Gleanings from Russian Orthodox Vladimir Soloviev

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Page 23
The schism initiated by Photius in 867 and consummated by Michael Cerularius
in 1054 was closely connected with the “Triumph of Orthodoxy” and was the
complete realization of the ideal which the orthodox anti-Catholic party had
dreamed of since the fourth century. Dogmatic truth having been once defined and
all the heresies finally condemned, they had no further use for the Pope; nothing
remained but to crown the work by a formal separation from Rome. Furthermore, it
was this solution which best suited the Byzantine Emperors; for they had come to
see that it was not worthwhile rousing the religious passions of their subjects by
doctrinal compromise between Christianity and paganism and thus throwing them
into the arms of the Papacy, when a strict theoretical orthodoxy could very well be
reconciled with a political and social order which was completely pagan. It is a
significant fact, and one that has not been sufficiently observed, that from the year
842 not a single imperial heretic or heresiarch reigned at Constantinople, and the
harmony between the Greek Church and State was not once seriously disturbed.
The two powers had come to terms and had made their peace, bound to one
another by a common idea: the denial of Christianity as a social force and as the
motive principle of historical progress. The Emperors permanently embraced
“Orthodoxy” as an abstract dogma, while the orthodox prelates bestowed their
benediction in sæcula sæculorum on the paganism of Byzantine public life. And
since “sine sanguine nullum pactum,” a magnificent hecatomb of one hundred
thousand Paulicians sealed the alliance of the Second Rome with the “Second
Church.”
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Again, wow. This is quite the claim.

I’m wondering what Orthodox folks think of this historical analysis?

God bless,
Ut
 
This guy is seriously blowing my mind! Pg. 24.
This profound contradiction between professed orthodoxy and practical heresy was the Achilles’ heel of the Byzantine Empire. There lay the real cause of its downfall. Indeed, it deserved to fall and still more it deserved to fall before Islam. For Islam is simply sincere and logical Byzantinism, free from all its inner contradiction. It is the frank and full reaction of the spirit of the East against Christianity; it is a system in which dogma is closely related to the conditions of life and in which the belief of the individual is in perfect agreement with the social and political order.
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We have seen that the anti-Christian movement, which found expression in the imperial heresies, had in the seventh and eighth centuries issued in two doctrines, of which one, that of the Monothelites, was an indirect denial of human freedom, and the other, that of the Iconoclasts, was an implied rejection of the divine phenomenality. The direct and explicit assertion of these two errors was of the essence of the Moslem religion. Islam sees in Man a finite form without freedom, and in God an infinite freedom without form. God and Man being thus fixed at the two opposite poles of existence, there can be no filial relationship between them; the notion of the Divine coming down and taking form, or of the human ascending to a spiritual existence, is excluded; and religion is reduced to a mere external relation between the all-powerful Creator and the creature which is deprived of all freedom and owes its master nothing but a bare act of “blind surrender” (for this is
what the Arabic word islam signifies). This act of surrender, expressed in a short formula of prayer to be invariably repeated day by day at fixed hours, sums up the whole religious background of the Eastern mind, which spoke its last word by the mouth of Mohammed.
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God bless,
Ut
 
Randy_Carson said:
Great!

BTW, I am reading The Fulfillment of All Desire by Ralph Martin, and he notes that John Paul II expressed the idea that “the supportive culture of Christendom has virtually disappeared and that Christian life today has to be lived deeply or else it may not be possible to live it at all.”

That quote is Martin’s paraphrase of JPII, but wow. I see the truth of it.
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Agreed. The idea of a cultural catholic is more and more laughable in this day and age. It takes a great deal will power to live a life that corresponds to the catholic ideals. To be honest, it takes an even greater amount of will power to live a life where you know you are failing in your Catholic ideals, but still affirm those ideals and work towards them.

God bless,
Ut
 
utunumsint said:
Page 23

Again, wow. This is quite the claim.

I’m wondering what Orthodox folks think of this historical analysis?

God bless,
Ut
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I can’t speak for “Orthodox folks” but I can speak for myself.

This Orthodox thinks that Mr. Soloviev was very much a product of his time. These views were definitely fringe, even in those days. His other philosophical works were influential, but his pro-Papacy views were definitely not one of them. He is no more representative of Orthodox thought than Hans Kung is representative of Latin thought.

The 19th Century was a Golden Age of Religious Polemics, and I view this in the same light.
 
Randy_Carson said:
MB,

Thanks again for referring me to the letter from Fr. Seraphim to Thomas Merton or Fr. Louis as he was known to the monks of Our Lady of Gethsemane.

As a young man, I seriously considered entering a Trappist monastery and visited many of the Cistercian abbeys along the east coast as well as in Colorado over a five-year period - in no small part due to reading many of the early writings of Thomas Merton. I actually entered the novitiate as an observer for several months before discerning that I was not called to that life. In later years, I became concerned about Merton’s drift towards the East - Buddhism, not Orthodoxy - and my suspicions have been echoed by others who have written about the possible doctrinal problems with Merton’s later works. Catholic Answers has a good article about this here: catholic.com/magazine/articles/can-you-trust-thomas-merton

Regarding Fr. Seraphim’s Letter, I enjoyed it (though he took a long time to make his points!), and I plan to forward it to a close friend who is the Executive Director of a large organization dedicated to caring for the poor in a major US city. I’m looking forward to getting his thoughts on Fr. Seraphim’s criticisms of Catholic social action.

I’m interested in yours, too. I’m sure that this document was called to your mind by my quotation of Soloviev’s parable of Cassian and Nicolas. Wouldn’t you love to ask Fr. Seraphim a few questions about his letter and any reply he may have received? I know I would! In general, though, who can argue with his condemnation of “social action” as he describes it?

But is that what Soloviev had in mind when he praised “Nicolas” for getting his clothes dirty in the service of the needy. It seems to me that if by “social action”, Soloviev is praising the Latin Church for the types of things that Fr. Eugene condemns in Merton, then Fr. Seraphim would get no argument from me. On the other hand, if Soloviev has in mind the kind of “action” we see in the parable of the Good Samaritan, then I think Soloviev would get no argument from Fr. Seraphim, me or you.

However, by taking issue with Merton’s misguided social action that stems from purely human motives in terms that are equally stark – the brevity of this life, the “kingdom not of the world” and “the transformation of men, not society”, etc. – Fr. Seraphim personifies Soloviev’s Cassian perfectly.

What are your thoughts?
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You wanted my thoughts on the parable, and here they are. I assume the Cassian is St. John Cassian, unless they are referring to another (St. Cassian of Imola was another Cassian, but he was a martyr and certainly not a prig of any type). Assuming that it is St. John Cassian, a basic skimming of his biography would show you that this characterization is ridiculous. St. John Cassian was a holy ascetic, and a man of God. Who certainly would not engage in the behavior described.

I think Soloviev was very much a product of his time. He saw what was happening around him, and wanted “action.” That was the buzzword then, and now…We need to “do something”…we need to do it, NOW! The Latin Church certainly was engaged in large scale social work, and he apparently felt that the Orthodox Church should be doing the same. But that presumes that the Monks just sat in their monasteries and prayed and didn’t do anything…which is not the case at all. Perhaps in his corner of Russia, he saw slackness…but out in the missions and in other parts of the Orthodox world, other things were happening. It is unfortunate that he didn’t have the internet, and maybe could have seen the bigger picture.

I think I am comfortable in saying, in union with Church teachings that Mr. Soloviev’s views are wrong. It is very good that he reposed in the Lord as an Orthodox and sought absolution and repentance.

The Corporal works of Mercy are one thing, which many Monks and Nuns over the centuries have done. What the Latin Church is engaging in, particularly of late is something else altogether. There will be no Utopia, there will be no transformation of the World, except by the hand of Christ in his second coming. We provide aid, and ease the suffering of this world…but we will never “eliminate hunger”…we will never “eliminate poverty” we will never “eliminate war” because only God can do that, only Christ will do that when he comes again in Glory. All we can do is make life on Earth easier and ease the sufferings of all of us here with some bread, prayer and comfort, but we aren’t going to make it “better.” Such high minded ideals flip to bitter cynicism such as you see now when these ideals smack head first into the reality of Fallen Man.

We know how this story ends, so we cannot be accused of cynicism…we know that it will all go away, and that there will be no more mourning. This is the point Father Seraphim was making, and this is the mistake that the Latin Church is making today.

The idea that because the Latin Church has more soup kitchens than the Orthodox Church somehow makes them better is a simplistic and misleading point.
 
And Randy, I would like to add that although you and I have our differences this has been a good exchange so far. Thank you for your thoughts as well.
 
Misplaced_Book said:
You wanted my thoughts on the parable, and here they are. I assume the Cassian is St. John Cassian, unless they are referring to another (St. Cassian of Imola was another Cassian, but he was a martyr and certainly not a prig of any type). Assuming that it is St. John Cassian, a basic skimming of his biography would show you that this characterization is ridiculous. St. John Cassian was a holy ascetic, and a man of God. Who certainly would not engage in the behavior described.

I think Soloviev was very much a product of his time. He saw what was happening around him, and wanted “action.” That was the buzzword then, and now…We need to “do something”…we need to do it, NOW! The Latin Church certainly was engaged in large scale social work, and he apparently felt that the Orthodox Church should be doing the same. But that presumes that the Monks just sat in their monasteries and prayed and didn’t do anything…which is not the case at all. Perhaps in his corner of Russia, he saw slackness…but out in the missions and in other parts of the Orthodox world, other things were happening. It is unfortunate that he didn’t have the internet, and maybe could have seen the bigger picture.

I think I am comfortable in saying, in union with Church teachings that Mr. Soloviev’s views are wrong. It is very good that he reposed in the Lord as an Orthodox and sought absolution and repentance.

The Corporal works of Mercy are one thing, which many Monks and Nuns over the centuries have done. What the Latin Church is engaging in, particularly of late is something else altogether. There will be no Utopia, there will be no transformation of the World, except by the hand of Christ in his second coming. We provide aid, and ease the suffering of this world…but we will never “eliminate hunger”…we will never “eliminate poverty” we will never “eliminate war” because only God can do that, only Christ will do that when he comes again in Glory. All we can do is make life on Earth easier and ease the sufferings of all of us here with some bread, prayer and comfort, but we aren’t going to make it “better.” Such high minded ideals flip to bitter cynicism such as you see now when these ideals smack head first into the reality of Fallen Man.

We know how this story ends, so we cannot be accused of cynicism…we know that it will all go away, and that there will be no more mourning. This is the point Father Seraphim was making, and this is the mistake that the Latin Church is making today.

The idea that because the Latin Church has more soup kitchens than the Orthodox Church somehow makes them better is a simplistic and misleading point.
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Thanks for your response. I literally just got off the phone with my friend to whom I had sent the article…the one who directs a large charitable organization in an inner city.

I (we) agree that Fr. Seraphim’s criticisms of Merton (and of some Catholic action) is valid. This was written in the 60’s, and some course correction may have occurred since then, but I do understand the drift Seraphim identifies. So, I AGREE with Fr. Seraphim regarding Merton, the Berrigan brothers and others who may have simply wrapped whatever social (leftist) cause they took up in a banner of the Church.

On the other hand, I (we) contend that perhaps Fr. Seraphim is too far to the other end of the spectrum. As I pointed out previously, the Good Samaritan is commended for getting involved with helping someone in need, and I suspect that the balance between Fr. Seraphim and Fr. Louis is somewhere in the middle. Mother Teresa may be an example of someone who found that middle ground - her nuns spent many hours in prayer each day in order to be able to do the very difficult work they did bringing the love of Jesus to the poorest of the poor.

I’m sure you agree that both love of God and love of neighbor are asked of us.

James 2:17-19
17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. 18 But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.
 
Randy_Carson said:
Thanks for your response. I literally just got off the phone with my friend to whom I had sent the article…the one who directs a large charitable organization in an inner city.

I (we) agree that Fr. Seraphim’s criticisms of Merton (and of some Catholic action) is valid. This was written in the 60’s, and some course correction may have occurred since then, but I do understand the drift Seraphim identifies. So, I AGREE with Fr. Seraphim regarding Merton, the Berrigan brothers and others who may have simply wrapped whatever social (leftist) cause they took up in a banner of the Church.

On the other hand, I (we) contend that perhaps Fr. Seraphim is too far to the other end of the spectrum. As I pointed out previously, the Good Samaritan is commended for getting involved with helping someone in need, and I suspect that the balance between Fr. Seraphim and Fr. Louis is somewhere in the middle. Mother Teresa may be an example of someone who found that middle ground - her nuns spent many hours in prayer each day in order to be able to do the very difficult work they did bringing the love of Jesus to the poorest of the poor.

I’m sure you agree that both love of God and love of neighbor are asked of us.

James 2:17-19
17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. 18 But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.
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I would agree that the Corporal works of Mercy are important and should not be ignored. The Orthodox Church is not ignoring them, and doesn’t ignore them. Our monasteries are doing some wonderful work, and in centuries past the Monasteries provided spiritual centers and centers of aid. It isn’t the Church’s primary mission to feed and clothe our neighbors, although they do do that when there is a need…it is OUR job.
My whole point in all of this, was to provide a direct rebuttal of the idea that the Orthodox Church somehow is neglectful of these things.
 
Misplaced_Book said:
I would agree that the Corporal works of Mercy are important and should not be ignored. The Orthodox Church is not ignoring them, and doesn’t ignore them. Our monasteries are doing some wonderful work, and in centuries past the Monasteries provided spiritual centers and centers of aid. It isn’t the Church’s primary mission to feed and clothe our neighbors, although they do do that when there is a need…it is OUR job.
My whole point in all of this, was to provide a direct rebuttal of the idea that the Orthodox Church somehow is neglectful of these things.
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In response to Soloviev’s charge…okay, I understand.

Why do you think he made those observations and those statements regarding the Russian Church?
 
Randy, I just want to thank you for this thread. I had never read anything by this man. I am totally blown away and looking forward to reading more. I’ll reserve my comments until then. 👍
 
SteveVH said:
Randy, I just want to thank you for this thread. I had never read anything by this man. I am totally blown away and looking forward to reading more. I’ll reserve my comments until then. 👍
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And to think he was totally unknown in the west until JPII referenced him in Fides et Ratio.

:tiphat:
 
Randy_Carson said:
In response to Soloviev’s charge…okay, I understand.

Why do you think he made those observations and those statements regarding the Russian Church?
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I am fully aware that there was corruption in religious institutions in the 19th Century, and the Russian Church would not be immune. Perhaps he saw some things he didn’t like, ok…fair enough. To build his case for Papal Jurisdiction he would necessarily have to attack Orthodoxy’s reasons for resisting that authority, and that includes how Orthodoxy views itself and its Praxis.

It is classic 19th Century Religious Polemics. It is clever in the same way that the writings of the late Christopher Hitchens are clever…HOWEVER, it is still wrong, even if it makes some well targeted barbs.
 
Misplaced_Book said:
I can’t speak for “Orthodox folks” but I can speak for myself.

This Orthodox thinks that Mr. Soloviev was very much a product of his time. These views were definitely fringe, even in those days. His other philosophical works were influential, but his pro-Papacy views were definitely not one of them. He is no more representative of Orthodox thought than Hans Kung is representative of Latin thought.

The 19th Century was a Golden Age of Religious Polemics, and I view this in the same light.
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To be honest, I have only just recently been introduced to Soloviev while researching the life of Catherine Doherty, who said she was product of Soloviev. It sparked my interest, but I have done no researching into his life or history. Then, just a few days ago, I had been reading Thomas Madden’s description of the Islamic invasion. He specifically mentioned that one of the reasons for the quick destruction of the Byzantine empire in Africa and in many parts of the Middle-East was the aid of the Monophysites who rejected the now orthodox Popes in Byzantium in union with the Popes in Rome. Madden said it was because of the oppression of their sect by these Emperors. Then along comes this post from Randy, and I get a completely different explanation for what happened from Soloviev. Although I am not entirely happy with his tone - seems like a tone that only a convert could use - I am wondering if there is something to it. Perhaps not the sweeping condemnations of Orthodoxy, but of the vulnerability of the Eastern Empire to Islam due to heretical schisms caused by the interplay of imperial support for Heresie and the controversial back and forth that caused deeper and deeper divisions in the empire. Soloviev seems to see the root cause of all these heresies in the unwillingness of the eastern church to submit to Rome and their eagerness to comprise with heretical emperors in order to emancipate themselves from Rome. That is his claim, anyway.

I am wondering, Misplaced_Book, if you could provide a different interpretation of this historical period and the religious weakness of the empire in the face of Islamic aggression? Perhaps suggest books? It is one thing to say he is fringe, but I would like something more to sink my teeth into. 🙂

God bless,
Ut
 
Misplaced_Book said:
The Rise of Militant Islam and the Crusades struck a crippling blow that the Empire never recovered from.

I am no expert on this time period, but the wikipedia article is pretty extensive and has great sources.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine_Empire
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Thanks! I will make the effort to educate myself. 🙂

Just off the top of my head, one argument I can make against Soloviev’s description of events is that Constantinople was a commercial hub where the Emperors lived, where the Church’s intellectual life thrived. So it was only natural that heresies would be generated in that context and that Emperors would take sides. It was also only natural that the clergy in Constantinople would feel pressured to follow imperial choices, because to oppose those choices was too dangerous. Perhaps in the backwater of the city of Rome, such decisions to support orthodoxy were less costly (although the counter argument here is that Rome had its own difficulties to deal with in terms of Arian Germanic tribes).

In any even, the fall of the eastern Roman empire may have been aided by heretical groups, like the Monophysites, but that those heretical groups existed is not necessarily on account of a (culpable) doctrinal weakness on the part of the Greeks, simply on account of their rejecting the leadership of Rome in favor of the powerful pressure from the imperial court. Although I am sure the imperial court exerted a great deal of pressure on orthodox dissenters, and, from time to time, the temptation was probably strong, to take the “easy road” and just submit to the “Imperial Party line”.

Perhaps there was some social and maybe even racial pride here as well. “What is Rome to us, here in glorious Constantinople? Why should we care what some backwater bishop from a city from a bygone era who surrounds himself with German barbarians, who are no longer of true Roman descent?” This certainly is not a great motivation for rejecting the authority of Rome, but it may have come into play.

Soloviev mentions that after a certain point (around the 800s), all great doctrinal issues had been more or less settled, and the emperors were content to accept doctrinal purity, so long as the clergy did not meddle or judge imperial actions, such as the genocidal murder of the Paulicians by a Roman emperor.

My counterargument here is that this was the last few hundred years of the Byzantine empire with constant pressure from Islam. Constantinople was no longer a hub of commercial or intellectual activity (I think), but an embattled fortress between the East and the West. They had no time for religious debates. And frankly, very likely, not much time to pass moral judgements on barbaric acts of emperors. I’m not saying they should not have passed moral judgements, only that their silence need not be attributed to a moral capitulation in favor of religious purity. That seems like a stretch.

Yes, the Papacy was gaining moral traction and political authority in this time period, although they also had their difficulties with Muslim raiders from North Africa, Vikings from the North, and Magyars (Huns) from Asia. They implemented the truce of God, then the peace of God, and finally, crusades against the Islamic threat galvanizing religious sentiment and concentrating religious and political authority in the Papacy.

Some thoughts anyway.
God bless,
Ut
 
“And I tell you that you are Peter…” (Mt. 16:18). Of the three attributes represented in this crucial passage as belonging by divine right to the prince of the apostles–1) the call to be the foundation of the Church by the infallible confession of the truth, 2) the possession of the power of the keys, 3) the power of binding and loosing–it is only the last that he shares with the other apostles.

"All Orthodox Christians are agreed that the apostolic power of binding and loosing was not conferred upon the Twelve as private individuals or in the sense of a temporary privilege, but that it is the genuine source and origin of perpetual priestly authority which has descended from the apostles to their successors in the hierarchy, the bishops and priests of the universal Church. But if this is true, then neither can the two former attributes connected particularly with Peter in a still more solemn and significant manner be individual or accidental prerogatives; the less so, in that it was with the first of these prerogatives that our Lord expressly connected the permanence and stability of His Church in its future struggle against the powers of evil.

"If the powers of binding and loosing conferred on the apostles is not a mere metaphor or a personal and temporary attribute, if it is, on the contrary, the actual living seed of a universal, permanent institution comprising the Church’s whole existence, how can Peter’s own special prerogatives, announced in such explicit and solemn terms, be regarded as barren metaphors or as some personal and temporary privileges? Ought not they also to refer to some fundamental and permanent institution, of which the historic personality of Simon Bar-Jona is but the outstanding and typical representative?"

(Soloviev, Vladimir, The Russian Church and the Papacy, pp.111-112)

+++

Could this “fundamental and permanent institution” that Peter represents be the office of the Royal Priesthood (cf. Is. 22:20-22)
 
I don’t want to point fingers, but I have to wonder why I subscribed to a Soloviev thread.
 
"Christ, we are told, is the rock of the Church. That is true; no Christian has ever disputed it. But it is hard to see the reasonableness, even if we admit the sincerity, of those who, in their zeal to defend Christ from an imaginary insult, persist in ignoring his express will and in repudiating the order which he established in so explicit a manner. For he not only declared that Simon, one of his apostles, was the rock of his Church, but in order to impress this new truth more forcibly upon us and to make it more evident and striking he gave to Simon a distinctive and permanent name derived from this very call to be the rock of the Church.

"We have here, then, two equally indisputable truths: Christ is the rock of the Church, and Simon Bar-Jona is the rock of the Church. But the contradiction, if there is one, does not stop here. For we find this very Simon Peter, even though he alone received from Christ this unique prerogative, declaring in one of his epistles that all the faithful are living stones in the divine-human building (1 Pet. 2:4-5). Jesus is the one and only rock of the Church; but, if we are to believe Jesus, the prince of the apostles is the rock of his Church par excellence; and again, if we would believe Peter, every true believer is the rock of the Church.

“Confronted with the apparent inconsistency of these truths, it is enough for us to observe their actual agreement in logic. Jesus Christ, the unique rock of the kingdom of God on the purely religious and mystical plane, sets up the prince of the apostles and his permanent authority as the fundamental rock of the Church in the social order of the Christian community; and each member of this community, united to Christ and abiding in the order he established, becomes an organic individual element, a living stone of this Church whose mystical and (for the time being) invisible foundation is Jesus Christ, and whose social and visible foundation is the monarchical power of Peter.”

(Soloviev, Vladimir, The Russian Church and the Papacy, pp.114)
 
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