important all-Orthodox Councils that were of important theological nature, and the Ecumenical Patriarch found it even necessary to defend the Pope against Lutheran "divines" who persistently tried to get the East to join their ranks against Rome.
The ink you spout about was spilled for naught, most of it to promote the myth of papal supremacy through False Decretals, another Frankish stupidity that was embraced in the West, or the heretical Anselmian deformation of Christ's sacrifice, or on damage control brought about by the Reformation.
Is it really necessary for Easterners not to let anything go past without getting in a dig at the West and at Augustine? Its tiresome
Sure, when silly sweeping generalizations, such as the one about the Blessed Augustine being the most quoted Father, or something to that effect (as if the other side of the Church did not exist, or doesn't count unless it kisses Pope's red Riding Hood shoes).
What's tiresome are such perpetual falsehoods which should not go unnoticed, and never will.
Something got garbled up, please disregard. I was saying that Islam did not arrive until the 15th century and even under islam the Church was not asleep or hibernating theologically.
Those who continue in debate and disagreement are heretics in the same fashion of the arians who denied Christ's divinity.
The mainstream protestants agree with the Church in regards to the arian heresy than reject those same Fathers they agree with on other issues due to self pride and elevation of self interpretation of Bible for man centered obedience to self
If a great Church Father cannot accept the Consensus Patrum, he is evicted
This consensus was agreed upon with the dogma of Immaculate Conception as well and did not end with in the 11th century schism
I am not sure where the idea of drinking his blood and eating his flesh came from, but as an observat Jew he was breaking the Law by saying that. Food for thought.
Show me otherwise.
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