Filioque

An audio primer on the Filioque controversy by Fr. Thomas Hopko of blessed memory. Approximately 1 hr in length.

Fr. Hopko characterizes the gradual (but as of yet, fruitless) movement for reconciliation on the Filioque as the Latin Church realizing that she's been in error and essentially stalling for a gracious way of backtracking to a pre-Filioque Credo. I don't this is the case in reality, considering that the issue has been authoritatively spoken on by a number of councils. I do recall an Orthodox bishop (Bishop Ware(?)) stating the issue is more semantic than doctrinal, which I think unfortunately is the attitude of people who want this whole disagreement to just go away for the sake of unity...Were it only that easy.

The Orthodox seem to err in a) attaching undue importance to that particular line of the Credo being a direct quote from the Bible, at the expense of fully explaining the matter, and b) jumping through hoops to develop a theology that explains away Gal 4:6, Rom 8:9, Phil 1:19, and Christ's sending of the Holy Ghost in Luke 24:49; John 15:26; 16:7; 20:22; Acts 2:33; Titus 3:6. Just because John 15:26 states the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father, it doesn't by extension require that the Holy Ghost not also proceed from the Son. Scripture refers to the Holy Ghost as both the Spirit of the Father AND the Spirit of the Son, and Christ's own words in John 16:15, in my opinion, settle the matter. ALL that is the Father's is the Son's, in a way we are not capable of understanding.

I would like to find that paper "Spirit of God, Spirit of Christ," but I would point out that the Catholic Church is not a member of the WCC (although certain heretical sects claiming to the Catholic Church are members), and hence, I regard the paper with skepticism until I see which, if any, Catholic theologians contributed.

I do recall an Orthodox bishop (Bishop Ware(?)) stating the issue is more semantic than doctrinal, which I think unfortunately is the attitude of people who want this whole disagreement to just go away for the sake of unity...Were it only that easy.

I've heard Metropolitan Zizioulas make the argument. I doubt either he or Bishop Ware want the issue to "go away".

We shouldn't forget that there is a pre-Filioque Credo in the Latin Church. When the Creed is sung in Greek at Rome it is sung without the filioque.

The idea as I've heard it is that Greek ekporeuein and Latin procedere do not mean exactly the same thing. The Greek implies procession from an ultimate source, while the Latin can admit a procession through intermediates: similar to the old Greek formula "proceeds from the Father through (dia) the Son". If that proves to be the case, it has really been an issue of semantics all along.

"I've heard Metropolitan Zizioulas make the argument. I doubt either he or Bishop Ware want the issue to "go away"."

I suppose "want the issue to go away" is a poor choice of words. Rather, there are parties on both sides that want to resolve the dispute without either side having to admit grave theological error going back 1000-odd years, so saying that the Churches simply misunderstood each other's theology on the subject is an attractive solution. But considering the learned minds on both sides that have hashed this issue about down through the ages, were it really a simple matter of semantics rather than dogma you'd think that it would have been resolved long ago.

The idea that, "from the Father and the Son" and, "from the Father through the Son," are interchangeable statements (with the latter presumably being acceptable to the Orthodox Churches), seems to be the current approach to resolving the split in that light. CCC 248 states,

"At the outset the Eastern tradition expresses the Father's character as first origin of the Spirit. By confessing the Spirit as he "who proceeds from the Father", it affirms that he comes from the Father through the Son.77 The Western tradition expresses first the consubstantial communion between Father and Son, by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (filioque). It says this, "legitimately and with good reason",78 for the eternal order of the divine persons in their consubstantial communion implies that the Father, as "the principle without principle",79 is the first origin of the Spirit, but also that as Father of the only Son, he is, with the Son, the single principle from which the Holy Spirit proceeds.80 This legitimate complementarity, provided it does not become rigid, does not affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed."

To me, this seems like a muddling for the purpose of stating Catholic Dogma in a manner acceptable to the Orthodox, rather than a definitive statement, and I don't see it satisfying either party in the long run. I don't know if the Orthodox, by and large, would simply accept a re-wording of the Latin theology that the Spirit proceeds through the Son, in the sense that the Latin Church means, although I'd be glad to find out I'm wrong on that score.

I should clarify—I do not expect that there will ever be a Latin rewording of the filioque. I am arguing, rather, that the existing wording is theologically correct in Latin, and that the Orthodox will have to come to a recognition of its equivalence with their concept of “through the Son”.

And yes, you make a good points about why wasn’t this solved long ago, if that was the case? Without delving into the primary sources I can only speculate that there were other issues involved that muddied the water—papal authority, for instance.

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