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To: kosta50; MarMema
Actually, it's as much a "personal decision" for me to adhere to the Formula "From the Father through the Son" as it is a Personal Decision for me to use a KJV or an NAS or an NIV english translation of the Bible. Calvinist Presbyterianism of course requires me to believe that the original Hebrew and Greek autographs are infallible, but that english translations are exactly that -- translations.

And, of course, that's what we're talking about here also -- English translations of the original Creeds. The Latins maintain that the filioque can be found in some very early Latin Texts of the Creed, even pre-dating it's final formulation... whereas the Greeks say No, It Wasn't...

And so it goes.

Eventually (as I understand it), the Greek Orthodox patriarchs resolved that if the filioque could indeed be found in any early Latin Texts of the Creed, it could be legitimately understood in the sense "through the Son" and that would be acceptable to Eastern Orthodoxy.

That's my (possibly incorrect) understanding of the EO view on the matter.

114 posted on 02/29/2004 5:46:24 AM PST by OrthodoxPresbyterian
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To: OrthodoxPresbyterian; MarMema
The Latins maintain that the filioque can be found in some very early Latin Texts of the Creed, even pre-dating it's final formulation...

That's interesting because that's the first time I hear of such a thing. Any leads on that?

At any rate, the form you use is Scripturally substantiated and is therefore not wrong to say that the Spirit proceeds through the Son -- but it's not part of the Creed.

Your Calvinist elders are wise people. They know that the Greek word for proceed implies origin (i.e. proceeds from). The Latin verb used is simple procedere which is independent of the origin.

The Greek Fathers observed that the Greek term correctly maintains the monarchy of the Father, from Whom everything proceeds, and that the Filioque is undoubtedly wrong -- because Latin simply did not develop sufficiently to translate a Greek concept faithfully, which is also true.

The Latins were saying that the Son is cosubstantial with the Father and any implication that He is anything less than the Father was heresy, which is true, but the Creed does not do that. That impression was gained from the deficient essence of Latin at that time. The Latin Christians did not speak Greek. Even St. Augustine had difficulty translating because of that and, in at leats one case, made a major error saying that Gos created the world "at once" instead of "in common" as the koine Greek original reads.

The Creed correctly maintains the Divine economy of the three Persons, as understood by the Church, with no implied or expressed inferiority of either.

Finally, the Roman bishop as well as the rest of the Church accepted the Creed as was formulated in Nicenae.

Comparing which verison of the Bible you use to the Creed is a bit of a stretch, don't you think? Obviously the original sources are preferred. If that's not available -- many different versions for comparison. The EO uses the Septuagint and the NT, with Apocryphal books (as beneficial but not for dogmatic formulation).

120 posted on 02/29/2004 7:51:22 AM PST by kosta50
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To: OrthodoxPresbyterian; kosta50
"The reduction of the human being to something else, and something infinitely less, than a creature made in the image of God for wisdom and knowledge, and every divine virtue, is the greatest of tragedies"
V. Lossky

"There are any number of doctrines about human persons today which make them anything and everything but images of God; from the meaningless moments of some mythical historical-evolutionary process or material-economic dialectic, to the passive victims of biological, social, economic, psychological, or sexual forces whose tyranny in comparison to the gods which they have allegedly destroyed is incomparably more ruthless and oppressive. And the fact that theologians, even Christian theologians, are there to provide their professional and professorial sanction to the enslaving power of self-contained and self-explained "nature" only adds further insult to this fatal injury."
Thomas Hopko

An isolated individual is a product of sin. We are of necessity "members one of another".
Man alone is not man, just as God alone is not God.
God is not one but communion...."...perfect unity without the suppression of diversity, and perfect multiplicity without the destruction of unity"....As Lossky so beautifully says.

And these are my replies to your question about man's nature.

122 posted on 02/29/2004 8:22:54 AM PST by MarMema
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