Must we believe in the Toll Houses?

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To add to my post above, for tollhouses, I’ve heard and seen various explanations from EOs (not much from Catholics), some acceptable, some not from the Catholic perspective. For example, some claim the dead must travel through several aerial toll booths manned by demons who judge all the departed one’s sins to see if the departed one’s soul belongs in heaven or hell (clearly this is unacceptable as Christ alone is said Judge). On the other hand, some say they are part of a process where satisfaction is exacted for particular sins before the soul can enter Heaven. For example, here’s how St. Cyril of Alexandria puts it:

St. Cyril of Alexandria, Homily on the Departure of the Soul
At Our soul’s separation from the body, there will stand before us on one side warriors and powers of Heaven, and on the other side the powers of darkness, the princes of this world, the aerial publicans, the torturers, the prosecutors of our deeds… Seeing them, the soul is dismayed, it shudders, and in consternation and horror will seek protection from the angels of God; but being received by the holy angels and passing through the aerial space, lifted on high under their protection, it encounters the toll-booths, as it were, certain gates or toll houses in which taxes are exacted which will bar its way into the Kingdom, will halt and hold back its progress towards it. At each of these toll-booths an account is demanded for particular sins.
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Here, the soul is held back from entering the Kingdom, not permanently, but until the taxes are paid. This seems to line up with the expression of EO doctrine on the final purification and that of Florence.
 
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@Genesis315 Excellent synthesis and interesting connection between East and West.

The Toll Houses are not real toll houses, but metaphorical, as we do not really believe that there are little booths manned by demons in the air, but rather as I was taught, the demonic powers led by the “prince of the power of the air” Eph. 2:2 are truly present and try to hinder the soul’s ascent into heaven to worship Christ. It is not so much that the demons have power to judge, for all Judgement is reserved to Christ, but rather once the soul is released from its body, all passions become fixed, and mysteriously by losing mortal, passible flesh the soul becomes impassible. Thus any unrepentant sins become a “claim, rights, etc.” by the demon of that particular sin. Think when Edmund Pevensie accepts the turkish delight from the White Witch in The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, she then has a claim over him as a traitor, and every traitor according to the deep magic must die. Of course in Edmund’s case, Aslan steps in, saves Edmund, and destroys the stone table, as the innocent, self-sacrficial type of Christ. That is why Confession and Holy Communion are so important to the Orthodox Christian, for if you die with a clean conscience and protected by the Body and Blood of Christ animating and protecting your soul then the demons with have very little hold over you.

Also, your guardian angel will meet each accusation from the demons with a defense showing your corresponding repentance or virtue, if you do not have that then the prayers of the Church for your soul can “pay” the satisfaction and put the demons to shame. In the East, while this is not a formally “defined” doctrine, we put the Toll Houses in the level of Holy Tradition as it is thoroughly expressed throughout the ages via the Divine Services, Iconography, and the experiential theology of the Saints as well as being corroborated by many Church Fathers.

Personally, since there is a major difference between East and West on this I leave it up to a future Ecumenical Council after full Reunion between Orthodoxy and Catholicism to sort out whose version of post-death purification is more fully supported by ontology.
 
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HomeschoolDad said:
The only problem that I have with “toll houses” is that it sounds like — and someone correct me if I’m wrong — there is the possibility that the demons will, indeed, “win the fight”, and drag the departed soul down into hell. I may be reading it wrong.
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When we pass from this life, we linger here awhile, until it is time to ascend following Christ to the Father… This establishes us in the first judgement, in which we abide until the Last Judgement… Ascending from earth to heaven, the spirits of the air are our accusers, wishing to keep us from that ascent to heaven… So we are ‘tried’ in our ascending through their accusations, and our Guardian Angel argues for us, and our dark angel accuses us, through the lower powers and principalities of the air, and these are demonic… We ourselves, in this, have no free will any longer, for we are reposed… And the trial may consist of simply being subjected to the temptation of each stage, and if we have repented of it, moving on, and if not, becoming ensnared at that point, until the prayers of our loved ones on earth, and the Church, give us the “buoyancy” to rise above the particular demonic power in which we are unable to rise due to our non-repentance…

The Saints, at least some of them, are reported to receive a kind of ‘cohort’ of angels with whom they rise directly to Paradise with the Father… In this understanding, the Saints, perfected in the Faith of Christ while on earth, are in a way already in Paradise, in an Earnest if not fully, and for them to die is gain, but to live on earth is Christ… (As Paul wrote)… And as Christ said, IF we believe in Him, we will not die… And indeed, death is overcome in His Holy Ones…

So the temporary, first judgement is established BY our repentance while on earth according to our ascending through the lower powers and principalities of the air after our repose from this life… And from here, we await the Last Judgement of God, but can rise further according to the loving prayers of those on earth… And further, by their deeds of repentance in our behalf… And their deeds of almsgiving on our behalf…

These lower powers are dark and foul… St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco was listening to a debate others were having, and someone asked him his opinion… His only reply, regarding the demonology of the “toll houses”, through which we must pass in our ascent to Paradise, was: “Have you ever seen one?” Followed by a shudder…

St. Xenia of Russia dedicated her life to repenting for her young husband, a military officer, who died in a horse-back riding incident shortly after their marriage, before repenting… Saving both him and herself…

geo
 
I’m no expert, but I believe the toll-houses to merely be an allegory to explain the partial judgment. Toll-houses are not a dogmatic teaching that we have to accept in order to be Orthodox, but I don’t know about Eastern Catholics.
 
HomeschoolDad said:
If “toll houses” are just another way of describing purgatory, then I have no problem with it —
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Not so much of purgatory, but of explaining the same thing, the need for purification, as well as the importance of prayers for the dead.

As for the obligation for EC to accept this speculation (I’m blanking on the technical word), given that neither EO or RC as a group are required to, EC clearly are not.
 
It’s my understanding that in the Oriental (Syriac / Coptic) view, most souls go to Hades / Sheol, the abode of the dead, just as they did before Christ… to progress from there to heaven when ready (or at the final judgment if not before). In that sense, “purgatory” would literally be “part” of hell, as Sheol, or the Limbo of the Fathers - part of hell but not eternal damnation and not necessarily a place of suffering.
 
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Be it Toll Houses or Purgatory, it is accepted there is some form of an “intermediate” stage . between heaven and Hell for those who are not completely free of the burdens of sins. What that is exactly, we don’t know. There a variety of visions of various Catholic saints who describe what Purgatory is like. Some of those are very frightening and some are viewed just as an a temporary distancing from God to work through the venial sins we carry. The thing we do believe is in that at some point, the souls in purgatory will eventually be in heaven.

In the Orthodox tradition there is a 40 day period of mourning after death. One would assume this is or may have been associated with the soul’s transition, possibly in line with the concept of the Aerial Toll Houses where the living pray for the individual’s safe transition in their passage. I’ll leave to others to comment on that.

Of recent times Father Seraphim Rose, an Orthodox monk ( who passed away in 1982) was a big proponent of the concept of Aerial Toll Houses. In his book, The Soul After Death, he does cite several Saints of the Orthodox Church who believed in them. If you are interested in a summary of the believe in them, it would probably be a good source. I believe one of the earliest references of the Toll Houses is around Saint Theodora as you mentioned.
 
I’ve never heard that before. Can you share some sources with me so that I can look into it?

I know in the Maronite prayers for the dead, the transition from this life to eternal life is spoken of as a journey from the shores of this life to the safe harbor of God’s Kingdom in heaven (much the same way as we speak of this present life as a journey and the Church as the ship).
 
twf said:
It’s my understanding that in the Oriental (Syriac / Coptic) view, most souls go to Hades / Sheol, the abode of the dead, just as they did before Christ… to progress from there to heaven when ready (or at the final judgment if not before). In that sense, “purgatory” would literally be “part” of hell, as Sheol, or the Limbo of the Fathers - part of hell but not eternal damnation and not necessarily a place of suffering.
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This actually makes a lot of sense. I know we as Catholics (Latin Rite ones, anyway) are quick to say “purgatory is not hell”, but do we know that? If hell can be defined as “that state of being after death where the Beatific Vision is not enjoyed and there is separation from God”, then that could include purgatory, limbo, the Bosom of Abraham, and fiery, punitive, eternal hell itself.

I’ve used this example before — and please forgive its utter homeliness — but I have wondered if eternity is like one of those cake and pie stands at a diner (think Waffle House(c)!) that have a knob on top, two covers one right over the other, with both having an opening in them to remove a piece of the dessert. When you rotate the top cover using the knob and align both openings, you can get your dessert. When you rotate it a little more, the dessert is fully enclosed. People in heaven are sitting in front of the enclosure and both openings are lined up. The “dessert” inside is the Beatific Vision, and they can feel the intensity of it. People in hell are on the other side of the stand. They can see the dessert, they can see the people in “heaven” being able to enjoy the BV (part of the torment — having to see for all eternity what they lost!), but they can’t enjoy it themselves, because it’s closed off to them (or rather, they closed it off to themselves in this life, by rejecting God).

They look kind of like this, only with two covers, one nesting into the other, openings in the sides of both.

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

I have always thought that hell consists, in part, of seeing What you lost and is beyond your grasp, and seeing all of the souls who did die in God’s friendship, enjoying What you will never have. We used to call that type of scenario “eating in front of a hungry man”.
 
Hi. I am new to the forum. Currently I am eastern orthodox. I can tell you that like many other things (doctrine and practice) in EO, toll houses are kinda mandatory. Priests wearing beard-never made law, but held for long so it basically became the law. Same is with toll houses. Problem with Orthodox Church is that a lot of things aren`t mandatory, but yet they are.
Declarative confessing of toll houses is present in more “strict”, “traditional”, and “monastic” circles (both monasteries and parishes).
 
It isn’t kinda mandatory. It’s so kinda not mandatory that I was Orthodox for a few years before I’d ever even heard of Toll Houses. When it was first brought up everyone got uncomfortable like WWIII was about to break out simply even mentioning it. It’s a hot button topic with some.
 
Rufinus said:
Declarative confessing of toll houses is present in more “strict”, “traditional”, and “monastic” circles (both monasteries and parishes).
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This plus this:
CoffeeFanatic said:
It isn’t kinda mandatory. It’s so kinda not mandatory that I was Orthodox for a few years before I’d ever even heard of Toll Houses. When it was first brought up everyone got uncomfortable like WWIII was about to break out simply even mentioning it. It’s a hot button topic with some.
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Equals different schools within Orthodoxy.

Kinda like the Alexandrian vs Antiochian schools in the ancient church. Both are within the Orthodox Church yet both put forth different mindsets of being Orthodox. Perhaps we best leave it at that.
 
That strictly depends on your community. What bothers me is the fact that that toll houses are deemed soteriologically important, like core doctrine of the faith. In Russian Church there have even been written guides for confession based on 20 toll houses.
 
If you recall in church history Antiochian school was rejected as heretical in the East in favor of Alexandrian school. One exception from Antiochian school was John Chrysostome. And even his works were mostly forgotten. Nobody would even knew if he had existed if it weren`t for liturgy ascribed to him.
 
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