A Hermeneutics of Suspicion

by Bishop Chrysostomos of Etna

 

 

One of the principles of contemporary scientific inquiry is that we proceed to establish an hypothesis by first attempting to reject it: by attempting to prove the so-called null hypothesis. Any hypothetical relationship that we confirm, by the same token, is always expressed in terms of a set criterion of probability that the disproved null hypothesis is indeed true. Modern science more assiduously avoids the introduction of wrongly affirmed hypotheses into the body of scientific data than it does the exclusion of wrongly rejected hypotheses into that body. Thus the essentially "negative" approach to truth.

The "negative" approach to the establishment of scientific "facts" has served the natural and social sciences well (though one might argue that a heuristic view of science—approaching all hypotheses as valid and worthy of investigation—is more expansive in its scope). Yet, it is an approach, when combined with the naive notion that the methodologies of the natural sciences can be applied universally, which has had a very negative effect on other fields of learning, especially theology. More often than not, less sophisticated investigators have come to think that good scholarship lies in the ability to debunk and to doubt a principle, while careful explication and investigation of an assumed truth is somehow unscientific. This hermeneutics of suspicion has come with full force to the Orthodox theological world in the form of a modernistic spirit of inquiry foreign to traditional Orthodox scholarship.

The natural sciences draw their hypotheses about the world from empirical investigation. An effect is established as a principle or law when it is confirmed by replication and the high probability that the effect is everywhere and at all times present under specified conditions. Orthodox theology also confirms its data by observation and replication, but its hypotheses are drawn from revelation. Whereas the natural sciences make probable statements about hypotheses drawn from deduction, theology confirms its revealed truths by their effects on the empirical world. Orthodox theology, therefore, is not unscientific in the sense of being oblivious to empirical data, but unlike the natural sciences, its methodology lies in a positive affirmation of spiritual principles in the real world.

An Orthodox theologian begins his study by affirming the existence of God and by applying the affirmations of that existence in revelation—whether Scriptural, Patristic, or experiential—to his own person and to the world around him. There is no possibility of the "negative" methodology that characterizes the natural sciences; nor can an Orthodox theologian approach theology as our tradition understands it in a spirit of doubt. The objective element in an Orthodox theologian's intellectual pursuit is his ability to capture, internalize, and then to express and articulate the spiritual truths which he encounters in Scripture and in the Fathers. His very objectivity lies in the authenticity of what he experiences. And that authenticity disallows a spirit of doubt and negativity.

It is a sad but true fact that many of our contemporary Orthodox theologians know little of the Patristic way of theology. They are thus neither theologians nor fully Orthodox in their thinking about and understanding of things spiritual. Indeed, most Orthodox theological thinkers, especially in America and Western Europe, are so immersed in the categories of Western theological science that they hardly understand that Orthodox theology is not a deductive science. An Augustinian theology prevails not only in the heterodox West, but holds forth strongly in the westernized spirituality of most of contemporary Orthodoxy—again, especially in America and in Western Europe.

Moreover, other Orthodox theologians confront the West, as Chrestos Yannaras once noted, with a sense of inferiority. A hermeneutics of suspicion and doubt, indeed, of snide sarcasm among the less savory advocates of this "science," often intimidates them. They therefore abandon the Orthodox way of scholarship and unwittingly adopt a methodology of inquiry which is inimical to Orthodoxy itself. As I read in a column in Orthodox Tradition some time ago, would-be experts on the Liturgy begin their classes with silly remarks about the "decrepit" state of contemporary Orthodox worship, undoubtedly unintentionally falling to blasphemy in the immature desire to imitate the negative spirit of their Western theological mentors. This is a sad state of affairs, for it deprives these individuals of their own Orthodox identity and, at the same time, serves to perpetuate a Western ascendency in theological scholarship which is neither fair nor productive.

We Orthodox must begin to defend our traditional approach to theology and cease imitating or being intimidated by the theological schools of the West. For example, I recently served as a reader for a fine doctoral dissertation written by an Orthodox clergyman, a thorough and analytical investigation of first quality. One of the other readers—non-Orthodox—commented that the paper, while well written and interesting, lacked the methodological rigor of what one would expect from a paper by a Western Christian scholar. Though openly confessing his ignorance of Patristics and displaying an obvious ignorance of Orthodox scholarship, the same reader made reference to the uncritical nature of Orthodox scholarship in general. He suggested that a spirit of "suspicion" in approaching the Orthodox attitude toward the subject matter of the dissertation might have made it more provocative and might have freed it from the ostensible limitations of Orthodox scholarship.

As is usually the case, the reader in question had no extensive knowledge of the Fathers. How, then, could he comment on the methodology of a theological system based on the Patristic witness? Moreover, sweeping criticism by those ignorant of the foundations of the scholarship which they are assessing is as unscientific and unobjective as the reader presumes Orthodox scholarship to be. I made this quite clear to the student who had written the thesis and made my views known, as well, to the other members of his dissertation committee. In following such a course, I brought into focus the fact that the negative scholarly methodologies of the West are not the exclusive paths to objective knowledge. Rather, they are often the source of unobjective thoughts and observations, as in the case of the negative comments about this dissertation.

One must learn to look at Western criticism for what it is: more often than not, it is the product of limited knowledge or of deep resentment of the expansive and impressive body of knowledge that constitutes the theology of the Orthodox Church. Viewing the West in this more objective way, unintimidated by its supposedly superior methodologies, one can turn with full faith to Orthodox studies. Uninhibited by Western prejudice, the Orthodox scholar can insist that Westerners allow the existence of methodologies which, while quite different from their own, are nonetheless quite rigorous and scientific within their own right.

With regard to the Orthodox Faith, we as Christians have fixed responsibilities within the Church. We should therefore discourage our Orthodox students, theologians, and leaders from adopting the snide suspicion and cynicism that mark much of Western theological studies. When we approach Scripture, the Fathers, and the teachings of the Orthodox Church with doubt, we are mocking the very meaning of Faith. As Soren Kierkegaard once remarked—if I may paraphrase from memory—, a philosophy which begins with doubt is like teaching a soldier to stand at attention by asking him to fall on the ground in a dead heap. Likewise, any attempt to set forth Orthodoxy by a methodology of doubt is doomed to fall in on itself. If faith in the truth of the revelatory foundations of Orthodoxy is missing, any theology thus set forth is, again, neither Orthodox nor—by an Orthodox reckoning— theology. Such "theologies" we must reject.

We traditional Orthodox scholars are not the inferiors of our Western brethren. We, too, can understand the scientific method. Many of us are very competent statisticians. Many of us understand well the assumptions of contemporary philosophy and the burning issues in the philosophy of science. We are not ignorant of the ways of Western theology. Nor, to be sure, are we so bold as to criticize Western theology without knowing thoroughly its ways and presuppositions—a boldness all too frequently to be observed in Western scholars as they approach the Orthodox East. We have, therefore, every right to speak candidly and forcefully to the heterodox West. After all, they proffer their often unfounded criticism of our scholarship with a knowledge of the intellectual world limited to their Western experience, while we have at hand a world-view which encompasses both the Western world and its Eastern roots.

In living, writing about, and protecting our ancient Faith, we Orthodox have a positive witness before the modern world. Let us not sacrifice it before a methodology of doubt that unfairly renders our way to knowledge "unscientific."

 

Source: Orthodox Tradition, Vol. VII (1990), No. 2, p. 13.

Human Abandonment and Godly Sorrow

A Letter of St. Tikhon of Zadonsk

(Commemorated on 13 July)

 

 

My beloved friend and brother in Christ!

It is written: “and my nearest of kin stood afar off” (Ps. 37:13). For white does not go with black and darkness is not in accord with light. Piety is in constant conflict with impiety. What concord can there be when one is trying and struggling to climb a mountain, while the other is tumbling down?

“And my nearest of kin stood afar off,” because you have stood far away from them. You stand far away because you find nothing in common with them. We avoid smoke and pitch lest we dirty ourselves; we distance ourselves from an epidemic lest we catch an illness; we flee from lepers lest we suffer the same as them.

That is why it has been said: “come out from among them…and touch not the unclean” (II Cor. 6:17, Is. 52:11, Rev. 18:4). Every person who avoids such ones draws near to God; and the nearer he draws to Him, the more people avoid him. And the more people avoid him, the nearer God draws near to him, like someone who has been abandoned. “The poor man has been left to thee; Thou wast a helper to the orphan” (Ps. 9:35). You must be the type of poor person that people abandon.

“O my God, Who hast all things! May everyone abandon me, until the last person; only do Thou not abandon me! I shall have all things in Thee; Thou art my help, comfort, strengthening, protection, refuge, counsel, and my consolation.” When you are abandoned by people, turn to God, as you do and as you write. For He shall find the way to accomplish His work, when people can do nothing. Now, that is the first thing.

Secondly. We must be sorrowful because we have saddened God; this wound is healed with such a bandage. When one has saddened God (O my God! Who are we? Worms, earth, dust, and ashes, and we sadden Thy Majesty! Do not allow us to do such a thing again, by Thy Grace!), when, as I was saying, one has saddened God, this is healed by being sorrowful for God’s sake. Sin induces sorrow, and with this sorrow, it is cured. A bitter thing is sorrow, which nevertheless swallows up its malevolent progenitor, sin. Such is the wondrous wisdom of God: the wound is healed by a wound! “For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of” (II Cor. 7:10), says the Apostle.

Thy mercy, O Lord, shall pursue me all the days of my life! Save, O Christ God, all of those you came to save, because for their sakes didst Thou shed Thine All-Holy Blood!

Closing here, and entrusting myself to the mercy of God, I remain...

 

Source: Ἃγιος Κυπριανός, No. 321 (July-August 2004), p. 88. Letter No. 18 from the Complete Works of St. Tikhon of Zadonsk (in Russian), Vol. V, 2nd ed. (Moscow:1994), pp. 305-306.

Orthodox Christianity: Compassion for Animals

Kallistos Ware

 

 

What is a merciful heart? It is a heart on fire for the whole of creation, for humankind, for the birds, for the animals, for the demons, for all that exists.

– St. Isaac the Syrian (seventh century)

 

A Place for Animals in Our Worship?

As I sit writing at my table, I have before me a Russian icon of the martyrs St. Florus and St. Laurus. At the top of the icon is the archangel Michael, and on either side of him are the two saints. Below them there is a concourse of horses, old and young: some have riders, some are riderless but with saddle and bridle, and others are running freely. I am not sure what the connection is between horses and these two stonemasons from Constantinople who suffered martyrdom in the early fourth century. But there the horses are, prominently depicted in the icon, and their presence gives me continuing pleasure.

Beside my bed I have another icon that shows the leading Russian saint of the nineteenth century, Seraphim of Sarov. He is seated on a log outside his wooden cabin in the forest, with his prayer rope in one of his hands, and with the other hand he is offering a piece of bread to a huge brown bear. Great was the surprise and alarm of visitors to the saint’s hermitage when they came upon him in the company of his four-footed friend Misha.

For members of the Orthodox Church, an icon is not to be regarded in isolation, simply as a picture on a religious subject, a decorative item designed to give aesthetic pleasure. Much more significant is the fact that an icon exists within a distinct and specific context. It is part of an act of prayer and worship, and divorced from that context of prayer and worship, it ceases to be authentically an icon. The art of the icon is, par excellence, a liturgical art. [1] If, then, Orthodox icons depict not only humans but also animals, does this not imply that the animals have an accepted place in our liturgical celebration and our dialogue with God? We do not forget that when Jesus withdrew to pray for forty days in the wilderness, he had the animals as his companions: “he was with the wild beasts” (Mark 1:13).

What the icon shows us – that the animals share in our prayer and worship – is confirmed by the prayer books used in the Orthodox Church. [2] It is true that when we look at the main act of worship, the Service of the Eucharist, we are at first sight disappointed, for in its two chief forms – the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom and that of St. Basil the Great – there are no direct references to the animal creation. Yet when we pray at the beginning of the liturgy “for the peace of the whole world,” this surely includes animals. As one commentator puts it, “we pray for the peace of the universe, not only for mankind, but for every creature, for animals and plants, for the stars and all of nature.” [3]

Turning, however, to the daily office, we find not only implicit but also explicit allusions to animals. A notable example comes at the beginning of Vespers. In the Orthodox understanding of time, as in Judaism, the new day commences not at midnight or at dawn but at sunset, and so Vespers is the opening service in the twenty-four-hour cycle of prayer. How, then, do we begin the new day? Throughout the year, except in the week after Easter Sunday, Vespers always starts in the same way: with the reading or singing of Psalm 103 (104). This is a hymn of praise to the Creator for all the wonders of his creation, and in this cosmic doxology we have much to say about the animals:

You make springs gush forth in the valleys;

they flow between the hills,

They give drink to every beast of the field;

the wild donkeys quench their thirst.

Beside them the birds of the air have their habitation;

they sing among the branches.

The psalm continues by speaking of cattle, storks, wild goats, badgers, and young lions, and it concludes this catalogue of living creatures with a reference to Leviathan, who must surely be a whale:

Yonder is the sea, great and wide,

which teems with things innumerable,

living things both small and great.

There go the ships,

and there is the great sea monster

which you formed to sport in it.

In this way, embarking upon the new day, we offer the world back to God in thanksgiving. We bless him for the sun and moon, for the clouds and wind, for the earth and the water; and not least we bless him for the living creatures, in all their diversity and abundance, with whom he has peopled the globe. We rejoice in their beauty and their playfulness, whereby they enrich our lives:

How marvellous are your works, O Lord!

In wisdom have you made them all.

As we stand before God in prayer, the companionship of the animals fills our hearts with warmth and hope.

Nor is it only in the service of Vespers that animals have their assured place. In the Orthodox book of blessings and intercessions known in Greek as the Evchologion, and in Slavonic as the Trebnik (Book of Needs in English), there are prayers for the good health of sheep, goats, cattle, horses, donkeys, mules, and even bees and silkworms; also, on the negative side, there are prayers for protection from poisonous snakes and noxious insects. Up to the present day, the great majority of Eastern Christians have dwelled in an agricultural rather than an urban environment, and so it is only natural that their prayers – rooted in the concerns of this world as well as being otherworldly – should reflect the needs of a farming community. In daily prayer as in daily life, humans and animals belong to a single community.

As a typical example of a prayer for living creatures, let us take these phrases from a blessing on bees:

In ancient times you granted to the Israelites a land flowing with milk and honey (Exod. 3:8), and you were well-pleased to nourish your Baptist John with wild honey in the wilderness (Matt. 3:4). Now also, providing in your good pleasure for our sustenance, do you bless the beehives in this apiary. Greatly increase the multiplication of the bees within them, preserving them by your grace and granting us an abundance of rich honey. [4]

A prayer for silkworms includes the following words:

All-good King, show us even now your loving kindness; and as you blessed the well of Jacob (John 4:6), and the pool of Siloam (John 9:7), and the cup of your holy apostles (Matt. 26:27), so bless also these silkworms; and as you multiplied the stars in heaven and the sand beside the sea-shore, so multiply these silkworms, granting them health and strength: and may they feed without coming to any harm . . . so that they may produce shrouds of pure silk, to your glory and praise. [5]

Yet not all prayers for animals are as genial as these, for there are also exorcisms directed against the creatures who, in this fallen world, inflict harm on humans and their produce:

I adjure you, O creatures of many forms: worms, caterpillars, beetles and cockroaches, mice, grasshoppers and locusts, and insects of various kinds, flies and moles and ants, gadflies and wasps, and centipedes and millipedes, . . . injure not the vineyard, field, garden, trees or vegetables of the servant of God [name], but be gone into the wild hills and into the barren trees that God has given you for sustenance. [6]

It can be noted here that the exorcism does not actually pray for the destruction of these baneful creatures, but prays only that they should depart to their proper home and cease to molest us. Even rats, hornets, and spiders have their appointed place in God’s dispensation! [7]

Here, by way of contrast, is a prayer by St. Nicodemus of the Holy Mountain (1748–1809) expressing tenderness and compassion for the animals:

Lord Jesus Christ, moved by your tender mercy, take pity on the suffering animals… For if a righteous man takes pity on the souls of his cattle (Prov. 12:10. LXX), how should you not take pity on them, for you created them and you provide for them? In your compassion you did not forget the animals in the ark (Gen. 9:19–20) . . . Through the good health and the plentiful number of oxen and other four-footed beasts, the earth is cultivated and its fruits increase; and your servants, who call upon your name, enjoy in full abundance the produce of their farming. [8]

Many other examples of such prayers for the animals could be quoted, but these are enough to show that Orthodox intercessions are not exclusively anthropocentric but encompass the entire created order. We humans are bound to God and to one another in a cosmic covenant that also includes all the other living creatures on the face of the earth: “I will make for you a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the creeping things of the ground” (Hos. 2:18; cf. Gen. 9:15). [9] We humans are not saved from the world but with the world, and that means with the animals. Moreover, this cosmic covenant is not something that we humans have devised, but it has its source in the divine realm. It is conferred upon us as a gift by God.

A striking illustration of this covenant bond is to be seen in the custom that once prevailed in the Russian countryside; perhaps it still continues today. Returning from the Easter midnight service with their newly kindled Holy Fire, the farmers used to go into the stables with the lighted candle or lantern and greet the horses and cattle with the paschal salutation “Christ is Risen!” The victory of the risen savior over the forces of death and darkness has meaning not only for us humans but also for the animals. For them also Christ has died and risen again. “Now all things are filled with light,” says the hymn at the Easter matins.

Do Animals Have Souls?

St. Nicodemus, in the prayer quoted previously, cites the words of Proverbs 12:10: “The righteous man shows pity for the souls of his cattle.” [10] Does this mean that animals have souls? [11] The answer depends on what precisely we mean by the soul. The Greek word psyche in the ancient world had a wider application than that which is customarily given in the present day to our word “soul.” Aristotle, for example, distinguishes three levels of soul: the vegetable, the animal, and the human. [12] According to this Aristotelian scheme, the vegetable or nutritive soul has the capacity for growth, but not for movement or sensation. The animal soul has the capacity for movement and sensation, but not for conscious thought or reason. Only the human soul is endowed with self-knowledge and the power of logical thinking. For Aristotle, then, psyche means in an inclusive fashion all expressions of life force and vital energy, whereas in contemporary usage we limit the term “soul” to the third level: the human or rational soul. If we today were to speak of potatoes or tomatoes as possessing souls, our remarks would doubtless be considered facetious. But Aristotle was not trying to make a joke.

Employing the term “soul” in a restricted sense, as denoting specifically the self-reflective rational soul, most thinkers in the West – and, on the whole, in the Christian East as well – have denied that animals are ensouled. Descartes held that they are simply intricate machines or automata. In such a view, there is a clear demarcation between human beings and the animal world. Humans alone, it is said, are created in God’s image, and they alone possess immortality, in contrast to “the beasts that perish” (Ps. 48 [49]:12, 20). In modern Greek the horse is called alogon, “lacking logos or reason.” Animals, so it is maintained, cannot form abstract concepts, and so they are unable to construct logical arguments; they lack personal freedom and the faculty of moral choice, for they cannot discern between good and evil but act solely from instinct.

Yet are we in fact justified in making such an emphatic division between ourselves and other animals? (I say “other” because we humans are also animals; we have the same origin as those whom we call “beasts.”) Many of the characteristics that we tend to regard as distinctively human are also to be found, to a varying extent, in other animals as well. This certainly was the view of early Christian writers. “The instinct (physis) that exists in hunting dogs and war horses,” observes Origen (c. 185 – c. 254), “comes near, if I may say so, to reason itself.” [13] We may think of the behavior of a monkey, confronted by a cage with a complicated latch and with a banana inside. Seeking to open the cage, twisting the latch first in one direction and then in another, the monkey is evidently engaged in something closely similar to the process of thinking that a human being would employ in a similar situation. Animals as well as humans try to solve problems.

Origen has in view domesticated animals, but Theophilus of Antioch (late second century) goes further, noting how the instinct in all animals, free-living as well as domesticated, leads them to mate and to care for their offspring: this indicates that they possess “understanding.” [14] Other patristic authors point out that animals share with humans not only a certain degree of reason and understanding but also memory and a wide range of emotions and affections. They display feelings of joy and grief, asserts St. Basil of Caesarea (c. 330–79), and they recognize those whom they have met previously. [15] St. John Climacus (c. 570 – c. 649) adds that they express love for each other, for “they often bewail the loss of their companions.” [16] Indeed, some animals are faithfully monogamous, in a way that all too many humans conspicuously are not.

It is often argued that animals lack the power to articulate speech. Yet as we can see from dolphins, they have other subtle ways of communicating with one another. Ants and bees are capable of social cooperation on an elaborate scale. Animals may not use tools, but they do not simply exist within the world; they actively adapt the environment to their own needs. Birds build nests; beavers construct dams.

Nor is this all. If we are to accept the testimony of scripture, it would seem that animals can sometimes display visionary awareness, perceiving things to which we humans are blind. In the story of Balaam’s ass (Num. 22:21–33), the donkey sees the angel of the Lord blocking the pathway with a drawn sword, whereas Balaam himself is unaware of the angel’s presence. As investigators of the paranormal have often discovered, animals react to unseen “presences” in places reputed to be haunted. May it not be claimed that animals possess, at least in a rudimentary form, psychic insight and a capacity for spiritual intuition?

Instead of making a sharp separation between animals and human beings, would it not be wiser to keep in view the kinship that links us together? Nemesius of Emesa (late fourth century) was surely correct to insist upon the unity of all living things. Sharing as they do the same life force, plants, animals, and humankind belong to the single integrated structure of creation. [17] We and the animals are interdependent, “members one of another” (Eph. 4:25). The world is variegated yet everywhere interconnected. As my history master at school used to say, “It all ties up, you see; it all ties up.”

Can we in fact be sure that animals do not enjoy immortality? At any rate there is good reason to believe that animals will exist in the future age, after the Second Coming of Christ and the general resurrection of the dead. As Isaiah affirms, “the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf and the young lion together, and a little child shall lead them” (Isa. 11:6). When Martin Luther, distressed by the death of his companion dog, was asked whether there would be animals in heaven, he replied, “There will be little dogs with golden hair, shining like precious stones.” [18]

It is not clear, however, whether these animals in the age to come will be the same animals as we have known in this present life. Yet that is at least a possibility; we do not have good grounds for asserting that it could not conceivably be so. Let us leave the question open. Friendship and mutual love contain within themselves an element of eternity. For us to say to another human person, with all our heart, “I love you,” is to say by implication, “You will never die.” If this is true of our love for our fellow humans, may it not be true of our love for animals? Although we are not to love animals in the same way we love our fellow humans, those of us who have experienced the deeply therapeutic effect of a companion animal will certainly recognize that our reciprocal relationship contains within itself intimations of immortality.

Even if animals are not ensouled, they are undoubtedly sentient. They are responsive and vulnerable. As Andrew Linzey rightly says,

animals are not machines or commodities but beings with their own God-given life (nephesh), individuality and personality… Animals are more like gifts than something owned, giving us more than we expect and thus obliging us to return their gifts. Far from decrying these relationships as “sentimental,” “unbalanced,” or “obsessive” (as frequently happens today), churches could point us to their underlying theological significance – as living examples of divine grace. [19]

“Cruelty is atheism,” said Humphrey Primatt in the eighteenth century. “Cruelty is the worst of heresies.” [20] Indeed, not only should we refrain from cruelty to animals, but in a positive way we should seek to do them good, enhancing their pleasure and their unselfconscious happiness. In the words of Starets Zosima in Dostoevsky’s masterwork The Brothers Karamazov: “Love the animals: God has given them the rudiments of thought and an untroubled joy. Do not trouble it, do not torment them, do not go against God’s purpose. Man, do not exalt yourself above the animals; they are sinless, and you, you with all your grandeur, defile the earth through your appearance upon it, and leave traces of your defilement behind you – alas, this is true of almost every one of us!” [21]

Unfortunately, it has to be said that although there can be found within Orthodoxy a rich theology of the animal creation, there exists a sad gap between theory and practice. It cannot be claimed that in traditional Orthodox countries such as Greece, Cyprus, or Romania, animals are better treated than in the non-Orthodox West; indeed, the contrary is regrettably true. We Orthodox need to kneel down before the animals and ask their forgiveness for the evils that we inflict upon them. I have concentrated here on the positive elements in the Orthodox teaching about animals, but we should not ignore the many ways in which we fall short of our pastoral responsibility toward the living creatures, domesticated and free-living, whom God has given us to be our companions.

Dominion or Domination?

“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny?” says Jesus. “Yet not one of them will fall to the ground without your Father’s will” (Matt. 10:29). “Not one of them,” he says: God’s care for his creation, his love for all the things that he has made, is not merely an abstract and generalized love. He cares for each particular creature, for every individual sparrow. But Jesus then goes on to say, “You are of more value than many sparrows” (Matt. 10:31). Every living thing has its unique value in God’s sight, but at the same time we dwell in a hierarchical universe, and some living things have a greater value than others.

The significance of this hierarchy is expressed in a more specific way in God’s creative utterance in the opening chapter of Genesis: “Then God said, ‘Let us make the human being in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth’” (Gen. 1:26). Humans, then, are entrusted by the Creator with authority over the animals. Yet this God-given “dominion” does not signify an arbitrary and tyrannical domination. We must not overlook the explicit reason that is given for this dominion: it is because we are fashioned in the image and likeness of God. That is to say, in the exercise of our dominion over the animals, we are to show the same gentleness and loving compassion that God himself shows toward the whole of his creation. Our dominion is to be God-reflective and Christlike.

How far does this dominion extend? Certainly, it includes the right to use domesticated animals for our service: to employ horses and oxen for plowing, to keep cows for their milk, to breed sheep for their wool. Yet there are definite limits to what we can legitimately do. We should not adopt a narrowly instrumentalist attitude toward animals. We are to respect their characteristic “lifestyles,” allowing them to be themselves. This is scarcely what happens with battery hens! We are not to inflict upon them excessive burdens that cause them exhaustion and suffering. We are to ensure that they are kept warm, clean, and healthy and are properly fed. Only so will our dominion be according to the image of divine compassion.

Does our dominion over the animals entitle us to kill and eat them? In the Orthodox Church, as in other Christian communities, there are many who on serious grounds of conscience refrain from eating animals. But the Orthodox Church as such is not in principle vegetarian. The normal teaching is that animals may indeed be killed and used for food, so long as this killing is done humanely and not wantonly. It is true that in traditional Orthodox monasteries, meat is not eaten in the refectory; fish, however, is allowed. It is also true that during Lent and certain other seasons of the year, all Orthodox Christians, whether monastic or in the “world,” are required to abstain from animal products. But this is not because the eating of animal products is in itself sinful, but because such fasting has disciplinary value, assisting us in our prayer and our spiritual growth. In the Gospels it is stated that Christ ate fish: “They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he ate before them” (Luke 24:41–42). Since he observed the Passover, presumably he also ate meat.

Beasts and Saints

In the lives of Eastern Christian saints – as among the saints of the West, especially in the Celtic tradition – there are numerous stories, often well authenticated, of close fellowship between animals and holy men and women. Such accounts are not to be dismissed as sentimental fairy tales, for they have a definite theological significance. The mutual understanding between animals and humans recalls the situation before the Fall, when the two lived at peace in paradise, and it points forward to the transfiguration of the cosmos at the end-time. In the words of St. Isaac the Syrian (seventh century), “the humble person approaches the wild animals, and the moment they catch sight of him their ferocity is tamed. They come up and cling to him as to their master, wagging their tails and licking his hands and feet. For they smell on him the same smell that came from Adam before the transgression.” [22]

This is not to say that mutual understanding between holy men and free-living animals has always been complete! There is, for example, a story in the Sayings of the Desert Fathers about an unsociable lion: “There was a certain old man, a solitary, who lived near the river Jordan; and going into a cave because of the heat, he found there a lion. The lion began to gnash his teeth and to roar. The old man said to him, ‘What is annoying you? There is plenty of room here for both of us. And if you don’t like it, get up and go away.’ But the lion, not taking it well, left and went outside.” [23]

Many of the twentieth-century stories about humans and animals come from the Holy Mountain of Athos, the chief center of Orthodox monasticism. I recall one such story, told to me many years ago. As the monks in a small hermitage prayed in the early morning, they were much disturbed by the croaking of frogs in the cistern outside their chapel. The spiritual father of the community went out and addressed them: “Frogs! We’ve just finished the Midnight Office and are about to start matins. Would you mind keeping quiet until we’ve finished!” To this the frogs replied, “We’ve just finished matins and are about to begin the First Hour. Would you mind keeping quiet until we’ve finished!”

Compassion for animals is vividly expressed in the writings of a recent Athonite saint, the Russian monk Silouan (1866–1938). “The Lord,” he says, “bestows such rich grace on his chosen ones that they embrace the whole earth, the whole world within their love . . . One day I saw a dead snake on my path which had been chopped into pieces, and each piece writhed convulsively, and I was filled with pity for every living creature, every suffering thing in creation, and I wept bitterly before God.” [24]

Such is in truth the compassionate love that we are called to express toward animals. All too often, they are innocent sufferers, and we should view this undeserved suffering with compunction and sympathy. What harm have they done to us that we should inflict pain and distress upon them? As living beings, sensitive and easily hurt, they are to be viewed as a “thou,” not an “it,” to use Martin Buber’s terminology: not as objects to be exploited and manipulated but as subjects capable of joy and sorrow, of happiness and affliction. They are to be approached with gentleness and tenderness and, more than that, with respect and reverence, for they are precious in God’s sight. As William Blake affirmed, “every thing that lives is holy.” [25]

 

Notes

1. See Philip Sherrard, The Sacred in Life and Art (Ipswich: Golgonooza, 1990), 71–74.

2. Relatively little has been written on the theology of animals from an Orthodox viewpoint. Extensive material on saints and animals in both ancient and modern times can be found in two books by Joanne Stefanatos: Animals and Man: A State of Blessedness (Minneapolis, MN: Light and Life, 1992) and Animals Sanctified: A Spiritual Journey (Minneapolis, MN: Light and Life, 2001). On the non-Orthodox side, compare the classic anthology by Helen Waddell, Beasts and Saints (London: Constable, 1934). There is not much from Eastern Christian sources in the two collections (in other respects, rich and representative) edited by Andrew Linzey, Animal Rites: Liturgies of Animal Care (London: SCM, 1999) and, with Paul Barry Clarke, Animal Rights: A Historical Anthology (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004).

3. A Monk of the Eastern Church [Lev Gillet], Serve the Lord with Gladness: Basic Reflections on the Eucharist and the Priesthood (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1990), 16.

4. The Great Book of Needs (South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1999), vol. 4, 382–83 (translation adapted).

5. N. P. Papadopoulos, ed., Evchologion to Mega (Athens: Saliveros, n.d.), 511.

6. “Exorcism of the Holy Martyr Tryphon,” in The Great Book of Needs, vol. 3, 53 (translation adapted).

7. But at a later point in this same exorcism, it is said that if these creatures fail to obey the command to depart to their own place, “may he [God] kill you with pigs . . . and birds also will be sent by my prayers to devour you” (The Great Book of Needs, vol. 3, 54).

8. “Prayer of St. Modestos,” in Mikron Evchologion i Agiasmatarion (Athens: Apostoliki Diakonia, 1984), 297.

9. See Robert Murray, The Cosmic Covenant: Biblical Themes of Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation (London: Sheed and Ward, 1992).

10. I follow here the text of the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament used at Orthodox church services.

11. See Kallistos Ware, “The Soul in Greek Christianity,” in From Soul to Self, ed. M. James C. Crabbe (London: Routledge, 1999), especially 62–65. For other passages in the Septuagint that mention the “souls” of animals, see, for example, Gen. 1:21 and 1:24 and Leviticus 17:14.

12. See Ware, “The Soul in Greek Christianity,” 55–56.

13. On First Principles 3:1:3.

14. To Antolycus 1:6.

15. Hexaemeron 8:1 (PG 29:165AB).

16. The Ladder of Divine Ascent 26 (PG 88:1028A).

17. On the Nature of Man 1 (ed. Morani, 2:13–14; 3:3–25).

18. William Hazlitt, ed., The Table Talk of Martin Luther (London: H. G. Bohn, 1857), 322.

19. Linzey, Animal Rites, 58.

20. Quoted in Linzey, Animal Rites, 151.

21. Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov, trans. Richard Pervear and Larissa Volokhonsky (New York: Vintage Classics, 1991), 319 (translation adapted).

22. Homily 82, in A. J. Wensinck, trans., Mystic Treatises by Isaac of Nineveh (Amsterdam: Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen, 1923), 386 (translation adapted).

23. Waddell, Beasts and Saints 24 (translation adapted).

24. Archimandrite Sofrony (Sakharov), Saint Silouan the Athonite (Tolleshunt Knights, UK: Stavropegic Monastery of St John the Baptist, 1991), 267, 469. But Silouan also warned against showing excessive affection toward animals (95–96).

25. William Blake, “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell,” in Geoffrey Keynes, ed., Poetry and Prose of William Blake (London: Nonesuch Press, 1948), 193.

 

References

Archimandrite Sofrony (Sakharov). Saint Silouan the Athonite. Tolleshunt Knights, UK: Stavropegic Monastery of St John the Baptist, 1991.

Blake, William. “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.” In Poetry and Prose of William Blake, edited by Geoffrey Keynes. London: Nonesuch Press, 1948.

Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Brothers Karamazov. Translated by Richard Pervear and Larissa Volokhonsky. New York: Vintage Classics, 1991.

The Great Book of Needs. South Canaan, PA: St. Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1999.

Hazlitt, William, ed. The Table Talk of Martin Luther. London: H. G. Bohn, 1857.

Linzey, Andrew. Animal Rites: Liturgies of Animal Care. London: SCM, 1999.

Linzey, Andrew, and Paul Barry Clarke. Animal Rights: A Historical Anthology. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004.

Mikron Evchologion i Agiasmatarion. Athens: Apostoliki Diakonia, 1984.

A Monk of the Eastern Church [Lev Gillet]. Serve the Lord with Gladness: Basic Reflections on the Eucharist and the Priesthood. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1990.

Murray, Robert. The Cosmic Covenant: Biblical Themes of Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation. London: Sheed and Ward, 1992.

Papadopoulos, N. P., ed. Evchologion to Mega. Athens: Saliveros, n.d.

Sherrard, Philip. The Sacred in Life and Art. Ipswich: Golgonooza, 1990.

Stefanatos, Joanne. Animals and Man: A State of Blessedness. Minneapolis, MN: Light and Life, 1992.

Stefanatos, Joanne. Animals Sanctified: A Spiritual Journey. Minneapolis, MN: Light and Life, 2001.

Waddell, Helen. Beasts and Saints. London: Constable, 1934.

Ware, Kallistos. “The Soul in Greek Christianity.” In From Soul to Self, edited by M. James C. Crabbe. London: Routledge, 1999.

Wensinck, A. J., trans. Mystic Treatises by Isaac of Nineveh. Amsterdam: Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen, 1923.

 

Source: The Routledge Handbook of Religion and Animal Ethics, edited by Andrew Linzey and Clair Linzey, Routledge, London, 2019, pp. 127-135.

On the Occasion of his nameday - "Metropolitan Pavlos of the G.O.C.: The Witness and Martyrdom of a Venerable Hierarch"

 By Theodore Kalmoukos | The National Herald – The Magazine | March 19-20, 2011

A life of witness and martyrdom. Concepts identical throughout the course of his life. He sensed beforehand and tasted in advance death, that last enemy of us all, but he managed to outwit it by the strength of his soul and of prayer, which can raise even the dead.

Confined to a wheelchair by a severe stroke he suffered five years ago, which brought him to the threshold of death, yet with his soul, as always, unfettered and unenslaved, strong and prayerful, 56-year-old Pavlos Stratigeas, the Metropolitan of the Genuine Orthodox Christians of North and South America, received The National Herald with much love and honor in his residence, which is located next to the Cathedral of Saint Markella.

Metropolitan Pavlos’s quarters, which also serve as his office, are simple and unadorned, with the pronounced characteristics of a monastic cell. Over his inner cassock we could see the pectoral emblem, embroidered with the Precious Cross, worn by monks of the Great Schema, a constant reminder that Metropolitan Pavlos Stratigeas, above and beyond everything else, is a monk in the literal sense of the term; that is, he represents what genuine monasticism ought to be: an unceasing witness to the joyful mourning of the Church.

His life, his course, his work, his witness and his martyrdom are known to the Greek-American community, of which he is its own offshoot, flesh of its flesh and bone of its bones, that is, its own child. He was born in Astoria, New York, on September 26, 1955, to his pious and God-fearing parents, Panagiotis and Maria Stratigeas, who raised him “in the discipline and admonition of the Lord.”

From his earliest infancy he was led into the Church, which he experienced in his childhood and youth, being nurtured by his ever-memorable uncle, the G.O.C. Bishop of Astoria, Petros Astyfides, whom he has now succeeded in the Metropolis.

After primary school in New York, he went to the American School in Halandri, Athens. Then, in 1974, he entered the Theological School of the University of Athens, from which he graduated in 1978. On November 17, 1978, he entered the Monastic Brotherhood of Saint Markella, while on the Sunday of Pentecost in 1979 he was tonsured a monk by Bishop Petros. One year later, on the Sunday of Pentecost in 1980, he was ordained deacon, and in 1985, again on the Sunday of Pentecost, he was ordained presbyter and was awarded the office of Archimandrite. The young cleric Pavlos developed noteworthy activity in the preaching, catechetical, philanthropic, and pastoral fields of the then G.O.C. Diocese of Astoria under Bishop Petros. From 1981 Metropolitan Pavlos began giving theological talks every Monday evening after Vespers, which he continues to this day.

On February 6, 1998, he was elected Metropolitan of the Genuine Orthodox Christians of North and South America by the Synod of the Church of the G.O.C. of Greece. His consecration took place in Athens on February 13 by the ever-memorable Archbishop Chrysostomos.

The G.O.C. Metropolis of America under Metropolitan Pavlos, with its seat at the Cathedral of Saint Markella in Astoria, consists of fifteen parishes throughout the United States, such as in Florida, Chicago, Detroit, and several monasteries, among which is the Monastery of the Ascension of the Lord in Bearsville, New York, where seven monks reside. The metropolis has twenty priests and one auxiliary bishop, Christodoulos of Theoupolis, of whom Metropolitan Pavlos said that “he is my right hand.”

We began our conversation by pointing out that we were surprised by his knowledge of the Greek language and how he had learned it so perfectly. His eyes flashed at once and he said, “My parents were from Greece, my father from Mani and my mother from Chios, and they spoke Greek to me,” adding that “I learned Greek more from my uncle Petros; we always spoke Greek.”

To the question, “What do you remember most about your uncle, Bishop Petros?” Metropolitan Pavlos, readily and without delay, said, “I remember our Christ,” and added, “He spoke to me and taught me continually about Christ. I do not know how to say it, but my uncle planted me with our Christ.”

To the related question of what kind of man Bishop Petros was, he said that he was “a man of religion, of love, of sacrifice.” He also said that his uncle Petros “came to America in 1951 and was at first at the Church of Saint Nicholas in Manhattan, which was destroyed by the terrorist attack on September 11, 2011,” and added that “the Church of Saint Nicholas was on the Old Festal Calendar then.”

He also said that “Bishop Petros was a wonderful man.”

He said that the G.O.C. Metropolis of North and South America “is progressing very well with the help of God.” To the question of how you support yourselves financially, whether you have dues, he said, “No, we do not have dues; we are supported by the love of the people. People give whatever each one wishes.”

To the follow-up question whether they charge for the performance of the Mysteries, Metropolitan Pavlos looked with an expression of surprise and said, “No, no.”

The information obtained by The National Herald indicates that if a Greek-American knocks on Metropolitan Pavlos’s door and says to him, “I want to baptize my child, but I have no money,” Pavlos opens his arms, congratulates him for making his child a child of Christ, baptizes the child, and in addition helps the family as much as he can.

It was inevitable that our conversation would turn to Theology, since, after all, it is a fact that Metropolitan Pavlos is educated and has a theological formation. And so, when we asked him what the Church is for him, he said that “the Orthodox Church is everything, the Alpha and the Omega,” while the priesthood, as he said, “is everything to me.”

If Metropolitan Pavlos were beginning his life today, he would again become a priest. He also said, “Of course I would become a priest, nothing else,” and added: “But I would not become a Bishop, because the work of a Bishop is heavy; I am not worthy to bear such a weight upon myself.”

His companions in his residence are the icons of Christ and of the Panagia, the photograph of his uncle, the ever-memorable Bishop Petros, and a photograph of Hagia Sophia, the great church of the Greek Nation.

When we asked him what Hellenism is for him, he said “everything,” and, pointing to Hagia Sophia, stated that “I live and breathe Constantinople.”

When we referred to the Greek-American community, Metropolitan Pavlos teared up, struggled a little, and said that “the Greek-American community is everything; I can give my life entirely for the Greek-American community.” He celebrates the Liturgy in the Cathedral of Saint Markella, as he said, “in Greek, only in the Greek language,” and emphasized that “Orthodoxy and Hellenism are one thing.”

Regarding whether faithful who were born in America also attend church, and whether they complain that he does not chant in English, he said that “of course people born here attend church; no, they do not complain that the Liturgy is in Greek.”

For the past five years Metropolitan Pavlos has been climbing his own personal Golgotha, laden with a heavy cross upon his shoulders because of the stroke he suffered. He walks the road of martyrdom with steadfastness and great patience, and continually glorifies the name of God for his remarkable recovery and healing. He has regained his speech, since he had been in a coma for months, and now expresses himself correctly, with clear thought and flowing speech, though not without small difficulties, which, however, he overcomes by stopping for a few seconds to think and articulate his words. With each passing day he continues to improve and walks the path toward full recovery.

He remembered and recounted to us everything that had happened to him: “My office was not here, but was across the way, and I felt a disturbance within me. I called Fr. Nektarios and said to him, ‘Come, because I want to confess.’ I told him everything, I confessed, and at the end I also said to him, ‘And now, Fr. Nektarios, I am going to die.’ I understood that I was ready for death. I said to Fr. Nektarios, ‘I am going to depart from this world; forgive me. I do not know how I will face our Christ,’ and immediately I fainted.”

At this point he stopped for a moment and fixed his gaze on the icon of Christ, smiling at Him in an attitude of prayerful thanksgiving.

He also said, “I lost consciousness; when I woke up I was in the hospital. I was in a coma for four months, but when I woke up, I realized what had happened.”

To the question whether there came moments when he said, “Ah, my God, why?” he said, “I confess to you at this moment with all my heart: I felt our Christ within my soul; I am telling you the truth,” and added that “I was saying, and I always say, may Thy will be done, my God.”

He found and continues to find balm and consolation for his pain and great trial in prayer. Metropolitan Pavlos’s beloved prayer is the prayer of the heart: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me.” “From morning until evening I would say the prayer,” he said.

To the question of how he feels today, he did not answer immediately, but turned his gaze to the icon of Christ and to the photograph of Hagia Sophia and said that “I feel well,” and added that “when Christ calls me, I am ready to depart at once.”

Asked whether this trial has changed him as a person and as a cleric, he said, “Yes, it changed me; it has brought me closer to our Christ.” He further added, “I love Christ to the utmost possible degree,” and, looking at the icon of Christ, he smiled at Him.

He confessed that “I see life differently,” while to the question whether there come moments when he asks why there is pain in our life, he said, “There is an answer to that,” and clarified that “pain is man’s inheritance; all the saints without exception, such as Saint Catherine, Saint George, Saint Spyridon, and Saint Anthony the Great, suffered pain in their lives.”

To the question whether pain is a scandal, why man must suffer, he said that “we must suffer because the devil wars against man very greatly,” and added that “our Christ suffered upon the Cross.”

Regarding whether he fears death, he said, “No, I do not fear death in itself; I fear what we will encounter after death.”

When we asked him about some things that marked his life, he said, “my studies in Athens, and I must tell you that I love the University of Athens very much; you cannot imagine what the University of Athens was for me,” while he added that “the greatest university, however, is the Church, and my professors are the saints, all of whom I love, but Saint John Chrysostom has a special place in my heart,” and he added that “I have studied all his works.”

He also said, “I also love Basil the Great, and indeed in my first year of Theology I wanted to take his name. I was reading his work for young people, ‘Address on How to Derive Benefit from Greek Literature.’”

“I did not know Greek; of course I spoke it and chanted in church, but I did not know advanced Greek, and when I read this book by Basil the Great, I was astonished.”

At this point he stopped for a few minutes, looked at the icon of Christ and at Hagia Sophia, and said, “You cannot imagine how much I enjoy this conversation,” and continued, “When I read the first page of Basil the Great’s book, I understood that I needed help. I sat down and read the book once, twice, three times, five times, and I said to Basil the Great, ‘Please help me learn Greek.’”

Metropolitan Pavlos’s secular name was Peter. “I said to my uncle, ‘Give me the name Basil when you ordain me,’ and he answered, ‘Whatever the Holy Spirit enlightens me to do at that moment,’ and he gave me the name Pavlos.”

Metropolitan Pavlos has not fulfilled all his dreams. He said, “I have one great dream: I want to build Hagia Sophia up in the mountains at the Monastery; it is a two-hour drive from here. I will die; my successors will build Hagia Sophia. This is my legacy.”

His desire is to establish a Greek Day School, but as he said, “unfortunately, I do not have the means.”

Metropolitan Pavlos begins his day at 5 o’clock in the morning, says twelve prayer ropes, then reads the Holy Scripture, and afterward the Service.

Many Greek-Americans visit the Cathedral of Saint Markella and Metropolitan Pavlos daily. To the question of what people say to him, he said, “they are seeking our Christ; they are searching for our Christ.”

His desire is for the Calendar issue to be resolved. He said, “I want a Pan-Orthodox Council to take place and for this issue to be resolved.”

Greek source: Εθνικός Κήρυκας, Το Περιοδικό, Saturday, March 19 – Sunday, March 20, 2011.

Online: https://s3.amazonaws.com/ekpdf/periodiko/pdf/2011/0319_20/0319_20.pdf

The Holy Apostles Peter and Paul Vis-à-vis Pagan Authorities

Bishop Klemes of Gardikion

[Currently Metropolitan of Larissa and Platamon]

 

 

1. The Church, as the “new creation,” [1] as the “body of Christ,” [2] faithful to Her universal and eternal mission and to Her Theanthropic character, from the outset showed Herself distinct from the spirit of the Roman state. [3] She was and has remained a purely spiritual and religious entity, and not a political movement.

However, in Her advent in history, it was necessary that She be incorporated peaceably into the social environment, for the purpose of transforming and sanctifying it. She was dispersed throughout a world that it was Her calling to conform to the Church, within a universal Empire. This secular power was at times indifferent towards her—this was usually the case—and at times at enmity with Her; and this resulted in difficulties in the shaping of Her relations with the power structures and forces of the surrounding world.

The establishment of relations between the members of the Church and the pagan state was a delicate and difficult matter, for which the Holy Apostles, with the aid of the Holy Spirit, had to formulate various general principles of outlook and behavior toward the state.

Relations between Church and state, we might say, were pro forma, based as they were upon the well-known pithy words of our Lord Jesus Christ in the Holy Gospel: “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.” [4] What does this saying mean?

To those who posed to Him the question as to whether or not they must pay tribute to Caesar, with the purpose of ensnaring Him, our Lord gave a silencing answer filled with Divine wisdom and inspiration, of value and importance even in our times.

He exhorted subjects to submit to their respective rulers only in that which is required, namely, payment of taxes and, in general, faithful observance and fulfillment of one’s obligations to the civil authorities, without compromise in matters of faith. [5] At the same time, He emphasized the obligation of offering up to God whatsoever belongs to Him, namely, faith, obedience, and adoration. The obligations of subjects toward the state are not necessarily at odds with devotional duties toward the true God. Obligations toward the state and one’s duties before God must be combined, and these two clearly distinct spheres, state and Church, need not be incompatible; because the authority of Caesar, as long as it is not given equal weight, can be considered not contrary to, but consonant with, the order of human affairs permitted by God. [6]

Indeed, in practice, when rulers are good and conscientious, the Lord’s injunction is easily put into practice. However, when bad rulers abuse their authority and show open hostility toward the Divine Law, and when, in general, the civil authorities fight and speak impudently against God, the Church will ineluctably be at conflict with the state, either through passive resistance or overt defiance, that the Divine commandment be neither breached nor trampled upon. [7]

One must not forget that our Lord said also that, “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword,” [8] which in this case means that, when the state demands for itself that which is proper to God, then peaceful cooperation and submission to this unlawful demand are no longer permissible. The state is not an illimitable and Divine institution, such that it can place itself on the same level as the Kingdom of God, but a temporal reality, [9] with a mission that is relative rather than absolute, inasmuch as it sees to the administration of human affairs of this transitory life.

2. In view of the foregoing, we may more easily trace the solution that the Holy Apostles—indeed, the chief Apostles Peter and Paul—gave on the issue of defining relations between the Church and the pagan state, and may also correctly grasp its significance.

We may note at the outset that the imperial and polytheistic Roman state showed a general tolerance toward various religions, but a specific kind of religious tolerance. It impressed upon its subjects its organizational structure and its emphasis on establishing justice and on the safeguarding of what was known as the Pax Romana, or the peaceful and undisturbed life of the people under its rule. This was seen as a way to maintain stability, but it was also an impediment to the manifestation of the mystery of iniquity. [10]

However, the Roman state was at the same time inseparably bound up with religion, and the Emperor was deemed worthy of being accorded divine honors on the part of his subjects, since the Romans had inherited and developed the theocratic idea of the divinization of the secular authorities, which was prevalent in the East. [11] This was of course completely unacceptable to Christians, and when an attempt was made to impose emperor- worship on them, they preferred rather to undergo glorious martyrdom.

Within this political and religious context and atmosphere, the Apostle Paul, a Roman citizen who had for the most part gained a rather positive impression of the Roman authorities’ conduct, had recourse to the authorities when he was relentlessly persecuted by the Jews. [12] In so doing, he wished to accomplish something significant that would delineate the [proper] stance toward the civil authorities. Since the Church was in Her infancy and many newly-converted Christians were somewhat hostile toward the pagan state and had revolutionary tendencies—especially on account of economic and social setbacks—the Apostle to the Gentiles was not slow to stress, in his Epistle to the Romans, the Divine provenance of secular authority and one’s duty to submit thereto. [13] For, if there were to be a revolutionary movement against it involving Christians, the penalties and consequences would be frightful. [14] For this reason, the Apostle emphasizes tellingly:

Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: for he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. For for this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God’s ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour. [15]

In this passage, the Divine origin of secular power is portrayed as deriving indirectly from God, and not, of course, being Divine by nature, since it belongs to the natural order of this world. [16] The existence of authority and power, according to St. Isidore of Pelusium, is “a work of God’s wisdom..., that the world might not descend into chaos.” [17] Hence, the Christian is obliged to submit to it, because it is permitted by God and exists for the sake of order and justice, for the purpose of punishing only transgressors, and not those who keep the law.

However, it is worth noting that it is not the person of the ruler, but the impersonal institution of the state, that draws its authority from God, as an organization necessary for the maintenance and preservation of society; the holy Chrysostomos expresses this lucidly: “He did not say, ‘There is no ruler who is not of God’; rather, it is the act he speaks of, saying, ‘There is no authority that is not of God.’ [18] For, if some “wicked man” (as St. Isidore expresses it) should rise to power by whatever means possible, it does not follow that such an individual has been instated or “ordained” by God! [19] That there should be civil authority, therefore, is a work of God, while the election and instatement of rulers is a human task. This is why, when the persecutions of Christians began after a few years, the first Apologists and Martyrs of the Faith by no means accepted their persecutors as having been instated by God. Furthermore, in the sacred Apocalypse [20] the Roman State, by this time no longer tolerating, but openly and relentlessly persecuting the Church, is identified with the Antichrist.

It is clear that the Apostle Paul respects the state, within the spirit of the Gospels, yet does not treat it as absolute, considering it rather an entity of secondary importance for the present life, because he emphasizes that our true commonwealth is in the Heavens, [21] in the city to come, [22] in so far as, in the Church, we become “fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.” [23]

The divine Apostle elsewhere exhorts that prayer be made for all mankind, and especially “for kings and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.” [24] For, when the rulers thrive and prosper, the subjects receive benefit, and peace and welfare will prevail.

However, the Apostle Paul, despite all that he asserts, does not pardon the evil and depraved state, supposedly spuming resistance against it, as one might think.

Elsewhere he dissuades Christians from having recourse to secular tribunals to resolve their differences; [25] this clearly signifies resistance against the depraved state, whose juridicial authority he does not acknowledge, [26] or, at any rate, he views it as unworthy and unfit to resolve differences between believing Christians.

Furthermore, in another place he urges the faithful, “Be not ye the servants of men”; [27] i.e., do not trust and obey the commands of ruthless men whose desire it is to divert you from the path of the Lord, [28] even if such disobedience brings penalties.

In yet another place, the Divine Apostle says categorically, “[F]or if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ”; [29] he sacrificed all things in order to be pleasing to God, and not to men opposed to the Divine teaching.

Yet again, “the word of God is not bound,” [30] even if some ruthless secular power desires to silence and eliminate it.

The Holy Apostle also urges his disciple Titus: “Put them [the faithful] in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work”; [31] blessed Theodoretos of Cyrrhos interprets it as follows: “One is not required to obey the rulers in everything; but to offer them tax and tribute and show them due honor, and yet to object forthrightly if they give an impious command.” [32]

All the things that the Apostle Paul mentions in the Epistle to the Hebrews are also well-known as a clear description of the resistance “through faith” [33] of the righteous of old even to the point of martyrdom at the impious commands of oppressive authorities. [34] And the martyric end of the Apostle himself in Rome shows plainly his resistance unto death under the godless secular authority, toward which there can be neither compromise nor acquiescence.

The result, then, is that those who hold secular power are of God only when they fulfill the obligations that He has laid upon them. Only the government that fulfills its intended purpose can be considered to be established by God. When it acts contrary to His Divine Will, it submits to Satan, who boasted to the Lord on the Mountain of Temptation that worldly power had been given to him. [35] Hence, there is required a judgment and decision, made freely according to one’s conscience, [36] as to how much the Divine origin of the secular powers applies in any given place and time. St. Basil the Great summarizes this for us well, saying that the Christian submits only to those higher authorities “in whom no commandment of God is obstructed.” [37]

3. The other leader of the Apostles, the great St. Peter, encourages the same outlook as the foregoing:

Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well—Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king. [38]

It is clear that this is in accord with what the Apostle Paul teaches, except that here the secular powers are characterized as human inventions (human creations), while the Divine Paul views them as deriving from God.

It is worthy of note that the Apostle Peter wrote these things when the Roman state had already begun to persecute the Christian Faith. The Apostle wished nonetheless that the work of evangelization not be hindered by a negative stance toward the government; moreover, he had always before him the eloquent example of the Divine Teacher and Savior, Who surrendered Himself to the Cross with prayer and forgiveness. [39] It still had to become apparent that Christians were neither seditious nor harmful, but willing and peaceable subjects.

Yet, the Apostle Peter’s own example, when, refusing to obey and to stop preaching, he uttered the famous words, “We ought to obey God rather than men,” [40] remained a concise statement of his stance toward every authority that exceeds its bounds in demanding the violation and transgression of the Divine commandments. This is why the exhortation to submit applies only as long as the government does not encroach on the religious conscience of each of its citizens or subjects and does not, in practice or commands, move in the direction of anything contrary to the Divine Teaching. Any unlawful demand that corrupts consciences and tramples upon the Divine commandments is to be met with heroic and resolute refusal and witness. Through his glorious martyrdom, the Apostle Peter amply demonstrated the truth and validity of these views.

4. In summary, we can say, in concord with the teaching of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, that, when the secular state, in its laws and decrees, is found to be in harmony with the Divine Will and justice, then we are obliged to show obedience. When, however, its laws are unjust and clash with the natural law—or, more importantly, with Divine justice—then we must refuse to conform to them. The Christian fears God alone, and not—using Tertullian’s words—His “subordinate”; i.e., the earthly ruler. [41]

Concluding, we would like to show how these ideas are relevant to our day, pointedly stressing the following:

The Church can never—and especially not in our times—remain indifferent toward deplorable social injustice or, more generally, toward the materialistic spirit of self-gratification that impoverishes mankind physically and morally, bodily and spiritually. Indeed, for the sake of securing the benefits of the few and arousing the passions, thousands of innocent souls are becoming the victim of severe poverty and despair, especially in our homeland [Greece]—those around us! But the danger of falling to solutions driven by anger, which, however, lead to nightmarish and pagan totalitarianism or neo-Nazism, is already more than a reality.

It is of the utmost necessity that the Church, by means of its conscientious members, aside from carrying out necessary charitable works, engage in a struggle for the amelioration of corrupt political and social life through the democratic election of genuine Christian rulers who will, as servants of God and in accordance with His Will, [42] use their authority within the political domain, as it has been shaped and as it functions, to counter conditions therein that are unconducive to the Will of God. In the meantime, the misdeeds of evil and unworthy rulers must be censured, not by public ridicule, but by reproving and dissuading them, in that the Body of the Church may be enlightened to resist sinful demands from secular authorities that patently violate the Divine Will. (Take, for instance, the recent abolition of Sunday as a day of rest from work [in Greece].) This does not constitute impermissible political activity and entanglement with non-religious affairs, but a prophetic mission of redemptive significance for man, even if it brings sorrow and anguish, or even martyrdom.

 

Notes

1. Galatians 6:15; II Corinthians 5:17.

2. Ephesians 1:23; Colossians 1:18.

3. See Protopresbyter George Metallinos, “«Εκκλησία καί Πολιτεία» στην ορθόδοξη παράδοση,” in Ή Εκκλησία μέσα στον κόσμο, second edition (Athens: Apostolike Diakonia, 1999), pp. 44-45.

4. St. Matthew 22:21; St. Mark 12:17; St. Luke 20:25.

5. “When you hear, ‘Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,’ know that this refers only to those things that do not violate the faith” (St. John Chrysostomos, “Homily 70, On St. Matthew’s Gospel,”’ §2, Pa- trologia Grceca, Vol. LVIII, col. 656). Shortly before that, our Holy Father writes: “It is possible both to carry out the orders of men and to give to God those things He requires of us” (ibid.).

6. See Archimadrite Antonios G. Kompos [Metropolitan of Sisanion and Siatista], Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία κατά τήν Καινήν Αιαθήκην (doctoral dissertation) (Athens: 1969), pp. 78-81.

7. Ibid., pp. 81-82.

8. St. Matthew 10:34.

9. See Kompos, Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία, p. 88.

10. Ibid., ρρ. 105 and 108, with reference to II Thessalonians 2:3-10.

11. Ibid.,pp. 97-100.

12. Consider the persecutions the Apostle Paul suffered in Paphos, Philippi, Thessalonica, Corinth, Jerusalem, Rome, etc. (Acts 13:6ff., 16:35— 40,17:6ff., 18:12-17, 22:25-29, 23:10,17-35, 24:22-23, 25:3-5,11-12, 16-18,21,25-27,26:31-32).

13. Romans 13:1-7.

14. See Kompos, Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία, pp. 106-108.

15. Romans 13:1-7.

16. Kompos, Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία, ρ. 108, η. 309.

17. “Epistle CCXVI, ‘To Dionysios’” (Second Book of Epistles), Pa- trologia Grceca, Vol. LXXVII, cols. 657D-660BC.

18. “Homily XXIII, On the Epistle to the Romans,”’ §1, Patrologia Grceca, Vol. LX, col. 615.

19. “Epistle CCXVI, ‘To Dionysios,”’ cols. 657D-660BC.

20. See chapter 13, in particular.

21. Philippians 3:20.

22. Hebrews 13:14.

23. Ephesians 2:19.

24.1 St. Timothy 2:1.

25. See I Corinthians 6:1-6.

26. See Kompos, Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία, pp. 113-114.

27.1 Corinthians 7:23.

28. St. John of Damascus explains it thus: “The free man will not be free when he is served by men and does everything to please them” (“On the First Epistle to the Corinthians,” Patrologia Grceca, Vol. XCV, cols. 625D-628A).

29. Galatians 1:10.

30. II St. Timothy 2:9.

31. St. Titus 3:1.

32. “Interpretation of the Epistle to Titus,” chap. 3, §1, Patrologia Grceca, Vol. LXXXII, col. 868A.

33. Hebrews 11:33—Trans.

34. See Hebrews 11:35-37,12:3,25,13:6.

35. See St. Luke 4:6.

36. Cf Romans 13:5.

37. “Morals,” Rule LXXIX, chap. 1, Patrologia Gmca, Vol. XXXI, col. 860B.

38.1 St. Peter 2:13-14,17.

39. See Kompos, Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία, ρ. 120.

40. Acts 5:29.

41. See Kompos, Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία, ρ. 135. St. John Chrysostomos comments even more tersely: “Should the king require the citizen to perform some evil deed, full of wickedness, then who is a good and obedient citizen? He who not only does not yield and obey, but also endeavors to dissuade the one who gave the command, even at the risk of his life” (“On Virtue and Vice,” Patrologia Grceca, Vol. LXIII, col. 762).

42. See Kompos, Θρησκευτική και Κοσμική Εξουσία, ρ. 137.

 

Source: Orthodox Tradition, Vol. XXXII (2015), No. 3, pp. 10-18.