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I'll find time to get back to this. But really, the "difference" would be solved in some of the above formulae given above about "the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son". It is in this sense that the Latin Creed put in the filioque ("que" tacked onto the end of the last of a grouping of words that "belong" together in Latin is one way of indicating "and". In English it would be "peanutbutter jellyque";).

This can be deduced from Scripture. The Eastern Church has never really paid historical attention to the fact that the "filioque" was added to combat a heresy that the Western Church was having some troubles with. It had little or nothing to do about trying to redefine an Ecumenical Council, only to clarify the teaching.

I've just pissed off a bunch of the Orthodox;)

Thank you for both posts.

The "through the Son" formula does not alter the fact that the Orthodox, -- at least today, -- deny any relation between the Son and the Holy Ghost. This is the weakness Aquinas leverages in his discourse: if the Son is not related to the Ghost, do we still have monotheism? and if He is, then what is it if not begetting?

So, I used to see unity in the "through the Son" language, but these days my Orthodox friends convinced me that the schism is deeper.

I'll do some Orthodox bumps after the Orthodox lent is over.

The Eastern Church has never really paid historical attention to the fact that the "filioque" was added to combat a heresy that the Western Church was having some troubles with

That is because after 450 AD, there was almost no communication between the East and the West, each exisiting almost autonomosly. The West was the domain of the Pope, the East under other Patriarchs. Very few spoke each other's language.

The trouble errupted specifically over the filioque under Pope Nicholas I, in the 9th century, and Bulgarian Khan Boris who was "shopping" for the best deal and German clergy arrived there and started to teach something other than what the Church taught in the east in compliance with the Ecumenical Council definitions of faith. It was at this time that the Pope saw an opportunity to extend his rule beyond the domains of the Western Patriarchate.

But the ground was made plenty fertile for the tear in Christendom by events prior to that. I would recommend reading this lenghty but well worthhwile summary of what took place leading to the Great Schism.

That being said, the fact that filioque was added to combat heresy is not the issue. The issue is that a German king in his own semi-iconoclast beliefs and faulty translations accused the Greek side of heresy for omitting the filioque. For centuries the East did not mention the insertion as long as it was understood that it was done to combat heresy. The issue became the issue when it was made into that by someone who wasn't even a theologian.