OK, thanks for the explanation. This sounds a whole lot like original sin, though. :)
Needless to say, the problem originates with Paul's innovation (who else!), that Christ in his humanity was the "Second Adam" (something not even Christ claimed!).
Does this mean the Orthodox don't buy into any of that Latin "Mary is the second Eve" stuff?
But in order for Paul to believe that Jesus was the Second Adam he would have had to believe that Christ was capable of sinning but chose not to. Which means that Paul could not think of Christ as equal to God.
I don't agree that follows. The comparison was drawn in part to show the means of entry of sin "into" man and the means of its "exit" from the saved. Besides, using this comparison Paul shows Jesus as God:
Of course it does. The Orthodox do not deny the original sin, only the personal guilt of the original sin on subsequent generations. My point was that man was created neither mortal nor immortal and certainly not incapable of committing sin. Archbishop Hilarion (Alfeyev) writes "it was also freedom that from the very beginning contained within itself the possibility to fall away from God." In other words, Adam was not incapable of sinning. But you and many others claim that Christ, in his humanity, was. Therefore, ontologically, Christ was not another Adam, as Paul claims.
Does this mean the Orthodox don't buy into any of that Latin "Mary is the second Eve" stuff?
Sure they do, they even have hymns that extant her as the Second Eve, although the whole notion of her being the Second Eve lends support to the Latin dogma of the Immaculate Conception which the Orthodox reject. In order for Mary to be the Second Eve, Mary would have had to be created like the Second Eve, i.e. without the original sin (which is at the core of the Immaculate Conception)!
The idea that she is the Second Eve was first proposed by +Justin Martyr around AD 150, and further advanced by +Irenaeus c. AD 180, except that there is a problem with Irenaeus' work (originally written in Greek), because the Latin copy (c. AD 400, the oldest surviving copy of his work) refers to Mary as the advocata, which—when translated back into Greek—becomes Paraclete or Holy Ghost!
Of course, given that +Irenauses' work in Greek is all but lost save for a few fragments of letters, it is difficult to know if +Irenaeus did believe Mary is Paraclete (which would be heresy), or if this is a "doctrinal correction" made by the Latin copyist, since the concept of Mary as an advocate is part of Latin Mariology. However, one has reason to put some trust into the Latin copy because there are copies of +Irenaeus in other languages (i..e Syriac) that agree very well with the Latin copies.
So, to be honest with you, I have no clue why the Orthodox believe Mary was the "Second Eve!" Maybe Kolo can chime in on this.
I am aware of his play on concepts.
Besides, using this comparison Paul shows Jesus as God: 1 Cor. 15:45-47 : 45 So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. 46 The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. 47 The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven.
Oh boy, what was he thinking!? As I read these verses, I am pulling my hair out. Now, Paul is known for his linguistic acrobatics, but even after reading them a hundred times over brings the same reaction in me. Let's look at it line for line.
Did Christ become a life-giving spirit? According to Paul he did. Did Christ not pre-exist man? According to Paul (this time) he did not. According to Paul, the earthly came first. Well, then Paul could not believe that Christ is God, because he clearly suggests the "life-giving spirit" was made after Adam! In other words, Adam pre-existed Christ. Yet in Colossians 1:15 he says that Christ is the "first-born of all creatures!"
Verse 47 is interesting, because later copies (including Textus Receptus that served as the "mother copy" for KJV) add the word Lord (Greek: ho kyrios), thus reading "the second the man, the Lord from heaven" which does not appear in the older manuscripts.
From 1 Cor 15:45-47 it sounds as if Paul believed, Jesus was a creature made in heaven in a spiritual form, yet in Galatians 4:4 he says he "came into existence (Greek: ginomai) of a woman, under the law."
Here is what the Church teaches: Jesus Chris is a single and unique hypostatic union of the divine and human, both natures being united inseparably and seamlessly, yet unconfused, each being 100%. In his divine nature, Christ pre-existed the world eternally with the Father and the Holy Spirit, as one God, who is a spirit. In his human nature, Christ is a 100% human being, like the rest of us, with a human soul and will, who suffered passions, died, was buried and on the third day rose from the dead.
The eternal Word of God "took on flesh" (became 'incarnate" or "enfleshed") as his second nature, developed as any normal embryo in the womb and, and was born of a virgin, not just "a woman." Her virginity is extremely important, actually essential in Christian theology, but apparently not to Paul.
The flesh the Word became is not the flesh of his mother (unless you subscribe to Immaculate Conception) because his humanity was not stained by the "original sin" but was like that of Adam before the Fall. The question, then, is whence came the flesh? According to the Bible, the flesh comes form the dust, not from heaven. But Paul says otherwise.
And did Christ not have a human will and spirit which he gave up at the moment of his death like all humans do? Certainly this was not the life-giving spirit Paul is talking about!
All in all, looking at 1 Cor 15:45-47 I don't see anything that mainline Christianity believes about Jesus Christ. It's that emperor-without-clothes thing. Everyone sees the emperor has no clothes, but everyone is pretending he does. Why do people do that?