In
a recently posted lecture on the topic of Fundamentalism, George Demacopoulos (hereafter "GD") fell into many of the same errors evident in his original article that began this discussion. He continues to make sweeping and unsubstantiated assertions, and he alleges connections between some of the most disparate ideas and groups found in contemporary Christendom without providing any evidence to substantiate his claims. He again fell into gross overstatement, oversimplification, and often evidenced a superficial understanding of the issues he raised, particularly with regards to Protestant thought and history, which he clearly has not spent a great deal of time familiarizing himself with. When you disagree with someone else, you should at least attempt to engage their actual positions, and when you state what those positions are, they should be stated in a way that is fair enough that your opponent would actually recognize them. There was unfortunately very little evidence in this lecture that GD has
tried to understand the positions of those he disagrees with, much less that he actually
has understood them, or has good reasons for disagreeing with them.
For those who would like to review the various exchanges in this discussion, you can read his original essay here:
Orthodox Fundamentalism
You can read my response to that essay here:
Response to "Orthodox Fundamentalism" by George Demacopoulos
You can listen to a debate we had on Ancient Faith Today on this subject here:
Orthodox Fundamentalism: What is it and does it exist?
That link also includes a transcript of the discussion.
I posted some further comments after that debate, which you can read here:
"Orthodox Fundamentalism" Discussion on Ancient Faith Today
To begin with, let me address one point that GD made well into the lecture (at about the 42 minute mark). He made the statement that every written criticism of his original essay that he had seen was written by a former Protestant convert, and then said "Maybe it's a coincidence... I don't know." In the context of his other comments, the suggestion was that at least "some" Protestants are more susceptible to a certain kind of "Orthodox Fundamentalism," and that perhaps those who disagreed with him fell into that category. As is true of his comments throughout the course of this debate, this was a part of what was largely a series of
ad hominem arguments. While it may well be the case that he had not seen any written criticisms of his essay that were written by authors who were not converts from Protestantism, it is not true that such essays were not actually written.
Fr. Emmanual Hatzidakis, who is a retired priest in the Greek Orthodox Archdioce of North America, wrote a response, which can be read here:
What is Orthodox Fundamentalism?
Fr. George Maximov, (who is a professor at the
Moscow Theological Academy, a member of the Church of Russia's Synodal Working Group on the Elaboration of the Conceptualization of Inter-Religious Relations, a member of the Expert Council of the Russian Federation's Justice Ministry on the Countering of Religious Extremism, a member of the Theological Commission of the Moscow Patriarchate's Interconciliar Presence, and the Head of the Sixth Day Missionary Educational Society) wrote an extensive rebuttal of GD's original essay, which you can read in Russian, here:
ПРИНЦИП «СОГЛАСИЯ ОТЦОВ» И СОВРЕМЕННЫЕ НАПАДКИ НА НЕГО
You can read this article in English here:
The Principle of Consensus Patrum and Modern Attacks Against It*
He ended his essay by stating "A wonderful critique of Demacopoulos' article was written by Fr. John Whiteford," and then he links to his own translation of my original response:
http://yurijmaximov.wixsite.com/pravoslavie/--1-c15s9
So given that such a prominent Orthodox Theologian not only agreed with what I wrote, but thought it worthy to take the time to translate it into Russian himself, and publish it on his website, I think I am on very firm Orthodox ground here, despite the apparent handicap of having converted to Orthodoxy after having been convinced that it was the True Faith.
Unfortunately, this typifies GD"s entire lecture. He does not engage those that he disagrees with. He simply seeks to dismiss them with ad hominem arguments. In this rebuttal I am going to respond to GD's lecture at some length and in a fair amount of detaill. It will be interesting to see if he will at some point actually engage the merits of any of the criticisms of his positions on the issues he raises, but I would not recommend anyone hold their breath.
Misunderstanding the History of Fundamentalism
GD asserts that Protestant Fundamentalism was a reactionary response to the then current expression of "biblical criticism and academic theology as they were being pursued at elite universities," and that it had a "self conscious anti-intellectual character" from its very beginning.
The problem with this claim is that it simply is not the case. GD is basing his comments on a caricature of Protestant Fundamentalism, rather than on their actual history. It is true that the Fundamentalist movement was a response to modernist and skeptical Biblical criticism, but the suggestion that it was those who were not educated responding to those who were is not at all true. The leaders of the early Fundamentalists included
B. B. Warfield and
J. Gresham Machen who were prominent professors at
Princeton Theological Seminary. Machen is still known to many because of his
New Testament Greek Grammar, which is still in use (it was used in my first year of New Testament Greek at Southern Nazarene University). Princeton was considered even in those days to be an "elite university."
It is true that if you look only at those Protestants who today like to refer to themselves as "Fundamentalists," you are more likely to find people with more than a bit of an anti-intellectual bent, but there are many conservative Protestants, who continue to hold to the same positions that Warfield and Machen espoused, but who do not typically use that label, because it has acquired a negative connotation, and also because they consider their historic confessions (Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican) to be better descriptions of their faith. And whatever you may think of groups, such as the
Missouri Synod Lutherans or the
Orthodox Presbyterians, they are hardly anti-intellectual, nor do they devalue education, and contrary to GD's suggestions, they are neither Dispensationalists nor Restorationists.
Inerrancy and Innovation
Then GD went on to assert that the Fundamentalists were "far more innovative than the scholarship [they] found so egregious." And as an example of their allegedly innovative positions, he cited their belief in biblical inerrancy, which he claims was given its first "widespread endorsement" by them.
First off, even if you disagree with the idea of biblical inerrancy, it is simply ridiculous from an historical standpoint to claim that this belief is far more innovative than denials of the deity of Jesus Christ, the virgin birth of Christ, or the physical resurrection of Christ -- which were all things that modernist scholars were teaching, that the Fundamentalists rightly rejected.
He went on to assert:
"The very notion of biblical inerrancy is a modern idea. I know of no patristic or medieval author -- and I have read quite a few of them -- who believed that the Bible was without error, which is what "inerrancy" means. Nor do I know of any ancient or medieval author who thought that the Scriptures were literally dictated to their authors by the Holy Spirit. Those are modern assertions, not patristic, not Byzantine, not medieval."
This is truly an astonishing claim. The
Fundamentalist-Modernist controversy is usually dated as beginning in the 1920's, though you could see the beginnings of it in America as early as the 1890's. The inerrancy of Scripture was a belief universally held by mainstream Christians prior to the 19th Century. The idea that it was invented by Fundamentalists is a claim that has no basis in history. You might take issue with
how Fundamentalists argued for inerrancy (and I would take issue with them there myself), and you can make a case that their
approach was innovative, but not the very idea of inerrancy.
As for the suggestion that Fundamentalists believe "that the Scriptures were literally dictated to their authors by the Holy Spirit" -- no one believes that in any literal sense -- not even among Protestant Fundamentalists. You do find many writers long before the Fundamentalist controversy using dictation language, but this was never taken literally, but was simply used to emphasize the Divine origins of Scripture.
Harold Lindsell, who was one of the staunchest Fundamentalists wrote "...there are no evangelical scholars who hold to mechanical dictation, although it is true that those who hold to Biblical inerrancy do believe in verbal inspiration..." (
The Battle for the Bible (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1976), p. 55). And by verbal inspiration, he simply means that they believe (as St. Paul teaches) that all Scripture is inspired by God, and this includes every word of Scripture -- but this does not mean that the writers of Scripture played no role in the writing of Scripture. But one thing that this assertion shows is that GD has clearly read a lot more
about Fundamentalists than he has ever bothered to read that was actually written
by them. His belief that they would espouse a literal dictation view of inspiration is based on listening to those attacking Fundamentalism, rather than reading anyone who ever actually articulated such views.
Having been a Protestant from the
Wesleyan-Arminian tradition, I once did an historical study of Methodist theologians, beginning with
John Wesley himself, and found that every major Methodist theologian affirmed inerrancy prior to the end of 19th century.
John Wesley, speaking with regard to someone who questioned the complete inspiration of Scripture, wrote:
"If he is a Christian, he betrays his own cause by averring that all Scripture is not given by inspiration of God, but the writers of it were sometimes left to themselves, and consequently made some mistakes. Nay, if there be any mistake in the Bible, there may well be a thousand. If there be one falsehood in that book, it did not come from the God of truth" (qtd in Wilbur T. Dayton, "The Bible in the Wesleyan Tradition," Asbury Seminarian 40 (Spring 1985): 32).
In fact, you do not find a major Methodist Theologian failing to specifically affirm inerrancy until you get to
John Miley's Systematic Theology, which was published in 1892. And only with
Olin Curtis, in 1905, do you find one who specifically denied the complete inerrancy of Scripture. So clearly it is contrary to fact to claim that the belief in the inerrancy of Scripture only came into prominence among the Fundamentalists in the early 20th century.
The Roman Catholic Church also clearly and unambiguously affirms the inerrancy of Scripture (see
A Catholic Understanding of Biblical Inerrancy). And so the idea that this teaching was invented by American Protestant Fundamentalists in the early 20th century, or even by earlier Protestants is simply a ridiculous assertion, contrary to actual history.
But not only did this belief predate the Fundamentalist controversy, and not only did it not originate within Protestantism -- you will find it clearly taught by the Fathers of the Church. You will find numerous quotes from the Fathers in which they express their belief that the Scriptures were without error in this article:
The Inerrancy of Scripture
However, here are a few examples:
“We however, who extend the accuracy of the Spirit to the merest stroke and tittle, will never admit the impious assertion that even the smallest matters were dealt with haphazard by those who have recorded them, and have thus been borne in mind down to the present day: on the contrary, their purpose has been to supply memorials and instructions for our consideration under similar circumstances, should such befall us, and that the examples of the past might serve as rules and models, for our warning and imitation” (NPNF2-07 St. Gregory Nazianzen, Oration II: In Defence of His Flight to Pontus, and His Return, After His Ordination to the Priesthood, with an Exposition of the Character of the Priestly Office , ch. 105, NPNF2, p.225).
Here St. Gregory references the words of the Lord: "And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail" (
Luke 16:17, c.f.
Matthew 5:18). St. Gregory not only affirms verbal inerrancy, but in fact affirms every jot and tittle inerrancy.
St. John Chrysostom wrote:
"Don't worry, dearly beloved, don't think sacred Scripture ever contradicts itself, learn instead the truth of what it says, hold fast what it teaches in truth, and close your ears to those who speak against it" (Homily 4:8 on Genesis, The Fathers of the Church: St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 1-17, trans. Robert C. Hill (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1986), p. 56).
And this quote from St. John Chrysostom is simply one of many in which he routinely assures his hearers that there is nothing in Scripture that is in error.
St. Augustine also stated the matter very clearly:
"For I confess to your Charity that I have learned to yield this respect and honour only to the canonical books of Scripture: of these alone do I most firmly believe that the authors were completely free from error. And if in these writings I am perplexed by anything which appears to me opposed to truth, I do not hesitate to suppose that either the manuscript is faulty, or the translator has not caught the meaning of what was said, or I myself have failed to understand it" (Letter to St. Jerome, 1:3).
You can find countless other examples from the Fathers, as well as from the Protestant reformers to show that they held this belief in this essay:
Inerrancy and Church History: Is Inerrancy a Modern Invention?, by Jonathan Moorhead
So if indeed GD had never before read a single patristic or medieval writer who affirmed the inerrancy of Scripture, now that examples have been pointed out to him, will he bother to engage the evidence? Unfortunately, his approach to this discussion up until now does not inspire much hope that he will, but we shall see. If he does wish to deny that the Fathers believed in inerrancy, I would challenge him to provide examples of Fathers who actually asserted that what the Scriptures intended to convey was actually erroneous. I know that he cannot, not because I have read everything that every Father ever wrote, but because if such quotes could be found, I am sure people like GD would quote them ad nauseum.
Historical Critical Biblical Scholarship
GD seems to be under the impression that the Biblical scholarship that predominates modern western universities represents some empirical science, and if you question it, you are in the same anti-intellectual camp as members of the Flat Earth Society. This is hardly the case. Certainly, there are aspects of such scholarship that provide useful and valuable information, and there are aspects of it that are more empirical than others, but this scholarship does not come free from ideological agendas. In particular, the
German Biblical Scholarship that emerged after the religious wars following the Protestant Reformation had a consciously secularizing agenda. I talk about the ideological assumptions of such scholarship in
my essay on Sola Scriptura, but for more on why this is the case, I would refer the interested reader to two books on the subject:
Politicizing the Bible: The Roots of Historical Criticism and the Secularization of Scripture (1300 - 1700), by Scott W. Hahn and Benjamin Wiker (New York, NY: Herder & Herder Books, 2013)
and
The Death of Scripture and the Rise of Biblical Studies, by Michael C. Legaspi (Oxford University Press, 2010).
When
Rudolf Bultmann, for example, argued that Jesus was not only
not the Christ, but that he did not even believe himself to be the Christ, this was not a scientific conclusion that we are bound to accept unless we wish to be anti-intellectual and deny reality. This was the expression of Bultmann's
opinions, cloaked in scholarly bluster in order to make it sound scientific. His opinions were not based on any hard evidence or undeniable facts whatsoever. This is true of quite a bit of what passes for Biblical scholarship today.
Having said all of that, I would never suggest that Orthodox scholars or clergy should not be familiar with such scholarship. In fact, I think it is very important that they be familiar with it, but like the Methodist theologian
Thomas Oden, I would encourage them to apply the same hermeneutic of suspicion to that scholarship, which its practitioners so love to apply to Scripture. As Oden observes:
"Scripture criticism is more firmly captive today to its modern (naturalistic, narcissistic, individualistic) Zeitgeist than Augustinianism ever was to Platonism or Thomism to Aristotelianism. Trapped in modern prejudices against pre-modern forms of consciousness, reductionistic exegesis has proved to be just as prone to speculation as were the extremist forms of Gnosticism and as uncritical of its own presuppositions as supralapsarian Protestant scholasticism" (Agenda for Theology: After Modernity What? (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990) p. 111).
“We violate a primary ethical demand upon historical study if we impose upon a set of documents presuppositions congenial to us and then borrow from the canonical prestige of the documents by claiming that it corresponds with our favored predisposition. That lacks honesty. The modern attempt to study Christ has done this repeatedly. The text has often become a mirror of ideological interest: Kant’s Christ becomes a strained exposition of the categorical imperative; Hegel’s Christ looks like a shadow-image of the Hegelian dialectic. Schleiermacher’s Christ is a reflection of the awkward mating of pietism and romanticism; Strauss’s Christ is neatly weeded of all supernatural referents. Harnack’s portrait of Christ looks exactly like that of a late nineteenth-century German liberal idealist; and Tillich’s Christ is a dehistorical existential idea of being that participates in estrangement without being estranged…. The historical biblical critic was “not nearly so interested in being changed by his reading of the Bible, as in changing the way that the Bible was read in order to confirm it to the modern spirit”” (The Word of Life: Systematic Theology Volume Two, (New York: Harper & Row, 1989), p. 224f).
"Historical biblical criticism has been allied with polemical concerns since its eighteenth century inception as an ideological agent of "Enlightenment." It has expressed a determined interest from the beginning in discrediting not merely the authority of Scripture, but authority in general -- all authority as such. Just read the biographies of Reimarus, Rousseau, Lessing, Strauss, Feuerbach, and of course Nietzsche (cf. Jacques Derrida, The Ear of the Other). It has operated especially as a partisan "ideology for the demystification of religious tradition"... It is astutely described as the strike force of modernity, "the Wehrmacht of the liberal Church"... The hermeneutic of suspicion has been safely applied to the history of Jesus but not to the history of the historians. It is now time for the tables to turn. The hermeneutic of suspicion must be fairly and prudently applied to the critical movement itself... One obvious neglected arena is the social location of the quasi-Marxist critics of the social location of classic Christianity, who hold comfortable chairs in rutted, tenured tracks. These writers have focused upon the analysis of the social location of the writers and interpreters of Scripture. Yet that principle awaits now to be turned upon the social prejudices of the "knowledge elite" -- a guild of scholars asserting their interest in the privileged setting of the modern university" (Ibid., p. 225f).
Patristic Inerrancy
GD never offers any citations of anyone who actually asserts that the fathers of the Church were inerrant and always agreed. Again, we are expected to trust the accuracy of his caricature, but I for one do not. I have never read a single writer who has ever asserted such a thing. We certainly do believe that the Church itself is inerrant, and
St. Cyprian of Carthage (who was martyred in 258 a.d.) clearly taught this, as has the Church ever since. No individual father is inerrant, but the consensus of the Fathers is... and we find this consensus most clearly expressed in the decisions of the Ecumenical Councils.
Fr. George Florovsky observed:
"The teaching authority of the Ecumenical Councils is grounded in the infallibility of the Church. The ultimate "authority" is vested in the Church, which is forever the Pillar and the Foundation of Truth" (The Byzantine Fathers of the Fifth Century).
The Patriarchal Encyclical of 1895, which was written in response to a Papal encyclical by Pope Leo XIII, in which he called for the reunion of the Orthodox Church with the Roman Church, states:
"...having recourse to the fathers and the Ecumenical Councils of the Church of the first nine centuries, we are fully persuaded that the Bishop of Rome was never considered as the supreme authority and infallible head of the Church, and that every bishop is head and president of his own particular Church, subject only to the synodical ordinances and decisions of the Church universal as being alone infallible, the Bishop of Rome being in no wise excepted from this rule, as Church history shows."
And
St. Nicodemus of the Holy Mountain states, as he begins his famous commentary on the Ecumenical Canons:
"So every ecumenical council that possesses these characteristic features is in fact the Holy and Catholic Church itself in which in the Symbol of Faith (called the Creed in English) we profess to believe. ...being infallible and sinless. For the Church, which the Ecumenical Council takes the place of as its personal representative, is a pillar and framework of the truth, according to St. Paul (I Tim. 3:15); accordingly, whatever seems right to Ecumenical Councils seems right also to the Holy Spirit of Truth: for, it says, “He shall teach you all things and remind you of everything I have said unto you” (John 14:26)" (D. Cummings, trans., The Rudder of the Orthodox Catholic Church: The Compilation of the Holy Canons Saints Nicodemus and Agapius (West Brookfield, MA: The Orthodox Christian Educational Society, 1983), p. 157).
Canon 1 of the Seventh Ecumenical Council states, with regard to all the Ecumenical canons and decrees of the previous Councils (as well as those of local Councils and Fathers whom these Councils specifically affirmed, states:
"For those who have been allotted a sacerdotal dignity, the representations of canonical ordinances amount to testimonies and directions. Gladly accepting these, we sing to the Lord God with David, the spokesman of God, the following words: “I have delighted in the way of thy testimonies as much as in all wealth,” and “thy testimonies which thou hast commanded witness righteousness,… Thy testimonies are righteousness forever: give me understanding, and I shall live” (Ps. 119:14, 138 and 144). And if forever the prophetic voice commands us to keep the testimonies of God, and to live in them, it is plain that they remain unwavering and rigid. For Moses, too, the beholder of God, says so in the following words: “To them there is nothing to add, and from them there is nothing to remove” (Deut. 12:32). And the divine Apostle Peter, exulting in them, cries: “which things the angels would like to peep into” (I Pet. 1:12). And Paul says: “Though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you any gospel besides that which ye have received, let him be anathema” (Gal. 1:8). Seeing that these things are so and are attested to us, and rejoicing at them “as one that findeth great spoil” (Ps. 119:162), we welcome and embrace the divine Canons, and we corroborate the entire and rigid fiat of them that have been set forth by the renowned Apostles, who were and are trumpets of the Spirit, and those both of the six holy Ecumenical Councils and of the ones assembled regionally far the purpose of setting forth such edicts and of those of our holy Fathers. For all those men, having been guided by the light dawning out of the same Spirit, prescribed rules that are to our best interest. Accordingly, we too anathematize whomsoever they consign to anathema; and we too depose whomsoever they consign to deposition; and we too excommunicate whomsoever they consign to excommunication; and we likewise subject to a penance anyone whom they make liable to a penance. For “Let your conduct be free from avarice; being content with such things as are at hand” (Heb. 13:5), explicitly cries the divine apostle Paul, who ascended into the third heaven and heard unspeakable words (II Cor. 12:2-4)."
And St. Nicodemus of the Holy Mountain adds two comments in his notes to his commentary on this canon:
"Note here how respectable and reverend the divine Canons are. For this holy Council, by calling them “testimonies” and “justifications,” and the like, dignifies these very same divine Canons with those title and names with which the divinely inspired and holy Bible is dignified."
And
"That is why Photius, in Title I, ch. 2, says that the third ordinance of Title II of the Novels invests the Canons of the seven Councils and their dogmas with the same authoritativeness as the divine Scriptures." (Rudder, p. 428f).
Everyone I don't Agree with is a Fundamentalist
In the course of his lecture, GD somehow manages to link groups as diverse as the Protestant Fundamentalists (which include pacifist Seventh-Day Adventists) and ISIS; Dispensationalists (who tend to be more Zionistic than Jewish Zionists) and Greek and Russian Antisemites; American Protestant converts to Orthodoxy (who tend to not favor Orthodox ethnic xenophobia) and radical Greek and Russian nationalists; Protestant Restorationists (who believe that the Church ceased to exist for most of its history, and had to be recreated) and Orthodox Traditionalists (who believe the normative practices of the Church should remain unchanged, and needs little or no reform).
With at least as much justice, one could speak of modernists as a broad category, and lump GD into the same basket as French revolutionaries, Russian Bolsheviks, the Chinese Red Guard, sexual libertines, Unitarian-Universalists, the Living Church movement, the Masons, and the most extreme liberals found in mainline Protestant denominations. However, not only would that be unfair, it would also do very little to help anyone actually understand GD's actual positions. The same is also true of GD's "basket of deplorables."
But GD somehow connects all of the groups he lumps together as "Fundamentalists" because they all are reacting in someway to the process of secularization and globalization. By that logic, one would have to assume that there was some ideological connection between the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, the Kingdom of Ethiopia, the Kingdom of Greece, and both the Nationalist and Communist Chinese... because all of them responded to being attacked by fascists in World War II by resisting it vigorously. But obviously, there was no ideological connection at work here. What was at work was the very basic instinct of any nation to want to survive as an independent nation rather than to be subjugated by a foreign power.
Modernism and secularism are not neutral results of the march of progress, as GD seems to suggest. They represent ideological views that are generally at odds with traditional religious faith. People who adhere to traditional religious faiths (of any kind) are generally going to resist attempts from the outside to impose foreign beliefs upon them, which contradict their deeply held beliefs. And in fact it is only the cultural imperialism of such modernists and secularists that would lead them to assume that adherents of such faiths had some obligation to bow the knee to their foreign worldview. Such modernists actively are pushing for moral relativism, and it is not surprising that any religion with a strong moral code would resist being "assimilated."
Deliberately Combative
One of the defining characteristics of Fundamentalism, according to GD, is its "deliberately combative" style, and yet in the course of this lecture we see ample evidence that GD deliberately adopts a combative style himself. For example, to explain his use of the term 'Fundamentalist" he mentioned that at a recent conference on Tradition, Secularization, and Fundamentalism at Fordham University, they had 14 international speakers, about 100 people in attendance, and said: "I think it's fair to say that no one in the room really agreed whether or not "fundamentalism" is an appropriate term... right? Because it is such a loaded term... right? And I acknowledge that it is a very very loaded term, and when I first wrote the blog I did it deliberately to be provocative... right? It worked... right?" and then he laughed. One has to wonder why he continues to be deliberately provocative, rather than attempt to engage in a constructive discussion on the many disparate issues he raises. For example, if he condemns Antisemitism, he would find me agreeing with him wholeheartedly.
I've preached sermons on the subject before, and I think it is important to be clearly opposed to it. If he could find someone who actually opposes rational thought or theological education in the Orthodox Church, I would agree with him that they are wrong on those points too. However, when he lumps those people in with those who take issue with ecumenism, or theological and liturgical renovationism, he is not trying to engage in rational discussion -- he is simply engaging in name calling in order to avoid engaging in an actual rational discussion.
Anti-Intellectualism
One of the more novel claims GD made was that
Vladimir Lossky,
Fr. George Florovsky,
Christos Yannaras,
Fr. John Meyendorff,
Fr. John Romanides, and
Metropolitan Hierotheos (Vlachos), all got it wrong on the differences between Orthodox spirituality and western spirituality. To make this claim, he confuses and conflates a number issues. He attempts to refute the contrast that these theologians made between the post schismatic west (which is obvious) by saying that there were no such differences during the patristic period... which would be pre-schism, and so obviously a very different matter. He also repeatedly conflates rationalism with rational thought, and so suggests that those who oppose rationalism are opposed to rational thought, and are thus anti-intellectual. Perhaps he was not reading his lecture notes properly when he made such statements, but the error is too obvious to waste time refuting. He also suggests that Metropolitan Hierotheos (Vlachos) somehow opposes "employing rational means," "critical thinking,"and "drawing upon non-Orthodox sources to make theological arguments." I'm pretty sure Metropolitan Hierotheos is not opposed to any of those things. But as is usually the case, we are left with bare assertions, and are presented with no actual evidence that what he claims is in fact true, nor with arguments that engage the person he is making these assertions about.
Restorationism
GD suggests that converts to Orthodoxy are prone to "embrace a restorationist approach to the Church. By "Restorationist" I mean an attempt to construct and pursue an imagined Orthodox past experience which never actually existed." His comments on this issue were based, I suspect, either on Fr. Oliver Herbel's recent book "
Turning to Tradition: Converts and the Making of an American Orthodox Church" or perhaps on him having heard a lecture by Fr. Oliver on that same topic. However, I think he takes this idea much further than Fr. Oliver does in his book.
For one thing, I don't think GD understands what Restorationism really is, or realizes that it is a very particular strain of Protestantism, and that not all Protestant come from such a background.
Among Protestants, there are broadly speaking two views of Church history. There are those that believe that they are a reformation of the Catholic Church... which they see as having been the visible Church, but which fell into a state that needed reform -- in this group, you would find the Lutherans, the Reformed Churches, the Anglicans, and those historically connected with Methodism. None of these groups could be described as "Restorationists." You often (at least historically speaking) find in such groups a clear sense that the Roman Catholic Church became an apostate Church, but this was because it was that part of the Church which refused to be reformed, as they thought it should be. So they see themselves in continuity with the same Church that St. Augustine and St. Athanasius the Great belonged to. Theologians from such groups frequently quote the Fathers as having important ideas that they wholeheartedly affirm.
Then there are those who either believe that they descend from a hidden and long persecuted remnant of the early Church (such as Anabaptist and Baptist groups -- see for example the book "
The Trail of Blood" for a classic expression of this view), and then there are those that believe that the Church actually ceased to exist, but was brought back into being by their group (such as the various Church of Christ denominations, the Mormons, the Jehovah's Witnesses, etc). Some would include both of these groups under the label of "Restorationists," but it is really only the second group that are truly "Restorationists" in the proper sense of the term. Such groups find little to no value in the Church Fathers, and would generally consider them to be apostates, though many of these groups are Trinitarian.
It is true that Protestants who come from a Restorationist background may well be drawn to Orthodoxy because they sense they have otherwise been disappointed by Restorationism, and Fr. Oliver Herbel makes a good case that this is what motivated the
Evangelical Orthodox Church to eventually convert to Orthodoxy and become the
Antiochian Evangelical Orthodox Mission. However, this is not what would motivate someone who converted from Episcopalianism, Presbyterianism, Lutheranism, or the Methodist movement.
Speaking from my own experience, I had an appreciation for Tradition before I had any real idea of what the Orthodox Church was, or had any thoughts of converting to it, because I came from a denomination that
explicitly affirmed that Tradition had a role in theology, and which saw itself as being connected with the rest of Church history, rather than as a restoration of the Early Church, which had disappeared because of a complete apostasy. For me, it was because of this appreciation of Tradition that I eventually went looking to the early Church Fathers for answers to questions, and in the process of doing so, came to the conclusion that the denomination I was born into was not in fact in continuity with the Church of the Fathers I was reading. In particular, when I read the epistles of
St. Ignatius of Antioch (who was a disciple of the Apostle John), I became convinced that I did not belong to the same Church that he did, but wanted to. Had I lived a hundred years earlier, I quite likely would have become an Anglo-Catholic, and been satisfied with that, but the Anglican Church of the late 1980's did not strike me as being any closer to St. Ignatius' Church than the one I was in.
The problem with the suggestion that converts are approaching Orthodoxy in a "restorationist" manner is that such people would not be embracing the received Tradition of the Church, but would rather be seeking to reconstruct the Church into something else altogether. The irony here is that it is actually Orthodox Modernists that are trying to do that. They tell us we should not have an iconostasis, or at least not close the curtains or the doors, because they say such things did not exist in the Early Church. They argue that we should do the secret prayers aloud, because even though the Church has done them secretly as far back as any surviving service books would indicate, they tell us that such prayers were not said secretly in the Early Church. We should have deaconesses again, because they had them in the Early Church. We should have married bishops, because they had them in the Early Church. We should have baptismal liturgies, and weddings done in the Liturgy, because, they tell us this is how they were done in the Early Church. It is the Modernists who are the Restorationists in the Orthodox Church, not the conservatives -- converts or cradle.
When a Protestant converts to the Orthodox Church, he has taken just about as opposite a course from that of Restorationism as is possible.
Toll Houses
In conspiracy theory fashion, GD, goes on to try to connect all of his other asserted Fundamentalist traits with the
Toll Houses. However, after first asserting that "It seems that a few Russian monks decided that it was a good idea to scare the peasants, and so they invented the teaching on the toll houses," he went on to say that "there is evidence in our
teaching for this tradition, I don't mean to say that there isn't. There is." He hastens to add that it was "a minor, and somewhat suspect teaching" found in "some Byzantine texts." However, it is obvious that if this is a part of our teaching and if it is found in Byzantine texts, it is hardly possible that Russians monks invented the idea to scare the peasants.
What's more to the point is that there is nothing about affirming a Tradition that GD concedes is part of our teaching that makes someone a Fundamentalist. Fr. Thomas Hopko was hardly a Fundamentalist, and yet he stated that this tradition is found in virtually every Father of the Church (see
The Illumined Heart: Toll Houses: After Death Reality or Heresy?, September 30, 2007:
http://audio.ancientfaith.com/illuminedheart/hopko_tolls.mp3). He interpreted them in a mostly allegorical way, though he believed that they did indicate that demons attack the soul at the time of death, and that at the point of death a person has to answer for his life. Whether his interpretation is more accurate than Fr. Seraphim (Rose)'s or not is really not that important to me. I think both opinions are within the bounds of acceptable opinions on the matter. However, the often vitriolic dismissal of a verbal image that is found in the Fathers and in the Services of the Church, that we often encounter in our times, reflects an unhealthy attitude towards the Tradition of the Church.
In short, GD's primary objection to the Toll Houses is that they are not fundamental to our Faith. Perhaps he should come up with a list of what he considers to be fundamental beliefs... maybe including the virgin birth, the death and bodily Resurrection of Christ, and maybe a couple of other points that he believes to be fundamental. But he should recognize that he is the one being a reductionist Fundamentalist here.
Black and White
At one point in the lecture, someone in the audience asked if GD considered Fr. Seraphim (Rose) to be a Fundamentalist. He answered, without any sense of irony:
"Seraphim (Rose)? Absolutely! Anyone who wants to say that things are black and white is either willfully ignorant,or is lying... right? It's one or the other, because you simply cannot read Orthodox Christian history and think that it's always black and white."
That seems an awfully black and white perspective. Once again, it is obvious that GD has read a lot more about Fr. Seraphim (Rose) than he has bothered read that was actually written by him. Fr. Seraphim (Rose) does not fit the bill of GD's definition of an Orthodox Fundamentalist. He did not see everything as black and white. He criticized extremists. He wrote
an essay on why we should call non-Orthodox Christians "Christians," and be cautious about using the word "Heretic" for people who have never been in the Church. He was highly educated, and encouraged education. One can disagree with him on some points, as I do myself, but he was not the caricature that GD would have us believe.
Ironically, when asked why people embrace those who see everything as "black and white" he answered that it was because it was "easy." But that is the problem with GD's entire lecture. He never acknowledges any nuances among those he attacks. He never concedes that their criticisms have any merit. It is all black and white. He has opted for easy, lazy responses.
Also, if one looks at
GD's Twitter feed, you will see that there are a great many issues that he sees as black and white.
Opposition to Ecumenism
GD's sweepingly asserts that opposition to Ecumenism is by definition Fundamentalism. To see if this is so, let's first ask a question that GD never bothers to address: what do we mean by Ecumenism? Ecumenism is the belief that the Orthodox Church is not itself the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, but that the Church exists in separated branches that are somehow spiritually united (which is the Protestant notion of the invisible Church), and needs to be united together for the Church to be fully one. In its most extreme form, Ecumenism even goes beyond the Christian world, and promotes religious
syncretism as an ultimate goal. The problem with those who promote Ecumenism is found in their use of the very word "Ecumenical." In the Orthodox Church, the word "Ecumenical" has a very particular meaning, and when we speak of an Ecumenical Council, we do not mean a council in which the Orthodox and all the various heretical and schismatic groups send representatives, and sing
kumbaya. At Ecumenical Councils, quite the opposite happened. The Orthodox met together to reject heretical and schismatic groups who refused to be united with it in a common confession of Faith, and in a unity of communion.
Did the Fathers speak with those who were in error in an attempt to correct and reconcile them? Yes, of course. Did they ever have pan-religious prayers for peace, or have endless hobnobbing cessions with the various heretical groups of their times, and then do "Ecumenical Doxologies" with them? No.
The canons clearly condemn praying with heretics or schismatics, and this is precisely because engaging in such joint prayers suggests a unity of faith that does not actually exist.
GD at various points suggests that those promoting Ecumenism are following the Tradition of the Church more closely than those who oppose them, and he speaks of them as "engaging in cautious but hopeful Ecumenical encounter." But here he completely ignores some of the most outrageous Ecumenical abuses we have seen in the past few decades, which included, for example, Orthodox bishops participating in liturgical processions that could only be described as heretical and pan-religious circuses. And if he believes that the Fathers engaged in such things, he is promoting an imagined history that never actually happened.
You can watch hours of such events in videos posted here:
I would recommend going to the bottom of that page, and watching the documentaries that are posted, starting with the oldest first. These videos were produced by
Greek Old Calendarists, but the footage they contain is real, and it is shameful. There are countless examples of ecumenical and pan-religious dog and pony shows in which you see Orthodox bishops playing prominent roles.
Fortunately, some of the worst abuses, particularly at the
World Council of Churches (WCC) have stopped, because the widespread distribution of the footage of such ecumenical atrocities resulted in a backlash from the faithful that forced their bishops to put a stop to such things. After the reforms of the WCC that were pushed especially by the Russian Orthodox Church, there are now no longer pan-religious services, or "inter-confessional" services done at WCC assemblies, and the WCC can no longer issue any statements that are not agreed to by every group represented (which gives the Orthodox an effective veto over anything that they might say that would be objectionable). This has rendered Orthodox participation in the WCC relatively harmless, but I would suggest that one has to wonder what good our continued participation in it has brought about, and those who believe we should completely withdraw from the WCC have arguments that are worthy of consideration. The various heterodox groups that are in the WCC are certainly no closer to us today than they were when our participation first began. In fact, it is obvious that they are drifting further away from us with each passing year. However, the Ecumenical Patriarchate continues to push the boundaries by participating in interfaith prayer services in other context. It is not unreasonable to ask what the goal is with such things, and also what good fruit has come from it? It has only confused the faithful and confused the heterodox about what we really believe.
It is undeniable that there have been gross abuses in the history of Orthodox participation in the Ecumenical movement, both in terms of actions and statements. I would agree that some take extremist positions in response to such things, and that they should be criticized. However, those who are responsible for these abuses will have to answer for the scandal they have caused in the Church, and for causing such temptations in the first place.
However, as far as GD is concerned, there is no difference between the extremists and those who are moderate in their opposition to Ecumenism. Nor has he conceded that they have any legitimate points, because GD prefers to take the easy way, and see it all as black and white, without any nuance.
From some of GD's statements, it sounds as if he believes that Roman Catholics and Protestants are somehow part of the Church, and so it sounds like he too holds to a branch-theory of the Church.
"We do not have a single shred of evidence from the entire Byzantine period that a synod of Orthodox bishops ever declared that western Christians did not belong to the Church, or that they should be baptized before they were restored to communion with Orthodoxy. The most famous canon lawyers of the 12th and 13th centuries maintained that Latin Christians only needed to offer a confession of Faith."
What does he mean to suggest here? Even when the Church receives someone by confession of Faith, they are receiving them into the Church. You don't receive someone into the Church who is already in it.
Baptism in the Name of the Trinity
GD argues that the insistence of anti-ecumenists that all converts from Roman Catholicism and Protestantism be received into the Orthodox Church by baptism is proof of their rejection of a real historic view of the Church and its Tradition.
For one thing, GD fails to note that not all those opposed to Ecumenism would take the same position. While it is the norm to baptize all converts in ROCOR, with the blessing of my bishop I have received several Roman Catholics, Traditionalist Anglicans, and Presbyterians by chrismation. So again there is nuance where GD sees everything as black and white. However, if you actually
read the service used to receive such groups into the Church, the text makes it very clear that they were not in the Church, but are being received into it.
But as the ultimate proof of the error of those who say that Roman Catholics should be baptized when they convert to Orthodoxy, GD points out that Arians, who "did not baptize in the name of the Trinity" were received by confession of Faith and not baptism. The problem with this argument is that we do not baptize with the words "in the name of the Trinity..." We baptize "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." The Arians baptized in precisely the same way. Even Jehovah's Witnesses today do the same. At the time of the Arian controversy, there were many local Churches that moved back and forth between communion with Arians and the Orthodox. It was a fluid situation. But this fluidity was possible in part because in terms of practical piety (how worship was conducted, how the sacraments were administered), there were not big differences. There is no reason that I am aware of to believe that the Arians baptized people in any way different than the Orthodox did. The difference was in what they believed about who the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were... not what they said and did when they baptized someone. In fact, Arian baptism was undoubtedly far closer to Orthodox baptism than you find in Roman Catholicism today or among the Protestants. Under the circumstances of the time, receiving people who had been baptized by Arian clergy made complete pastoral and practical sense.
The objection that people who argue that all Protestants and Roman Catholics should be baptized have, is not that it is impossible to receive people by economia who were baptized by a triple immersion outside of the Church. Their objection is that the form of baptism that is commonly practiced among such groups is not triple immersion baptism.
Being baptized by triple immersion (or pouring, in cases of necessity) in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is the canonical standard of a baptism that is valid in outward form. Canon 7 of the Second Ecumenical Council lists various groups that would either be received by confession of faith, or by chrismation, but specifically mentions that the Eunomians "who are baptized with a single immersion" are to be received by baptism. And most Protestants are baptized today by a single immersion, and often they are baptized with non-standard verbage, such as "in the name of Jesus."
The historic practice of the Russian Church has been to receive Roman Catholics, Reformed (Episcopalians, Presbyterians), and Lutherans by
economia. Since the 70's, the practice of the Russian Church Outside of Russia has been to baptize all converts as a rule, unless the bishop gives a specific blessing to receive someone by economia.
Another question we should consider is how does the Church view the baptisms of those outside of the Church? True baptism unites one to the Church, and obviously, those who are baptized outside of the Church are not united to the Church by their baptism.
We pass no judgment on the souls of those outside of the Church, and leave that question in the hands of God, but we can say that at least in this life, they remain outside of the Church until and unless they are received into the Orthodox Church.
In the early Church there was a dispute about whether converts who had been baptized by heretics or schismatics should be baptized or not.
St. Cyprian of Carthage took the position that they should, and he presided over a council in Carthage that declared there is no true baptism outside of the Church. And this canon was affirmed by the Sixth Ecumenical Council in its second canon. However, that same canon also affirmed the canons of
St. Basil, and his first canon, provides a bit more nuance. He agreed that the Church is under no obligation to recognize baptisms that take place outside of the Church, but states that for the sake of "
economia" the Church may do so, though he also noted that in different regions, different practices prevailed when it came to how certain heretics or schismatics were received.
So what happens when the Church accepts a baptism that was done outside of the Church, by economia?
St. Augustine compared baptism to the "military mark" which was
a tattoo a soldier was given when he entered the Roman Army, and it showed what commander he belonged to. St. Augustine said that such a mark could be retained by deserters (schismatics), and it could illicitly be given to those who had never been in the army, and yet unless and until such men actually joined (or rejoined) the army, those marks did not have the real significance that they should have... however if they did rejoin or join the army, the mark would not need to be redone. And so what happens when someone is received by economia is they are finally united to the Church, and their baptism is then given the real meaning of what true baptism is.
So the key question here is whether or not the outward form of baptism of a particular convert is acceptable or not. Particularly in our times, this is an increasingly difficult question, because even what were once "mainstream" denominations have people doing all kinds of crazy things these days, such as baptizing people "in the name of the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Sustainer.." And so simply confirming that someone was baptized as a Lutheran or even a Roman Catholic is no longer any guarantee of how they were actually baptized.
While one might disagree with how far some people take this issue, to deny that they at least have some reasonable concerns is to deny the Tradition of the Church on the matter.
For more on this subject, see:
http://orthodoxinfo.com/ecumenism/ea_baptism.aspx
Moral Relativism
I would like to conclude this response by getting down to what I think is at least in large part the elephant in the room that is behind much of what GD is arguing,
** but which he does not come out and say -- and that is the question of Christian morality, moral relativism, and homosexuality in particular. GD says that those he considers to be Fundamentalists believe that the Church is under siege by modernism and secularism, but that he does not believe that these are serious threats -- certainly no more serious than problems the Church has faced at any other time. However, one of the manifestations of secularism we see in high gear today, is the push against any Traditional morality. Is this really an imaginary threat to the Orthodox piety? If you look at
a Pew survey which compared the beliefs of various Christian groups, those identifying as Orthodox have some of the worst percentages on moral issues of any of the groups listed. This shows that secularization has had a very negative effect already on the Church in America, and we would be foolish to not see it as a serious threat.
St. Paul made it very clear that there are some moral issues that really are black and white:
"Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals (malakoi), nor sodomites (arsenokoitai), nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God (1 Corinthians 6:9-11).
We have many voices in the Church today who deny that homosexual sex is inherently sinful. They claim it is no more serious a sin than any other, if they do not flat out deny that it is a sin at all -- as very many of them do. Not too long ago we had the case of Gregory Pappas of
the Pappas Post who
publicly complained that a Greek Orthodox priest refused to commune him, because he was an active homosexual. In his complaint, there is no suggestion that he is struggling against this sin, only justification of his sin -- and in fact, a clear denial that it really is a sin. But the saddest part of this story is that, according to him, Metropolitan Savas of Pittsburgh told him that while the priest was "technically within his canonical rights" to deny him communion, he would commune him, and that other priests had likewise offered to commune him. He likewise tossed the word "Fundamentalist" around quite a bit too, suggesting that it was Fundamentalism that was behind telling an active homosexual that he could not receive communion.
Gregory Pappas is a victim of pastoral malpractice -- not because he was denied communion for refusing to repent of a serious sin -- but because he has been given the false impression that he does not need to repent of that sin, because it is not a sin. One cannot repent of a sin that they do not believe to be such. This is a complete departure from the Tradition of the Church, and if anyone thinks that there was a time when the saints of the Church would have put up with the suggestion that one could be an Orthodox Christian in good standing and also live in an active homosexual relationship, they are positing an imaginary history that never actually happened.
My questions for George Demacopoulos are:
1. Do you believe that it is inherently sinful for a man to have sex with another man?
2. Is a priest a Fundamentalist if he denies communion to a man who is having sex with another man, and doesn't believe he needs to repent of it?
3. Is it issues like this that are behind the push for "post-patristic theology," because only when we are ready to "move beyond the Fathers" can such things be "reinterpreted" in such a way as to satisfy the spirit of the age?
I am old enough to remember when pretty much every Christian group agreed that
homosexuality was a sin, because it says so in the Bible. This was not in some imagined Fundamentalist past that never really was, this was not all that long ago.
*The English translation omitted the concluding sentence of the original Russian text, probably because it repeated an earlier footnote. You can see a Google translation of the original Russian Text by
clicking here.
**I say this based on conversations with past students of GD at Fordham University.
