Cyril Lukaris and the Confession of Dositheus

Patriarch Cyril Lukaris

Jason Wallace of the Ancient Paths YouTube channel has produced two videos attacking Orthodoxy. The first was "The Failure of Eastern Orthodoxy," and the second was "Cyril Lucaris: Calvinist Patriarch/Orthodox Saint." Craig Truglia and I did two video responses, which you can view here:

 

More recently, Jason Wallace appeared on "The Dividing Line," with James White, and discussed his videos, but focused on the question of Cyril Lukaris, on an episode entitled "Let’s Make Cyril Lucaris Great Again!" 

This latest video doesn't warrant another lengthy video rebuttal, but there were a number of erroneous things asserted that should be corrected.

To sum up his argument, he claims that Cyril Lukaris was in fact a Calvinist, and that the Orthodox tried to cover up this fact because supposedly this would call into question our understanding of Apostolic Succession, he asserts that the Orthodox Church has affirmed that the Council of Jerusalem and the Confession of Dositheus are on the same level as the Seven Ecumenical Councils and Scripture, and that the Orthodox Church has recognized Cyril Lukaris as a saint, despite the fact that he was a Calvinist, and thus a heretic from an Orthodox perspective. All of this, he claims, proves that the Orthodox Church has contradicted itself and is therefore not infallible, as it claims.

Was Cyril Lukaris a Calvinist?

In Jason Wallace's interview with James White, he claimed that I had asserted that the Confession of Cyril Lukaris was a forgery, but the clip he refers to clearly shows that I said "There is an argument to be made that his confession was a forgery, or that it was altered." I put it this way precisely because the arguments I had read were clearly not proof that this was this case, but they seemed reasonable to me at the time. But I would still say that there is an argument to be made to that effect. Jason Wallace's video does present a strong case that this is not true. The bottom line is that it doesn't really matter that much. Heretical occupants of the patriarchal throne of Constantinople are no novelty in the history of the Church.

The historical context here is very complicated, and there was a lot intrigue going on. The Church of Constantinople was under the thumb of the Turks, and so outside powers, both Protestant and Catholic, were able to manipulate Sultans who were more than happy to remove a Patriarch so that they could extract money from whoever wanted him replaced, and so that is why Cyril was removed five times from that position. In that context, lots of people presented one face to one group, and a different one to another. Cyril may well have been such a person.

Stephanie Falkowski, in her dissertation "Not Quite Calvinist: Cyril Lucaris a Reconsideration of His Life and Beliefs," makes the case that Cyril was not as much of a Calvinist as has been generally claimed, but that he was trying to get help from Calvinists, and so tried to sound like as much of a Calvinist as he could, though he often used ambiguous language to accomplish that purpose. I won't take the time to lay out the case that she does, but would recommend those interested give her dissertation a read.

If Cyril Lukaris was In Fact a Calvinist, Would This Disprove Apostolic Succession?

Most of those who have been labelled as heresiarchs (the founder of a heresy or the leader of a heretical sect) have in fact been bishops, and several were Patriarchs of Constantinople. We do not hide this fact. On the Sunday of Orthodoxy, bishops recite the Synodikon of Orthodoxy, and pronounce anathemas on the most prominent of these heretics. So if Cyril Lukaris was a Calvinist, this would be not be an anomaly in Church history.

Wallace asserts that the reason why Orthodox people, going back to the time of the Council in Jerusalem in 1672, have argued that Cyril Lukaris was not a Calvinist because (he mistakenly believes) this would prove Orthodoxy to be false, but even if we assume Cyril was a full blown Calvinist, the reason why the Council of Jerusalem may have argued otherwise is simply because this was not the face he showed to his flock, and so many had positive memories of him. One of the reasons why he would have sought out specifically Protestant allies is that he had spent much of his ministry battling Jesuits who were promoting Uniatism in Ukraine, which was obviously something the Orthodox would have seen as a very laudable part of his history.  

Wallace noted that the Council of Jerusalem cited sermons of Cyril Lukaris without providing the dates these sermons were delivered, as if this was an intentional way of clouding the facts. Modern footnotes are relatively recent things. They certainly are often helpful, but the fact that the council didn't provide modern footnotes doesn't prove anything, other than that they were not accustomed to later conventions. It may also be that the texts of these sermons simply were not dated. The fact that this Council argued that his Confession was either forged or altered was not necessarily because they knew this was false. There was a lot of confusion that reigned during this time, and so there are good reasons why they probably believed this to be the case, even if, in fact, this was not true.

Did the Orthodox Church Recognize Cyril Lukaris as a Saint?

Jason Wallace seems to think that the fact that the local Church of Alexandria glorified Cyril Lukaris as a saint means that, if he in fact was a Calvinist, the Orthodox Church would be guilty of error, and it its infallibility would be thus disproven. The problem is that the decisions of one local Church have never been considered to be necessarily infallible. The only way the decisions of a local Council to glorify a saint could be claimed to be approved by the whole Church, would be either for the whole Church to affirm that decision in an Ecumenical Council (and that would entail a Council both claiming to be Ecumenical, and that Council being received by all the local Churches as Ecumenical); or he would need to be officially recognized by all of the local Orthodox Church as a saint. Neither of these things have happened.

I have seen references to the Patriarchate of Constantinople recognizing Cyril Lukaris as a saint in 2022, but I have been unable to find anything that actually demonstrates that this happened. But even if it did, that would still be only two local Churches, and there is no guarantee that such a decision would be infallible. The Orthodox Church has never claimed that it was impossible for a local Orthodox Church to fall into error. This is also no novelty in the history of the Church.

Is the Council of Jerusalem of 1672 an Ecumenical Council?

Jason Wallace stated that the conciliar work of the Orthodox Church continued uninterrupted in history through the later councils of universal authority, but there have been no Ecumenical Councils outside of the Seven Ecumenical Councils, that both claimed to be Ecumenical and have been universally received in the Orthodox Church to be such. One does find references to the Eighth and to the Ninth Ecumenical Councils, and they would certainly be the best candidates to be labeled such, but while these councils have been universally received as authoritative, they have not been universally received as being on the same level as the Seven Ecumenical Councils.

The Council of Jerusalem is considered to be of some authority, but it's decrees were in fact not seen to be infallible, as is shown by the fact that another Council in 1723 made corrections to the Confession of Dositheus (see the Epistle of the Patriarchs of the Eastern Catholic Church on the Orthodox Faith (1723). These corrections were reflected in the Russian text of the Confession of Dositheus which was published by St. Philaret of Moscow.

One of the things Jason Wallace highlighted as objectionable in the Confession of Dositheus was what is said in Question 1 of the Confession:

"Question 1

Should the Divine Scriptures be read in the vulgar tongue [common language] by all Christians?

No. Because all Scripture is divinely-inspired and profitable {cf. 2 Timothy 3:16}, we know, and necessarily so, that without [Scripture] it is impossible to be Orthodox at all. Nevertheless they should not be read by all, but only by those who with fitting research have inquired into the deep things of the Spirit, and who know in what manner the Divine Scriptures ought to be searched, and taught, and finally read. But to those who are not so disciplined, or who cannot distinguish, or who understand only literally, or in any other way contrary to Orthodoxy what is contained in the Scriptures, the Catholic Church, knowing by experience the damage that can cause, forbids them to read [Scripture]. Indeed, it is permitted to every Orthodox to hear the Scriptures, that he may believe with the heart unto righteousness, and confess with the mouth unto salvation {Romans 10:10}. But to read some parts of the Scriptures, and especially of the Old [Testament], is forbidden for these and other similar reasons. For it is the same thing to prohibit undisciplined persons from reading all the Sacred Scriptures, as to require infants to abstain from strong meats."

This statement was in the context of the Greek speaking Church, at a time when the Turks suppressed the education of Christians. Cyril Lukaris had published a translation of the New Testament into modern Greek, and this translation was objected to by many. Protestants have many people who still object to updating the King James Version, but these bishops were not objecting to replacing an older translation of the New Testament with a new one -- they were objecting replacing the inspired original text of the Greek New Testament with a modern translation. Greek Orthodox Christians continue to use the original text of the Greek New Testament to this day. It does require some effort for a modern Greek to be able to fully understand it, but I used to have a Greek auto mechanic who had a copy of the Orthodox Bible in Greek, which consisted of the Septuagint text for the Old Testament and the Greek New Testament, which he read regularly. When I admired his copy, he gave it to me, and it is well worn. While one might ridicule people who insist on exclusively reading a 400 year old English translation of the Bible, it should be understandable why Greeks would want to maintain the use of the inspired original Greek text. 

Nevertheless, other bishops did object to the way this question was answered in the Confession of Dositheus, and so it was corrected in 1723 to read:

Question 1. – Should all Christians read the Holy Scriptures?

Answer. We know that all Scripture is God-inspired and beneficial, and so necessary that without it it is absolutely impossible to be pious; but not all are able to read it, but only those who know how to test the Scriptures, to study them, and to understand them correctly. Thus, every pious person is allowed to hear the Scriptures, in order to believe in the truth with his heart and confess with his lips unto salvation, but not everyone is allowed to read certain parts of the Scriptures, especially the Old Testament, without guidance. To indiscriminately allow the unskilled to read the Holy Scriptures is the same as to offer infants the use of strong food.

This is the wording reflected in the text of the Confession published by St. Philaret of Moscow. And, you will note that the beginning word "No" has been removed. And as a matter of fact, St. Philaret of Moscow oversaw the publication of the Russian Synodal translation of the Bible, and encouraged people to read it, especially the New Testament. This translation is still used by many Russian speaking Protestants, by the way. When this text speaks of guidance being necessary for the Old Testament, Protestants who constantly published study Bibles for that same purpose should hardly find that objectionable. Providing such guidance has long been one of the primary focuses of catechetical instruction provided to young Orthodox laymen, as one could see by looking at texts, such as "The Law of God: For Study at Home and School," by Fr. Seraphim Slobodskoy, which is 651 pages in length in the English translation, and close to half of that text is about the content of the Bible, and about half of that is focused on the Old Testament (as can be seen online, here).

Wallace argues that the Orthodox Church declared the Council of Jerusalem to be an Ecumenical Council at the Council of Crete in 2016, having "universal authority, just like the Ecumenical Councils," this is incorrect. For one thing, the Churches of Antioch, Georgia, Bulgaria, and Russia did not attend this council, and so far more than half of Orthodox world was not represented -- contrary to Wallace's assertion that "You had Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, Constantinople, and Moscow, Bulgarians... basically everyone represented." Secondly, even if you look at the Encyclical which Wallace assumes to have referenced the Council of Jerusalem, it actually refers to a council held in Constantinople in 1672, which was held prior to the Council of Jerusalem:

"...and furthermore through the Holy and Great Councils convened in Constantinople, in 1484 to refute the unionist Council of Florence (1438-1439), in 1638, 1642, 1672 and 1691 to refute Protestant beliefs, and in 1872 to condemn ethno-phyletism as an ecclesiological heresy" [Emphasis added].

All of the councils referenced here were held in Constantinople. And while it does cite these councils as being part of the ongoing conciliar work of the Church, it does not actually assert that they are on the same level as the Seven Ecumenical Councils, contrary to Wallace's claim.

Archbishop Vasily (Krivoshein), in his "Symbolic Texts in the Orthodox Church," points out that the Council in 1672 held in Constantinople was attended by 40 bishops, and produced a statement against Calvinism. Later, in that same year, Patriarch Dositheus of Jerusalem, who had participated in that council took advantage of a gathering of clergy and laity for festivities held at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, and presented his Confession. Only 8 bishops were present and signed this document, and so to even speak of a "Council of Jerusalem" is a debatable point, but it was hardly on the same level as an Ecumenical Council, and as stated, was later corrected by a subsequent council, and so while the corrected Confession of Dositheus is a document of some authority, neither that council nor this document was ever seen as an infallible.

Jaroslav Pelikan, who was a preeminent scholar on the history of Christian doctrine (who was a Lutheran most of his life, but converted to Orthodoxy in 1998) discusses in some detail the status of texts like the Confession of Dositheus in his book "Credo: Historical and Theological Guide to Creeds and Confessions of Faith in the Christian Tradition," which has a chapter on the Orthodox Church (which includes a telling subsection entitled "The Ambivalence of the Orthodox Church Toward "Symbolic Books"). Toward the end of that chapter, Pelikan sums things up as follows: 

"Drawing upon this liturgical confession of the faith of the church and shaping it in turn, the doctrinal decisions and formulations of the seven church councils between 325 and 787 stand as the formal deposit of normative dogma for Eastern Orthodox teaching. "The West incessantly asks us for the symbolical books of Orthodoxy," the Bulgarian Orthodox New Testament scholar Nikolaj Nikaronovic Glubokovsky once observed with some annoyance. "We have no need of them. The faith of the seven first councils is sufficient for us." In one sense, therefore, the sacred tradition of the seven ecumenical councils... is a legacy that Eastern Orthodoxy shares with Roman Catholicism, as well as with those other Western confessions in which the validity of the ecumenical councils is acknowledged, albeit with varying degrees of authority being assigned to them. 

In another sense, however, the Eastern Orthodox view of the councils is peculiar to the East. One reason for this is that no later actions of any church, neither those actions that lay claim to the title "ecumenical" in Western dogmatics and canon law nor even the actions of the East itself since 787 at "provincial synods" nor the Eastern Orthodox "confessions" may be ranked on a level with the seven councils" (Credo: Historical and Theological Guide to Creeds and Confessions of Faith in the Christian Tradition (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2003), p. 413f). 

Only God knows the future. The day may come when a new Ecumenical Council is held and is received as being on the same level as the first seven, but that day has not come yet. The Church managed for nearly three centuries without an Ecumenical Council, and so having had Seven, the urgency for another is not as great as many would like to imagine.

Do the Orthodox See the Services of the Church as Being on the Same Level as Scripture?

Another claim Wallace makes is that we see the services as being on the same level as the Scriptures, and cites as an example an Akathist to St. Constantine the Great which states that St. Constantine was baptized by St. Sylvester of Rome, despite the fact that Eusebius and other contemporary writers stated that he was baptized by Eusebius of Nicomedia, who was later condemned as an Arian. He claims that this is an example of the Orthodox Church trying to re-write history to cover up uncomfortable facts.

First off, it is the Orthodox Church that preserved texts, like Eusebius' History of the Church, and so obviously the Church is not engaged in any cover up there. Secondly, the fact that a bishop who was in good standing with the Church at the time later was condemned as a heretic does not mean that those who were baptized by him were heretics, or that the baptism was invalid.

I am not sure where Wallace got the impression that we put the services of the Church on the same level as Scripture, but we do see universally received services as being part of the Tradition of the Church, as are the Scriptures. However, not all parts of the Tradition of the Church are on the same level of authority, nor would we affirm that everything that is true of the Scriptures is equally true of the services. Even within Scripture, not all the Scriptures are on the same level. The book of Esther, for example, is not on the same level of authority as the Gospels -- though we would affirm that all Scripture is inspired and inerrant. 

When it comes to the services, not all services are on the same level of authority. Akathists, aside from the Akathist to the Mother of God, are not appointed to be served in the regular services of the Church. They are a popular genre, because they are easy for laymen to use on their own. However, most of them have not been endorsed by even a single local Orthodox Church, much less the entire Church. The texts of the liturgies of St. John Chrysostom, St. Basil the Great, and the Presanctified Liturgy are certain held in very high regard. Menaion services vary in their authority, because not all of them are used universally in the Church. But we would affirm that any service that is used universally does not contain doctrinal error, and they certainly do lay out our Faith. 

The principle of Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi -- which means "the rule (or law) of prayer is the rule of Faith," was first articulated (at least so far as we have it in writing) by St. Prosper of Aquitaine, who wrote:

"Let us consider the sacraments of priestly prayers, which having been handed down by the apostles are celebrated uniformly throughout the whole world and in every Catholic Church so that the law of praying might establish the law of believing" (Patrologia Latina 51:209-210).

And this stands to reason. I would encourage those who want to dig into this question to read the book "The Shape of the Liturgy," by Dom Gregory Dix. In that book he makes the compelling case that all the ancient Liturgies of the Church have a common order, that this order is rooted in Jewish worship, and so this order is apostolic in origin. It is not as if Christians in 350 would have looked over the shoulder of non-Christian Jews and would have started copying their forms of worship. The only time in Church history that Jewish forms of worship could have entered the Tradition of the Church is the time of the Apostles themselves. And so this is a clear example of Apostolic Tradition which has been preserved by the Church.

Does the Orthodox Church Anathematize All Protestants?

The Church certainly condemns Protestant heresies, but we do not pass judgment on individuals who are outside of the Church. Furthermore, when an anathema is proclaimed, unless it names specific people, it is not a judgment on any individual. There are many people in the Church who hold opinions that are heretical, but in most cases, this would simply be due to ignorance. If an Orthodox laymen stated something that was a condemned heresy, they would only be subject to an anathema, if they refused to be corrected. Anathemas and canons do not work like landmines, which go off on their own accord when someone tramples on them. Similarly, when you have a speed limit sign, the sign does not write you a ticket -- a police officer has to write you a ticket, and then you have an opportunity to dispute the ticket in court. Likewise, if someone says or does something contrary to a canon or an anathema, there are things that the authorities in the Church have to do to make the respective penalty apply to an individual.

This is made very clear in the most authoritative compilation of the Ecumenical Canons:

"We must know that the penalties provided by the Canons, such as deposition, ex- communication, and anathematization, are imposed in the third person according, to grammatical usage, there being no  imperative available. In such cases in order to express a command, the second person would be necessary. I am going to explain the matter better. The Canons command the council of living bishops to depose the priests, or to excommunicate them, or to anathematize laymen who violate the canons. Yet, if the council does not actually effect the deposition of the priests, or the excommunication, or the anathematization of laymen, these priests and laymen, are neither actually deposed, nor excommunicated, nor anathematized. They are liable to stand trial, however, judicially, here as touching deposition, excommunication, or anathematization, but there as touching divine vengeance. Just as when a king commands his slave to whip another who did something that offended him, if the slave in question fail to execute the king’s command, he will nevertheless be liable to trial for the whipping. So those silly men make a great mistake who say that at the present time all those in holy orders who have been ordained contrary to canons are actually deposed from office. It is an inquisitional tongue that foolishly twaddles thus without understanding that the command of canons, without the practical activity of the second person, or, more plainly speaking, of the council, remains unexecuted, since it does not act of itself and by itself immediately and before judgment. The Apostles themselves explain themselves in their c. XLVI unmistakably, since they do not say that any bishop or presbyter who accepts a baptism performed by heretics is already and at once actually in the state of having been deposed, but that they command that he be deposed, or, at any rate, that he stand trial, and, if it be proved that he did so, then “we command that he be stripped of holy orders by your decision,” they say" (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. 5f [emphasis added]). 

Of course if someone is guilty of sin, either in terms of moral failures or of intentionally harboring heretical views and refusing the correction of the Church, even if the authorities in the Church never take any action either because they are kept hidden, or the authorities neglect their duties, this does not mean that the person will not go to hell as a result, if they refuse to repent. But this does mean, contrary to Donatism, that even if a bishop or priest is secretly living a double life for which they should be removed from the clergy, so long as the Church allows them to continue to function in their role, the sacraments they perform continue to have the grace of God, because the grace of God is not dependent on the worthiness of those performing them. Otherwise, one could never be sure that they ever received any sacrament.

Conclusion

I am sure Jason Wallace is a sincere man, but I would encourage him to spend more time studying what we actually believe, before he comments any further about the Orthodox Faith. He no doubt believes what his own church teaches. I am sure he thinks he is doing the work of the Lord by defending his own beliefs, and attacking what he perceives to be errors in the teachings of the Orthodox Church, but anyone who is familiar with what we believe cannot fail to notice how frequently he fails to understand even some of the most basic teachings of our Faith. 

For more information, see also:

Are Ecumenical Councils Infallible?

Sola Scriptura

The Inerrancy of Scripture

How James 2:18-24 Parallels Romans 3:27-4:22 According to James Dunn

Yesterday I participated in a discussion with one other Orthodox person and two Protestants on the question of Justification, and in particular, about whether the Scriptures teach the Protestant doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone (Sola Fide).

One point that I raised was the parallels between Romans 3:27-4:22 and James 2:18-24, according to  the Protestant Biblical commentator Dr. James D. G. Dunn, who as it turns out was a Wesleyan Biblical scholar, though I bought his commentary on Romans, I simply bought it because I knew many consider it to be the best Protestant commentary on Romans. Here is the chart that he included in his commentary, laying out the parallels, which he of course discussed in far greater detail:

                                                                 Romans           James

Issue posed in terms of faith and works  3:27-28            2:18

Significance of claiming “God is one”   3:29-30            2:19

Appeal to Abraham as test case              4:1-2                2:20-22

Citation of proof text – Gen 15:6           4:3                    2:20-22

Interpretation of Gen 15:6                      4:4-21              2:23

Conclusion                                              4:22                 2:24

 (James D. G. Dunn, Word Biblical Commentary: Romans 1-8, vol. 38a (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 1988), p. 197).

The fact that James 2 so closely and precisely parallels Romans 3 and 4 cannot be merely coincidental, and so what we have is St. James commenting on what St. Paul wrote -- not to contradict St. Paul, but to correct a misunderstanding of what St. Paul was saying. And so when St. James says "You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith alone" (James 2:24), he is directly contradicting the notion that St. Paul taught justification by faith alone. He did teach that we are justified by faith, but not by faith alone. Rather, as he says in Galatians 5:6, true faith is faith that "works by love," or as St. James also says, "Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone" (James 2:17).

What Dunn and many of the Fathers who comment on Romans point out is that St. Paul was not talking about "works" in general, as Protestants have generally taken it, but he is dealing with Jews (both those who accepted Jesus as the Messiah, and those who did not) as having a privileged position with God because of their adherence to the Law of Moses, and the ceremonial aspects of that Law in particular. His point in Romans 3 and 4 was that it is only on the basis of faith in what Christ did for us on the Cross that anyone is saved, and not on the basis of "the works of the law," which was the observance of the rules and rituals of the Mosaic covenant. He was not arguing that we are saved by "Faith alone," regardless of whether we are faithful to God's commandments, as they are properly understood in the light of the Gospel.

More on the Question of the Toll Houses

When it comes to those who wish to either dismiss the idea of the toll houses, or to label them as heretical, I have often been amazed, both at the evidence that they are willing to ignore, and what they seem to think proves their case.

Let me say up front that no one I have ever come across takes the toll house imagery in a literalistic fashion. The toll houses are a particular way of speaking about a reality that is spoken about by the fathers and the services in various ways. However, the various ways that they speak about it, all point to the same reality.

One of the articles from the modernist website "Public Orthodoxy" that has been referenced by several such people in recent weeks, is "Aerial Toll Houses, Provisional Judgment, and the Orthodox Faith: A Review of The Departure of the Soul According to the Teachings of the Orthodox Church," by Stephen J. Shoemaker. And this article has been cited as proof that the toll houses are not a mainstream part of the Tradition of the Church. This article was published in 2017, and it is by a bonafide patristic scholar. In fact, I just got a copy of one his books a few weeks ago, so I don't doubt that he has a high level of  familiarity with the writings of the Fathers. However, after making the case that the toll houses are not, in his opinion, found in very many of the documents of the first millennium of Church History, he wraps up his review of an 1,111 page book, with this comment:

"In the contest of angels and demons over the newly departed soul, then, the monks have admittedly identified a vibrant tradition that reaches back into the ancient church and has been witnessed by many authorities – in contrast with the aerial toll houses."

The problem with this statement is that the aerial toll houses are precisely an image of "the contest of angels and demons over the newly departed soul." So far from Dr. Shoemaker refuting the toll houses, he actually confirms them.

He goes on to assert that:

"The problem, however, is that this is not the only such tradition about the fate of the soul, and herein lies the fundamentalism that steers this volume and generates its misrepresentation of the Orthodox faith. It is a fundamentalism that insists on reading a part of the tradition, isolated from the complexity of the whole, in the most literal fashion, when perhaps more nuanced, figurative interpretations are warranted instead. For instance, how should one understand such a tradition, when read literally, in light of the well-established practice of prayer for the dead that does not mention the toll houses? The Orthodox tradition is much broader and diverse than its presention [sic] in this book. In seizing on a single strand of this tradition and investing it with absolute authority at the expense of legitimate, alternative perspectives, the book is fundamentally grounded in error, obscuring and distorting, rather than clarifying and disclosing, the full teaching of the Orthodox Church."

The problem with what he says here is that he does not demonstrate at all how the idea that there is a conflict of angels and demons over the soul of the departed contradicts anything else in the Tradition of the Church. Now if there were many Fathers that could be cited that objected to this idea, then he would have a case, but he doesn't.

We are speaking about a reality that is beyond our normal experience in this life, and so, as is the case with many spiritual and theological issues, we have to speak about them in verbal images. Verbal images point us to a reality, but they are not the reality itself. Often we have a variety of images. For example, when it comes to how Christ has saved us, we have the image of "ransom" which comes from the lips of Christ Himself (Matthew 20:28). This is an image that conveys part of the reality. It is not the only Biblical image, but it is also not an image that we are free to toss out. It is also an image, like most images, that can be pressed too far. And so, one could take it to mean that Christ is given as a ransom paid to the devil, but as we know, St. Gregory the Theologian responded to that idea with "fie upon the outrage!" (Second Oration on Easter, 22). Each image we find in Scripture tells us part of the whole, and we have to take them all together, and not press them beyond their intended purpose.

This contest between angels and demons over the soul of the departed is a reality, and it is part of what we call the particular judgment. In a recent interview, George Demacopoulos, one of the editors of "Public Orthodoxy," suggested that the toll houses denied that we would be judged by Christ (A new leader for the Greek Orthodox Church in America (The Greek Current, May 20th, 2019), at the 26:10 mark). This is of course not at all true. As Christians, we all know that there will be a general resurrection, and that some will be raised to life, and others to eternal damnation, but we will all stand before the final judgment. However, the particular (or partial) judgment, which is a universal teaching of the Church, is what happens when we die, prior to that final judgment. We will spend the time between our deaths and that final judgement somewhere. The particular judgment is what determines where we will spend that time, at least initially, before the final judgment. Many people will spend that time receiving a foretaste of torment, because they died in rebellion against God, and they will spend that time in Hades. We find a description of one such person in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus:

"And in Hades [the rich man] lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame" (Luke 16:23-24).

Now as for those who object to the idea that if you die without repentance, the demons will drag you down to Hades, and see it as "horrific"... something "contrary to the mercy of God," etc. -- when compared with this depiction by the Savior Himself of the fate of the rich man, how you get there seems to me to be a rather small matter. However bad the ride might be, it's the destination that would be the real downside to the whole deal.

And the objection to the idea that God might use demons, the devil, or evil men for that matter, to deliver judgment upon human beings, is contrary to Scripture, which is full of references to precisely that. The entire book of Habakkuk, for example, is about the Prophet Habakkuk's struggle with the idea that the people of the Kingdom of Judah, though sinful and rebellious, were punished at the hands of an even more evil nation (the Babylonians).

Both George Demacopoulos in that same interview, and Fr. Evan Armatas, on a recent episode of "Orthodoxy Live" (Ancient Faith Radio, May 19, 2019), appeal to the the funeral service, and its lack of references to toll houses, as proof that the Church does not teach such a thing. There actually is an allusion to the trials the soul endures after death in second sticheron of Monk John, which we sing towards the end of the service:

"Alas! What an agony the soul endures when from the body it is parting; how many are her tears for weeping, but there is none that will show compassion: unto the angels she turns with downcast eyes; useless are her supplications; and unto men she extends her imploring hands, but finds none to bring her rescue. Thus, my beloved brethren, let us all ponder well how brief is the span of our life; and peaceful rest for him (her) that now is gone, let us ask of Christ, and also His abundant mercy for our souls" (Funeral Text of the Greek Archdiocese of North America)

And in the stichera after the last kiss for the departed, (in the eighth sticheron) we sing:

"When the soul is about to be carried away from the body with violence by dread Angels, it forgets all kinsmen and acquaintances and is troubled concerning standing before the tribunal that is to come, that shall pass judgment upon vain things and much-toiling flesh. Then, entreating the Judge, let us all pray that the Lord will forgive him (her) the things he (she) has done" (The Office for the Burial of a Layman, vol 3, Book of Needs, (South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon Seminary Press, 1999, p. 210). This hymn is not found in the online text of the Greek Archdiocese, which is a very much abbreviated version of the Funeral service).

Furthermore, if the souls of the departed were instantly in the eternal bliss of heaven, there would be little reason for all of the prayers in the funeral and memorial services that we do for the departed, which clearly suggest that at least most souls are in need of such prayers. 

But we have more services than just the funeral service, when we pass from this world to the next. The very first service we will likely hear, before our deaths, if a priest is available, or if we wish to pray these prayers ourselves, as many saints have done before us, is the service for the departure of the soul. There are two versions of this service in the Book of Needs: one is "The Canon of Supplication to our Lord Jesus Christ and the Most-Holy Theotokos, the Mother of the Lord, at the Parting of the Soul from the Body of any Orthodox;" and the other is "The Order at the Parting of the Soul from the Body when one has Suffered for a Long Time," which is attributed in the Book of Needs to St. Andrew of Crete.

In the first of these services, we find, for example:

"Noetic roaring lions have surrounded me, seeking to carry me away and bitterly torment me. Do thou crush their teeth and jaws, O pure One, and save me" (The Canon of Supplication to our Lord Jesus Christ and the Most-Holy Theotokos, the Mother of the Lord, at the Parting of the Soul from the Body of any Orthodox, vol 3, Book of Needs, (South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon Seminary Press, 1999, p. 76). 

"Count me worthy to pass, unhindered by the persecutor, the prince of the air, the tyrant, him that stands guard in the dread pathways, and the false accusations of these, as I depart from earth" (Ibid., p. 77).

"Behold, terror has come to meet me, O Sovereign Lady, and I am afraid of it. Behold, a great struggle awaits me, in which be thou unto me a helper, O Hope of my salvation" (Ibid., p. 77).

"Do thou translate me, O Sovereign Lady, in the sacred and precious arms of the holy Angels, that sheltered by their wings, I not see the impious, foul and dark form of the demons" (Ibid., p. 79).

"Do thou count me worthy to escape the hordes of bodiless barbarians, and rise through the aerial depths and enter into Heaven, that I may glorify thee unto the ages of ages, O holy Theotokos" (Ibid., p. 81).

In the second of these services, we find:

"Behold a multitude of evil spirits are standing about, holding the handwriting of my sins, and they cry out exceedingly, shamelessly seeking my lowly soul" (The Order at the Parting of the Soul from the Body when one has Suffered fro a Long Time, vol 3, Book of Needs, (South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon Seminary Press, 1999, p. 87). 

Have mercy on me, O all holy angels of the Almighty God, have mercy upon me and save me from all the evil toll-collectors [which should actually have been translated as "toll houses," telonion poneron, in the Greek text], for I have no good deeds to balance my evil deeds" (Ibid., p. 90).

These prayers are literally the final instructions given to those about to depart this life, but these are by no means the only prayers in the liturgical tradition of the Church. For example, at Cheesefare Saturday Matins, we hear the hymn:

"We ever give thee thanks and magnify thee, O pure Theotokos; we venerate and praise thy childbearing, O full of grace, and we call upon thee without ceasing: Save us, merciful Virgin, in thy love; deliver us from the fearful scrutiny which we must undergo before the demons, and in the hour of our examination suffer not thy servants to be put to shame" (The Lenten Triodion: Supplementary Texts, trans. Mother Maria and Bishop Kallistos Ware (South Canaan: St. Tikhon Seminary Press, 2007, p. 58).

At the prayer to the Theotokos at the end of Small Compline, we ask each day for her "at in the hour of my departure, to care for my wretched soul, and drive far away from it the dark countenances of evil demons" (The Great Horologion (Brookline, MA: Holy Transfiguration Monastery, p. 1997, p. 230).

At the Saturday Midnight Office, at the prayer of St. Eustratius, we pray:

"And now, O Master, let Thy hand shelter me and let Thy mercy come upon me, for my soul is troubled and in sore distress at its departure from this, my wretched and defiled body, lest the evil counsel of the adversary come upon it and hinder it because of the sins I have committed in this life, whether in ignorance or in knowledge. Be gracious unto me, O Master, and let not my soul behold the gloomy and darksome countenance of the wicked demons, but let Thy radiant and luminous Angels receive it. Give glory unto Thy holy Name, and by Thy might lead me up unto Thy divine tribunal. When I am to be judged, let not the hand of the prince of this world seize me, that he might drag me, the sinner, down unto the deep of Hades; but stand Thou by me, and be Thou unto me a Saviour and Helper" (The Great Horologion (Brookline, MA: Holy Transfiguration Monastery, p. 1997, p. 48).

Many, many more examples could be cited here.

You also find many examples of commentaries on the Scriptures by the Fathers, which allude to this same reality.

For example, in Luke 12:20, in the parable of the rich fool, most translations read, like the King James Version:

"But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?"

However, the King James margin note, correctly notes: "Gr[eek], do they require thy soul."

Young’s Literal Translation notes this fact in its translation:

"And God said to him, Unthinking one! this night thy soul they shall require from thee, and what things thou didst prepare -- to whom shall they be?"

In the commentary of Blessed Theophylact (which is pretty much the gold standard when it comes to commentaries in the Orthodox Church) he makes a point about the verb translated by the KJV in the passive voice as "shall be required", but he points out that that it is is in the active voice, future, third person, plural -- and so should be "they shall require".

Blessed Theophylact says:

"Notice also the words "they will require". Like some stern imperial officers demanding tribute, the fearsome angels will ask for your souls, and you will not want to give it because you love this life and claim the things of this life as your own. But they do not demand the soul of a righteous man, because he himself commits his soul into the hands of God and Father of spirits, and he does so with joy and gladness, not in the least bit grieved that he is handing over his soul to God. For him the body is only a light burden, easily shed. But the sinner has made his soul fleshy, something difficult to separate from the body. This is why the soul must be demanded of him, the same way that harsh tax collectors treat debtors who refuse to pay what is due. See that the Lord did not say, "I shall require thy soul of thee," but, "they shall require"" (The Explanation of the Holy Gospel According to Luke. Fr. Christopher Stade, Trans. (House Springs, MO: Chrysostom  Press, 1997), p. 148).

One of the oldest Christian texts we have is St. Justin Martyr's "Dialogue with Trypho", and in it, he says:

“And what follows of the Psalm, -- ‘But Thou, Lord, do not remove Thine assistance from me; give heed to help me. Deliver my soul from the sword, and my only-begotten from the hand of the dog; save me from the lion’s mouth, and my humility from the horns of the unicorns,’—was also information and prediction of the events which should befall Him. For I have already proved that He was the only-begotten of the Father of all things, being begotten in a peculiar manner Word and Power by Him, and having afterwards become man through the Virgin, as we have learned from the memoirs. Moreover, it is similarly foretold that He would die by crucifixion. For the passage, ‘Deliver my soul from the sword, and my only-begotten from the hand of the dog; save me from the lion’s mouth, and my humility from the horns of the unicorns,’ is indicative of the suffering by which He should die, i.e., by crucifixion. For the ‘horns of the unicorns,’ I have already explained to you, are the figure of the cross only. And the prayer that His soul should be saved from the sword, and lion’s mouth, and hand of the dog, was a prayer that no one should take possession of His soul: so that, when we arrive at the end of life, we may ask the same petition from God, who is able to turn away every shameless evil angel from taking our souls" (Dialogue with Trypho, ch. 105, ANF 1, p. 251f).

St. Basil the Great says this, in his homily on Psalm 7:

"Accordingly, being under the sentence of death, knowing that there is One Who saves and One Who delivers, 'In Thee have I put my trust,' he says, 'save me' from 'weakness' and 'deliver me' from captivity. I think that the noble athletes of God, who have wrestled considerably with the invisible enemies during the whole of their lives, after they have escaped all their persecutions and reached the end of life, are examined by the prince of the world, in order that, if they are found to have wounds from the wrestling or any stains or effects of sin, they may be detained; but, if they are found unwounded and stainless, they may be brought by Christ into their rest as being unconquered and free. Therefore he prays for his life here and for his future life. For he says: 'Save me' here 'from them that persecute me; deliver me' there in the time of the scrutiny 'lest at any time he seize upon my soul like a lion.' You may learn this from the Lord Himself who said concerning the time of His passion: 'Now the prince of this world is coming, and in me he will have nothing' [John 14:30]. He who had committed no sin said that he had nothing; but for a man it will be sufficient, if he dares to say: 'The prince of this world is coming, and in me he will have few and trivial penalties.' And there is a danger of experiencing these penalties, unless we have some one to deliver us or save us. For, the two tribulations set forth, two petitions are introduced. 'Save me from the multitude of them that persecute me, and deliver me, lest at any time I be seized as if there were no one to redeem me" [Psalm 7:2-3] (The Fathers of the Church,  vol. 46: St. Basil, Exegetical Homilies, trans. Sister Agnes Clare Way, C.D.P (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1963), p. 167f).

And many more quotes of this kind are found throughout the Fathers. It just cannot be disputed that this is so, which is why so few of those who wish to dismiss this teaching of the Church actually dare to engage the evidence.

For those who wish to see more of that evidence laid out, the text "The Departure of the Soul According to the Teaching of the Orthodox Church" does so. You can also see Evidence for the Tradition of the Toll Houses found in the Universally Received Tradition of the Church online, for a small bit of that evidence.

There is nothing Gnostic about this. To avoid being dragged down to Hades, there are no secret passwords, handshakes, or incantations that will save you. You simply need to pray for "a Christian ending," and strive, by God's grace, to prepare for such an ending. A Christian ending is one, wherein a person dies, having a clear conscience, and with faith and repentance toward God. If you die in that way, you will have nothing to worry about.

For more information, see:

David Bentley Hart and the Toll Houses

David Bentley Hart and the Toll Houses

There he goes again. David Bentley Hart, the "Orthodox Theologian" who thinks he knows better than the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Ecumenical Councils about what Orthodoxy is, has now decided to weigh in on the question of the toll houses. I don't really have any great desire to rehash this question yet again, and would have just ignored this article, had DBH not decided to call me out personally in it:

"Among a great many Orthodox scholars in the academic world (especially when they gather together in hushed colloquy among the shadows and feel at liberty to speak strictly entre eux) it is often taken as depressing evidence of how radically the public intellectual culture of Orthodoxy in America has degenerated in recent years—how, that is, it has declined from the urbane, scholarly, perhaps slightly Mandarin sophistication of the generation of Alexander Schmemann and John Meyendorff to the fundamentalist, doctrinaire, and yet deeply uneducated primitivism promoted principally by former Evangelicals in the John Whiteford mold—than the increasing respectability of the myth of the aerial toll houses."

He further attempts to dismiss this tradition as having been "at most a fragment of quaint folklore, found in this country only among marginal eccentrics, like Seraphim Rose."  Though later, he later concludes his essay with:

"Admittedly, some genuinely holy and venerable teachers of the Orthodox past have promoted the myth. But that is of no consequence. As Paul also says, “even if an angel out of heaven should proclaim to you good tidings that differ from what you received, let him be accursed”" (Galatians 1:8)" [emphasis added].

So apparently, the teaching was not limited to just a few "eccentrics" and uneducated fundamentalists, after all. But once again we run into some of the same problems with DBH's reasoning that we have run into before. Had he been properly catechized before he was received into the Orthodox Church, DBH would have learned to affirm "that the Holy Scriptures must be accepted and interpreted in accordance with the belief which hath been handed down by the Holy Fathers, and which the Holy Orthodox Church, our Mother, hath always held and still doth hold" (from the affirmations found in "The Office for the Reception of Converts," in  the Service book of the Holy Orthodox-Catholic Apostolic Church, tr. Isabel Florence Hapgood, fourth Edition, Syrian Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese of New York, New York, 1965, p. 458).

DBH does not demonstrate why he knows better than those "genuinely holy and venerable teachers" of the Church. He does not engage anything that they actually say on the subject. He does not even mention the countless references to the toll houses that are found in the services of the Church. He in fact does not engage a single statement or argument made by anyone on the subject. He merely dismisses them all as being advocated only by "uneducated fundamentalists," and then shares his opinions on the matter, which he apparently considers to be self-evidently true, since not a shred of evidence is actually offered.

It also doesn't seem to have occurred to DBH that by citing Galatians 1:8, as he does, he is suggesting that these "genuinely holy and venerable teachers of the Orthodox past" are anathema, having preached a false Gospel.

I readily admit that DBH's academic education is far better than my own -- my family's "white privilege" debit card having been mostly exhausted a few generations before my time -- and so as much as I would have liked to have gone on and gotten a PhD., I was doing good to pay the debt accrued for my BA in Theology, which was entirely my own responsibility. However, I did learn how to read fairly well, and I can follow a reasoned and supported argument, and can spot an argument based on little more than ad hominem and gratuitous assertions. And even if someone is uneducated, that does not disprove that what they say is true... if it did, much of the New Testament would be proven false. After all, on Pentecost, we do not sing:

"Blessed art Thou, O Christ our God, Who hast shown forth the fishermen as supremely wise, by sending them to the University of Notre Dame..."

But let's consider some of the other contemporary "uneducated fundamentalists" that DBH does not deign to even engage:

1. Fr. Thomas Hopko. DBH longs for the days of Fr. Alexander Schmemann and Fr. John Meyendorff, but Fr. Thomas Hopko was first their student, and then their successor as dean of St. Vladimir Theological Seminary. What did he have to say on the subject?

"It is a very old teaching, and you will find the teaching about toll houses in practically every Church Father. You find it in St. John Chrysostom. You find it in John of the Ladder. The first development of it was in St. Cyril of Alexandria. The teaching was, and is, as far as I understand it, that when you die, you have to let go of, and be delivered from, and purified from, whatever sins and demons are holding you" ("Toll Houses: After Death Reality or Heresy?" from The Illumined Heart Podcast, on Ancient Faith Radio, September 30, 2007).

Personally, Fr. Thomas interpreted the toll houses in a largely allegorical way, but he did not dismiss the Tradition as a gnostic heresy, as does DBH. I would argue that Fr. Thomas' view is within the bounds of acceptable opinions on the subject, but DBH's view is not.

2. Jean-Claude Larchet, is thought by many to be the foremost patristic scholar of our time. He has written numerous texts on Orthodox Theology, that are highly respected, and widely disseminated, and among those texts is the book "Life after Death according to the Orthodox Tradition." He spends quite a bit of time discussing the toll houses, and among the fathers he cites as affirming the Tradition are St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. John Chrysostom, St. Cyril of Alexandria, St. Maximus the Confessor, and St. Gregory the Dialogist. Those are hardly just a random minority collection of Church Fathers -- they are among the most important of them. Nor are they the only ones that could be mentioned here, by any stretch.

See also the French Wikipedia article on Jean-Claude Larchet for more information on his academic career.

3. Metropolitan Hierotheos (Vlachos), is not often described as being an "uneducated fundamentalist" a "primitivist" or a convert from Evangelicalism. He likewise has published countless texts on the teachings of the Fathers, is highly regarded, and he also published a book entitled "Life after death." He has an entire chapter that focuses on this question, and it begins as follows:

"Also related to the foregoing is the teaching of both Holy Scripture and the holy Fathers about the taxing of souls. At this point we shall examine the subject thoroughly, as it has a bearing on the terrible mystery of death. We find this topic in the whole biblico-patristic tradition and it corresponds to a reality which we need to look at in order to prepare ourselves for the dreadful hour of death. What follows is written not in order to arouse anxiety, but to prompt repentance, which has joy as its result. For he who has the gift of the Holy Spirit and is united with Christ avoids the terrible presence and activity of the customs demons.

According to the teaching of the Fathers of the Church, the soul at its departure from the body, as well as when it is preparing to leave, senses the presence of the demons who are called customs demons, and is possessed with fear because of having to pass through customs.

Of course we must say from the start that the customs demons have no sovereignty over the righteous, those who have united with Christ. The righteous not only will not go through "customs-houses", but they will also not be in fear of that. We shall see all this better when we compare the teaching of the Fathers. The characterisation of the soul's passage through the demons as customs is taken from the tax collectors of that time. We may look briefly at this subject in order to understand why the Fathers characterise the soul's passage through the demons as customs.

In ancient times the name of tax gatherer was given to those who purchased the public taxes from the State and then collected them from the people" [48]. The tax gatherers were divided into two classes. The first class comprised the so-called "publicans ('confiscators') or tithe collectors", who were the wealthiest class and the force of authority, and the second comprised the "tax collectors". The publicans were the general public collectors, who had bought the taxes from the State, while the tax collectors were their salaried servants, who collected the taxes from the people and gave them to the publicans" (Life after death, by Metropolitan Hierotheos (Vlachos), trans. Esther Williams, Birth of the Theotokos Monastery: Levadia, Greece, 1995, p. 62f, emphasis added. This chapter can be read in its entirety, online).

If DBH wants to argue that the this tradition is not really found throughout the Fathers and the Services of the Church, something like actual arguments, with evidence, would need to be made. No one has made  any attempt to refute these texts since they were published, and that is probably because there is no argument to be made. In fact, in addition to the above referenced texts, St. Anthony's Greek Orthodox Monastery has published a very hefty tome entitled "The Departure of the Soul According to the Teaching of the Orthodox Church," and its 1,111 pages consist largely of patristic and liturgical citations that demonstrate just the opposite.

Now is it true that some have focused too much on this issue? Probably so. However, just as I would agree that one could have an unhealthy focus on the book of Revelation, I would likewise challenge anyone who argued that the book of Revelation should be removed from the Bible as a result.

When my parishioners ask me about the toll houses, I explain what the Tradition is, but I always say that they should focus on repenting of their sins, and not having anything on their consciences when they die, and then they won't have anything to worry about.

The toll house tradition is an image that is intended to teach us something about things that are beyond our normal experience. No one believes there are literal toll booths in the heavens, but it is true that if we die without repentance, we won't be successfully passing through them (however literally or figuratively you may take them).

This is certainly not the most important tradition of the Church, but dismissing a tradition found throughout the Fathers and the Services of the Church as being a gnostic heresy reflects a mindset that is not Orthodox by any stretch or measure.

For More Information:

The Strange Theology of David Bentley Hart

The Hart Idiosyncratic Version

Evidence for the Tradition of the Toll Houses found in the Universally Received Tradition of the Church

Stump the Priest: Is Christmas Pagan?

Sol Invictus, the Unconquerable Sun

Question: "Did Christmas originate from a pagan holiday?"

There has been a long tradition among Protestants of accusing Roman Catholics of engaging in pagan practices based on shoddy history, and modern atheists seem to have taken up that tradition in order to discredit Christianity altogether.

The claims that Christmas originated as a pagan festival have a number of problems historically. For one, the Saturnalia, which is often claimed to be the feast that inspired Christmas was celebrated on December 17th, and eventually this feast was expanded to a week, which ended on December 23rd. The feast of the Unconquerable Sun, which actually was celebrated on December 25th, is a much later feast. The earliest evidence that this feast was celebrated on December 25th comes from a text dated in the year 354 a.d. The earliest Christian reference to a belief that Christ was born on December 25th comes from St. Hippolytus' commentary on Daniel, which was written about 150 years earlier. So if anyone was trying to displace a feast, it is more likely that Pagan Romans were trying to displace a Christian feast, then the other way around.

The other problem with this claim is that the Feast of the Annunciation is the more ancient feast. It was believed that the Messiah would complete his earthly mission on the anniversary of its inception. And we find Tertullian stating that Christ was Crucified on March 25th as early as 208 a.d. (An Answer to the Jews, Ch. VIII). If you calculate a birth exactly nine months later, you come to December 25th.

A further problem with this claim is that before Christmas became a universal feast of the Church, most of the Church celebrated Christ's birth and the beginning of his ministry in His baptism on January 6th. Only later, when the eastern part of the Church adopted the celebration of Christmas was the celebration of Christ's birth transferred to that date, and January 6th exclusively focused on Christ's baptism.

But even if it were the case that there was a pagan feast celebrated on December 25th, if Christians had displaced it with a Christian feast, this would hardly make the celebration pagan in origin. To prove that, you would need to demonstrate a lot more than the coincidence of the date.

More wild claims that the idea of the virgin birth of Christ is based on pagan myths have even less historical credibility. For the most part they are based on made up similarities that have no actual basis in reality.


For more information: 

The 25th of December Pagan Feast or Patristic Tradition?", by Hugh O'Donnell

"Why December 25?" by Jon Sorensen

"Was the Virgin Birth of Jesus Grounded in Paganism?" by Jon Sorensen

"Was the Virgin Birth Story Created by the Church?" by Mikel Del Rosario

Why the Russian Orthodox Church Celebrates Christmas on January 7th

Answering Atheists

I recently gave a lecture at the St. Herman's youth conference in Albany, New York on the subject of Answering Atheists. At Archbishop Gabriel's request, I first spoke briefly about how I became Orthodox.

You can listen to the lecture by clicking here.

You can read a more detailed account of my conversion by clicking here.

You can also read an article that I mentioned about the question of the violence of the Old Testament by clicking here.

You can read about the 2013 Finnish study on Atheists by clicking here.

You can read St. John Chrysostom's "A Treatise to Prove that No One Can Harm the Man Who Does Not Injure Himself," by clicking here.

Here is a speech by Dinesh D'Souza, entitled "How Do I Know God Exists?" which covers some of the same ground, but makes some very compelling arguments:

Did St. Mark "Blunder"?

Note: While I disagree with Fr. Gregory Hallam on the issues I will address in this article, I appreciate the fact that he produces the podcasts that he does, which are generally very informative. 

Is it correct that St. Mark "blundered" in the writing of his Gospel? There is no reason why we should conclude that he did, and you will never find any Father of the Church making any such suggestion. However, this is what Fr. Gregory Hallam stated recently in his E-Quip lecture series, in a lecture about St. Mark's Gospel [beginning at about the 16 minute mark of the recording]:

“…Indeed we must admit, [that St. Mark] sometime got the sequence of events and geographical details in the Gospel incorrect…. In Mark 5:1 Jesus exorcises the Gerasene demoniac  -- however, Gerasa is 30 miles south east… south southeast of the lake in question, that is of course what is now known as Galilee. That’s a pretty big jump for those pigs. OK? There is also no 30 mile long embankment running down from Gerasa  to the lake to accommodate this onward rush. St. Matthew recognizes St. Mark’s blunder in handling this material, and tries to correct “Gerasa” to “Gadara,” from which we get, of course, the Gadarene swine, but Gadara is still 6 miles from the lake, so it’s hardly a very satisfactory solution. We could say that these are minor matters, and indeed they are. But we could list many others in Mark’s Gospel  where  he gets geographical or indeed cultural details wrong, concerning Judaism of the time, and the rights of women or otherwise to divorce, he gets wrong. So… you know… this reminds us that these are the writings of ordinary men who were attempting faithfully to present what Jesus said and did, but they’re not verbally inerrant – and I am sorry if that offends some people who are listening to this on Ancient Faith Ministries, but research it yourself. Find out about these geographical lapses and these cultural lapses in Mark’s Gospel, and let that minister to you as you think how we can still call this the word of God and accept human fallibility its compilation. Because that is a fact, you can’t just argue around it, and try and translate “Gerasa” or “Gadara” in different ways. Geography is Geography.”

First off, there is a textual issue with these passages that Fr. Gregory does not address here. Fr. Gregory is assuming the accuracy of the readings found in the Nestle-Aland/United Bible Societies critical editions of the Greek New Testament, which are based on assumptions that are Protestant in origin (namely, that there was an earlier pure version of the Greek New Testament that was later corrupted, and has to be rediscovered and reconstructed, as opposed to accepting the text as the Church has actually preserved it). According to those texts, this is how the Synoptic Gospels describe this place in question:

Mark 5:1: "the country of the Gerasenes..."

Matthew 8:28: "the country of the Gadarenes..."

Luke 8:26: "the country of the Gerasenes..."

It should be noted that the readings in Mark and Matthew are rated "C" in the United Bible Societies text, and the reading is Luke is rated a "D." In that text an "A" reading is one that the editors are very sure of, "B" is less sure, "C" is more questionable, and "D" is the lowest rating that they give to a reading that they adopt in their text.

In the vast majority of Greek manuscripts -- and in the texts which the Church has universally received -- the names of this place that are found in the Synoptic Gospels are as follows:

Mark 5:1: "the country of the Gadarenes..."

Matthew 8:28: "the country of the Gergesenes..."

Luke 8:26: "the country of the Gadarenes..."

The evidence for these readings are very strong, though there is some support for "Gergesenes" in Mark 5:1. But in any case, any way you slice it, we have at least two names in the Gospels for this place. It should be noted that in none of these readings do we find it speaking of a city directly associated with these names, but rather it speaks of "the country of...", which is a very general description of the place. The Tradition of the Church tells us exactly where this miracle took place -- the present day Kursi, or Kersa, which was known in ancient times as "Gergesa," which is on the eastern shore of the sea of Galilee. This place fits the narrative perfectly. And yet this place was probably not well known, and so it is described as being in the region of the Gadaranes (i.e. the district of Gadara -- which was the chief city of the area at that time, and would have been generally better known).

The textual variations are most likely due to the fact that you had two place names found in the Synoptic Gospels, and some scribes attempted to harmonize them. But does this mean that at least one of these names is wrong? No. This area was a pagan area, and so there were no doubt Greek names for the locations in this area, but Aramaic speaking Jews would have used some variation of those names.

I live in Spring, Texas (which is also where my parish is), but Spring is actually not an incorporated city, and so is really governed by Harris County, though Houston is the city that dominates Harris County, and the City of Houston has some extra-territorial jurisdiction over this area (as I discovered much to my irritation during the permitting process for the construction of our current Church building). When people ask me where I live, depending on how much time I have to explain, and whether or not I think they have any idea of the local geography, I sometimes will tell them that I live in Houston, simply because most people don't know where Spring, Texas is, and it is in fact part of the Metropolitan Houston area. So I could say that I live in Spring, Texas, or Houston, or Harris County, and yet all three statements would be true -- and this is true without mixing in the question of variations on place names due to the transmission of those names through different languages.

The following video deals with this question at about the 50 minute mark:



If you watch this video from the beginning, you will see that it addresses some other claims of geographical errors in the Gospel of Mark, and does so very handily.

Fr. Gregory alludes to another claim, made by Bart Ehrman, that the Gospel of Mark is in error, when it says in Mark 7:3 that the Jews would not eat with unwashed hands. The video above addresses that claim just after the 20 minute mark, and it points out that this claim is baseless, and that there is ample extra-biblical evidence of this being the common practice of the Jews of that period.

Furthermore, Fr. Gregory references the claim that St. Mark erred in Mark 10:12, by speaking of women divorcing their husbands. It is argued that Jewish law made no provision for a woman to divorce her husband, and so therefore, St. Mark clearly didn't know what he was talking about here. However, this ignores the rather notorious example of Herodias, who divorced her first husband in order to marry Herod, her brother-in-law. That this happened is recorded not only by the Gospels, but also by the Jewish historian Josephus. The above video addresses this question about the 24 minute mark.

So it is not simply a matter of fact that St. Mark erred in his Gospel. Geography is geography, but when you are talking about the names of places in a region that has experienced more than a few cultural upheavals in the past 2000 years, it is not simply a matter of getting out a map and proving that St. Mark made an error. In fact, on closer inspection, the geography of St. Mark's Gospel is very accurate, and provides a great deal of evidence of its traditional origins as an account written by St. Mark but based on the recollections of St. Peter.

For example, here is a lecture by Dr. Richard Bauckham: "Mark's Geography and the origin of Mark's Gospel":



Here addresses the question of the story of the Demoniac in Mark 5 beginning at just before the 30 minute mark. He assumes that the reading of "Gerasenes" is correct, but provides a very plausible explanation for how that name would not refer to the city of Gerasa, as Fr. Gregory assumes, but to the region of the eastern shore of the sea of Galilee. The entire lecture is well worth listening to.

Regardless of how one decides the textual issues I mentioned, there is no reason why an Orthodox Christian needs to conclude that the Gospels are in error. The Tradition of the Church clearly teaches us that the Scriptures are without error.* When we see something in Scripture that seems problematic, we may or may not always know how to definitively resolve the question of how to explain the problem, but the faith of the Church is that the Scripture is without error, and it is contrary to that Faith to make assertions to the contrary.

*For those who assert that the Orthodox Church does not affirm the inerrancy of Scripture, I refer you to the quotations from the Fathers in the article on inerrancy below, and challenge anyone to produce a single instance of a Church Father that asserted that there were any real errors in Scripture.

For More Information:

The Inerrancy of Scripture, by Fr. John Whiteford

I would also recommend Dr. Richard Bauckham's lecture "The Authenticity of the Apostolic Eyewitness in the New Testament":



Update: Just today there is news of new archeological evidence in support of Kursi as the location of the miracle in Mark 5: Archaeologists Find Hebrew Letters Engraved on Tablet at Jesus Miracle Site.

Stump the Priest: Allegorical Interpretations of Scripture?

St. Paul

Question: "Why do the Orthodox use the allegorical method of Bible interpretation, when there is no evidence of it being used prior to the year 190 A.D.?"

The premise of the question is false, because we find allegorical biblical interpretations in the New Testament itself, and this had its roots in traditional Jewish methods of interpretation.

Philo of Alexandria (who live from approximately 25 B.C. to 50 A.D.), used allegorical interpretations of the Scripture extensively

The parables of Christ have an allegorical dimension, although Protestant scholars have generally resisted that conclusion. However, Christ Himself provided the interpretation of one parable in the Gospels -- the Parable of the Sower (Mark 4:1-9) -- and the interpretation He gave was clearly an allegorical interpretation (Mark 4:10-20).

St. Paul's epistles contain allegorical interpretations of the Old Testament, most notably in Galatians 4:21-31, in which he explicitly states that the story of Hagar and Sarah and their respective sons Ishmael and Isaac was an "allegory":

"Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise. Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Hagar. For this Hagar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all. For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now. Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman. So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free."

Another example is found in 1 Corinthians 9:9-10:

"For it is written in the law of Moses, thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope."

Many more examples could be cited of typological interpretations of  the Old Testament, found in the New.

Protestants generally wish to reject the allegorical method, but when faced with clear examples of the Apostles engaging in that very method, their response is usually to say: "Well, the Apostles were inspired to do it, but no one else is." But this is clearly an arbitrary opinion that has no basis in Scripture or Tradition.

The allegorical sense of Scripture does not negate the literal sense -- it is another level of meaning in the text. Traditionally, there are four senses of Scripture:

1. Literal: This refers to the obvious meaning of the text. In some cases, the text is clearly not intended to be taken literally, but even poetic texts have an obvious meaning.

2. Typological/Allegorical: A type is a stamp which imprints an image. An antitype is that which is imaged by the type.  We find the word "type" explicitly used in Romans 5:12-14:

"Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned— (For until the law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come."

And we find the word "antitype" used explicitly in 1 Peter 3:18-22:

"For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison, who formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water. There is also an antitype which now saves us—baptism (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers having been made subject to Him."

A story could be composed as an allegory, such as the Parable of the Sower (the Pilgrim’s Progress being a more extended example), but an historical narrative can also be interpreted allegorically, as St. Paul did.

3. Moral: The moral sense is the practical application of Scripture on an individual or corporate level. To see this reading of Scripture in action, you can read through the Canon of St. Andrew of Crete that is prayed during Lent in the Orthodox Church.  

4. Anagogical/Heavenly/Eschatological: "Anagog" comes from Greek meaning “to go up.”  So this sense looks at how a passage points us to the fulfillment of all things.  

Interestingly, Rabbinic Jewish interpretation of Scripture also sees Scripture as having a Four-fold sense, which has many similarities.

Protestants have reacted negatively to the allegorical method because it was used to such great excess in the west, especially during the medieval period. However, if you read the commentaries of the great Fathers of the Church, you find it used in a way that is far more balanced.

Clearly, if the Apostles could interpret the Old Testament in allegorical and typological terms, no one who claims to be a Christian should object to the Church Fathers doing likewise.