St. Palamas and the Immaculate Conception

[Mickey]

They actually do have different theological expressions, yet accept the same dogmas

Strange dichotomy, eh?

 

[Vico]

Strange dichotomy, eh?

And I read one comment objecting to expressing a dogma that is not part of the tradition in terms of that tradition: specifically, indulgences. There is a thread on that you might have read.

 

[awatkins69]

I wish I had a nickel every time someone tried to use this logic for proving the IC. The Trinity is very apparent throughout Scripture—but the IC is not there.
And I will reiterate—it is impossible to show the contradiction of something that did not exist.

Again, you pick and choose which ones are apparent from Scripture, and which ones we are just reading into it.

And you *can *show a statement contradicting it. They don’t have to say “Mary was not from the moment of her conception, by a singular privilege of God, spared from Original Sin.” It could be something like “Mary was not made perfect”, thus contradicting Saint Proclus. Also, saying that “Mary was made perfect” is an example of Eastern expression of the same Catholic doctrine.

 

[mardukm]

Strange dichotomy, eh?

Methinks only to a mind that believes unity is based on uniformity.

Blessings

 

[mardukm]

Again, you pick and choose which ones are apparent from Scripture, and which ones we are just reading into it.

And you *can *show a statement contradicting it. They don’t have to say “Mary was not from the moment of her conception, by a singular privilege of God, spared from Original Sin.” It could be something like “Mary was not made perfect”, thus contradicting Saint Proclus. Also, saying that “Mary was made perfect” is an example of Eastern expression of the same Catholic doctrine.

There is a passage in the OT predicting the New Creation. It says something to effect: “Behold! I create something new, a woman encompasses a man.”

I sincerely believe this was a prophecy that whereas in the First Creation, woman came from man, in the New Creation, it would start with woman first.

Blessings

 

[mardukm]

WOW … …
sheeesh…
Marduk???
I have never seen anything like this…
Marduk…you moved my text to a diffrent thread and you started to debate me without my knowledge that you are debating me this is the best strawman set up I ever saw, Marduk shame shame shame…
Now I know how desparate you are to win a debate, by doing this I will not know that you are debating me, and naturally I would not respond to your claims and thus it would look like I can’t respond to you and you would look like a won the day

BUT as we say in the Middle East “…and the wind did not go as the ship would have hoped”
How could you do such thing???
Is this the first time you do this, or, whenever you feel that you must win a debate???

I moved the discussion here because the thread where it came from had absolutely nothing to do with the Immaculate Conception.

Spare us the tirade and the emoticons. They make you look foolish.

Blessings

 

[mardukm]

You reject someone holding out a hand of brotherhood. Glad to know where your heart and mind is. You give EO’xy a bad name.:nope:

A Monk’s interpretation, who spent all his life studying the Saints and the Scriptures is a whole lot more valid then yours, besides if you bother to read all saint Palamas’s writting it will become evident for you that this interpretation is correct and yours is the wrong one.

Read below Marduk and learn after you study and search.

Fr. Lev Gillet does not believe the IC is a heresy, unlike you, and works for reunion between the EO and the CC based on understanding, not uniformity. What Fr. Lev does is the antithesis of your mindset, so spare us your pretended “respect” for this monk.

Besides, your statement here is a fallacy called “appeal to authority.” It doesn’t work.

Ignatios:

Marduk:

But his Sermon does not actually contain any notion that there was a progressive sanctification in St. Mary’s lineage that culminated in the perfect creature named Mary.

**…and after **she became supremely perfect ****even as regards her body by such great marvels,…A Homily on the Dormition,by St. Gregory Palamas]

HHHuh!!! you are not at the level to call such people that they interpreted things wrong, you need a lot more years of high study to be able to make such a claims Marduk.

I know English is not your first language, so you may not know what the phrase “progressive sanctification in St. Mary’s lineage” means. The sentence you gave has absolutely nothing to do with Mary’s ancestry, but rather with Mary’s growth in holiness during her life. I suggest you stop making your snide remarks. They only do damage to your own credibility, especially when you can’t support it.uch:

And if you read and comprehend the text you will find out that the sanctification started by the sanctification of her ancesters.

Nope. St. Palamas doesn’t say anything about Mary’s own sanctification starting with her ancestors. He simply points out the holiness in certain figures from the OT, and states that God actively guided her ancestry through these holy people. God didn’t “sanctify” these people in a special way. Rather, he saw that they were holy in word and deed, and thus chose them to be ancestors of Mary (i.e., guided her ancestry, as said earlier). Btw, would you like to give us a direct quote from St. Palamas stating that God sanctified her ancestors?

I think you should go back and read all of Saint Palamas writting before you start to manifest your wishfull thoughts.

Until you can give us a direct quote from St. Palamas stating that Mary was sanctified before she came into being (which you can’t), I suggest once again, that you hold back on the sarcasm,

Ignatios:

mardukm:

What St. Palamas teaches is this:

1. It was necessary for Jesus to come from flesh that was “both new and ours.”
2. God chose the woman who would fulfill this requirement from the beginning.
3. God had a plan to produce this woman and directed her ancestry through a line of holy persons.

And where in the above do you see the I.C.

You have to take it with the fourth point, which you conveniently separated from this portion. Mary was to bear the flesh that was “both new and ours,” foreordained from the beginning. “When the chosen time had come,” God made provision through Sts. Joachim and Hannah to bring into being the one who who had no stain. The statement “when the chosen time had come” indicates poignantly that this special sanctification, this “immaculate fruition” (in St. Andrew of Crete’s words) did not occur before that time (refuting your claim that Mary was sanctified before she came into existence). Now, unless you claim that there was a different Mary who was conceived than the one who bore Christ, then the flesh Mary possessed from the first moment of her existence was “both new and ours,” without stain, pure, and immaculate, the new flesh from whom Christ would get our human nature.

Read and comprehend what you wrote, Marduk, all the above is against your claim, and is fully Orthodox except to the words in the third line "…God had a plan to produce this woman " GOD had a plan for this Women , But to say that GOD produced this women as if he especiallyt made her for this purpose, is wrong.

Which just about makes you lose all credibility to my Orthodox ears.

CONTINUED

 

[mardukm]

CONTINUED

Ignatios:

mardukm:

immaculate not in virtue of her manner of conception, but in the holiness of her being).

meditate on the highlighted lines, do you comprehend what they are saying? this proof that St. Palamas was not talking about the I.C. because the I.C. is exactly the opposite of those lines

Oops, sorry for being unclear. When I said “manner of conception,” I meant her physical conception, which was not immaculate. As I hope you know, the Immaculate Conception does not refer to the physical conception of Mary, but her spiritual conception (i.e.,the creation of her soul by God). So aside from that clarification, what I stated was correct and exactly consistent with the IC.

Ignatios:

mardukm:

From the beginning of her existence in St. Hannah’s womb

The I.C. goes to beyond the beginning of her existence in her mother’s womb, the I.C. teaches that GOD had sanctified a “speacial” soul for her and/or her soul was preserved by GOD prior to her conception, where St. Palamas is clear in YOUR OWN QUOTE" beginning of her existence" beginning is not prior to.

That is a strange, unique, and WRONG understanding of the IC. May I ask where you got this misconception from? What Christian thinks that a person’s soul exists before its creation/instantaneous infusion into the flesh? There is a thread in the Apologetics section entitled “What’s the Craziest Anti-Catholic Whopper you’ve ever heard?” I think this takes the cake.

the bed rock and the foundation of the I.C. is the Original sin, the I.C. existed because the theory of the Original sin, St. Palamas was clear as the sun that he did not beleive in the O.S. nor did he beleive in the assumption of St. Mary to Heaven alive which it complete the “dinasty” of the Original sinin which it led to the Immaculate Conception in which it would make all the sence only in the case of the Assumption of St Mary into the Heaven alive, IN WHICH we do not find any of those in St Palamas Mariology.

Yep. Proves what I’ve been saying - the basis for EO “unity” is uniformity, not understanding.

Hence the words of one of our predecessors, Alexander VII, who authoritatively and decisively declared the mind of the Church: "Concerning the most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, ancient indeed is that devotion of the faithful based on the belief that her soul, in the first instant of its creation and in the first instant of the soul’s infusion into the body,

This is a “mechanism” If you wish to call the apple an orange, that does not change the apple into an orange, does it become obvious for you that your ways of trying to minipulate and/or spin things around is not working but on the contrary you are bringing humiliation to yourself and your RCC?

Let’s see. There was/is a universal belief in the Church that the flesh Jesus took from Mary was immaculate, free from all stain of sin, even original sin - hence, the Immaculate Conception. People speculated, “How did this come about?” With the tradition that the mechanism by which original sin was passed down was through the father, some people began to teach that Mary was herself born of a virgin - i.e., that Mary’s physical conception was immaculate, and she was not conceived naturally from Sts. Joachim and Hannah. Pope Alexander combats the error by proclaiming “the IC refers to her spiritual conception, not her physical conception.” The mechanism that people understood was thrown out the window. It was left a mystery.

Now, many Catholics believe that the IC sanctified her flesh at the moment of conception. That is the mechanism which you, brother Ignatios, want to pretend so badly exists in the dogma. But it doesn’t. The dogma does not insist on the mechanism by which Mary’s flesh was sanctified to be able to bear the Messiah. When and how Mary’s flesh became immaculate is not the subject of the dogma. As stated, many believe her flesh was sanctified at the moment of conception. I, as an Oriental, believe that Marys flesh was sanctified at the Annunciation. Both positions are perfectly consistent with the dogma of the IC.

In the matter of the Church, when you say Teaching, that would mean this is what the Church Teaches, IOW, you will be reffering to a dogmatic Teaching or a Doctrine or something that it is officially recognized by the Church etc…what you were trying to do is to give the text a spin to make it sound as if it were a doctrine, where it is not. sermon is not a Teaching. Besides it is obviopus that St. Palamas was not teaching the I.C. if we read the whole Text and all of his writting. so likw the vast majority of the times you are wrong, try again maybe one you will get lucky.

St. Palamas was teaching the IC. You just don’t want to admit it. He also taught that the main consequence of Original Sin is spiritual death, not physical death - which is probably why he had no problem with the IC. If you don’t know where St. Palamas teaches that, let me know, and I’ll give you a direct quote.

Blessings

 

[dvdjs]

Who are you to tell me that my laughter is inappropriate? Sheesh! If I find something humorous…I am free to chuckle…it happens all the time here. You are free to believe that I am dodging. You are free to believe that I am not providing cogent responses. You have free will. But please, do not tell me when I can laugh or not…that is a bit restrictive.

Most anyone at all understands that to LOL about anyone’s comment is exceedingly rude.
Yes, it happens all the time here - especially with certain posters. That doesn’t make it anything other than “common” in the vulgar sense. Why do you begrudge my pointing out what I perceive as rudeness? You do the very same thing on this thread. Is this aspect of dialog restricted to you alone?

 

[dvdjs]

This is very rude. I would not be surprised if Ignatios does not dignify this comment with a response.

I would be happy to apologize to Ignatios. However, this point of language has come before in this forum, and I thought it may be helpful to bring his attention to the gaffe, while also putting it aside to pursue the salient point.

We clearly have different ideas of what constitutes vulgarity and rude behavior.

 

[dvdjs]

…some appeal to this strategy in order to get out of a squeeze.

There is no strategy, just a willingness to overlook vulgarity in your case, and to invite a discussion of the actual issue raised by Formosus. The invitation stands.

 

[Vico]

…
What Christian thinks that a person’s soul exists before its creation/instantaneous infusion into the flesh?
…
Blessings

That idea was part of the pre-existance of souls and universalism (that all will be saved) of Origen which was rejected by the fifth ecumenical council.

“If anyone asserts the fabulous pre-existence of souls, and shall assert the monstrous restoration which follows from it: let him be anathema.”

The Immaculate Conception dogma states the Blessed Virgin Mary was “preserved” from “the first instance of her conception”:

“We declare, pronounce, and define that the doctrine which holds that the most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instance of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful.”

The traditional Marian prayer, which expresses it well, and said each day by those in the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary is worded like this:

V. Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
R. As it was in the beginning, is now and will be forever. Amen.
V. In Your Conception, O Virgin Mary, You were Immaculate.
R. Pray for us to the Father whose son, Jesus, you brought forth into the world.
Let us pray.
Father, you prepared the virgin Mary to be the worthy mother of your Son. You let her share beforehand in the salvation Christ would bring by his death, and kept her sinless from the first moment of her conception. Help us by her prayers to live in your presence without sin. We ask this in the name of Jesus the Lord.
R. Amen.
V. The Virgin Mary’s Immaculate Conception
R. Be our Health and our Protection.

 

[Mickey]

I I thought it may be helpful to bring his attention to the gaffe

Helpful indeed.

 

[Mickey]

Most anyone at all understands that to LOL about anyone’s comment is exceedingly rude.

Wrong. It is your perception. LOL can be construed in many different ways. This is merely an internet forum—perhaps you should toughen your skin?

 

[Mickey]

Let’s see.

Wait a minute! This is even worse than LOL. The “ROTFL emoticon” is rude according to dvdjs.

 

[Mickey]

Methinks only to a mind that believes unity is based on uniformity.

Yethinks what!?!.

 

[hope_7]

I know that this is a little off track for you all but I have a hard time accepting that Mary was born and lived without ever sinning.
The reason is that the scripture says that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, in Romans 2:10 it says that there is none righteous no not one,
in Psalms 51:5 it says behold I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother concieve me. Romans 5:12 wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned.

There are many scriptures that say this. I have had no problem with this and find it a wonderful thing that God the Son could dwell in Marys body and be born into this world. I like what Luke1:45 -47 says and blessed is she that believed for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord and Mary said My soul doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
To me it is a picture of anyone who has been born again. How God has saved us and forgiven us and cleansed us of our sin and made us righteous with His righteousness. I have never thought of it any other way. What you all seem to be saying is that Mary never sinned .
I believe that Mary is sinnless too but only because God has taken it away. Can any of you show me from the bible about this immaculate conception How can this be if the scriptures say that all have sinned and if Mary never sinned then why would we need the sacrifice of Christ Jesus God’s only begotton Son?

I am not trying to attack what you believe but trying to understand why you believe the way you do. I know that this is not quite the thread you started but it gives me a place to ask this question.

 

[Vico]

…
I believe that Mary is sinnless too but only because God has taken it away. Can any of you show me from the bible about this immaculate conception How can this be if the scriptures say that all have sinned and if Mary never sinned then why would we need the sacrifice of Christ Jesus God’s only begotton Son?..

I can see where it is puzzling to many, especially if tradition is not a factor in their belief, and relying only on scriptural quotes. The strongest single Biblical statement supporting the Immaculate Conception (preserved from sin from the first moment of her conception beforehand, due to the salvation of Christ by his death) is Luke 1:28 (KJV):

“And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.”

Note the Greek word: *kekharitomene (a *perfect passive participle meaning being in a state of having already been favored or graced).

You might find this interesting:
sufferingworld.blogspot.com/2009/08/hail-mary-full-of-grace-classicists.html

It was discussed quite a bit recently on this thread:
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=462935

 

[Ignatios]

] I moved the discussion here because the thread where it came from had absolutely nothing to do with the Immaculate Conception

Like always you try to divert things away from what makes you look bad, what I blamed you for was the moving of my text and you started to debate me without notifying me that you have moved my posts to a different thread AND that you are debating me without my knowledge that you are doing so !!! Tell you the truth I thought you were going to apologize after reading my posts, but I was wrong, instead, you showed what you are best at.

Spare us the tirade and the emoticons. They make you look foolish.

Why should I spare you from my tirade? it was just and right and gave true description of what you have done, besides you should advise yourself on staying away from actions such as you have done because “THAT” what makes you foolish.

You reject someone holding out a hand of brotherhood. Glad to know where your heart and mind is.

What a pathetic answer, shouldn’t you let the other individual know that you are initiating a brotherhood hand reach out or discussion/debate with him first? Your “out stretched hand of brotherhood” is false, if it was true, you would have notified me that you were engaged in a debate with me in another thread. The word foolish here for what you have done, comes very short in describing your intention.

You give EO’xy a bad name.

Your manifested opinions about the Holy Orthodox faith is clear evidence that it is you who is trying to give the Holy Orthodox Church of GOD a bad name, BUT as CHRIST the Only HEAD of the Orthodox Church said and the gates of hell shall not prevail against her, so try all you want, you will not prevail against the Holy Orthodox Church of GOD, People like you would have given the Orthodox bad name.

Fr. Lev Gillet does not believe the IC is a heresy, unlike you,

Unlike me and 99.99% of the Orthodox and maybe 35% of the RCC prior to the 1854 I.C. dogma who did not believe in it and objected it for over 6 centuries, also like many RC great theologians and Saints Thomas Aquinas, Bernard Clairvaux, Bonaventure and the Dominican friars and all the rest of the Christians etc…

…and works for reunion between the EO and the CC based on understanding, not uniformity.

1)The absurdity of your comments are so intense, he may have had no problem with the I.C. and that would not make him non-Orthodox because the Holy Orthodox Church of GOD does not make such things a Dogma, unlike your church, who condemned those who believes otherwise.
2) “…Understanding, not uniformity” is your own label that it can’t be attached to the Orthodox Church nor the RCC, But if the understanding should be the base for the unity, then let us see how is it going to work between RCs and the Protestants and if the same to the protestants then it must be the same to the Mormons and so on for the J.W. etc… thus we become a universalists, Nope you can keep this version of christianity to yourself, I know that not even the RCC accept such things.
3)Besides, shall I remind you that he (Fr. Gillet) was RC Monk( Benedictine) and Converted to the Orthodox Faith, would you like to talk about why he converted to the Holy Orthodox Church from Catholicism??? I don’t think you would like to get into that now, would ya?
4)Uniformity is a must according to the Bible:
Ephesians 4:11-14 11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the** unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,**
But maybe the Bible is only to be used when it is in accordance with the Dogmas of your church? If so, then, you are right according to your belief.

 

[Ignatios]

…What Fr. Lev does is the antithesis of your mindset, so spare us your pretended “respect” for this monk.

Again you think that you can succeed in giving a spin to this one also, he surely has an antithesis, however, it is the antithesis of your mindset, otherwise he wouldn’t have converted to the Orthodox faith, from Catholicism… where you converted to the Catholicism from Orthodoxy, THIS what makes his work the antithesis of YOUR mind, quite bargain we had here.… loool silly goose.
Marduk, be sensible and save yourself lots of embarrassments.

Besides, your statement here is a fallacy called “appeal to authority.” It doesn’t work.

Yes I have to agree with you, on the “it doesn’t work” for if it does, you would have searched and studied and learned long time ago and you wouldn’t be getting mockery to, both, yourself and your church.
However your statement above fits you better.

I know English is not your first language, so you may not know what the phrase “progressive sanctification in St. Mary’s lineage” means. The sentence you gave has absolutely nothing to do with Mary’s ancestry, but rather with Mary’s growth in holiness during her life. I suggest you stop making your snide remarks. They only do damage to your own credibility, especially when you can’t support it.

Actually English is my third language. Would you like to speak your (I suppose) second Language (the Arabic) since you claimed to be the second Egyptian generation, I know the Egyptians keeps the traditions and the customs very well.
OOO I do know what it means, Marduk, but maybe you just overlooked intentionally or unintentionally that those statement were a “quotes” from your favorite Monk the one that you praised his work about the I.C., in a few posts up, and before that statement of yours and then also after it, you disagreed with his interpretation and analysis of Saint Palamas’s work, then you challenged it as being false. Marduk pull yourself together, your arguments lacks consistency.
Besides the main Point here is to show that St Palamas didn’t believe in the I.C. emphatically as Ghosty tried to put forth as proof by using the writing of Fr. Gillet. In which it showed the opposite, and my quote above was in relation to the subject as whole i.e. to show that St Palamas’s Mariology was not the same as the I.C. definition where in my quote from St Palamas it shows that St Mary became perfect (Immaculate) gradually in her life where the I.C. theory shows that she became perfect instantaneously at her conception, two different concept don’t equal to the same dogma.

Nope. St. Palamas doesn’t say anything about Mary’s own sanctification starting with her ancestors. He simply points out the holiness in certain figures from the OT, and states that God actively guided her ancestry through these holy people. God didn’t “sanctify” these people in a special way. Btw, would you like to give us a direct quote from St. Palamas stating that God sanctified her ancestors?

The above is your own perverted opinion of Saint Palamas, and the venerable Monk that you seemed to admire his work, a Monk that spent his life studying and searching AND learning came up with the following **:“…Palamas’ solution to the problem, of which as far as we know, he has been the sole supporter, is that God progressively purified all Mary’s ancestors, one after the other and each to a greater degree than his predecessor so that at the end…” **
One has got to be insane to believe Marduk’s work as genuine and Fr. Gillet’s work to be defective just because he doesn’t show that St Palamas believed in the dogma of the I.C.