And the Son

[ronyodish]

Just a side note Rony. You can get some of Philoxenus’ writings in print if you go to lulu.com. I have also seen Isaac of Nineveh, Narsai, and a few other Syrian saints. Most of the Narsai is Syriac but I noticed that there are some liturgical homilies that are in translation.

Jimmy,

Thanks! I’ve actually visited this site before and purchased some of their books. They have very good prices in my opinion.

God bless,

Rony

 

[jimmy]

I don’t think that Byzantines lack reason. Sorry, I am the one who believes that Byzantine Christianity does not need do adopt the silly thinking described above because its above such nonsense.

1. Even if there were two sources in the Trinity, that would not invalidate monotheism because the members of the Trinity are still one in essence, undivided, possssing the same nature, existance, substance, etc.

We have had this discussion before. You continually force your western view on the Byzantine saints. They did not start from the idea of essence as you do and the west does. They started from the idea of the Person of the Father as the source of the Trinity. The Trinity is one because the Father is the source, not simply because they are one essence. They denied the Greek philosophers concept that essence is the highest aspect of existence. Personhood, not essence, is the beginning of all discussion of existence. As the creed says, 'we believe in one God the Father almighty". The Father is the one God, not some impersonal essence. From the Father the Son is begotten and the Spirit proceeds. It is a union of three persons.

Two sources means two gods to the Greek fathers. You can call the Greeks heretics if you like but that is what they believed.

1. No one is claiming that there are two sources in the Trinity. The Church teaches that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son as a single principle, not two different principles. That is why the phrase “from the Father, through the Son” is quite appropriate.

What does it mean that the Father and Son are one source? Are they an amorphous mob? Yes, from the Father through the Son is appropriate but the Father is still the source. The Son is not a source of the divinity of the Spirit.

1. By Claiming that the Procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son makes the Holy Spirit lower than the Father and the Son because no divine person comes from him is also faulty reasoning. If that principle were true, the fact that the Son is generated by the Father makes him less than the Father and, yet, that would not fit anyone’s theology of the Trinity.

Actually the Father is superior to the Son and the Holy Spirit in the sense that He is the source of the Trinity. The procession of the Spirit is not what is meant when the scriptures say that the Father gave everything to the Son. What is meant is that the Father gave the Son all that He is. The Spirit also happens to have recieved all that the Father is though. They have recieved their very existence, their personhood from the Father.

1. The Charge of ditheism is so ridiculous that its almost laughable, considering the fact that it is Eastern Theologians that claim that God is divided into essence and energies, a theology that immediately descends into ditheism.

You should study eastern theology a little more before you claim that the idea of essence/energies descends into ditheism. You are the one who has introduced two sources into the Trinity. According to those who formed the theology of the Trinity at Nicea and Constantinople there is one source and to tell them there are two is the same as telling them there are two gods.

 

[ronyodish]

I have not denied the Apostolicity of either the Latin or the Oriental Churches; instead, I have simply said that all traditions, Eastern, Western, and Oriental, must take into account the teaching of the inspired Greek New Testament, by translating the terms used by our Lord – and later by the Greek Fathers – correctly, and make a real distinction between the Spirit’s procession (ekporeusis) of origin as person, which is from the Father alone, and His manfestation (pephenos) or progression (proienai) from the Father through the Son as already existent and only personally (enhypostatically) manifest.

Clearly, the receptor languages into which the Greek scriptures and tradition have been translated must be faithful to the original meaning of the words used in order to avoid any theological confusion or corruption. Thus, whether Latins and Orientals like it or not, God, for whatever reason, chose to inspire the human authors of sacred scripture in the Greek language, and so that language has a normative value in theology.

Todd (Apotheoun),

I must respectfully disagree with some points you mentioned above.

Our Lord spoke the Aramaic language, using Aramaic terms that were translated into Greek by the Divinely inspired authors.

The Chaldean Catholic Church, and the other Churches of the East, are Aramaic Churches officially. We do not primarily rely on the Greek translation of the Lord’s teachings, because we have received by Holy Tradition the Lord’s teachings in the Aramaic language. We also rely primarily on the Aramaic Peshitta Bible for our official teaching of doctrine.

And while, I take the position of the majority of Biblical scholars that the original inspired autographs of most of the New Testament was written in Greek, there is a minority among scholars who are known as “Aramaic Primacists” who believe that the original autographs of all or many of the New Testament books was written in Aramaic.

We do not rely primarily on the Greek Fathers for our patrimony, rather we rely first and foremost on the Aramaic Fathers, such as Mar Aprahat, Mar Papa Bar Gaggi, Mar Bawai the Great, and other Fathers of the Church of the East. Historically, any reference to the Greek Fathers among us was a reference to three specific Greek Fathers that were condemned as “Nestorian heretics” in the Roman empire, namely: Diodore of Tarsus, Theodore the Interpreter (Bishop of Mopsuestia), and Nestorius of Constantinople. Officially, the Chaldean Catholic Church does not venerate as Saints these Fathers, but might do so in the future when the Chaldean Catholic and Assyrian/Ancient Christian Churches re-establish full communion with one another.

The book of Acts specifically mentions that the Good News was received in our language:

Acts 2:5-11:​

Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. And they were amazed and wondered, saying, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? Par’thians and Medes and E’lamites and residents of Mesopota’mia, Judea and Cappado’cia, Pontus and Asia, Phryg’ia and Pamphyl’ia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyre’ne, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians, we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.”​

Mesopotamia is the land of the Chaldeans and Assyrians. When later St. Thomas, and Sts. Addai, Mari, and Aggai established our Catholic Church of the East, we again received and were nourished by the Gospel in our Aramaic language.

We do not run our theology on Greek terms like ekporeusis, pephenos, proienai, and enhypostatically. We use Aramaic terms to describe our theology, and Aramaic does not always correspond exactly with Greek equivalents. The Greek language does not have a normative value in our theology, rather, Aramaic is the language that has the normative value in our theology.

Our patrimony never was and never will be Greek or Hellenistic. We have maintained the Aramaic language of Jesus Christ, and we prefer to continue to maintain it and preserve it.

God bless,

Rony

 

[jimmy]

I do not deny that if you view the Latin theology from a Latin perspective that it is orthodox. If you approach it from the Latin perspective I am sure it holds to the truth. But don’t force Latin perspectives on the Greeks. It will not work. You force contradictions upon them. Maybe ‘filioque’ works within the framework of the Latin theologians but it does not work in that of the Greeks. The Greeks accept that the procession is through the Son but they do not make the Son a source. The procession is eternal from the Father through the Son. The Greeks will affirm that much. Rome accepts the fact that the Greek theology can not accomodate the term filioque into Greek, otherwise there would be no reason for the Greek Catholics not to have the filioque in their creed. Rome agrees that the Greeks should not have it in their creed because it makes two sources.

 

[Diak]

Jimmy - some excellent posts. I keep coming back to Article I of the Union of Brest which our forefathers agreed to as our statement of communion with Rome -

…we ask that we should not be compelled to any other creed but that we should remain with that which was handed down to us in the Holy Scriptures, in the Gospel, and in the writings of the holy Greek Doctors,…

Well said.
FDRLB

 

[East_and_West]

The filioque is not “theology from a Latin perspective”. Goodness gracious!!! It is the dogma of the Church declared in council. Why would some one who is Catholic and trying to live according to the will of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ want to deny a teaching of His Church!!! Its down right disobedient!
Why do you guys insist that we proclaim two different faiths in the Catholic Church?

 

[Ghosty]

The Union does not speak of the Son as the source of the Trinity. The Catholic Church speaks of one source of the Spirit, the Father. The Son happens to be a part of it in some fashion but the Father is the source.

I agree 100%, and that is the teaching of the Filioque. Only the Father is Source, as explained at the Council of Florence; the Son receives the Spiration of the Holy Spirit, not in the sense of the Son being the target (though there can be an element of that as well), but in the sense of the Son receiving a share in the Personal Spiration of the Holy Spirit.

The classic Eastern expression of the spring, river, and sea expresses this nicely, and is perhaps the best illustration of the filioque in terms of simplicity and exactitude. The spring is the undeniable Source of the sea, no exceptions possible, but the river is a direct participant in the flowing of the sea from the spring; the river isn’t the source of the sea, since it is not the source of any water whatsoever but rather the recipient, but you don’t have the sea without the river. The spring and river are literally “one principle” of the sea, since the sea comes from one flowing and not two distinct flowings, but the spring and the river are not precisely the same in their relations to that flowing. The spring is “principle without principle”, while the river is the “principle with a principle”.

What Apotheoun is saying, however, is that the Son has no place in the Personal Spiration of the Holy Spirit. To use the spring/river/sea example, the sea is ONLY from the spring, and the connection with the river comes only from the river “showing us the sea”.

You are absolutely right, however, that the expression of the Union of Brest is entirely orthodox, and no more than it should be asked of Byzantine-tradition Catholics. After all, it expresses the same fundamental belief through a different (and totally valid) theological approach. There is no need to draw from Florence when the same Faith is preserved in the East in its own manner.

In the Melkite Church we do not commemorate the Council of Florence at all, and many folks don’t even know about it! It would be absolutely wrong for us to say that Florence was a heretical Council, however, as it represents the teaching of the Latin Church who shares the Catholic Communion (and, let’s be honest, is over 90% of the Catholic Communion in terms of population). When I asked our Bishop if we could view Florence, and its definitions, as heretical he said “Absolutely not!” At the same time, however, he did say that the Council of Florence doesn’t really concern the Melkite Church, and can be truly spoken of as a “General Council of the West”, as the Popes themselves have done.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Ghosty]

East and West wrote:

1. Even if there were two sources in the Trinity, that would not invalidate monotheism because the members of the Trinity are still one in essence, undivided, possssing the same nature, existance, substance, etc.

There couldn’t be two sources in the Trinity while maintaining the unity of Essence. The reason for this unity is found in the fact that there is one Source, the Father. If there were two Sources there would be two different Essences contributing to the Trinity; it is the very fact that the Trinity is from one Source, the Person of the Father, that there can be unity of Essence when distinguishing the Divine Persons by origin.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Ghosty]

Apotheoun wrote:

I have called no one a heretic, because I do not accept the teachings espoused by the later fourteen Latin councils as ecumenical.

This position is completely untenable since it basically claims that an Ecumenical Council is required to proclaim heretical teachings. If that were the case then there would be no heresies at all, since no Ecumenical Council can proclaim heresy by definition.

Regardless, the Latin Church has made it quite clear that it upholds the teaching of Florence. This can be seen from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

246 The Latin tradition of the Creed confesses that the Spirit “proceeds from the Father and the Son (filioque)”. The Council of Florence in 1438 explains: "The Holy Spirit is eternally from Father and Son; He has his nature and subsistence at once (simul) from the Father and the Son. He proceeds eternally from both as from one principle and through one spiration. . . . And, since the Father has through generation given to the only-begotten Son everything that belongs to the Father, except being Father, the Son has also eternally from the Father, from whom he is eternally born, that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son."75

The question isn’t whether the teaching is “Ecumenically binding”, but whether it is held as definitive in the Latin Church; it clearly is. Even if the decision were some day overturned (something I don’t believe is either likely or possible) the fact remains that it is the teaching of the Latin Church now. If that teaching is heretical, then the Latin Church and their Catechism is also heretical. That would make the Catholic Communion a Communion with heretics, something you should seriously consider.

Fortunately I have a decision from my Bishop on the matter: such a claim is nonsense and unacceptable.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Ghosty]

Clearly you should complain to the Vatican then, because in its clarification it accepts that ekporeusis and proienai have completely different meanings; the former concerns a procession of origin from a source, while the latter concerns only the progression or movement of something already existent.

The clarification says no such thing about the word “proienai”. The text, for those interested, can be found here:

agrino.org/cyberdesert/statement.htm

Here is what the document actually says about the meaning of “proienai”:

This origin of the Holy Spirit from the Father alone as Principle of the whole Trinity is called ekporeusis by Greek tradition, following the Cappadocian Fathers. St Gregory of Nazianzus, the Theologian, in fact, characterises the Spirit’s relationship of origin from the Father by the proper term ekporeusis, distinguishing it from that of procession (to proienai) which the Spirit has in common with the Son. “The Spirit is truly the Spirit proceeding (proion) from the Father, not by filiation, for it is not by generation, but by ekporeusis” (Discourse 39. 12, Sources Chretiennes 358, p.175).

Notice in this case it cites St. Gregory Nazianzus as saying that ekporousis is a kind of procession (proienai). If it was understood that proienai was that of something only already existing, then ekporousis could not be considered a kind of proienai alongside filiation (begetting).

And further:

In the Patristic period, an analogous theology had developed in Alexandria, stemming from St Athanasius. As in the Latin tradition, it was expressed by the more common term of ‘procession’ (proienai) indicating the communication of the divinity to the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son in their consubstantial communion: “The Spirit proceeds *(proeisi) *from the Father and the Son; clearly, he is of the divine substance, proceeding (proion) substantially (ousiodos) in it and from it” (St Cyril of Alexandria, Thesaurus, PG 75, 585 A). [4]

Nothing about the movement of something already existing, but rather it deals with the very communication of Divinity itself.

Whether the Vatican’s understanding is correct or not, it is certain that their understanding of the terms ekporousis and proienai is not the same as yours.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Ghosty]

I guess it all depends on what you mean by through. I still stand by my previous analysis. It has been a while since I read the document in whole, but I have never found that it restricts the use and propagation of the Eastern Theological position. Remember, they agreed to disagree about the filioque because of being stubborn.

God Bless,
R.

It doesn’t restrict the Eastern theology at all, you’re correct. It simply states the Eastern position as understood by the Ukrainian Orthodox of the time.

My point is that this position is exactly that of the fundamental teaching of the Filioque, namely that the origin of the Holy Spirit is from the Father through the Son, and not “from the Father alone”. The Ukrainians were resisting the adoption of Latin theology, which was well within their right; the Latins accepted the Ukrainian confession of Faith not because they “agreed to disagree” on a fundamental issue, but because they agreed to agree on the fundamental teaching without forcing the theological language and trappings. In other words, since the fundamental idea was the same, there was no need to quarrel over how to say it, or how much emphasis to give it.

In short, since the confession in the Union of Brest is identical in substance to the Latin belief in the Filioque, the Latins were completely comfortable with it accepted it as part of the Union agreement. I have no doubt that if they had viewed it as contradictory that they would not have accepted the terms of Union.

It’s only when contradictions to that Confession, such as the notion that the origin of the Holy Spirit has no relation to the Son, comes up that problems arise and contradictions set in. Fortunately notions such as those have not been adopted on any high level within the Catholic Communion, and only a few individuals such as Apotheoun hold to them.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Allyson]

The filioque is not “theology from a Latin perspective”. Goodness gracious!!! It is the dogma of the Church declared in council. Why would some one who is Catholic and trying to live according to the will of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ want to deny a teaching of His Church!!! Its down right disobedient!
Why do you guys insist that we proclaim two different faiths in the Catholic Church?

The “filioque” is the generally speaking part of the Latin (more broadly Western) expression of Trinitarian theology, that was first propagated in Spain - which is can be argued is different from what the Fathers meant in their use. Augustine, as I said before has revsions of his use of it in the Retractiones (Of On the Trinity.)

I don’t think that having a different theological expression is being disobedient to the Church, since both claim to be refuting the same heretical idea. No one is saying that there are two different faiths in the Church, as far as I can tell. However, the debate comes off that way because each side thinks that it refutes the heresy of ditheism better.

I think that the forest has been missed by looking through the trees. Don’t both sides of the debate here profess the faith with the same Creed:

We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds (æons), Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father;
by whom all things were made;
who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man;
he was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried, and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father;
from thence he shall come again, with glory, to judge the quick and the dead;
whose kingdom shall have no end.
And in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified, who spake by the prophets. In one holy catholic and apostolic Church; we acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

(the English translation given in Schaff’s Creeds of Christendom)

AND IN THE GREEK:

Πιστεύω εἰς ἕνα Θεόν, Πατέρα, Παντοκράτορα, ποιητὴν οὐρανοῦ καὶ γῆς, ὁρατῶν τε πάντων καὶ ἀοράτων.
Καὶ εἰς ἕνα Κύριον Ἰησοῦν Χριστόν, τὸν Υἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ τὸν μονογενῆ, τὸν ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς γεννηθέντα πρὸ πάντων τῶν αἰώνων·
φῶς ἐκ φωτός, Θεὸν ἀληθινὸν ἐκ Θεοῦ ἀληθινοῦ, γεννηθέντα οὐ ποιηθέντα, ὁμοούσιον τῷ Πατρί, δι’ οὗ τὰ πάντα ἐγένετο.
Τὸν δι’ ἡμᾶς τοὺς ἀνθρώπους καὶ διὰ τὴν ἡμετέραν σωτηρίαν κατελθόντα ἐκ τῶν οὐρανῶν καὶ σαρκωθέντα
ἐκ Πνεύματος Ἁγίου καὶ Μαρίας τῆς Παρθένου καὶ ἐνανθρωπήσαντα.
Σταυρωθέντα τε ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν ἐπὶ Ποντίου Πιλάτου, καὶ παθόντα καὶ ταφέντα.
Καὶ ἀναστάντα τῇ τρίτῃ ἡμέρα κατὰ τὰς Γραφάς.
Καὶ ἀνελθόντα εἰς τοὺς οὐρανοὺς καὶ καθεζόμενον ἐκ δεξιῶν τοῦ Πατρός.
Καὶ πάλιν ἐρχόμενον μετὰ δόξης κρῖναι ζῶντας καὶ νεκρούς, οὗ τῆς βασιλείας οὐκ ἔσται τέλος.
Καὶ εἰς τὸ Πνεῦμα τὸ Ἅγιον, τὸ κύριον, τὸ ζωοποιόν,
τὸ ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς ἐκπορευόμενον,
τὸ σὺν Πατρὶ καὶ Υἱῷ συμπροσκυνούμενον καὶ συνδοξαζόμενον,
τὸ λαλῆσαν διὰ τῶν προφητῶν.
Εἰς μίαν, Ἁγίαν, Καθολικὴν καὶ Ἀποστολικὴν Ἐκκλησίαν.
Ὁμολογῶ ἓν βάπτισμα εἰς ἄφεσιν ἁμαρτιῶν.
Προσδοκῶ ἀνάστασιν νεκρῶν.
Καὶ ζωὴν τοῦ μέλλοντος αἰῶνος.
Ἀμήν.

This is the the normative creed of the Church! Later liturgical additions do not abrogate the normative character of the Creed as composed at Constantinople.

God Bless,
R.

 

[East_and_West]

Fortunately I have a decision from my Bishop on the matter: such a claim is nonsense and unacceptable.

Peace and God bless!

And my Ruthenian Pastor agrees as well: the Latin definition of the filioque is completely orthodox.

 

[East_and_West]

The “filioque” is the generally speaking part of the Latin (more broadly Western) expression of Trinitarian theology, that was first propagated in Spain - which is can be argued is different from what the Fathers meant in their use. Augustine, as I said before has revsions of his use of it in the Retractiones (Of On the Trinity.)

I don’t think that having a different theological expression is being disobedient to the Church, since both claim to be refuting the same heretical idea. No one is saying that there are two different faiths in the Church, as far as I can tell. However, the debate comes off that way because each side thinks that it refutes the heresy of ditheism better.

I think that the forest has been missed by looking through the trees. Don’t both sides of the debate here profess the faith with the same Creed:

We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds (æons), Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father;
by whom all things were made;
who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man;
he was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried, and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father;
from thence he shall come again, with glory, to judge the quick and the dead;
whose kingdom shall have no end.
And in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified, who spake by the prophets. In one holy catholic and apostolic Church; we acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

(the English translation given in Schaff’s Creeds of Christendom)

AND IN THE GREEK:

This is the the normative creed of the Church! Later liturgical additions do not abrogate the normative character of the Creed as composed at Constantinople.

God Bless,
R.

And the west professes, absoltutley that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father AND the Son. So do we really profess the same faith?

 

[jimmy]

I agree 100%, and that is the teaching of the Filioque. Only the Father is Source, as explained at the Council of Florence; the Son receives the Spiration of the Holy Spirit, not in the sense of the Son being the target (though there can be an element of that as well), but in the sense of the Son receiving a share in the Personal Spiration of the Holy Spirit.

This is interesting because just yesterday I was looking for the clarification of the filioque which was published several years ago. I found one that had a commentary by an EO Christian side by side with the text. I just randomly read a section of his commentary and he quoted Metr. Zizioulas as saying that the Spirit recieves His person from the Father alone but on the level of essence the Spirit can be said to come from the Son. To tell the truth I had no idea what was meant by this distinction. It does show the point I was trying to make about Greek theology though before with its pre-eminence of the person over the essnce though. Here is the quote from Zizioulas.

Another important point in the Vatican document is the emphasis it lays on the distinction between ἐκπόρευσις and processio. It is historically true that in the Greek tradition a clear distinction was always made between εκπορεύεσθαι and προείναι, the first of these two terms denoting exclusively the Spirit’s derivation from the Father alone, whereas προείναι was used to denote the Holy Spirit’s dependence on the Son owing to the common substance or ουσία which the Spirit in deriving from the Father alone as Person or υπόστασις receives from the Son, too, as ουσιωδώς that is, with regard to the one ουσία common to all three persons (Cyril of Alexandria, Maximus the Confessor et al). On the basis of this distinction one might argue that there is a kind of Filioque on the level of ουσία, but not of υπόστασις.
However, as the document points out, the distinction between εκπορεύεσθαι and προείναι was not made in Latin theology, which used the same term, procedere, to denote both realities. Is this enough to explain the insistence of the Latin tradition on the Filioque? Saint Maximus the Confessor seems to think so. For him the Filioque was not heretical because its intention was to denote not the εκπορεύεσθαι but the προείναι of the Spirit.

I can’t really comment on this though because it is a new idea to me.

The classic Eastern expression of the spring, river, and sea expresses this nicely, and is perhaps the best illustration of the filioque in terms of simplicity and exactitude. The spring is the undeniable Source of the sea, no exceptions possible, but the river is a direct participant in the flowing of the sea from the spring; the river isn’t the source of the sea, since it is not the source of any water whatsoever but rather the recipient, but you don’t have the sea without the river. The spring and river are literally “one principle” of the sea, since the sea comes from one flowing and not two distinct flowings, but the spring and the river are not precisely the same in their relations to that flowing. The spring is “principle without principle”, while the river is the “principle with a principle”.

I don’t think there is any problem with this from a Greek perspective. I think there is a problem with some other defenses of the filioque though that I have seen. The single source is often defended by saying that since the Son was begotten by the Father then even though He Spirates the Spirit as well there is still only one source. It seems to imply a double procession of the Spirit with the Son contributing what He has and the Father contributing what He has.

What Apotheoun is saying, however, is that the Son has no place in the Personal Spiration of the Holy Spirit. To use the spring/river/sea example, the sea is ONLY from the spring, and the connection with the river comes only from the river “showing us the sea”.

I am not sure what you mean by 'the river showing us the sea". Apotheoun did say that the manifestation of the Spirit by the Son is eternal, not just temporal. I am not sure if that is different from what you are saying.

 

[jimmy]

The filioque is not “theology from a Latin perspective”. Goodness gracious!!! It is the dogma of the Church declared in council. Why would some one who is Catholic and trying to live according to the will of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ want to deny a teaching of His Church!!! Its down right disobedient!
Why do you guys insist that we proclaim two different faiths in the Catholic Church?

You seem to think that the tradition of the Church must be changed to fit the Latin developments. As Rome has affirmed, the Greeks are not to include the filioque in their creed. The approach of the Capadocians and the rest of the Greek fathers does not teach that the Son is a source. You wish the east to bow to the west. It will not happen.

I never said that the Latins and easterns profess two faiths. I disagree with your interpretation of the faith though.

Eastern priests should start saying the novus ordo instead of the Liturgy of St. James and the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom. After all, it was promulgated by an infallible pope.

 

[Diak]

1. Even if there were two sources in the Trinity, that would not invalidate monotheism because the members of the Trinity are still one in essence, undivided, possssing the same nature, existance, substance, etc.

Speaking of reason, I am not sure how anyone could reasonably hold such a thing. Any concept of “mono” is violated by assuming “duo” as essential sources.

To take an interesting “spin”, Spinoza concluded that one either belives ultimately there is one source or two. Two, he further concluded, was nonsensical because the two would have inherent tension or opposition to each other as disparate sources simply by their coexistence and need to separately create as sources, and anyone who held the existence of two could never be considered monotheistic.
FDRLB

 

[Diak]

Perhaps it is timely to repost the article by Fr. Dr. Paul Babie of the Eparchy of Melbourne (UGCC):

EASTERN CHRISTIANITY, THE UKRAINIAN GREEK-CATHOLIC CHURCH, AND THE FILIOQUE: A DISCUSSION PAPER
by
Rev Dr Paul Babie

I. Introduction: What is the Filioque?
The filioque is the italicised portion of the following article of the Creed: ‘the Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son.’ The Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, which was approved at the Council of Constantinople in 381AD, is based upon the doctrinal statements of the Council of Nicaea in 325AD and which was confirmed at the Council of Chalcedon in 451AD, did not contain the filioque. Rather, it was a later Western Christian addition. The filioque, because of the way in which it was added to the Creed and because of concerns about its theological correctness, has been and continues to be a source of controversy and tension between Eastern and Western Christians. Moreover, the filioque has an uncertain status as part of the contemporary form of the Creed used by the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church.
This brief discussion paper identifies and considers: (i) ecclesiological differences between Eastern and Western Christians concerning the way in which the filioque was added to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, (ii) the issues associated with the theological correctness of the filioque, and (iii) the status of the filioque in the Creed used by the contemporary Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church. This latter point involves a consideration of the Union of Brest-Litovsk which restored communion between the Kyivan (Ukrainian) Church and the Roman (Latin) Church in 1596.

II. Ecclesiology: The Means by Which the Filioque was Added to the Creed
The Eastern Christian theological tradition considers illegitimate the alteration of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed by the interpolation of the filioque. This section considers the reasons for this position.
The Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, because of its antiquity, is almost universally recognised among Christian denominations as a true expression of Christian faith. That version of the Creed states simply a belief in ‘the Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father, who together with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified.’ This Creed acquired liturgical importance among Eastern Christians both as a baptismal creed and, from the fifth century, as the creed used in the Divine Liturgy.
The first evidence of the filioque is found in extant versions of Canon 2 of the documents of the Third Council of Toledo (589AD). This council was one of a series of Anti-Arian Councils in Spain which sought to affirm the Divinity of Christ by making the Second Person of the Trinity co-equal with the Father; this was accomplished by ascribing the procession of the Holy Spirit to both the Father and the Son. As such, these councils, Toledo III among them, altered the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed by interpolating the filioque into the Creed so that the relevant article would read: ‘who proceeds from the Father and the Son….’ The status of the filioque at Toledo III is, however, doubtful. It is not at all clear that the canons promulgated at the Council itself, as opposed to later versions of those canons, did in fact contain the filioque. Similarly, there was a particular reason for the interpolation: the refutation of the Arian heresy. Nonetheless, the doctrine of the double procession of the Holy Spirit, from the Father and the Son, came to be widespread in the West, and the modification of the Creed spread. Still, the Roman Church, starting with Pope Leo III (798-816AD) (who even had two silver plates engraved with the Creed without the filioque and placed in St Peter’s), opposed the use of the interpolation until the eleventh century.
Eastern Christianity considers the filioque, regardless of the purpose for which it was added to the Creed, to be an illegitimate interpolation of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, an alteration that lacks canonical status. For Eastern Christian theologians, such an addition to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, approved by Ecumenical Council in 381AD and affirmed at a second such Council in 451AD, could only be made by Ecumenical Council, which Toledo III was not. And even if Toledo III was such a council, the contemporaneous versions of the canons promulgated there did not contain such an approval of the filioque.

 

[Diak]

Had to break it up to get the post to fit:

III. Theology: The Eastern Christian Doctrine of the Holy Trinity and the Procession of the Holy Spirit
In addition to concerns with the interpolation of the filioque, Eastern Christian theologians have long rejected the doctrine of the double procession of the Holy Spirit. As such, Eastern Christian theology considers the filioque to be theologically inaccurate, and, indeed, to be a human attempt to alter the very essence of God (the Divinity of God), by misconstruing the internal relationship of the three Hypostases (Persons) of the Holy Trinity. The Doctrine of the Trinity, for Eastern Christian theology, is not an invention of theologians, nor a teaching which gradually developed within the Church, but a Divinely revealed truth. It goes without saying that humans, theologians or otherwise, are in no position to change that Divinely revealed truth, which explains the Divinity of the Trinity, the Godhead, Three in One and One in Three, any more than they can change Holy Scripture.
It is useful to consider the development of the Doctrine of the Trinity in the East. Early patristic writings indicate the theological differences between the Eastern and the Western approach: the school of Antioch (c 460AD) leaned toward the literal interpretation of Holy Scripture and emphasised the distinction of the Divine Persons, thus opposing the filioque, while the Alexandrian school (c 444AD) favoured analogical interpretation of Holy Scripture and emphasised the oneness of the Divine essence, thus possibly allowing for (although probably not actually teaching) the filioque.
While St Augustine of Hippo (d 430AD), the great patristic father of the Western Church favoured an approach that sits comfortably with the filioque, the Cappadocian Fathers, the Great fathers of the East Basil the Great (d 379AD), Gregory of Nazianzus (d 390AD) and Gregory of Nyssa (d 395AD) developed their teaching on the Holy Trinity along the lines of the Antiochene school. They stressed the real distinction of the Divine Persons and defined the distinguishing characteristic of the Father as Unoriginate Origin or Unbegotten, the Son as Begotten and the Holy Spirit as Proceeding. In this system, filioquist thought is entirely out of place because it obscures what is unique to the Hypostasis of the Father: the Son is generated from, or born of the Unoriginate Origin, the Father, while the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, and not from the Begotten. These ‘personal attributes’ distinguish the three Hypostases of the Trinity one from another while at the same time expressing the relationships—mysterious though they may be (although such mysteriousness is not problematic for the apophatic theology of the East)—between them. On the basis of this Doctrine of the Trinity, as developed from the work of the Cappadocian Fathers, Eastern Christianity ultimately came to argue that the filioque is not only an illegitimate addition (on the shaky foundation of Toledo III) but also a grave theological error. It was eventually included among the list of complaints against Rome that led to the Great Schism between East and West in 1054, and remains a source of division and tension between the two Churches to this day.
Attempts at union since 1054, while problematic for various reasons, have always foundered on the issue of the filioque. The Western Church sought to impose acceptance of the filioque at the Council of Lyons in 1274 and at Florence in 1439. The Eastern Christian response to the proclamations at those councils demonstrates the growing importance of the underlying issues of the Eastern Doctrine of the Trinity and the ecclesiological issue regarding the authority to alter the Nicene Creed by interpolation. An Eastern Council held in Constantinople in 1351AD bolstered the Eastern position on the filioque. There, the distinction between the Divine essence and the Divine energies, which had begun in the writings of the Cappadocians and reached its zenith in the work of St Gregory Palamas (d 1359), was defined as dogmatic. On the basis of that distinction, as well as on the conviction that it is the Father’s personal property to be the source of Divine life, and that the Monarchy of the Father alone allows for the Procession of the Holy Spirit, Eastern Christian theologians continued to insist that the filioque was irreconcilable with Eastern Trinitarian faith.
The filioque continues to be a matter of concern among theologians interested in ecumenical discussion and, in that regard, it is to be noted—and in the present context it is very significant—that the vast majority of contemporary Western theologians propose that the filioque be dropped from the Creed when it is recited in the mass. This proposal is founded upon two bases: (i) the process by which the filioque was added was questionable at best, and (ii) it remains a barrier to the profession of the common Christian faith expressed in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed.

 

[Diak]

Last portion:

IV. The Union of Brest-Litovsk 1596, the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, and the Filioque
It is clear that the contemporary Church known as the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, which traces its origins to the Kyivan Church, was a part of the Christian East during the time at which the foregoing theological and ecclesiological positions were germinating, growing and ripening to their present stature. Indeed, it remained part of the Christian East following the Great Schism of 1054. As such, the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church traces its theological and ecclesiological heritage and roots to the patristic and theological tradition of the East, not the West. While that may not be an uncontroversial statement, it is considered fact by virtually all theologians, Eastern and Western, who have written on the topic. It is far less controversial to say that the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church came into full communion with the Roman Church pursuant to the Articles of Union contained in the Union of Brest-Litovsk, concluded between Metropolitan Province of Kyiv and the Roman Church in 1596. Thus, the theological, spiritual and liturgical tradition of the Kyivan Church was thoroughly Eastern until 1596.
Some background to the Union of Brest-Litovsk is useful. In 1569 the Union of Lublin united Poland and Lithuania. The Eastern Christian faithful of the Kyivan Church, the subjects of the new state, found themselves socially disadvantaged and facing the active presence of the Roman (Western) Church. Poland also viewed with suspicion all contact between the Kyivan hierarchs and their mother church in Ottoman-ruled Constantinople. Eventually the hierarchs of the Kyivan Church, after considerable deliberation, in 1595 formulated a carefully considered document setting out thirty-three conditions under which they would be prepared to enter into communion with the Roman Church. The Union of Brest-Litovsk was concluded at a synod in 1596, on the basis of the conditions set out by the Kyivan hierarchs the previous year. These conditions included the retention of the traditional Creed and rites, the stipulation that they would not be obliged to observe Roman (Latin) customs, the retention of a married clergy, freedom to have bishops consecrated without mandate from Rome and the assurance that the Kyivan Church’s hierarchs would always be ‘of our religion’, that monasteries were to remain under Eastern Episcopal control, and that the Eastern clergy would enjoy parity of esteem and privilege with the Roman clergy. The Kyivan bishops who agreed to the Union of Brest-Litovsk were concerned chiefly with stopping the spread of Protestantism among their faithful, raising the standards of their clergy, and, above all, preserving their Eastern Christian tradition in the face of expanding Polish Roman Catholicism.
In the present context, we are concerned with the issue of the Creed and the stipulation that there be no obligation to observe Latin customs. It is clear that the Creed, as understood in the Christian East—in 1054, in 1596, or, for that matter, today—did not and does not contain the filioque; indeed, as we have seen, to insert it was considered by Eastern theologians to be both an ecclesiological and a grave theological error. In relation to the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, the terms of the Union of Brest-Litovsk make clear that the Kyivan hierarchs who entered into communion with Rome in 1596 adhered, without question, to the Eastern understanding of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. Because the Kyivan bishops who ratified the Union were very concerned to protect the Eastern Christian heritage of their church, they insisted that the very first Article of Union, read as follows:

Firstly, since among the Romans and the Greeks there is a dispute as to the procession of the H(oly) Spirit, which is a considerable obstacle to unification and which probably endures for no other reason than that we do not understand each other, we, therefore, request that we not be constrained to a different confession [of faith], but that we remain with the one that we find expressed in the S(acred) Scriptures, in the Gospels, and also in the writings of the H(oly) Greek Doctors *, namely that the H(oly) Spirit does not have two origins, nor a double procession, but that He proceedes from one origin, as from a source—from the Father through the Son.

V. Conclusion
The Doctrine of the Trinity, the understanding of the procession of the Holy Spirit, and the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed as found in the Christian East in 1596 were expressly recognised and affirmed by all parties to the Union of Brest-Litovsk. The Union of Brest-Litovsk therefore expressly excluded, and excludes not only the requirement that the filioque form any part of the Creed as used by the Ukrainian Catholic Church, but also that it even accept the Western understanding of the double procession of the Holy Spirit. Thus, the practice of reciting the Western form of the Creed, which contains the filioque, is nothing more than a practice which has developed as a consequence of Latinisation. This is reflected in the fact that many contemporary Ukrainian Catholic liturgical books enclose in brackets the filioque (’[and the Son]’). Such a Latinisation of Eastern creeds and rites must be viewed, pursuant to Eastern Christian theology and tradition, and pursuant to the Union of Brest-Litovsk, and specifically Article One of the Union, as not obligatory upon Ukrainian Catholics, and as a direct violation of the Union. *