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On the Noetic Sun, Moon and Stars

Tuesday, January 17, 2012 By Leave a Comment

St. Gregory of Tours ca. 538-594

When the Lawgiver-prophet began to speak of the creation of the world and to show the Lord forming the expanse of the heavens by the majesty of His right hand, he added, “And God made two great lights and the stars and placed them in the firmament of heaven, so that they rule over the day and the night and shine in the firmament of heaven” (Gen. 1:16-17). Likewise, in the firmament of human understanding He placed – as the authority of the Fathers affirms – two great lights, that is, Christ and the Church, in order that they shine in the darkness of ignorance and illuminate our humble intelligence as the Evangelist John says of the Lord, because truly He is the light of the world, Who “enlightens every man who comes into the world” (Jn. 1:9) He also placed in this firmament stars, that is, the patriarchs, prophets, and apostles, who instruct us with their doctrine and illuminate us with their miracles, as He has said in the Gospel: “You are the light of the world” (Matt. 5:14), and again, “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father Who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:16). The Apostles, to whom these words were addressed, have rightly been taken for the whole Church, which does not have wrinkles and which remains wihout blemish, as the Apostle says: “That He might present the Church to Himself pure, having no blemish or wrinkle or anything similar.” (Eph. 5:27)

Now, thanks to the doctrine of the Apostles there are up to our times men who, like unto stars in this world, not only were resplendent by the light of their merits, but also shone by the grandeur of their teachings; and who have lighted the whole universe by the rays of their preaching, going to teach in every place, founding monasteries for divine worship, instructing men to abstain from earthly cares and to despise the darkness of concupiscence in order to follow the true God, by Whom everything has been created. (Vita Patrum: The Life of the Fathers by St. Gregory of Tours trans. by Hieromonk Seraphim Rose. Chap. 18 pp.275-276)

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, St. Gregory of Tours ca. 538-594

On Classical Christianity

Thursday, December 29, 2011 By Leave a Comment

St. Nectarios of Aegina 1846-1920

Christianity is a religion of revelation. The Divine reveals its glory only to those who have been perfected through virtue. Christianity teaches perfection through virtue and demands that its followers become holy and perfect. It disapproves of and opposes those who are under the influence of the imagination. He who is truly perfect in virtue becomes through Divine help outside the flesh and the world, and truly enters another, spiritual world; not, however, through the imagination, but through the effulgence of Divine grace. Without grace, without revelation, no man, even the most virtuous, can transcend the flesh and the world. (“Modern Orthodox Saints, St. Nectarios of Aegina”, by Dr. Constantine Cavarnos)

Source: http://www.serfes.org/writtings/stnectarios.htm

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, St. Nectarios of Aegina 1846-1920

On the “Patristic” Age

Tuesday, December 27, 2011 By 2 Comments

Fr. Georges Florovsky 1893-1979

It is misleading to single out particular statements of the Fathers and to detach them from the total perspective in which they have been actually uttered, just as it is misleading to manipulate with detached quotations from the Scripture. It is a dangerous habit “to quote” the Fathers, that is, their isolated sayings and phrases, outside of that concrete setting in which only they have their full and proper meaning and are truly alive. “To follow” the Fathers does not mean just “to quote” them. “To follow” the Fathers means to acquire their “mind,” their phronema.

Now, we have reached the crucial point. The name of “Church Fathers” is usually restricted to the teachers of the Ancient Church. And it is currently assumed that their authority depends upon their “antiquity,” upon their comparative nearness to the “Primitive Church,” to the initial “Age” of the Church. Already St. Jerome had to contest this idea. Indeed, there was no decrease of “authority,” and no decrease in the immediacy of spiritual competence and knowledge, in the course of Christian history. In fact, however, this idea of “decrease” has strongly affected our modern theological thinking. In fact, it is too often assumed, consciously or unconsciously, that the Early Church was, as it were, closer to the spring of truth. As an admission of our own failure and inadequacy, as an act of humble self-criticism, such an assumption is sound and helpful. But it is dangerous to make of it the starting point or basis of our “theology of Church history,” or even of our theology of the Church. Indeed, the Age of the Apostles should retain its unique position. Yet, it was just a beginning. It is widely assumed that the “Age of the Fathers” has also ended, and accordingly it is regarded just as an ancient formation, “antiquated” in a sense and “archaic.” The limit of the “Patristic Age” is variously defined. It is usual to regard St. John of Damascus as the “last Father” in the East, and St. Gregory the Dialogos or Isidore of Seville as “the last” in the West. This periodization has been justly contested in recent times. Should not, for instance, St. Theodore of Studium, at least, be included among “the Fathers”? Mabillon has suggested that Bernard of Clairvaux, the Doctor mellifluous, was “the last of the Fathers, and surely not unequal to the earlier ones.” [4] Actually, it is more than a question of periodization. From the Western point of view “the Age of the Fathers” has been succeeded, and indeed superseded, by “the Age of the Schoolmen,” which was an essential step forward. Since the rise of Scholasticism “Patristic theology” has been antiquated, has become actually a “past age,” a kind of archaic prelude. This point of view, legitimate for the West, has been, most unfortunately, accepted also by many in the East, blindly and uncritically. Accordingly, one has to face the alternative. Either one has to regret the “backwardness” of the East which never developed any “Scholasticism” of its own. Or one should retire into the “Ancient Age,” in a more or less archeological manner, and practice what has been wittily described recently as a “theology of repetition.” The latter, in fact, is just a peculiar form of imitative “scholasticism.”

Now, it is not seldom suggested that, probably, “the Age of the Fathers” has ended much earlier than St. John of Damascus. Very often one does not proceed further than the Age of Justinian, or even already the Council of Chalcedon. Was not Leontius of Byzantium already “the first of the Scholastics”? Psychologically, this attitude is quite comprehensible, although it cannot be theologically justified. Indeed, the Fathers of the Fourth century are much more impressive, and their unique greatness cannot be denied. Yet, the Church remained fully alive also after Nicea and Chalcedon. The current overemphasis on the “first five centuries” dangerously distorts theological vision, and prevents the right understanding of the Chalcedonian dogma itself. The decree of the Sixth Ecumenical Council is often regarded as a kind of an “appendix” to Chalcedon, interesting only for theological specialists, and the great figure of St. Maximus the Confessor is almost completely ignored. Accordingly, the theological significance of the Seventh Ecumenical Council is dangerously obscured, and one is left to wonder, why the Feast of Orthodoxy should be related to the commemoration of the Church’s victory over the Iconoclasts. Was it not just a “ritualistic controversy”? We often forget that the famous formula of the Consensus quinquesaecularis [agreement of five centuries], that is, actually, up to Chalcedon, was a Protestant formula, and reflected a peculiar Protestant “theology of history.” It was a restrictive formula, as much as it seemed to be too inclusive to those who wanted to be secluded in the Apostolic Age. The point is, however, that the current Eastern formula of “the Seven Ecumenical Councils” is hardly much better, if it tends, as it usually does, to restrict or to limit the Church’s spiritual authority to the first eight centuries, as if “the Golden Age” of Christianity has already passed and we are now, probably, already in an Iron Age, much lower on the scale of spiritual vigour and authority. Our theological thinking has been dangerously affected by the pattern of decay, adopted for the interpretation of Christian history in the West since the Reformation. The fullness of the Church was then interpreted in a static manner, and the attitude to Antiquity has been accordingly distorted and misconstrued. After all, it does not make much difference, whether we restrict the normative authority of the Church to one century, or to five, or to eight. There should he no restriction at all. Consequently, there is no room for any “theology of repetition.” The Church is still fully authoritative as she has been in the ages past, since the Spirit of Truth quickens her now no less effectively as in the ancient times. (St. Gregory Palamas and the Tradition of the Fathers)

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Fr. Georges Florovsky 1893-1979, Holy Fathers

On Orthodox/Roman Catholic Differences

Friday, December 16, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Blessed Father Seraphim Rose 1934-1982

Question: Something I don’t know much about, and probably a lot of other people don’t is: what are some of the concrete differences and similarities between, say the Russian Orthodox Church and, say, the Roman Catholic Church with regard to different doctrines and ideas, like about the Trinity or whether priests marry or not – all those million and one little differences.

Fr. Seraphim: There are a lot of little differences. There is one main difference, I think; and I would explain it precisely in connection with the Holy Spirit. The Church of Christ is that which gives grace to people; and in the West, when Rome broke off from this Church, this grace was actually lost (maybe people individually found it here and there, but from their whole Church the grace was cut off). I look at modern Roman Catholiciscm as an attempt to substitute, by human ingenuity, the grace which is lost. Therefore, it makes the Pope “infallible”, having to give an answer to the question of “where is truth?”

There are some who look at our Orthodox Church and say, “It’s impossible for people to find truth there. You say you don’t believe in any one pope or bishop, and thus there is no guarantee; you don’t believe in the Scriptures like a Protestant might and say that they are the absolutely ‘infallible’ word. If you have a controversy, where is the final word?” And we say that the Holy Spirit will reveal Himself. This happens especially when bishops come together in council, but even then there can be a false council. One might then say, “There’s no hope!” But we say that the Holy Spirit guides the Church, and therefore He will not be false to the Church. If you haven’t got the feeling that this is so, then you devise things like making the Bible infallible, making the Pope infallible. Also, you make Orthodox things – as the Roman Catholics did – into some kind of “law”, so that everything is nicely defined: if you break this law you go your confessor, get such-and-such a penance, and you’re all “set” again. Orthodoxy does not believe; from this came the whole idea of indulgences, which is a totally legalistic perversion of the idea of repentance. If you repent, like the thief on the cross, you can be saved at that moment.

Orthodoxy always emphasizes this spiritual aspect of the relationship of one’s own soul to God; and all the sacraments and discipline of the Church are only a means of getting one’s soul right with God: this is the whole of our Faith. In the Roman Church until very recently when things began to dissolve, the emphasis was rather on obeying a whole set of laws and thereby getting “right” with God in a legalistic sense, which is a substitute for the Holy Spirit. (God’s Revelation to the Human Heart: Questions and Answers, pg 48)

Filed Under: All, Blessed Father Seraphim Rose 1934-1982, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, Holy Spirit

How to Read the Scriptures and the Fathers

Tuesday, December 13, 2011 By 2 Comments

St. Athanasius of Alexandria ca. 293-373

…[F]or the searching of the Scriptures and true knowledge of them, an honourable life is needed, and a pure soul, and that virtue which is according to Christ; so that the intellect guiding its path by it, may be able to attain what it desires, and to comprehend it, in so far as it is accessible to human nature to learn concerning the Word of God. For without a pure mind and a modelling of the life after the saints, a man could not possibly comprehend the words of the saints. For just as, if a man wished to see the light of the sun, he would at any rate wipe and brighten his eye, purifying himself in some sort like what he desires, so that the eye, thus becoming light, may see the light of the sun; or as, if a man would see a city or country, he at any rate comes to the place to see it—thus he that would comprehend the mind of those who speak of God must needs begin by washing and cleansing his soul, by his manner of living, and approach the saints themselves by imitating their works; so that, associated with them in the conduct of a common life, he may understand also what has been revealed to them by God, and thenceforth, as closely knit to them, may escape the peril of the sinners and their fire at the Day of Judgment, and receive what is laid up for the saints in the Kingdom of Heaven, which eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, whatsoever things are prepared for them that live a virtuous life (1 Cor. 2:9), and love the God and Father, in Christ Jesus our Lord: through Whom and with Whom be to the Father Himself, with the Son Himself, in the Holy Spirit, honour and might and glory for ever and ever. Amen. (On the Incarnation of the Word, 57)

Filed Under: All, Bible, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, St. Athanasius of Alexandria ca. 297-373

Fr. Seraphim Rose on Eternal Perspective

Saturday, December 10, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Blessed Fr. Seraphim Rose (1934 – 1982)

Our Christianity is a religion which tells us about what we are going to be doing in eternal life, that is, to prepare us for something eternal, not of this world. If we think only about this world, our horizon is very limited, and we don’t know what’s after death, where we came from, where w’re going, what’s the purpose of life. When we talk about the beginning of things, or the end of things, we find out what our whole life is about. Not of This World, p.823

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, Post-Mortem

What is Orthodoxy?

Saturday, December 10, 2011 By 3 Comments

Fr. Seraphim Rose 1934-1982

We can define Orthodoxy in no better way than in the words of the great 18th-century Russian Father, St. Tikhon of Zadonsk — a Saint whose fervent spirit is needed very much today by Orthodox Christians. We should read him more and practice what he teaches. St. Tikhon calls Orthodoxy “the true Christianity,” and he wrote a whole book under this title. But “true Christianity” does not mean just having the right opinions about Christianity — this is not enough to save one’s soul.

St. Tikhon in his book, in the chapter on “The Gospel and Faith,” says: “If someone should say that true faith is the correct holding and confession of correct dogmas, he would be telling the truth, for a believer absolutely needs the Orthodox holding and confession of dogmas. But this knowledge and confession by itself does not make a man a faithful and true Christian. The keeping and confession of Orthodox dogmas is always to be found in true faith in Christ, but the true faith of Christ is not always to be found in the confession of Orthodoxy… The knowledge of correct dogmas is in the mind, and it is often fruitless, arrogant, and proud… The true faith in Christ is in the heart, and it is fruitful, humble, patient, loving, merciful, compassionate, hungering and thirsting for righteousness; it withdraws from worldly lusts and clings to God alone, strives and seeks always for what is heavenly and eternal, struggles against every sin, and constantly seeks and begs help from God for this.” And he then quotes Blessed Augustine, who teaches: “The faith of a Christian is with love; faith without love is that of the devil” (“True Christianity,” ch. 287, p. 469). St. James in his Epistle tells us that “the demons also believe and tremble” (James 3:19).

St. Tikhon, therefore, gives us a start in understanding what Orthodoxy is: it is something first of all of the heart, not just the mind, something living and warm, not abstract and cold, some thing that is learned and practiced in life, not just in school. (Orthodoxy in America)

Source: http://www.stxenia.org/files/history/ortham.html

Filed Under: All, Blessed Father Seraphim Rose 1934-1982, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, St. Tikhon of Voronezh and Zadonsk 1724-1783

Saint Macarius on Heart and Mind

Wednesday, December 7, 2011 By Leave a Comment

 Saint Macarius the Great

When those who are rich in the Holy Spirit, really having the heavenly wealth and the fellowship of the Spirit in themselves, speak to any the word of truth…it is out of their own wealth and their own treasure, which they posess within themselves when they speak, and out of this that they gladden the souls of the hearers of the spiritual discourse…But one who is poor, and does not posses the wealth of Christ in his soul…even if he wishes to speak a word of truth and to gladden some of his hearers, yet not possessing within himself the Word of God in power and reality but only repeating from memory and borrowing words from various parts of the book of Scripture, or what he has heard from spiritual men, and relating and teaching this -see, he seems to gladden others…but after he has gone through it, each word goes back to the source from which it was taken, and he himself remains once more naked and poor…For this reason we should seek first from God with pain of heart and in faith, that he would grant us to find this wealth, the true treasure of Christ in our hearts, in the power and effectual working of the Spirit. In this way, first finding in ourselves the Lord to be our profit and salvation and eternal life, we may then profit others also, according to our strength and opportunity, drawing upon Christ, the treasure within.” (Spiritual Homilies of Saint Marcius the Great – Translated by Fr. Seraphim Rose)

Filed Under: All, Ascetics, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, Holy Spirit

St. Diadochos on Spiritual Knowledge

Tuesday, October 18, 2011 By Leave a Comment

SAINT DIADOCHOS

71. Spiritual knowledge teaches us that, at the outset, the soul in pursuit of theology is troubled by many passions, above all by anger and hatred. This happens to it not so much because the demons are arousing these passions, as because it is making progress. So long as the soul is worldly-minded, it remains unmoved and untroubled however much it sees people trampling justice under foot. Preoccupied with its own desires, it pays no attention to the justice of God. When, however, because of its disdain for this world and its love for God, it begins to rise above its passions, it cannot bear, even in its dreams, to see justice set at naught. It becomes infuriated with evil-doers and remains angry until it sees the violators of justice forced to make amends. This, then, is why it hates the unjust and loves the just. The eye of the soul cannot be led astray when its veil, by which I mean the body, is refined to near transparency through self-control. Nevertheless, it is much better to lament the insensitivity of the unjust than to hate them; for even should they deserve our hatred, it is senseless for a soul which loves God to be disturbed by hatred, since when hatred is present in the soul spiritual knowledge is paralyzed.

72. The theologian whose soul is gladdened and kindled by the oracles of God comes, when the time is ripe, to the realm of dispassion; for it is written: ‘The oracles of the Lord are pure, as silver when tried in fire, and purged of earth’ (Ps. 12:6. LXX). The Gnostic, for his part, rooted in his direct experience of spiritual knowledge, is established above the passions. The theologian, if he humbles himself, may also savor the experience of spiritual knowledge, while the Gnostic, if he acquires faultless discrimination, may by degrees attain the virtue of theological contemplation. These two gifts, theology and gnosis, never occur in all their fullness in the same person; but theologian and Gnostic each marvel at what the other enjoys to a greater degree, so that humility and desire for holiness increase in both of them. That is why the Apostle says: ‘For to one is given by the Spirit the principle of wisdom; to another the principle of spiritual knowledge by the same Spirit’ (1 Cor. 12:8).

73. When a person is in a state of natural well-being, he sings the psalms with a full voice and prefers to pray out loud. But when he is energized by the Holy Spirit, with gladness and completely at peace he sings and prays in the heart alone. The first condition is accompanied by a delusory joy, the second by spiritual tears and, thereafter, by a delight that loves stillness. For the remembrance of God, keeping its fervor because the voice is restrained, enables the heart to have thoughts that bring tears and are peaceful. In this way, with tears we sow seeds of prayer in the earth of the heart, hoping to reap the harvest in joy (cf. Ps. 126:5). But when we are weighed down by deep despondency, we should for a while sing psalms out loud, raising our voice with joyful expectation until the thick mist is dissolved by the warmth of song.

74. When the soul has reached self-understanding, it produces from within a certain feeling of warmth for God. When this warmth is not disturbed by worldly cares, it gives birth to a desire for peace which, so far as its strength allows, searches out the God of peace. But it is quickly robbed of this peace, either because our attention is distracted by the senses or because nature, on account of its basic insufficiency, soon exhausts itself. This was why the wise men of Greece could not possess as they should what they hoped to acquire through their self-control, for the eternal wisdom which is the fullness of truth was not at work within their intellect. On the other hand, the feeling of warmth which the Holy Spirit engenders in the heart is completely peaceful and enduring. It awakes in all parts of the soul a longing for God; its heat does not need to be fanned by anything outside the heart, but through the heart it makes the whole man rejoice with a boundless love. Thus, while recognizing the first kind of warmth, we should strive to attain the second; for although natural love is evidence that our nature is in a healthy state through self control, nevertheless such love lacks the power, which spiritual love possesses, to bring the intellect to the state of dispassion.

75. When the north wind blows over creation, the air around us remains pure because of this wind’s subtle and clarifying nature; but when the south wind blows, the air becomes hazy because it is this wind’s nature to produce mist and,, by virtue of its affinity with clouds, to bring them from its own regions to cover the earth. Likewise, when the soul is energized by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, it is freed completely from the demonic mist; but when the wind of error blows fiercely upon it, it is completely filled with the clouds of sin. With all our strength, therefore, we should, try always to face towards the life-creating and purifying wind of the Holy Spirit – the wind which the prophet Ezekiel, in the light of spiritual knowledge, saw coming from the north (cf. Ezek. 1:4). Then the contemplative faculty of the soul will always remain clear, so that we devote ourselves unerringly to the contemplation of the divine, beholding the world of light in an air filled with light. For this is the light of true knowledge.

76. Some have imagined that both grace and sin – that is, the spirit of truth and the spirit of error – are hidden at the same time in the intellect of the baptized. As a result, they say, one of these two spirits urges the intellect to good, the other to evil. But from Holy Scripture and through the intellect’s own insight I have come to understand things differently. Before holy baptism, grace encourages the soul towards good from the outside, while Satan lurks in its depths, trying to block all the intellect’s ways of approach to the divine. But from the moment that we are reborn through baptism, the demon is outside, grace is within. Thus, whereas before baptism error ruled the soul, after baptism truth rules it. Nevertheless, even after baptism Satan still acts on the soul, often, indeed, to a greater degree than before. This is not because he is present in the soul together with grace; on the contrary, it is because he uses the body’s humors to befog the intellect with the delight of mindless pleasures. God allows him to do this, so that a man, after passing through a trial of storm and fire, may come in the end to the full enjoyment of divine blessings. For it is written: ‘We went through fire and water, and Thou hast brought us out into a place where the soul is refreshed’ (Ps. 66.12. LXX).

77. As we have said, from the instant we are baptized, grace is hidden in the depths of the intellect, concealing its presence even from the perception of the intellect itself. When someone begins, however, to love God with full resolve, then in a mysterious way, by means of intellectual perception, grace communicates something of its riches to his soul.-Then, if he really wants to hold fast to this discovery, he joyfully starts longing to be rid of all his temporal goods, so as to acquire the field in which he has found the hidden treasure of life (cf. Matt. 13:44). This is because, when someone rids himself of all worldly riches, he discovers the place where the grace of God is hidden. For as the soul advances, divine grace more and more reveals itself to the intellect. During this process, however, the Lord allows the soul to be pestered increasingly by demons. This is to teach it to discriminate correctly between good and evil, and to make it more humble through the deep shame it feels during its purification because of the way in which it is defiled by demonic thoughts.

On Spiritual  Knowledge and Discrimination

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers

St. Diadochos on Communion with God

Saturday, October 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment


SAINT DIADOCHOS OF PHOTIKI

“When God recedes in order to educate us, this brings great sadness, humility and even some measure of despair to the soul. The purpose of this is to humble the soul’s tendency to vanity and self-glory, for the heart at once is filled with fear of God, tears of thankfulness, and great longing for the beauty of silence. But the receding due to God’s complete withdrawl fills the soul with despair, unbelief, anger and pride. We who have experienced both kinds of receding should approach God in each case in the appropriate way. In the first case we should offer Him thanks as we plead in our own defence, understanding that He is disciplining our unruly character by concealing His presence, so as to teach us, like a good father, the difference between virtue and vice. In the second case, we should offer Him ceaseless confession of our sins and incessant tears, and practise a greater seclusion from the world, so that by adding to our labours we may eventually induce Him to reveal His presence in our hearts as before. Yet we must realize that when there is a direct struggle between Satan and the soul- and I am speaking here of the struggle that takes place when God recedes in order to educate us- then grace conceals itself a little, as I have said, but nevertheless supports the soul in a hidden way, so that in the eyes of its enemies the victory appears to be due to the soul alone.” On Spiritual Knowledge and Discernment (AD 451)

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, Theosis/Salvation

Orthodoxy…Holistic Christianity!

Thursday, October 13, 2011 By Leave a Comment

SAINT NIKOLAO VELIMIROVIC

“Our religion is founded on spiritual experience, seen and heard surely as any physical fact in this world. Not theory, not philosophy, not human emotions, but experience.”

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers

Do You Want to Become a Theologian?

Monday, August 22, 2011 By Leave a Comment

St. Gregory the Theologian ca. 329-389

Do you want to become a theologian and worthy of the Diety? Keep the commandments, go through life observing God’s ordinances; for action is the foundation for contemplation [of spiritual mysteries]. (Homily 20, 12, PG 35.1080B.)

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, St. Gregory the Theologian ca. 329-389

Latin, Greek and Hebrew

Friday, March 18, 2011 By Leave a Comment

St. Maximus the Confessor ca. 580-662

The notice on the inscription of the Savior’s charge clearly shows us that the One who was crucified is King and Lord of ascetic, natural and theological ways of wisdom. For we are told that the inscription was written in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Now by the Latin inscription I understand the ascetic state, since the empire of the Romans was, according to Daniel, appointed as the mightiest of all earthly empires, and strength is the characteristic of the ascetic state, if anything is. By the Greek inscription I understand natural contemplation because the Greek nation more than anyone else devoted themselves to natural philosophy. And by the Hebrew inscription I understand theological revelation because this nation was manifestly set up from above by God as our ancestors. (Chapters on Knowledge, Second Century 96)

Filed Under: All, Epistemology, Holy Fathers, St. Maximus the Confessor ca. 580-662