Development of doctrine

[Mina Mounir]

Dear Fathers and friends,
I was reading about the Development of doctrine , but all the availabe sites on the internet talk about the western different perspectives , how does the east see it ?
thanks !
(note : here's Henry Newman's essay about it : http://www.newmanreader.org/works/development/)

[Herman Blaydoe]

Dear Fathers and friends,
I was reading about the Development of doctrine , but all the availabe sites on the internet talk about the western different perspectives , how does the east see it ?
thanks !
(note : here's Henry Newman's essay about it : http://www.newmanreader.org/works/development/)

As I understand it, we don't see it. Truth is not a development. It is not a series of statements, a compilation of "facts", nor an analysis of precedents. Truth is a person, Christ Jesus, who revealed Himself to His Apostles, and through their witness, to us.

[Mina Mounir]

As I understand it, we don't see it. Truth is not a development. It is not a series of statements, a compilation of "facts", nor an analysis of precedents. Truth is a person, Christ Jesus, who revealed Himself to His Apostles, and through their witness, to us.
in his essay , Newman refers to the concept of development of doctrine as a development of ideas , I think from chapter7 he gave explanation of development :

For the convenience of arrangement, I will consider the Incarnation the central truth of the gospel, and the source whence we are to draw out its principles. This great doctrine is unequivocally announced in numberless passages of the New Testament, especially by St. John and St. Paul; as is familiar to us all: "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth." "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life, that declare we to you." "For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus {325} Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich." "Not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me."

4.
In such passages as these we have
1. The principle of dogma, that is, supernatural truths irrevocably committed to human language, imperfect because it is human, but definitive and necessary because given from above.
2. The principal of faith, which is the correlative of dogma, being the absolute acceptance of the divine Word with an internal assent, in opposition to the informations, if such, of sight and reason.
3. Faith, being an act of the intellect, opens a way for inquiry, comparison and inference, that is, for science in religion, in subservience to itself; this is the principle of theology.
4. The doctrine of the Incarnation is the announcement of a divine gift conveyed in a material and visible medium, it being thus that heaven and earth are in the Incarnation united. That is, it establishes in the very idea of Christianity the sacramental principle as its characteristic.
5. Another principle involved in the doctrine of the Incarnation, viewed as taught or as dogmatic, is the necessary use of language, e.g. of the text of Scripture, in a second or mystical sense. Words must be made to express new ideas, and are invested with a sacramental office.
6. It is our Lord's intention in His Incarnation to make us what He is Himself; this is the principle of grace, which is not only holy but sanctifying.
7. It cannot elevate and change us without mortifying our lower nature:—here is the principle of asceticism. {326}
8. And, involved in this death of the natural man, is necessarily a revelation of the malignity of sin, in corroboration of the forebodings of conscience.
9. Also by the fact of an Incarnation we are taught that matter is an essential part of us, and, as well as mind, is capable of sanctification.
I think he wants to say that the prinicples aer not changed , but due to the change and development of human philosophy , logic and different circumsatnces like heresies , it became important to have a development of doctrine on the level of the explanation of truth itself.

he gave an application on the 4th , 5th and 6th centuries controversies and how the fathers defended faith using a developed language .
from my viewpoint , I think I can even touch this in the scripture itself . Christ didn't reveal himself directly to his disciples , but gradually. also , the language of early chapters of the new testament are more 'Jew' terminologically than the late writings "such as the 4th Gospel".

[Herman Blaydoe]

This is how the Catholics rationalize adding to the original deposit of Faith. You know those little things like Papal supremacy and infallibility. They were not part of the Apostolic Witness but they "developed" over time. This is simple recognition that these "developments" were NOT part of the early church and cannot be justified as that which is believed in all places at all times. We moderns know so much more and so much better than those who walked and lived with Christ in person.

Nope, I for one am not buying into it, but that might just be me.

Herman the Pooh

[Owen Jones]

Forgive me for sounding cynical, but Newman had to rationalize leaving the Anglican Communion for the Roman Catholic Church, which requires him to adopt more recent RC conciliar doctrines.

[Mina Mounir]

This is how the Catholics rationalize adding to the original deposit of Faith. You know those little things like Papal supremacy and infallibility. They were not part of the Apostolic Witness but they "developed" over time. This is simple recognition that these "developments" were NOT part of the early church and cannot be justified as that which is believed in all places at all times. We moderns know so much more and so much better than those who walked and lived with Christ in person.

Nope, I for one am not buying into it, but that might just be me.

Herman the Pooh
I think the papal supremacy and infallibility are not a development as much as an addition or change . some days before, I was reading about the ecumenical dialog between Orthodox and RC church after pope Benedict discarding of the title 'Patriarch of the west' an interesting point mentioned was : "The Orthodox Synod asks Pope Benedict to recall what he wrote several years ago, when (as Cardinal Ratzinger) he said that the Holy See should not the Eastern churches to accept any more expansive understanding of Petrine primacy than the idea that prevailed during the first Christian millennium."
this means that there's ' an idea ' , and then there's another 'idea' . I believe it is a substition of ideas or exchange , but not a development. but I think the development is like the applications mentioned by Newman.
we can't say that the first century christians didn't believe in Trinity and then they did after the 4th century debates. but I think we can feel how deeper and deeper the christian theologians of the 4th century were digging inside the same concept of trinity and revealing it much wider.



I think I've read something similar in fr. Florovsky of blessed memory, he says :

" This experience has not been exhausted either in Scripture, or in oral tradition, or in definitions. It cannot, it must not be, exhausted. On the contrary, all words and images must be regenerated in its experience, not in the psychologisms of subjective feeling, but in experience of spiritual life. This experience is the source of the teaching of the Church. However, not everything within the Church dates from Apostolic times. This does not mean that something has been revealed which was "unknown" to the Apostles; nor does it mean that what is of later date is less important and convincing. Everything was given and revealed fully from the beginning. On the day of Pentecost Revelation was completed, and will admit of no further completion till the Day of Judgment and its last fulfilment. Revelation has not been widened, and even knowledge has not increased. The Church knows Christ now no more than it knew Him at the time of the Apostles. But it testifies of greater things. In its definitions it always unchangeably describes the same thing, but in the unchanged image ever new features become visible. But it knows the truth not less and not otherwise than it knew it in time of old. The identity of experience is loyalty to tradition. Loyalty to tradition did not prevent the Fathers of the Church from "creating new names" (as St. Gregory Nazianzen says) when it was necessary for the protection of the unchangeable faith. All that was said later on, was said from catholic completeness and is of equal value and force with that which was pronounced in the beginning. And even now the experience of the Church has not been exhausted, but protected and fixed in dogma. But there is much of which the Church testifies not in a dogmatic, but in a liturgical, manner, in the symbolism of the sacramental ritual, in the imagery of prayers, and in the established yearly round of commemorations and festivals. Liturgical testimony is as valid as dogmatic testimony. The concreteness of symbols is sometimes even more vivid, clear, and expressive than any logical conceptions can be, as witness the image of the Lamb taking upon Himself the sins of the world." (http://www.fatheralexander.org/booklets/english/catholicity_church_florovsky.htm)

I think it is close to Newman's idea..?

[Herman Blaydoe]

I guess I still have a problem with the idea that the farther away you get from something the better you understand it. Every generation must come to terms with the Apostolic Witness. I don't see that as the same thing as development of doctrine, being a bear of very little brain.

Herman the Pooh

[Father David Moser]

I think the papal supremacy and infallibility are not a development as much as an addition or change .

However, the point is that even though you may understand the concept of "development of doctrine" in this way, it is not the way that the concept was originated and put forward by the Roman Catholic Church. The underlying concept to the development of doctrine is that we start with the revelation of Christ and then using our rational intellect we "develop" new doctrines which were not part of the original revelation. This, the Orthodox Church rejects. Jesus Christ is the only full and complete revelation of God to man and there is nothing that can be (or need be) developed from it. Everything is contained already in the apostolic witness. This is of course consistent with Florovsky


On the day of Pentecost Revelation was completed, and will admit of no further completion till the Day of Judgment and its last fulfilment. Revelation has not been widened, and even knowledge has not increased. The Church knows Christ now no more than it knew Him at the time of the Apostles.

however it is not consistent with the Roman teaching of the development of doctrine. Rome teaches that we do know Christ now more than we knew him at the time of the Apostles through the exercise of our rational minds we "develop" new doctrines which broaden our knowledge of Christ. These new doctrines are based on that revelation but they were not part of it and add to it. The idea of "development of doctrine" in the end denies that Jesus Christ is the only true and complete revelation of God to man, that there are other "revelations" which are waiting to be discovered by the exercise of our intellect.

Fr David Moser

[John Wilson]

One example of 'development of doctrine' gone wrong is the RC Dogma of the Assumption of Mary. The feast day of the Dormition of Mary was first celebrated in the East and was introduced to the Church under Rome around the sixth century I believe. So here we have the Church in Rome celebrating a feast which is clearly about the death of the Theotokos, although it also celebrated her bodily assumption. With their declaration of the Dogma of the 'Immaculate Conception' it became problematic for someone who is supposedly free from 'Original Sin' to be subject to its consequences, namely death. So when they declared as dogma the Assumption of Mary, the Pope did not state plainly that she was bodily assumed after her death, but rather at the end of her earthly life. Personally I don't see a difference between the terms "death" and "end of earthly life" but Catholic theologians give it great weight, claiming that the Church has thus not made a definite statement regarding whether she died or not, so Catholics are free to believe that she was assumed into heaven without tasting death.

Thus, instead of moving from vagueness to clarity as 'development of doctrine' claims to do they have gone in the opposite direction, from knowing something without a doubt, to having the option of believing it or not with the latter option being encouraged by their distorted theology.

John

[Paul Cowan]

Rome teaches that we do know Christ now more than we knew him at the time of the Apostles through the exercise of our rational minds we "develop" new doctrines which broaden our knowledge of Christ. These new doctrines are based on that revelation but they were not part of it and add to it. The idea of "development of doctrine" in the end denies that Jesus Christ is the only true and complete revelation of God to man, that there are other "revelations" which are waiting to be discovered by the exercise of our intellect.

Fr David Moser

Hence, the Mormon Church

[Sean M.]

I don't think development of doctrine means to add new doctrines, it is to expound on what has always been the truth.

Wasn't that what Church Councils were for?

[Herman Blaydoe]

I don't think development of doctrine means to add new doctrines, it is to expound on what has always been the truth.

Wasn't that what Church Councils were for?

Except it was used to add new doctrines by the Vatican. The holy Apostle Peter never claimed infallibility, it was added (developed?) later. The United Church never taught immaculate conception, it was added (developed?) after the split by the Romans and never accepted by the Orthodox.

See how it works?

[Demetrios Galanidis]

I don't think development of doctrine means to add new doctrines, it is to expound on what has always been the truth.

Wasn't that what Church Councils were for?
The councils were not meant to develop doctrine but to define dogmatically that which already existed as the deposit of Faith - no "expansion" was/is involved. Such a concept seems to come from the RC idea of some kind of "seeds" which supposedly exist from which doctrines can be made. That is most foreign to us.

[Sean M.]

What about the Trinity, the dual nature of Christ, and the assumption of Mary, were these all explicity believed by the early Church?

[Herman Blaydoe]

What about the Trinity, the dual nature of Christ, and the assumption of Mary, were these all explicity believed by the early Church?

You don't think so?

In that the Apostles witnessed the death of the Theotokos and were present at her empty tomb, I have to suppose they explicitly believed their own eyes and faithfully passed on what happened. How could they not?

When the Apostle Thomas exclaimed "My Lord and my God!" as he touched the Resurrected Lord, do you think he did not believe in the dual natures of Christ?

And when our Lord told His Apostles to baptize in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, what exactly do you think they thought?

it is not they did not believe these things from the beginning, it is simply that others tried to discount or deny them later on. The belief in the Trinity did not simply appear at the first council, it was not "added" to the Faith, it was not "developed", it was merely confirmed.

[Sean M.]

it is not they did not believe these things from the beginning, it is simply that others tried to discount or deny them later on. The belief in the Trinity did not simply appear at the first council, it was not "added" to the Faith, it was not "developed", it was merely confirmed.

They were confirmed because of the Nestorian and Arian heresies. They were confirmed because they came under disrepute. Confirmation does not mean development, it means confirmation of something that has always been true.

[Herman Blaydoe]

They were confirmed because of the Nestorian and Arian heresies. They were confirmed because they came under disrepute. Confirmation does not mean development, it means confirmation of something that has always been true.

Exactly. Which is different from the things that Roman Catholic theology "developed", such as the immaculate conception (which flows from a distorted understanding of "original sin") and papal infallibility, and so on.

[Sean M.]

Exactly. Which is different from the things that Roman Catholic theology "developed", such as the immaculate conception (which flows from a distorted understanding of "original sin") and papal infallibility, and so on.

Both doctrines are connected, if Mary prefigured the Church, and Mary was without sin, then it supports the doctrine of infallibility.

[Demetrios Galanidis]

Both doctrines are connected, if Mary prefigured the Church, and Mary was without sin, then it supports the doctrine of infallibility.

Huh? Now THAT must be development - adding new doctrine.

[Aidan Kimel]

The question of the development of doctrine is, I know, controversial. All Christian Churches claim to embody the objective fullness of the apostolic revelation within their life and tradition. All deny departure from that revelation. All deny innovation. Yet when one looks at the history of Christian doctrine, both in the East and the West, it seems hard to deny that "development" in some sense has occurred. The doctrine of the Holy Trinity is one example; the Palamite distinction between the divine being and energies is a second. In both cases one is hard put to prove, through a critical examination of the Holy Scriptures and the writings of the first and second century Church Fathers that Christians explicitly believed what came to be explicitly taught by the later Church. One can, of course, dogmatically assert the non-development of doctrine and interpret the historical data through a non-development hermeneutical paradigm, but one wonders how convincing such judgments are to those who do not read the data through this paradigm.

I am, as a Catholic believer, convinced the Nicene doctrine of the Holy Trinity faithfully states the apostolic revelation, but I also have to admit that I read Scripture and the writings of the Fathers in light of the Nicene doctrine. Until the doctrine became fully established in the consciousness of the Church, things were not always so clear: see, e.g., R. P. C. Hanson's The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God.

I am, as a Catholic believer, convinced that God truly communicates himself to the baptized and incorporates them into his divine life; but I do not believe that this conviction requires Christians to posit the kind of distinction between the divine being and energies as formulated by Palamas. I do not believe that the historical evidence allows one to dogmatically assert that this distinction was explicitly believed by the Apostles or by even the majority of the Church Fathers. It seems to me that some acknowledgement of development is necessary for Orthodoxy to plausibly assert the Palamite distinction as more than a theologoumenon.

My friend Michael Liccione has written a number of interesting blog articles on this question. I especially commend to you his articles on two Orthodox writers: Andrew Louth (http://mliccione.blogspot.com/2007/03/development-of-doctrine-fr-louth-and.html) and John Behr (http://mliccione.blogspot.com/2008/06/this-time-fr-behr.html). Sometimes the distance between Catholic and Orthodox scholars is not as great as is popularly asserted.

[Mina Mounir]

Thanks fr. Alvin, I think it is clearer now that the development of doctrine is not an addition , nor change , but a deeper understanding of the same apostolic doctrine , and I think this is natural becausr human mind and culture is becoming more complicated and deeper.

[Theodore Janiszewski]

. . . however it is not consistent with the Roman teaching of the development of doctrine. Rome teaches that we do know Christ now more than we knew him at the time of the Apostles through the exercise of our rational minds we "develop" new doctrines which broaden our knowledge of Christ. These new doctrines are based on that revelation but they were not part of it and add to it. The idea of "development of doctrine" in the end denies that Jesus Christ is the only true and complete revelation of God to man, that there are other "revelations" which are waiting to be discovered by the exercise of our intellect.

One section of the Catechism of the Catholic Church that always impressed me for its conciseness and lucidity was that on Revelation. I'll give you a few quotations:
CCC73: "The Son is his Father's definitive Word; so there will be no further Revelation after him."
CCC67: "Christian faith cannot accept 'revelations' that claim to surpass or correct the Revelation of which Christ is the fulfillment, as is the case in certain non-Christian religions and also in certain recent sects which base themselves on such revelations.'"
CCC66: "Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries."

No one, Catholic or Orthodox, would controvert the importance and authority of the Fathers' insight into divine Revelation. But to say that in the West, these ponderings are regarded as miniature "revelations" strikes me as being a bit of a stretch. Fr. Moser, could you share with us the documents that lead you to make these claims?

Also, Mina, I'd like to bring to your attention the writings of St. Vincent of Lérins. St. Vincent lived in Southern Gaul in the fifth century, and is venerated by both the East and the West. His magnum opus, The Commonitory, contains a chapter "On Development in Religious Knowledge" [link (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf211.iii.xxiv.html)] that you might find interesting:


Our forefathers in the old time sowed wheat in the Church’s field. It would be most unmeet and iniquitous if we, their descendants, instead of the genuine truth of corn, should reap the counterfeit error of tares. This rather should be the result,—there should be no discrepancy between the first and the last. From doctrine which was sown as wheat, we should reap, in the increase, doctrine of the same kind—wheat also; so that when in process of time any of the original seed is developed, and now flourishes under cultivation, no change may ensue in the character of the plant.
[. . .]
Therefore, whatever has been sown by the fidelity of the Fathers in this husbandry of God’s Church, the same ought to be cultivated and taken care of by the industry of their children, the same ought to flourish and ripen, the same ought to advance and go forward to perfection. For it is right that those ancient doctrines of heavenly philosophy should, as time goes on, be cared for, smoothed, polished; but not that they should be changed, not that they should be maimed, not that they should be mutilated. They may receive proof, illustration, definiteness; but they must retain withal their completeness, their integrity, their characteristic properties.

[Justin]

This is only indirectly relevant, but interestingly, Gregory the Theologian speaks of something akin to a progression of revelation (not a development of doctrine per se):


"To this I may compare the case of Theology except that it proceeds the reverse way. For in the case by which I have illustrated it the change is made by successive subtractions; whereas here perfection is reached by additions. For the matter stands thus. The Old Testament proclaimed the Father openly, and the Son more obscurely. The New manifested the Son, and suggested the Deity of the Spirit. Now the Spirit Himself dwells among us, and supplies us with a clearer demonstration of Himself. For it was not safe, when the Godhead of the Father was not yet acknowledged, plainly to proclaim the Son; nor when that of the Son was not yet received to burden us further (if I may use so bold an expression) with the Holy Ghost; lest perhaps people might, like men loaded with food beyond their strength, and presenting eyes as yet too weak to bear it to the sun’s light, risk the loss even of that which was within the reach of their powers; but that by gradual additions, and, as David says, Goings up, and advances and progress from glory to glory, (Ps. 84:7; 2 Cor. 3:18) the Light of the Trinity might shine upon the more illuminated." - Gregory the Theologian, Fifth Theological Oration, 26

[Mina Mounir]

Dear Theodore ,
thanks for the quote , I think it proves my idea on that point
actually , I'd like to add saint Gregory of Nazianzus quote on the same point from the fifth Theological oration:

XXVI. To this I may compare the case of Theology3733 (http://thechurchofjesuschrist.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/gregory-nazianzen-on-doctrinal-development/toggle%28%27fnf_iii.xvii-p68.1%27%29;)3733 Theology is here used in a restricted sense, as denoting simply the doctrine of the Deity of the Son or Logos. It is very frequently used in this limited sense; examples of which may readily be found in Gregory of Nyssa, Basil, Chrysostom, and others. A similar use occurs in Orat. XXXVIII., c. 8, in which passage θεολογία is contrasted with οἰκονομία, the doctrine of our Lord’s Divinity with that of the Incarnation. except that it proceeds the reverse way. For in the case by which I have illustrated it the change is made by successive subtractions; whereas here perfection is reached by additions. For the matter stands thus. The Old Testament proclaimed the Father openly, and the Son more obscurely. The New manifested the Son, and suggested the Deity of the Spirit. Now the Spirit Himself dwells among us, and supplies us with a clearer demonstration of Himself. For it was not safe, when the Godhead of the Father was not yet acknowledged, plainly to proclaim the Son; nor when that of the Son was not yet received to burden us further (if I may use so bold an expression) with the Holy Ghost; lest perhaps people might, like men loaded with food beyond their strength, and presenting eyes as yet too weak to bear it to the sun’s light, risk the loss even of that which was within the reach of their powers; but that by gradual additions, and, as David says, Goings up, and advances and progress from glory to glory,3734 (http://thechurchofjesuschrist.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/gregory-nazianzen-on-doctrinal-development/toggle%28%27fnf_iii.xvii-p69.3%27%29;)3734 Ps. lxxxiv. 7, and 2 Cor. iii. 18 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.Ps.84.html#Ps.84.7). the Light of the Trinity might shine upon the more illuminated. For this reason it was, I think, that He gradually came to dwell in the Disciples, measuring Himself out to them according to their capacity to receive Him, at the beginning of the Gospel, after the Passion, after the Ascension, making perfect their powers, being breathed upon them, and appearing in fiery tongues. And indeed it is by little and little that He is declared by Jesus, as you will learn for yourself if you will read more carefully. I will ask the Father, He says, and He will send you another Comforter, even the spirit of Truth.3735 (http://thechurchofjesuschrist.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/gregory-nazianzen-on-doctrinal-development/toggle%28%27fnf_iii.xvii-p70.2%27%29;)3735 John xiv. 16, 17 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.John.14.html#John.14.16). This He said that He might not seem to be a rival God, or to make His discourses to them by another authority. Again, He shall send Him, but it is in My Name. He leaves out the I will ask, but He keeps the Shall send,3736 (http://thechurchofjesuschrist.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/gregory-nazianzen-on-doctrinal-development/toggle%28%27fnf_iii.xvii-p71.2%27%29;)3736 John xvi. 7 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.John.16.html#John.16.7). then again, I will send,—His own dignity. Then shall come,3737 (http://thechurchofjesuschrist.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/gregory-nazianzen-on-doctrinal-development/toggle%28%27fnf_iii.xvii-p72.2%27%29;)3737 Ib. xvi. 8 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.John.16.html#John.16.8).the authority of the Spirit.
but still I believe that the human influence i.e. addtion on the revelation is something rejected by all traditions
the question is in classifying each dogma if it is an addition or just a development according to the development of human mind and its capacity.

[Anna Stickles]

Justin, I think that your quote from St. Gregory is extremely relevant.

Dcn Matthew Steenberg put together a beautiful commentary on this some time ago and maybe it is worthwhile to bring it to light here. The discussion is here (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showthread.php?p=20427#post20427), but I think it worthwhile to quote Dcn Matthew's remarks even if they are lengthy.


The ‘faith once delivered’ was and is the singular reality of God, the incarnate Christ, and the life in Christ initiated by he himself as incarnate, passed along to future generations by those called to be his disciples and apostles. Orthodox theology is the theology of experience of this divine reality, of communion with the one who is personally the fullness of truth. This truth was ‘once delivered’ because Christ was once incarnate: truth and life can come no more fully, no more potently, than in his full becoming human. What is guarded and protected, ‘earnestly contested for’ and preserved, is the proper and right experience of this great truth that is the incarnate Son. It is for this reason that Orthodox theology is paramountly ‘practical’, ascetical, for its inner character is that of experience and relation, not dogmatic assertion.

The course of Orthodox history shows that the doctrinal articulation of this mystery develops and changes as the Church grows and matures. That which is experienced, which must be articulated, is unchanging; and the fight of Orthodoxy is precisely never to let attempts at right articulation detract ultimately from the right and proper experience of God as God has revealed himself. And this is a creative, dynamic project. The Trinitarian explanations at the time of the council of Constantinople (381) were articulations of novel character: they differed from those of Athanasius immediately after Nicaea, and certainly differed immensely from earlier fathers such as Irenaeus, Just, Ignatius, etc. The Christological articulations of Cyril differed notably from those of Gregory of Nazianzus, as also from his own predecessor at Alexandria, Athanasius.

Indeed so, but this is precisely because in Orthodoxy, the articulation of the mystery of the life in Christ is not creative of that life, but the explorative means of communicating that mystery as it is. In other words, Orthodox doctrine is not understood to define the theological realities of the faith—these exist in the personal reality of the Son. Doctrine articulates the experienced mystery of God.

INXC, Matthew


What we find here is a two-fold criteria for truth. Right experience and right articulation flowing from that experience. If Christ's action in the salvation of mankind is a picture wholly contained in His incarnation, life, death and resurrection then maybe the development of doctrine can be seen as the filling in of that picture. We start with the outline, gradually add more details, and eventually add color.

St Gregory of Sinai has said

Everyone baptized into Christ should pass progressively through all the stages of Christ's own life, for in baptism he receives the power so to progress, and through the commandments he can discover and learn how to accomplish such progression.

I think it is only as the Church Herself passes through these stages that the details can be added.



All Christian Churches claim to embody the objective fullness of the apostolic revelation within their life and tradition.


This I think is precisely the problem. It is those who claim that they have, who in reality have not, and those who claim that they know, who really know nothing. The attitude of defending one's own truth claim means already that the image of Christ is corrupt. Christ did not defend Himself or His own claims.

If what is true is that "perfection is reached by additions" then no one has, as of yet, the fullness of truth nor the embodiment of it in any real sense, but rather we are still being perfected. At best a tradition can say that it has maintained the potential for moving toward the time when
"we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ." uncorrupted and true to form.