Debating the filioque

[frjohnmorris]

Dear brother Richca,

Everything you state below has already been given a response. Yet, you have barely addressed any of my responses, but simply keep bringing up new things, things which are not really new, but merely a rehash of your position. I am not complaining that you are rehashing, since we need to approach this matter in every possible way to completely refute the peculiar idea that the Father is not the one and only Source in the Procession, just as He is the one and only Source in the Trinity. What I am complaining about is that you have barely given a response to any of the points I have brought up. Why is that? Is the inconsistency of your position so difficult to accept? Nevertheless I will respond to your latest post, but please have the courtesy to actually address my statements this time, if you seek to challenge them.

The Council of Florence postively and explicitly affirms that the Father is the source of all deity, the Son and the Holy Spirit. How do you reconcile this with your statement “It is not true…” PLEASE RESPOND.

Yes, but where does the CCC explicitly state your opinion that the Son is also the origin/source of the Holy Spirit? PLEASE RESPOND.

Yes, but where does your Creed explicitly state that the Son (with the Father) is the origin/source of the Holy Spirit? PLEASE RESPOND.

Where does the 4th Lateran Council explicitly assert that the Son (with the Father) is the origin/source of the Holy Spirit? PLEASE RESPOND.

St. Thomas explicitly explains that the term “equally” refers to the fact that the power of spiration is equal in both, equal because the Father, Who is the Source, gives it to the Son, NOT because both are equally to be considered the Source of this power of spiration.

Are you claiming that the Father and Son are equally the Source of the power of spiration? PLEASE RESPOND.

And if you do so claim, please respond with direct evidence from Magisterial sources. Again, I am not in the least interested in subjective extrapolations from erroneous assumptions that conflate “principle” and “source,” on the one hand, and ekporeusai and procedit, on the other. If you are going to claim the Son is a source, or the Source with the Father, of the spirative power, provide us with explicit, direct statements from Magisterial sources.

This is most likely true. Which would then make the English proceeds practically equivalent to the Greek ekporeusai. But this does not thereby mean the Latin procedit is practically equivalent to the Greek ekporeusai. This has been the erroneous assumption of your position all along. What Magisterial source can you offer to justify the idea that the Latin procedit is practically equivalent to the Greek ekporeusai? PLEASE RESPOND.

CONT’d

The meaning of the word ekproreusai is not equivalent to the Latin word procedit. That is a simple fact of the actual meaning of words. I find it difficult to understand what difference the Roman Catholic Magisterial sources makes. Even Rome cannot change the meaning of a word. Besides, I have already quoted a Vatican source, in which The Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity recognized the problems caused by the difference between two words. I will not repost the quote because I have already done it several times. However, ekproreusai means to proceed from one source in the original Greek. The correct teaching is that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father as its source of origin and is sent by or through the Son or rests on the Son because the Father is the source of both the Spirit and the Son. I find the Catholic doctrine confusing because some imply that the Spirit proceeds equally from the Father and the Son, while others teach that the Holy Spirit comes from the Father and is sent by or through the Son. Orthodox can accept the teaching that the Holy Spirit comes from the Father and is sent by or through the Son, but cannot accept the teaching that the Holy Spirit proceeds equally from the Father and the Son.

Archpriest John W. Morris

 

[Wandile]

Dear brother Wandile,

I personally do not find anything wrong with what Fr. John stated. Granted, I am not a Latin Catholic. but an Oriental Catholic.

Also, may I ask - I recall somewhere on the internet a long time ago seeing the handle “Wandile” but it was used by an Orthodox Christian. Were you ever in the Orthodox communion?

Blessings,
Marduk

It must have been someone else Mardukm… I’ve been catholic since I was born

 

[Wandile]

Wandile;11342515:

Even the Vatican has admitted that the Latin translation of the text of John 15:26 and the Creed does not convey the exact meaning of the original Greek text.
“In 1995, the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity published in various languages a study on The Greek and the Latin Traditions regarding the Procession of the Holy Spirit,[136] which pointed out an important difference in meaning between the Greek verb ἐκπορεύεσθαι and the Latin verb procedere, both of which are commonly translated as “proceed”. It stated that the Greek verb ἐκπορεύεσθαι indicates that the Spirit “takes his origin from the Father … in a principal, proper and immediate manner”, while the Latin verb, which corresponds rather to the verb προϊέναι in Greek, can be applied to proceeding even from a mediate channel. Therefore the word used in the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed (ἐκπορευόμενον, “who proceeds”) to signify the proceeding of the Holy Spirit cannot in the Greek language be appropriately used with regard to the Son, but only with regard to the Father, a difficulty that does not exist in Latin and other languages.” en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filioque

Archpriest John W. Morris

Father the point in making is you can’t dismiss the Latin fathers as if the theology of Filioque only developed after the vulgate came into existence. This is because the Latins were teaching filioque before the vulgate even existed as it was tradition that the Latins received and the Alexandrians.

So if you are intellectually honest there are some Latin fathers you should be interested to heat from. But I’ll show some eastern fathers too who had the “Pure” Greek text to teach from :

Bishop St. Basil the Great of Caesarea (Doctor)
This great Cappadocian Father says in in 365 [Against Eunomius 3:1 in PG 29:655A]:

“Even if the Holy Spirit is third in dignity and order, why need He be third also in nature? For that He is second to the Son, having His being from Him and receiving from Him and announcing to us and being completely dependent on Him, pious tradition recounts; but that His nature is third we are not taught by the Saints nor can we conclude logically from what has been”

Bishop St. Hilary of Poitiers (Doctor) 1/13

. The saintly bishop of Poitiers says 357 [On the Trinity 2:29 in PL 10:69A], “Concerning the Holy Spirit I ought not to be silent, and yet I have no need to speak; still, for the sake of those who are in ignorance, I cannot refrain. There is no need to speak, because we are bound to confess Him, proceeding, as He does, from Father and Son.”

In 8:20 of the same work [PL 10:250C-251A], the holy Doctor clarifies,

“For the present I forbear to expose their license of speculation, some of them holding that the Paraclete Spirit comes from the Father or from the Son. For our Lord has not left this in uncertainty, for after these same words He spoke thus,-- “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. When He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He shall guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak from Himself: but what things soever He shall hear, these shall He speak; and He shall declare unto you the things that are to come. He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine and stroll declare it unto you. All things whatsoever the Father hath are Mine: therefore said I, He shall receive of Mine and shall declare it unto you” [Jn 16:12-15]. Accordingly He receives from the Son, Who is both sent by Him, and proceeds from the Father. Now I ask whether to receive from the Son is the same thing as to proceed from the Father. ** if one believes that there is a difference between receiving from the Son and proceeding from the Father, surely to receive from the Son and to receive from the Father will be regarded as one and the same thing.**”

. In 12:57 of this same work, St. Hilary confesses the equivalent Greek formula when he says to the Father [PL 10:471A], “** I receive your Spirit Who takes His being from You through Your only Son.”**

Bishop St. Epiphanios of Salamis (Doctor of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church)
In 374 [The Well-Anchored Man 71 in PG 43:148B, the great shepherd of the faithful of Salamis states,

But someone will say, “Therefore we are saying that there are two Sons. And how then is He the Only-begotten?” Well then. “Who art thou that repliest against God?” [Rom 9:20]. For if he calls the one Who is from Him the Son, and the one Who is from both (παρ᾽ ἀμφοτέρων) the Holy Spirit, which things we understand by faith alone, from the saints— full of light, givers of light, they have their operation full of light…

. He says in 73 of the same work [PG 43:153A],

For just as “No one knows the Father except the Son, nor the Son except the Father” [Mt 11:27], so I dare to say that no one knows the Spirit except the Father and the Son, that is, the one from Whom He proceeds and the one from Whom He receives, and that no one knows the Son and the Father except the Holy Spirit, He Who truly glorifies, Who teaches all things, is from the Father and the Son.

 

[Wandile]

Bishop St. Basil the Great of Caesarea (Doctor)
This great Cappadocian Father says in in 365 [Against Eunomius 3:1 in PG 29:655A]:

“Even if the Holy Spirit is third in dignity and order, why need He be third also in nature? For that He is second to the Son, having His being from Him and receiving from Him and announcing to us and being completely dependent on Him, pious tradition recounts; but that His nature is third we are not taught by the Saints nor can we conclude logically from what has been”

Bishop St. Gregory of Nyssa (Doctor of the Syro-Malabar and Chaldean Catholic Churches) 3 In Sermon 3 on the Lord’s Prayer, the Cappadocian Father says,

“For both the Son came forth from the Father, as the Scripture says, and the Spirit proceeds from God and from the Father. But just as being without cause pertains to the Father alone, and cannot be made to agree with the Son and the Spirit, so also, conversely, being from a cause, which is peculiar to the Son and the Spirit, is not of such a nature as to be contemplated in the Father. Now, as it is common to the Son and the Spirit to exist in a not-ungenerated way, in order that no confusion arise as to the underlying subject, one must again seek out the unconfused difference in their properties, so that both what is common may be preserved, and what is proper to each may not be confused. For the one is called by Holy Scripture “the Only-Begotten Son of the Father,” and the word leaves His property at that; But the Spirit both is said to be from the Father, and is further testified to be from the Son. For, it says, “if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His” [Rom 8:9]. Therefore the Spirit, Who is from God, is also the Spirit of Christ; but the Son, Who is from God, neither is nor is said to be “of the Spirit,” nor does this relative order become reversed.”

In To Ablabius On “Not Three Gods” [PG 45:133BC], the saint explains,

“While we confess the invariable character of the nature, but we do not deny the difference in respect of cause, and that which is caused, by which alone we apprehend that one Person is distinguished from another; — by our belief, that is, that one is the Cause, and another is of the Cause;and again in that which is of the Cause we recognize another distinction. For one is directly from the first Cause, and another through that which is directly from the first Cause; so that the attribute of being Only-begotten abides without doubt in the Son, and the mediation of the Son, while it guards His attribute of being Only-begotten, does not shut out the Spirit from his relation by way of nature to the Father.”

To be the αἰτία, the cause, is to exist in an ungenerated way.

In Against the Macedonians on the Holy Spirit 6 [PG 45:1308AB], St. Gregory says that the Son, with the Father, gives existence to the Holy Spirit:

“Where in each case activity in working good shows no diminution or variation whatever, how unreasonable it is to suppose the numerical order to be a sign of any diminution, or any variation with respect to nature. It is as if a man were to see a divided flame burning on three torches (and we will suppose that the cause of the third light is the first flame, kindling the end torch by transmission through the middle one), and were to maintain that the heat in the first exceeded that of the others; that that next it showed a variation from it in the direction of the less; and that the third could not be called fire at all, though it burnt and shone just like fire, and did everything that fire does. But if there is really no hindrance to the third torch being fire, though it has been kindled from a previous flame, what is the philosophy of these men, who profanely think that they can slight the dignity of the Holy Spirit because He is named by the Divine lips after the Father and the Son?”

 

[frjohnmorris]

frjohnmorris;11343124:

Father the point in making is you can’t dismiss the Latin fathers as if the theology of Filioque only developed after the vulgate came into existence. This is because the Latins were teaching filioque before the vulgate even existed as it was tradition that the Latins received and the Alexandrians.

So if you are intellectually honest there are some Latin fathers you should be interested to heat from. But I’ll show some eastern fathers too who had the “Pure” Greek text to teach from :

Bishop St. Basil the Great of Caesarea (Doctor)
This great Cappadocian Father says in in 365 [Against Eunomius 3:1 in PG 29:655A]:

“Even if the Holy Spirit is third in dignity and order, why need He be third also in nature? For that He is second to the Son, having His being from Him and receiving from Him and announcing to us and being completely dependent on Him, pious tradition recounts; but that His nature is third we are not taught by the Saints nor can we conclude logically from what has been”

Bishop St. Hilary of Poitiers (Doctor) 1/13

. The saintly bishop of Poitiers says 357 [On the Trinity 2:29 in PL 10:69A], "Concerning the Holy Spirit I ought not to be silent, and yet I have no need to speak; still, for the sake of those who are in ignorance, I cannot refrain. There is no need to speak, because we are bound to confess Him, proceeding, as He does, from Father and Son.

"

In 8:20 of the same work [PL 10:250C-251A], the holy Doctor clarifies,

“For the present I forbear to expose their license of speculation, some of them holding that the Paraclete Spirit comes from the Father or from the Son. For our Lord has not left this in uncertainty, for after these same words He spoke thus,-- “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. When He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He shall guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak from Himself: but what things soever He shall hear, these shall He speak; and He shall declare unto you the things that are to come. He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine and stroll declare it unto you. All things whatsoever the Father hath are Mine: therefore said I, He shall receive of Mine and shall declare it unto you” [Jn 16:12-15]. Accordingly He receives from the Son, Who is both sent by Him, and proceeds from the Father. Now I ask whether to receive from the Son is the same thing as to proceed from the Father. ** if one believes that there is a difference between receiving from the Son and proceeding from the Father, surely to receive from the Son and to receive from the Father will be regarded as one and the same thing.**”

. In 12:57 of this same work, St. Hilary confesses the equivalent Greek formula when he says to the Father [PL 10:471A], “** I receive your Spirit Who takes His being from You through Your only Son.”**

Bishop St. Epiphanios of Salamis (Doctor of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church)
In 374 [The Well-Anchored Man 71 in PG 43:148B, the great shepherd of the faithful of Salamis states,

But someone will say, “Therefore we are saying that there are two Sons. And how then is He the Only-begotten?” Well then. “Who art thou that repliest against God?” [Rom 9:20]. For if he calls the one Who is from Him the Son, and the one Who is from both (παρ᾽ ἀμφοτέρων) the Holy Spirit, which things we understand by faith alone, from the saints— full of light, givers of light, they have their operation full of light…

. He says in 73 of the same work [PG 43:153A],

For just as “No one knows the Father except the Son, nor the Son except the Father” [Mt 11:27], so I dare to say that no one knows the Spirit except the Father and the Son, that is, the one from Whom He proceeds and the one from Whom He receives, and that no one knows the Son and the Father except the Holy Spirit, He Who truly glorifies, Who teaches all things, is from the Father and the Son.

Taking quotes of the Fathers out of context does not prove anything. Besides no Father or group of Fathers has greater authority than the Ecumenical Councils who approved the Creed without the filioque and taught that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father. The Vulgate was not the first translation of parts of the New Testament into Latin. I am not sure that Augustine used the actual translation of St. Jerome. Whatever translation he used was incorrect as was St. Jerome’s Vulgate.

Archpriest John W. Morris

 

[Wandile]

Wandile;11345936:

Taking quotes of the Fathers out of context does not prove anything. Besides no Father or group of Fathers has greater authority than the Ecumenical Councils who approved the Creed without the filioque and taught that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father. The Vulgate was not the first translation of parts of the New Testament into Latin. I am not sure that Augustine used the actual translation of St. Jerome. Whatever translation he used was incorrect as was St. Jerome’s Vulgate.

Archpriest John W. Morris

Yet the Ecumenical councils never said he proceeded ONLY from the father. And besides the Greek word in the creed does not mean the same thing as the Latin word hence the Greek does not permit the inclusion of the phrase “and the son”

And since we are speaking about the ecumenical councils… St Cyril of Alexandria’s “Third Letter to Nestorius” which is also the main body of the Council of Ephesus says:

“For even though the Spirit exists in his own hypostasis and is thought of on his own, as being Spirit and not as Son, even so he is not alien to the Son. He has been called “the Spirit of truth”, and Christ is the truth, and the Spirit was poured forth by the Son, as indeed the Son was poured forth from the God and Father.”

 

[Zekariya]

The Vulgate was not the first translation of parts of the New Testament into Latin. I am not sure that Augustine used the actual translation of St. Jerome. Whatever translation he used was incorrect as was St. Jerome’s Vulgate.

Archpriest John W. Morris

St Augustine undoubtedly used the old Latin (Vetus Latina) text. While St Jerome was translating his Vulgate, St Augustine wrote him many letters to show his disapproval of St Jerome’s switching from the LXX text to the Hebrew text for the basis of his translation.

 

[frjohnmorris]

frjohnmorris;11346039:

Yet the Ecumenical councils never said he proceeded ONLY from the father. And besides the Greek word in the creed does not mean the same thing as the Latin word hence the Greek does not permit the inclusion of the phrase “and the son”

And since we are speaking about the ecumenical councils… St Cyril of Alexandria’s “Third Letter to Nestorius” which is also the main body of the Council of Ephesus says
“For even though the Spirit exists in his own hypostasis and is thought of on his own, as being Spirit and not as Son, even so he is not alien to the Son. He has been called “the Spirit of truth”, and Christ is the truth, and the Spirit was poured forth by the Son, as indeed the Son was poured forth from the God and Father.”
:

A more accurate translation of the text by St. Cyril is “For although the Spirit is the same essence, yet we think of him by himself, as he is the Spirit and not the Son; but he is not different from him; for he is called the Spirit of truth and Christ is the Truth, and he is sent by him, just as, moreover, he is from God and the Father.”

One of the letters of Pope Agatho to the 6th Ecumenical Council, Constataninople III in 680 states that " We believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible; and in his only-begotten Son, who was begotten of him before all worlds; very God of Very God, Light of Light, begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father, that is of the same substance as the Father; by him were all things made which are in heaven and which are in earth; and in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, and with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified;"

Both quotes are taken from the Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers, vol. XIV on the Ecumenical Councils.
Your statement makes no sense. Just because the Ecumenical Councils do not specifically reject some doctrine does not make it acceptable. We must adhere to the Faith as it was expressed by the Councils. The original Greed text did not have the filioque clause. Even the Vatican has recognized that it is incorrect to add the filioque to the original text, because the word ἐκπορευόμενον means to proceed from one source. The West had no authority to unilaterally change the Creed as approved by the Ecumenical Councils. Since the Creed was originally written in Greek, any translation that does not express exactly what the original Greek stated is an incorrect translation and must be rejected.

Archpriest John W. Morris

 

[QNDNNDQDCE]

I’m not sure I understand your point. The Latin translation of John 15:26 is inaccurate. There is a Latin term that denotes origination (like ekporeusai), but it would easily lead to confusion with the concept of the generation of the Son.

But you do bring up a good point. Perhaps we need to be more specific in our terms. Perhaps what we should say is that the Latin is indeed an incorrect transliteration of the original Greek. But as far as translation (as distinct from transliteration) is concerned, we should consider that, as in any translation, the translator’s presuppositions are most likely being taken into account. It is possible that when St. Jerome read the Johannine passage, he imagined the passage in the context of the eternal sending (since it is indeed given by Jesus in that context). In that sense, procedere would conceivably be the correct translation (though not the correct transliteration).

On that assumption, however, your own comment about a distinction between popular and theological usage would be irrelevant, for the Latin procedere (or the Greek proienai) in the context of the eternal sending can never be conflated with the Greek ekporeusai in the context of the origin of hypostases.

My argument is that the Latin translation is not in any way inaccurate.

In ordinary usage the Greek and Latin words “procedit” and “ekporeusis,” there is not the distinction in meaning noted in the PCPCU. The distinction only originated out of theological jargon which developed well after St. John wrote his Gospel. Therefore, this distinction would not have been present in St. John’s writing according to his original intentions.

Whoever first introduced the translation “procedit” did so as an honest and and accurate translation of John 15:26, which did not fail to capture a meaning that is not necessary in the text. Both say that the Holy Spirit goes forth from the Father. The Greek fathers came to interpret this to refer to the sense of the Holy Spirit’s procession that is proper to the Father alone, whereas the Latin fathers did not read John 15:26 is in this specific manner. The Greek fathers crafted a theological vocabulary which carefully distinguished between ekporeusis and proienai, but this is not so much due to any fundamental linguistic distinction outside of a developed Trinitarian theology.

If you think this is not accurate, perhaps we could examine the usage of “ekporeusis” and “processio” in examples contemporary with John 15:26 and we can discern if these theological distinctions are a necessary outcome of ordinary language. I guess this distinction would be that “processio” does not denote a source whereas “ekporeusis” entails a necessary source. An English example of procession without a specified source could be “the party processed through the streets.” However, this doesn’t seem to be relevant to John 15:26 anyway since it specifies in Latin that he proceeds ex Patre, explicitly denoting a source. Furthermore, “to proceed” is a movement, and movement necessarily implies a source. it doesn’t appear either that “ekporeusis” even has to explicitly denote a source, much less a single source, as Luke 4:37 uses the verb in reference to a rumor spreading all over a region without specifying a source of the rumor. A distinction that “ekporeusis” means “procession from an ultimate principle which is without principle” in ordinary language cannot be true.

 

[QNDNNDQDCE]

I believe this is an inappropriate comment. I hope you apologize to Father.

I think you are right. I should have chosen my words better. Nevertheless, it is frustrating to see someone trot out inaccurate polemics about linguistic issues in which they are obviously not an expert, when they are educated enough that they ought to have better discretion.

When you stated “as a manner of speaking,” I thought you were going to point out the fact that the original Latin text of Trent (which is the Catholic standard for the teaching on Original Sin) has been mistranslated into English. The original Latin text does not actually use the term “guilt” (which is the Latin culpa), but English translations seem to have unanimously (and wrongly) translated the Latin reatus as “guilt.” This has given the impression that the Latin Catholic Church officially teaches a transmitted guilt. Reatus in fact connotes more the idea of “consequence” than “guilt.”

Your statement “in this sense we are guilty” implies far too much about the Catholic teaching. It is better to avoid the term “guilt” or its derivatives altogether when discussing Original Sin, since, in point of fact, Trent does not use that term.

I appreciate your argument here, because you are interpreting things in the best possible light. However, the word “guilt” is used so widely in English translations that we have to deal with it, and “guilt” is not used without reason. “Reatus” really does literally mean “guilty,” and it is derived from juridical language. Furthermore, “culpa” can mean fault (as in defect), but it can mean guilt too, and there is an idea of guilt in the Latin tradition, which, HOWEVER, must not be understood as if man being “guilty” of original sin is in any way the same sort of thing as being “guilty” of one’s own actual sins. Your are correct in your expression of what the concept of guilt is getting at.

St. Thomas, for example, in the Summa (I-II, 81, 1) explains that we inherit Adam’s guilt because humanity as a whole can be considered as one man with one common nature. His analogy is that a man when a man commits a crime with his hands, such as murder, it is not a voluntary action of the hands, but of the soul. Therefore, guilt is not imputed to the hands considered by itself, but guilt is imputed to the person as a whole, of which the hand is a part. He takes great pains to distinguish between the nature of original and actual sin. For example, in the same question, he says, “A man is not blamed for that which he has from his origin, if we consider the man born, in himself. But it we consider him as referred to a principle, then he may be reproached for it: thus a man may from his birth be under a family disgrace, on account of a crime committed by one of his forbears.”

I guess this idea must have developed to explain why man who has not committed any fault himself is liable to suffer punishment for Adam’s sin. The other side of things, which is far from ignored in Latin theology, is that original justice was a supernatural grace and so God does not have any obligation to extend this gift anyway. These are both complimentary concepts. It does not make sense to deny any sense of juridical guilt whatsoever since the fact is that we will all be stand before the throne to be judged by God in the end and he will put his sentence on each of us. Man standing before God apart from his justifying grace will receive a sentence, whether to eternal torment or to perfect “natural” happiness, that is less than ideal. In that sense that man receives this penalty, he can be considered a guilty party.

The idea also that unbaptized infants suffer “pain of sense” (in addition to “pain of loss,” i.e. privation of the beatific vision) in hell undoubtedly motivated a concept of inherited guilt, but St. Thomas, who I quoted above, does not teach this, nor has it been the common teaching of the Church at least since then.

 

[frjohnmorris]

The Eastern Orthodox Churches teach that we inherit the consequences of the sin of Adam which is mortality and the corruption that it brings. Because of our mortal nature, we earn guilt by sinning ourselves. We affirm free will and believe that the nothing can destroy the Image of God in which we are all created. Luther and Calvin taught from Augustine that we are all born totally corrupted by guilt and deserving damnation. Both denied free will, also found in Augustine. Luther taught predestination to salvation, but stopped short of Calvin’s double predestination of some to salvation but others to damnation. As I understand it, the Roman Catholic Church teaches something in between these two doctrines but does teach inherited guilt but does not deny free will.

Archpriest John W. Morris

 

[QNDNNDQDCE]

The meaning of the word ekproreusai is not equivalent to the Latin word procedit. That is a simple fact of the actual meaning of words. I find it difficult to understand what difference the Roman Catholic Magisterial sources makes. Even Rome cannot change the meaning of a word. Besides, I have already quoted a Vatican source, in which The Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity recognized the problems caused by the difference between two words. I will not repost the quote because I have already done it several times. However, ekproreusai means to proceed from one source in the original Greek. The correct teaching is that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father as its source of origin and is sent by or through the Son or rests on the Son because the Father is the source of both the Spirit and the Son. I find the Catholic doctrine confusing because some imply that the Spirit proceeds equally from the Father and the Son, while others teach that the Holy Spirit comes from the Father and is sent by or through the Son. Orthodox can accept the teaching that the Holy Spirit comes from the Father and is sent by or through the Son, but cannot accept the teaching that the Holy Spirit proceeds equally from the Father and the Son.

Fr. Morris, I said above earlier that your post was “not a product of humility.” I should not have said this, but now you know that I thought it and that I am a sinner as much as anyone. I am sorry for this, and I hope you will give my perspective another consideration.

The fact is that while the PCPCU’s document The Father as the Source of the Whole Trinity makes a distinction between the meaning of “ekporeusis” and “processio,” it only distinguishes between there usage theologically, and not in any real distinction in the meaning of the Biblical texts. I will quote the relevant paragraphs.

Since the Latin Bible (the Vulgate and earlier Latin translations) had translated Jn 15:26 (para tou Patros ekporeutai) by “qui a Patre procedit,” the Latins translated the “ek tou Patros ekporeuomenon” of the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople by “ex Patre procedentum” (Mansi VII, 112 B). In this way, a false equivalence was involuntarily created with regard to the eternal origin of the Spirit between the Oriental theology of the ekporeusis and the Latin theology of the processio.

Notice it does not say that the Latins mistranslated the Greek Bible. It says they introduced a “false equivalence” (mistranslation, if we are uncharitable) in the Creed, which came much later.

The Greek ekporeusis signifies only the relationship of origin to the Father alone as the principle without principle of the Trinity. The Latin processio, on the contrary, is a more common term, signifying the communication of the consubstantial divinity from the Father to the Son and from the Father, through and with the Son, to the Holy Spirit.3 In confessing the Holy Spirit “ex Patre procedentem,” the Latins, therefore, could only suppose an implicit Filioque which would later be made explicit in their liturgical version of the Symbol.

Notice that the document nowhere attributes the distinction between “ekporeusis” and “processio” to ordinary language or even to Biblical language, but to specific theological terminology which developed well after John’s Gospel was written. I am not saying this to trivialize the distinction in theological terminology, but to defend the accuracy of the Latin translation. Let’s show the respect to the great scholars of the past that they deserve.

 

[frjohnmorris]

Fr. Morris, I said above earlier that your post was “not a product of humility.” I should not have said this, but now you know that I thought it and that I am a sinner as much as anyone. I am sorry for this, and I hope you will give my perspective another consideration.

The fact is that while the PCPCU’s document The Father as the Source of the Whole Trinity makes a distinction between the meaning of “ekporeusis” and “processio,” it only distinguishes between there usage theologically, and not in any real distinction in the meaning of the Biblical texts. I will quote the relevant paragraphs.

Since the Latin Bible (the Vulgate and earlier Latin translations) had translated Jn 15:26 (para tou Patros ekporeutai) by “qui a Patre procedit,” the Latins translated the “ek tou Patros ekporeuomenon” of the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople by “ex Patre procedentum” (Mansi VII, 112 B). In this way, a false equivalence was involuntarily created with regard to the eternal origin of the Spirit between the Oriental theology of the ekporeusis and the Latin theology of the processio.

Notice it does not say that the Latins mistranslated the Greek Bible. It says they introduced a “false equivalence” (mistranslation, if we are uncharitable) in the Creed, which came much later.

The Greek ekporeusis signifies only the relationship of origin to the Father alone as the principle without principle of the Trinity. The Latin processio, on the contrary, is a more common term, signifying the communication of the consubstantial divinity from the Father to the Son and from the Father, through and with the Son, to the Holy Spirit.3 In confessing the Holy Spirit “ex Patre procedentem,” the Latins, therefore, could only suppose an implicit Filioque which would later be made explicit in their liturgical version of the Symbol.

Notice that the document nowhere attributes the distinction between “ekporeusis” and “processio” to ordinary language or even to Biblical language, but to specific theological terminology which developed well after John’s Gospel was written. I am not saying this to trivialize the distinction in theological terminology, but to defend the accuracy of the Latin translation. Let’s show the respect to the great scholars of the past that they deserve.

What is false equivalence but a mistranslation? You assume that the distinction between ekporeusis and processo was developed later, but do not actually prove it. Besides the text of John 15:26 is specific. It states, “But when the Counselor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me;” Therefore the correct Biblical teaching is that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and is sent by the Son. I believe this is a simple matter of teaching what the Holy Scriptures and the original text of the Creed teaches without change or addition.

Archpriest John W. Morris

 

[QNDNNDQDCE]

The Eastern Orthodox Churches teach that we inherit the consequences of the sin of Adam which is mortality and the corruption that it brings. Because of our mortal nature, we earn guilt by sinning ourselves. We affirm free will and believe that the nothing can destroy the Image of God in which we are all created. Luther and Calvin taught from Augustine that we are all born totally corrupted by guilt and deserving damnation. Both denied free will, also found in Augustine. Luther taught predestination to salvation, but stopped short of Calvin’s double predestination of some to salvation but others to damnation. As I understand it, the Roman Catholic Church teaches something in between these two doctrines but does teach inherited guilt but does not deny free will.

The idea of guilt is two-fold. First, the fact that we do suffer the temporal penalties of mortality and corruption is attributed to “guilt” in the sense of a liability to punishment. Secondly, we are guilty because we are suffer the eternal penalty of the deprivation of heaven. The “guilt” of original sin is not at all the same as the guilt of actual sin. It would be a mistake to read this as, “YOU ate the apple too, Fr. Morris.” We do not have guilt ourselves for Adam’s crime, but we all suffer the penalties of Adam’s disobedience because his sin affected human nature (let me clarify in advance, nature not as a synonym of essence).

Does St. Augustine deny free will? I have not read much Augustine, but I am looking at the beginning of “On Grace and Free Will” and it appears that he affirms the existence of free will. Is his definition of free will not satisfactory for you?

Where does St. Augustine teach that humanity is “totally corrupted” by guilt? Where does he teach that the “Image of God” is destroyed in us? What do these expressions signify?

Granted, St. Augustine seems to have taught that unbaptized infants go to hell, but this is not the common teaching of the Church. Augustine’s teaching was undoubtedly shaped by his clashes with the Pelagians and he intended above all to express the necessity of God’s renewing grace for eternal life (cf. John 3:3). We should interpret his writings in light of this holding his primary intent to be the the assertion of the necessity that even infants be “born again” than that infants are deserving of hell fire. St. Thomas points to Augustine’s statement in Enchiridion ch. 93, “And, of course, the mildest punishment of all will fall upon those who have added no actual sin, to the original sin they brought with them,” to mean that they only suffered “pain of loss.” St. Thomas certainly never taught that infants suffer torment.

 

[Wandile]

Wandile;11346058:

A more accurate translation of the text by St. Cyril is “For although the Spirit is the same essence, yet we think of him by himself, as he is the Spirit and not the Son; but he is not different from him; for he is called the Spirit of truth and Christ is the Truth, and he is sent by him, just as, moreover, he is from God and the Father.”

One of the letters of Pope Agatho to the 6th Ecumenical Council, Constataninople III in 680 states that " We believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible; and in his only-begotten Son, who was begotten of him before all worlds; very God of Very God, Light of Light, begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father, that is of the same substance as the Father; by him were all things made which are in heaven and which are in earth; and in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, and with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified;"

Both quotes are taken from the Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers, vol. XIV on the Ecumenical Councils.
Your statement makes no sense. Just because the Ecumenical Councils do not specifically reject some doctrine does not make it acceptable. We must adhere to the Faith as it was expressed by the Councils. The original Greed text did not have the filioque clause. Even the Vatican has recognized that it is incorrect to add the filioque to the original text, because the word ἐκπορευόμενον means to proceed from one source. The West had no authority to unilaterally change the Creed as approved by the Ecumenical Councils. Since the Creed was originally written in Greek, any translation that does not express exactly what the original Greek stated is an incorrect translation and must be rejected.

Archpriest John W. Morris

Funny you mention a Pope of Rome ,Father, as the popes of Rome taught the filoque although objected to its inclusion in the creed. I’m fact No Popes condemned it at the time of the council of Toledo and in fact we know that Rome was using the filioque (though perhaps not in the Nicene Creed) during the lifetime of St. Maximos the Confessor (who defended the Roman teaching against those who objected to it in the East).

This all goes to show that the “ONLY” argument is valid as many popes used the crewed without the filioque yet explicitly taught it. So did many other fathers. Ecumenical councils don’t cover every aspect of Christian theology father and the filioque is one instance of this.

 

[QNDNNDQDCE]

What is false equivalence but a mistranslation? You assume that the distinction between ekporeusis and processo was developed later, but do not actually prove it. Besides the text of John 15:26 is specific. It states, “But when the Counselor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me;” Therefore the correct Biblical teaching is that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and is sent by the Son. I believe this is a simple matter of teaching what the Holy Scriptures and the original text of the Creed teaches without change or addition.

Father, if you look at my response to Mardukm above and elsewhere in the thread, you will see that I have addressed the linguistic distinction. Etymologically the two words are basically the same. “Procedere” is “pro” + “cedere (go (from)),” to go forth. “Ekporeuomai” is “ek (out of)” + “poreuomai (to go),” to go out from. These are synonymous terms. Secondly, I have provided a few examples of the use of “ekporeusis” which do not seem to support any real distinction between “ekporeusis” and “procedit”:

Mark 13:1 - Jesus comes out of the Temple. The Temple is not a “principle without principle” of Jesus.

Luke 4:37 - A rumor spread throughout the region. This spreading is not in reference to a single principle, much less a principle without principle.

Finally, again, there is Revelation 22:1, where “ekporeusis” is used in reference to the Holy Spirit coming (in some sense) from the Son. If St. John actively selected “ekporenomena” in John 15:26 because it was the only verb that could accurately communicate his Trinitarian theology and knew that the concept of “proienai” just wouldn’t suffice, he appears to have forgotten this by the time he wrote Revelation if it was written later, or he must have not yet realized the linguistic distinction if Revelation was written first (which would support the idea that there is in fact no real distinction in ordinary language).

If you insist that the processio-ekporeusis distinction was present in the ordinary language of First-Century Koine Greek and not merely a development of theological jargon afterward, the burden is on you to prove that there is a distinction, since it is not obvious.

(1) What is the distinction in the first place that you are tasking me to refute? It cannot be formulated in reference to the Holy Trinity because you are arguing that it preceded Trinitarian theology.

(2) Can you provide some early examples, either from the Bible or outside the Bible, that support this distinction?

If you are unable to answer these two questions, we will have to agree that “ex Patre procedit” is not a mistranslation of John 15:26. At worst, the Latin fathers misinterpreted the significance John 15:26 (in both Greek and Latin), but that is a separate conversation.

 

[frjohnmorris]

The idea of guilt is two-fold. First, the fact that we do suffer the temporal penalties of mortality and corruption is attributed to “guilt” in the sense of a liability to punishment. Secondly, we are guilty because we are suffer the eternal penalty of the deprivation of heaven. The “guilt” of original sin is not at all the same as the guilt of actual sin. It would be a mistake to read this as, “YOU ate the apple too, Fr. Morris.” We do not have guilt ourselves for Adam’s crime, but we all suffer the penalties of Adam’s disobedience because his sin affected human nature (let me clarify in advance, nature not as a synonym of essence).

Does St. Augustine deny free will? I have not read much Augustine, but I am looking at the beginning of “On Grace and Free Will” and it appears that he affirms the existence of free will. Is his definition of free will not satisfactory for you?

Where does St. Augustine teach that humanity is “totally corrupted” by guilt? Where does he teach that the “Image of God” is destroyed in us? What do these expressions signify?

Granted, St. Augustine seems to have taught that unbaptized infants go to hell, but this is not the common teaching of the Church. Augustine’s teaching was undoubtedly shaped by his clashes with the Pelagians and he intended above all to express the necessity of God’s renewing grace for eternal life (cf. John 3:3). We should interpret his writings in light of this holding his primary intent to be the the assertion of the necessity that even infants be “born again” than that infants are deserving of hell fire. St. Thomas points to Augustine’s statement in Enchiridion ch. 93, “And, of course, the mildest punishment of all will fall upon those who have added no actual sin, to the original sin they brought with them,” to mean that they only suffered “pain of loss.” St. Thomas certainly never taught that infants suffer torment.

Blessed Augustine contradicted himself. In some writings he affirms free will, but is his anti-Pelagian writings he teaches predestination and denies free will. The Roman Catholics never accepted Augustine without qualification. However, both Luther and Calvin did, at least his anti-pelegian writings. For example he wrote;
“Let us, then, understand the calling whereby they become elected,—not those who are
elected because they have believed, but who are elected that they may believe. For the Lord Himself also sufficiently explains this calling when He says, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.” For if they had been elected because they had believed, they themselves would certainly have first chosen Him by believing in Him, so that they should deserve to be elected. But He takes away this supposition altogether when He says, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you…Therefore they were elected before the foundation of the world with that predestination in which God foreknew what He Himself would do; but they were elected out of the world with that calling whereby God fulfilled that which He predestinated. For whom He predestinated, them He also called, with that calling, to wit, which is according to the purpose. Not others, therefore, but those whom He predestinated, them He also called; nor others, but those whom He so called, them He also justified; nor others, but those whom He predestinated, called, and justified, them He also glorified; assuredly to that end which has no end. Therefore God elected believers; but He chose them that they might be so, not because they were already so.” From a Treatise on the Predestination of the Saint. Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers, vol xiv p. 515.

Archpreist John W.Morris

 

[frjohnmorris]

frjohnmorris;11346237:

Funny you mention a Pope of Rome ,Father, as the popes of Rome taught the filoque although objected to its inclusion in the creed. I’m fact No Popes condemned it at the time of the council of Toledo and in fact we know that Rome was using the filioque (though perhaps not in the Nicene Creed) during the lifetime of St. Maximos the Confessor (who defended the Roman teaching against those who objected to it in the East).

This all goes to show that the “ONLY” argument is valid as many popes used the crewed without the filioque yet explicitly taught it. So did many other fathers. Ecumenical councils don’t cover every aspect of Christian theology father and the filioque is one instance of this.

The filioque was first added to the Creed at Rome in 1014. St. Maximos wrote that the Roman Catholics meant that the Holy Spirit proceeds through the Son by the filioque, a teaching that is also found in some of the Greek Fathers and Eastern Orthodox liturgical texts. As I have written before interpreted as meaning that the Holy Spirit proceeds through or is sent by the Son Orthodox have no problem with the doctrine. However, if it is interpreted to mean that the Holy Spirit derives its being from a double procession from the Father and the Son, the doctrine is unacceptable to Orthodox. Therefore, it all depends on what you mean by the filioque doctrine. However, no one has the authority to change the text of the Creed adopted by the Ecumenical Councils.

Archpriest John W. Morris

 

[mardukm]

Dear brother Q,

appreciate your argument here, because you are interpreting things in the best possible light. However, the word “guilt” is used so widely in English translations that we have to deal with it, and “guilt” is not used without reason. “Reatus” really does literally mean “guilty,” and it is derived from juridical language. Furthermore, “culpa” can mean fault (as in defect), but it can mean guilt too, and there is an idea of guilt in the Latin tradition, which, HOWEVER, must not be understood as if man being “guilty” of original sin is in any way the same sort of thing as being “guilty” of one’s own actual sins. Your are correct in your expression of what the concept of guilt is getting at.

A Latin priest explained it to me thus:

Reatus is not guilt, but the legal consequence of an action that made a man guilty. Imagine Bob, who is a father, wrecked John’s car. The court judges that Bob is guilty of that act and orders him to pay restitution for the car. But then Bob dies, and the son inherits the father’s property. The court judges that Bob’s son has to pay John for the car.

The priest explained that what the son inherited was not Bob’s guilt, but the responsibility to pay restitution. That is the legal concept of reatus. It is not a transmission of guilt, but rather a transmission of debt.

Is there anything wrong with the priest’s explanation? Should the priest have told me that the son inherited not just the debt, but the guilt as well?

Blessings,
Marduk

P.S. I’ll join in on the textual discussion later.

 

[QNDNNDQDCE]

Blessed Augustine contradicted himself. In some writings he affirms free will, but is his anti-Pelagian writings he teaches predestination and denies free will. The Roman Catholics never accepted Augustine without qualification. However, both Luther and Calvin did, at least his anti-pelegian writings. For example he wrote;
“Let us, then, understand the calling whereby they become elected,—not those who are
elected because they have believed, but who are elected that they may believe. For the Lord Himself also sufficiently explains this calling when He says, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.” For if they had been elected because they had believed, they themselves would certainly have first chosen Him by believing in Him, so that they should deserve to be elected. But He takes away this supposition altogether when He says, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you…Therefore they were elected before the foundation of the world with that predestination in which God foreknew what He Himself would do; but they were elected out of the world with that calling whereby God fulfilled that which He predestinated. For whom He predestinated, them He also called, with that calling, to wit, which is according to the purpose. Not others, therefore, but those whom He predestinated, them He also called; nor others, but those whom He so called, them He also justified; nor others, but those whom He predestinated, called, and justified, them He also glorified; assuredly to that end which has no end. Therefore God elected believers; but He chose them that they might be so, not because they were already so.” From a Treatise on the Predestination of the Saint. Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers, vol xiv p. 515.

I don’t see this as a denial of free will. Catholicism affirms both predestination and free will so it does not follow that Augustine denied free will because he affirmed predestination. His point is that we in no way merit justification because justification is by grace. This is the dogmatic teaching of the Council of Trent.

And whereas the Apostle saith, that man is justified by faith and freely, those words are to be understood in that sense which the perpetual consent of the Catholic Church hath held and expressed; to wit, that we are therefore said to be justified by faith, because faith is the beginning of human salvation, the foundation, and the root of all Justification; without which it is impossible to please God, and to come unto the fellowship of His sons: but we are therefore said to be justified freely, because that none of those things which precede justification-whether faith or works-merit the grace itself of justification. For, if it be a grace, it is not now by works, otherwise, as the same Apostle says, grace is no more grace.
history.hanover.edu/texts/trent/ct06.html

I do not think there is any difficulty in affirming that man’s assent to faith is not due to his own will but to God’s grace. Faith is a supernatural virtue, which raises us above our nature, whereas free-will is only a natural power. This is consonant with what St. Paul says: “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God” (Eph. 2:8). There is a big difference between saying that we can only arrive at faith by grace and saying that we are saved either against our wills or without our wills. If justification by grace is a denial of free will, then is the doctrine of creation a denial of free will since man did not will his own creation?

It is not 100% clear to me what your objection is. Could you please explain your view of predestination?