David
The daily readings during Lent are from the Old Testament. Specifically, from Genesis, Proverbs, and Isaiah.
I have been thinking about the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. What does it signify? Why was eating of it bad?
If we read the other extant creation stories of the Middle East, the Tree of Life appears in them, which represents God’s intention, and Man’s desire for immortality. But, interestingly, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil only appears in the Hebrew story of Creation.
Many interpretations of this Tree exist, but the one that seems to most plausible to me is that… Continue reading
As an Orthodox Christian who holds a deep appreciation for the Christian Roman Republic while also cherishing the principles of Jeffersonian federal democracy, I find myself reflecting on the complexities of governance in both contexts. Many in the Orthodox community tend to romanticize monarchy, often overlooking the fact that the Christian Roman Empire was fundamentally a republic—a monarchical republic, to be sure, but one that most Byzantines viewed as a system of shared governance rather than an absolute monarchy. This system was not solely sacred; it also embraced secular elements, balancing divine authority with practical administration. Moreover, the dangers of democratic majoritarian rule were recognized… Continue reading
As we approach Great Lent, the Orthodox Christian Church offers a series of Sundays that lead us into this sacred season. Each Sunday serves as a poignant reminder of our spiritual journey and invites us to reflect on our lives, our relationship with God, and the call to repentance and humility. Through the stories and teachings of these Sundays, the Church emphasizes themes of redemption, self-examination, and the love of Christ, encouraging us to prepare our hearts for the transformative experience of Lent.
Zaccheus Sunday introduces us to the story of Zaccheus, a tax collector who climbs a sycamore tree to see Jesus as He… Continue reading
Yesterday, February 23, we celebrated the feast day of St. Polycarp, a revered Bishop of Smyrna and one of the earliest Church fathers and martyrs, who lived from 69 to 155 AD. His significance as a witness to the faith is profound, particularly because he was taught by the original Apostles, especially St. John, and had conversed with those who had witnessed Jesus Christ. St. Polycarp received his episcopate directly from the Apostles, making his teachings a vital link to the early Church.
As an Orthodox Christian, I find great inspiration in Polycarp’s writings, especially his Epistle to the Philippians. His insights were pivotal in… Continue reading
In the life of the Church, controversies often arise that can be challenging to navigate, especially for those without access to a library filled with the writings of the Church Fathers and the rich history of the Church. One such pressing issue is how to receive converts who have been baptized in heterodox communions into the Orthodox Church. This question raises fundamental concerns: Should these individuals be baptized again? Should they be received through chrismation? Or is it sufficient for them to confess their faith, renounce their previous beliefs, and partake in the Eucharist?
Historically, the Orthodox Church has maintained the norm of receiving those… Continue reading
In the realm of Orthodox Christianity, discussions surrounding baptism and the nature of sacraments can be deeply polarizing. A particularly contentious issue arose within the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR) during the leadership of Metropolitan Philaret (Voznesensky), who was First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia from 1964 until 1985 regarding the practice of corrective baptism. This practice involves rebaptizing individuals who were previously received into the Church through chrismation, often due to concerns about the validity of their initial reception.
The Context of Corrective Baptism
Corrective baptism, in this instance, refers to the rebaptism of those who had been chrismated,… Continue reading
In American Orthodoxy over the last several decades, a contentious issue has emerged regarding the reception of converts from other Christian communions into the Orthodox Church.
Some individuals advocate for the baptism of virtually every Christian, while the majority of Orthodox Christians in America adhere to the traditional belief and practice upheld by nearly all Orthodox jurisdictions worldwide. This practice has deep historical roots, dating back to the earliest centuries of the Church. The issue was notably settled in the third century during the debates between Sts. Stephen and Cyprian. It was further solidified when the phrase “I believe in one baptism” was added to… Continue reading
In order for this book to be the “patristic consensus and criteria for Orthodoxy” that it purports to be, in spite of the fact that most of Orthodoxy believes differently on these issues, you only have to accept that:
-The Apostolic Canons refer indiscriminately to all heretics rather than just to the non-trinitarian heretics at the time they were written, against the position of Orthodoxy’s great medieval and modern canonists (Balsamon, Zonaras, Milas, etc.).
-You have to accept that St. Cyprian won the debate against St. Stephen regarding the reception of the heterodox, against the testimony of all the Church fathers who commented on it… Continue reading
Few books are as popular in sacramentally rigorist circles as the Pedalion, or The Rudder. It has an extremely high status, particularly among young new converts eager to learn all they can as quickly as they can about the Orthodox Faith. Often, zealous individuals will read portions of the Rudder and conclude that most Orthodox bishops “are doing it wrong” when receiving converts to the Church.
Yet, the Rudder is not universally received in the Orthodox Church nor is it an authoritative source for canon law. Neither is the peculiar and theologically modern interpretive lens it offers with the economia vs. akrivia theory which is… Continue reading
This last Sunday was the Feast of St. Luke. It was more than coincidence I think that I happened across a couple of verses from his Gospel that I look at very differently now than when I was a Protestant.
The verses in question are Luke 11:27-28, “As he said this, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, ‘Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you nursed!’ But he said, ‘Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!’”
In my Baptist days, I was taught that this cut across Roman Catholic… Continue reading
Started reading Amos last night. I decided to try something different and after reading the first chapter I went ahead and read the last chapter.
In chapter one, the prophet says he is going to give a prophecy against Jerusalem, the capital of the southern Jewish Kingdom. Yet I know from having studied Amos before that although he himself was a southerner, he had traveled north to the breakaway northern Kingdom to give oracles against them. Perhaps that means in God’s eyes there was still but one Kingdom? Or perhaps the northern Kingdom was too far gone and the southern still had time to repent?… Continue reading
Lenten Reading: On the Lord’s Prayer published by SVS Press.
We have extant three pre-Nicene treatises explaining the meaning of the petitions in the Our Father which the early Christians were encouraged to pray very often.
They are all in this volume: Tertullian, Origen, and St. Cyprian of Carthage.
One of the more enigmatic petitions in the Lord’s Prayer is, “Lead us not into temptation”. What does this mean?
How can God lead us into temptation when James said, “When temptations come, let no one say, “I am tempted by God,” because God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one.” (James… Continue reading
Finished up Tobit the night before last. It is always a favorite book to reread because it is such a good story, it has a strong Christological spiritual sense, and it is one of the few places in the Scriptures where dogs are given a positive presence.
In most other places in the Bible, dogs get a bad rap. To be called a dog, a dog’s head, or a dead dog was an insult. Dogs were unclean and ate unclean things- sometimes even human carrion. Apparently, packs of feral dogs roamed in urban areas back then (Ps. 58:7, 15 and Ps. 21:17, 21 [that’s Psalms… Continue reading
A RC in one of my forums asked why Orthodox find Purgatory objectionable when we also pray for our departed:
One chief difference between the RC and Orthodox views on the Intermediate State is that we don’t go for the whole purgatorial fires thing.
In RC purgatory, forgiven sins are still being punished in some way, while in the Orthodox view forgiven sins are forgiven and the damage it caused is being healed in a place of refreshment. RC descriptions of purgatory, especially before Vatican 2 often presented it as horrible as hell but just with a time limit. We do not accept such a… Continue reading
The Book of Esther comes to us in two versions. There is the Hebrew Masoretic Text and the Greek Septuagint. The Greek is a bit longer as it has additions to the text, mostly in the form of prayers from Mordecai and Esther (as well as Mordecai’s prophetic dream in the first chapter and his remembering it in the last).
For centuries, the Jews debated whether Esther was even inspired Scripture because in the Hebrew version there are no explicit references to God. The Greek additions seem to be a conscious corrective to that lack.
I like having both versions in front of me. The… Continue reading
