Posted on 08/30/2003 6:54:36 PM PDT by Destro
How an Icon Brought a Calvinist to Orthodoxy
By Robert K. Arakaki
A Journey to Orthodoxy
Conciliar Press - It was my first week at seminary. Walking down the hallway of the main dorm, I saw an icon of Christ on a students door. I thought: "An icon in an evangelical seminary?! Whats going on here?" Even more amazing was the fact that Jims background was the Assemblies of God, a Pentecostal denomination. When I left Hawaii in 1990 to study at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, I went with the purpose of preparing to become an evangelical seminary professor in a liberal United Church of Christ seminary. The UCC is one of the most liberal denominations, and I wanted to help bring the denomination back to its biblical roots. The last thing I expected was that I would become Orthodox.
Called by an Icon
After my first semester, I flew back to Hawaii for the winter break. While there, I was invited to a Bible study at Ss. Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Church. At the Bible study I kept looking across the table to the icons that were for sale. My eyes kept going back to this one particular icon of Christ holding the Bible in His hand. For the next several days I could not get that icon out of my mind.
I went back and bought the icon. When I bought it, I wasnt thinking of becoming Orthodox. I bought it because I thought it was cool, and as a little gesture of rebellion against the heavily Reformed stance at Gordon-Conwell. However, I also felt a spiritual power in the icon that made me more aware of Christs presence in my life.
In my third year at seminary, I wrote a paper entitled, "The Icon and Evangelical Spirituality." In the paper I explored how the visual beauty of icons could enrich evangelical spirituality, which is often quite intellectual and austere. As I did my research, I knew that it was important that I understand the icon from the Orthodox standpoint and not impose a Protestant bias on my subject. Although I remained a Protestant evangelical after I had finished the paper, I now began to comprehend the Orthodox sacramental understanding of reality.
After I graduated from seminary, I went to Berkeley and began doctoral studies in comparative religion. While there, I attended Ss. Kyril and Methodios Bulgarian Orthodox Church, a small parish made up mostly of American converts. It was there that I saw Orthodoxy in action. I was deeply touched by the sight of fathers carrying their babies in their arms to take Holy Communion and fathers holding their children up so they could kiss the icons.
The Biblical Basis for Icons
After several years in Berkeley, I found myself back in Hawaii. Although I was quite interested in Orthodoxy, I also had some major reservations. One was the question: Is there a biblical basis for icons? And doesnt the Orthodox practice of venerating icons violate the Ten Commandments, which forbid the worship of graven images? The other issue was John Calvins opposition to icons. I considered myself to be a Calvinist, and I had a very high regard for Calvin as a theologian and a Bible scholar. I tackled these two problems in the typical fashion of a graduate student: I wrote research papers.
In my research I found that there is indeed a biblical basis for icons. In the Book of Exodus, we find God giving Moses the Ten Commandments, which contain the prohibition against graven images (Exodus 20:4). In that same book, we also find God instructing Moses on the construction of the Tabernacle, including placing the golden cherubim over the Ark of the Covenant (Exodus 25:1722). Furthermore, we find God instructing Moses to make images of the cherubim on the outer curtains of the Tabernacle and on the inner curtain leading into the Holy of Holies (Exodus 26:1, 3133).
I found similar biblical precedents for icons in Solomons Temple. Images of the cherubim were worked into the Holy of Holies, carved on the two doors leading into the Holy of Holies, as well as on the outer walls around Solomons Temple (2 Chronicles 3:14; 1 Kings 6:29, 30, 3135). What we see here stands in sharp contrast to the stark austerity of many Protestant churches today. Where many Protestant churches have four bare walls, the Old Testament place of worship was full of lavish visual details.
Toward the end of the Book of Ezekiel is a long, elaborate description of the new Temple. Like the Tabernacle of Moses and Solomons Temple, the new Temple has wall carvings of cherubim (Ezekiel 41:1526). More specifically, the carvings of the cherubim had either human faces or the faces of lions. The description of human faces on the temple walls bears a striking resemblance to the icons in Orthodox churches today.
Recent archaeological excavations uncovered a first-century Jewish synagogue with pictures of biblical scenes on its walls. This means that when Jesus and His disciples attended the synagogue on the Sabbath, they did not see four bare walls, but visual reminders of biblical truths.
I was also struck by the fact that the concept of the image of God is crucial for theology. It is important to the Creation account and critical in understanding human nature (Genesis 1:27). This concept is also critical for the understanding of salvation. God saves us by the restoration of His image within us (Romans 8:29; 1 Corinthians 15:49). These are just a few mentions of the image of God in the Bible. All this led me to the conclusion that there is indeed a biblical basis for icons!
What About Calvin?
But what about John Calvin? I had the greatest respect for Calvin, who is highly regarded among Protestants for his Bible commentaries and is one of the foundational theologians of the Protestant Reformation. I couldnt lightly dismiss Calvins iconoclasm. I needed good reasons, biblical and theological, for rejecting Calvins opposition to icons.
My research yielded several surprises. One was the astonishing discovery that nowhere in his Institutes did Calvin deal with verses that describe the use of images in the Old Testament Tabernacle and the new Temple. This is a very significant omission.
Another significant weakness is Calvins understanding of church history. Calvin assumed that for the first five hundred years of Christianity, the churches were devoid of images, and that it was only with the decline of doctrinal purity that images began to appear in churches. However, Calvin ignored Eusebiuss History of the Church, written in the fourth century, which mentions colored portraits of Christ and the Apostles (7:18). This, despite the fact that Calvin knew of and even cited Eusebius in his Institutes!
Another weakness is the fact that Calvin nowhere countered the classic theological defense put forward by John of Damascus: The biblical injunction against images was based on the fact that God the Father cannot be depicted in visual form. However, because God the Son took on human nature in His Incarnation, it is possible to depict the Son in icons.
I was surprised to find that Calvins arguments were nowhere as strong as I had thought. Calvin did not take into account all the biblical evidence, he got his church history wrong, and he failed to respond to the classical theological defense. In other words, Calvins iconoclasm was flawed on biblical, theological, and historical grounds.
In my journey to Orthodoxy, there were other issues I needed to address, but the issue of the icon was the tip of the iceberg. I focused on the icon because I thought that it was the most vulnerable point of Orthodoxy. To my surprise, it was much stronger than I had ever anticipated. My questions about icons were like the Titanic hitting the iceberg. What looked like a tiny piece of ice was much bigger under the surface and quite capable of sinking the big ship. In time my Protestant theology fell apart and I became convinced that the Orthodox Church was right when it claimed to have the fullness of the Faith.
I was received into the Orthodox Church on the Sunday of Orthodoxy in 1999. On this Sunday the Orthodox Church celebrates the restoration of the icons and the defeat of the iconoclasts at the Seventh Ecumenical Council in AD 787. On this day, the faithful proclaim, "This is the faith that has established the universe." It certainly established the faith of this Calvinist, as the result of the powerful witness of one small icon!
Robert Arakaki is currently writing his dissertation on religion and politics in Southeast Asia at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. He attends Saints Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaii.
It was not a slam of anything. Just a meaningless post. Meant to reflect on my earlier one, which I posted to lighten up the mood.
Now just follow me here. Humpty before he came off that wall had integrity, right? The kind that Rom meant, the kind that meant his egg was not yet broken, whole.
Humpty fell and as I recall, he was not able to be put together again. So you and Rom made your peace, but that left Humpty without a resolution.
It is pretty telling that the Orthodox on this thread did nothing to correct your understanding. Although they won't admit it here, because it is so similar to Catholic belief, Orthodox baptism actually is a sacrament and it results in the forgiveness of sin.
Mary is prefigured immediately after the Fall of Man; her divine motherhood is prophesied.
Mary and her role in the history of our salvation is foretold by the prophet Isaiah; her virginity and divine motherhood is confirmed.
Matthew begins his genealogy with Abraham and ends with Mary.
Luke narrates the angel Gabriel's announcement to Mary that she is to conceive a son and remain a virgin.
Luke also narrates Mary's visit to her cousin Elizabeth (pregnant with John the Baptist). It is Elizabeth who first calls Mary "the mother of God (Lord)".
Matthew records Mary's engagement to Joseph.
Luke narrates the birth events of Jesus.
Luke includes the circumcision and presentation of Jesus.
Luke narrates the loss and finding of Jesus in the temple in Jerusalem by Mary and Joseph.
John records the wedding feast at Cana where Mary prompts Jesus' first miracle.
Matthew writes of Jesus' own words that compare his relationship with his followers to his relationship with his mother.
It is John (an eye witness) who recalls his personal experience at the foot of the cross on Calvary.
Luke, in his Acts of the Apostles, records the presence of Mary with the Apostles in the community in Jerusalem between the Ascension of Jesus and Pentecost.
A final reference to Mary is found in John's Book of Revelation.
Sin: Infraction or Infection?
by Frederica Mathewes-Green
Often in conversations with Christians of other traditions I find myself explaining the Orthodox view of sin. For most Western Christians, sin is a matter of doing bad things, which create a debt to God, and which somebody has to pay off. They believe that Jesus paid the debt for our sins on the Cross-paid the Father, that is, so we would not longer bear the penalty. The central argument between Protestants and Catholics has to do with whether Jesus paid it all (as Protestants would say) or whether, even though the Cross is sufficient, humans are still obligated (as Catholics would say) to add their own sacrifices as well.
Orthodox, of course, have a completely different understanding of Christ's saving work. We hold to the view of the early church, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself. Our sins made us captives of Death, and God in Christ went into Hades to set us free. The penalty of sin is not a debt we owe the Father; it is the soul-death that is the immediate and inevitable consequence of sin. We need healing and rescue, not someone to step in and square the bill. The early Christians always saw the Father pursuing and loving every sinner, doing everything to bring us back, not waiting with arms folded for a debt to be paid. When the Prodigal Son came home, the Father didn't say, I'd love to take you back, but who's going to pay this Visa bill?
This was the common view for the first thousand years of Christianity, until Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury at the time of the Great Schism, offered an alternative view. Anselm believed that God could not merely forgive us, because our sins constituted an objective wrong in the universe. It could not be made right without payment. No human could pay such a huge debt, but Jesus' blood was more than sufficient to pay it, which gave Jesus a claim on God the Father. If the Son chose to make over the claim He had on God to man, could the Father justly forbid Him doing so, or refuse to man what the Son willed to give him?
We would say that Western Christians, Protestant and Catholic, have mixed up two Scriptural concepts: sacrifice/offering and ransom/payment. Jesus couldn't have paid the ransom for our sins to the Father; you pay a ransom to a kidnapper, and the Father wasn't holding us hostage. No, it was the Evil One who had captured us, due to our voluntary involvement in sin. It cost Jesus his blood to enter Hades and set us free. That's the payment, or ransom, but it obviously isn't paid to the Father. Yet it is a sacrifice or offering to the Father, as a brave soldier might offer a dangerous act of courage to his beloved General.
If I haven't lost you yet, I'd like to take this one step further. As I said, I often have this conversation with other Christians, and make the point that sin is not infraction, but infection; sin makes us sick. The Christian life is one of healing and restoration; its not merely about paying a debt.
It recently occurred to me that this difference between Western and Eastern Christianity explains something else I hadn't noticed till now: that Orthodoxy doesn't spend a lot of time worrying about the problem of evil. The question of why bad things happen is a major one in the West; it seems to refute the assertion that God is good and loves us. If he's all powerful and loves us completely, why does he let bad things happen? I expect that this lingering image of a God who is reluctant to forgive, waiting to be paid, feeds a suspicion that maybe he doesn't really love us.
I think the Orthodox view of sin as illness, rather than rule-breaking, answers this. There is evil in the world because of the pollution of our sins. Our selfishness and cruelty don't merely hurt those around us, but contribute to setting the world off-balance, out of tune. It has a corporate nature. Anyone can observe that life isn't fair; bad things happen to good people. But even good people contribute some sin to the mix, and we all suffer the consequences of the world's mutual sin.
The radio humorist Garrison Keillor used an image for this that has always remained in my mind. He told a story about a man considering adultery, who contemplated how one act of betrayal can unbalance an entire community: I saw that we all depend on each other. I saw that although I thought my sins could be secret, that they would be no more secret than an earthquake. All these houses and all these families, my infidelity will somehow shake them. It will pollute the drinking water. It will make noxious gases come out of the ventilators in the elementary school. When we scream in senseless anger, blocks away a little girl we do not know spills a bowl of gravy all over a white tablecloth.
What we Orthodox keep in mind, and Western Christians often forget, is the presence of the Evil One. In Anselm's theory of the Atonement, there's no Devil. The whole transaction is between us, the Father, and Jesus (and when the Devil is ignored, he has a field day). But Orthodox know who our true enemy is, and we cling to the Lord Jesus as our deliverer. When we see evil in the world, we know immediately that an enemy has done this (Matthew 13:28). We're not surprised that life is unfair and that good people suffer; when we see innocent suffering, we know that our own sins helped cause it, by helping to unbalance the world and make a climate of injustice possible. The Evil One loves to see the innocent suffer, and the fact that such events grieve and trouble us delights him all the more. This is in fact one of the ways we bear the burden of our sins: that we must feel the wrenching pain of seeing innocence suffer, and know that we helped make it happen. Western Christians, on the other hand, who see sin as a private debt between an individual and God, and who forget the presence of the Evil One, can't figure out how God could let an innocent person suffer, and are left with the chilly thought of questioning the goodness of God.
Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! (Romans 7:24-25). We do not trust in our own strength to get out of this mess, but rely entirely on the power of Jesus Christ, who has trampled down death by death. Day by day growing in grace, we can contribute to the world's healing, by forgiving our enemies, loving those who hate us, and overcoming evil with good. The first place it needs to be overcome, we know, is in our hearts.
I would wager that they do, but since theyre (the Orthodox) not Catholic, they must be ok, at least to some extent.
This is carrying a worthy metaphor to an illogical and repulsive extreme.
Satan has no "claim" on God, as if he is "owed" the price of Jesus' blood to set us free from bondage to sin. What Satan is "owed" is punishment for his wickedness in corrupting mankind.
The Catholic Encyclopedia has an interesting discussion of the Atonement, and addresses fully the "rights of Satan" argument and St. Anselm's "Cur Deus Homo?".
Christ is foremost the archetype of the Paschal Lamb and of all sacrificial sin-offerings. These Jewish sacrafices were always made to God to pay the debt owed to God, a theology neatly summarized by their annual Day of Atonement.
Western Christians, on the other hand, who see sin as a private debt between an individual and God
Catholics see it having a dimension of offense against God, and disturbance of the social order. The offense against God is forgiven in confession. The disturbance in the social order is only forgiven by penitential acts or perfect charity. Since sin destroys charity, only charity can overcome its effects.
Hermann, I'm glad you referenced the Catholic Encyclopaedia article on Atonement, because I too found it most useful. As I recall however, it does not side definitively with Anselm. Notwithstanding the infinite merit appertaining to even the slightest suffering on the part of Christ, God in his perfect freedom, the article points out, is eternally capable of pardoning all human sin by a gratuitous act of mercy, without any need for the Crucifixion. In my opinion, the Sacrifice of Christ acting as Mediator for the sin of the world is not legal satisfaction but the very overthrow of that concept. God being perfect, He is insusceptible of injury and thus can never suffer any "lack" needing to be repaired or restored. As Logos Christ restores the world to right order. As Mediator, Christ intercedes for us with the Father; and being perfect Mediator, his perfect and complete intercession implies perfect and complete gift of self. It's in this sense that the Crucifixion is truly a sacrifice, not in the sense that it satisfies a debt. The Crucifixion is not restitution; it's revelation. By his kenotic Passion, the Son reveals the same unrestricted, loving gift of self that characterises the inner life of the Trinity: the Son's obediance of the Father and complete gift of self for love of the Father's created images and likeness is a window into the Trinitarian life that we're all called to share.
To my Orthodox friends, I want to point out that the Catholic Catechism is very clear on the nature of sin as not so much legal transgression as alienation. Conversion, not effective restitution, lies at the heart of our sacrament of reconciliation, for the plain reason that like the Eucharist, Pennance is a sacrament of communion. It's an ecclesial event, not a legal event; and though penitential acts are imposed on the penitent as a condition of his forgiveness, these exist not for God's sake (who needs nothing from us), for for the sinner's, whose need is to cooperate with the grace restoring him to communion with the Body of Christ.
Historical documents from Byzantium say otherwise.
A quite agreeable view....imo.
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