The maleness of priests as 'icons of Christ' [Archive]

M.C. Steenberg

20-10-2008, 01:52 PM

Dear friends,

I've just been 'catching up' with this thread, reading it from its beginnings, as I've been away for a few days. Much interesting and thoughtful discussion, covering various issues, has sprung up very quickly. Thanks to so many for the thoughtful and thought-provoking posts

I'd like to address specifically the question of the male priesthood, and what this indicates about women - and more particularly, I'd like to look at (and question) a position that has been forward, summarised in this comment:

It was Eve who first breached God's commandment so Adam's gender alone was trusted with service to God in the Altar.
I should like to begin by questioning this. It does not strike me as a position maintained by the fathers of the Church or its living heritage - and if any can support it with some writings in the fathers, I would be very grateful indeed to see the texts and explore their context and meaning. It is certainly not impossible that one or another father has said this (though I cannot off hand think of one who did); but it does strike me as quite outside the norm of patristic interpretation of the priesthood.

The position was elaborated on in this post by you, Paul C.:

Adam and Eve broke away from authority. They lost very much in doing so but afterwards, through much toil and travail, they repented and regained not only what they lost but were blessed with more from God for their sincere repentence and final acceptance of God's will.

The descendants of Adam and the descendants of Eve are respectively, human males and females. If we search the first few pages of the first book of the Old Testament we will see whose authority Adam breached and whose authority Eve breached. Then maybe we will understand why today we must submit to those same authorities with repentance in order to regain what our first parents lost.

The reason it is different for males and females is because they disobeyed different commands from God and received different orders from Him after their breach. Anyone who casts blame today is only repeating what both Adam and Eve did in Genesis when God questioned them after their acts of disobedience. There are different cures for different ills but it is the pridefull blaming and complaining that causes the source of that behavior the greatest pain since it separates them from God, the source of all good.

[...] So women and men are treated outwardly different to each other because they transgressed God's commandments differently.

There are some interesting points here. Firstly, I think we need to clarify that it is not the case that Adam and Eve 'disobeyed different commands from God': in fact they disobeyed precisely the same commandment. How they disobeyed, and in what manner this affected their relationship one to another, and to God, was distinct, because each was a distinct, creative person. But the commandment was one.

Secondly, the fact that Adam and Eve each sin individually is, indeed, significant. Just what is implied by the distinction, and the whole question of the casting of blame, is however a mystery on which the fathers reflect in numerous ways. There are some who indicate that the casting of blame (which is, in its origin, Adam's sin: Eve follows Adam in this act, conveying the blame to the serpent) is a sign of additional sin; there are others (for example, St Irenaeus), who indicate that in fact this is a truthful and honest indication of deception: Adam truthfully indicates he was led astray by Eve; Eve truthfully indicates she was deceived by the serpent - and so God rightly punishes most severely the one who was truly at fault: Satan (see St Irenaeus, Refutation and overthrow of knowledge falsely so-called, 3.23.5).

But however this distinction indicates their persons, and however the response is met out in personal chastisement (i.e. it is different for Adam as a unique person, including his maleness; and for Eve as unique person, including her femaleness), the fathers seem to be very clear indeed on the fact that the weight of sin, and the opportunity of virtue, are met equally by all members of the race - male and female alike. So, for example, a passage by St Basil the Great, commenting on the first psalm:

"Blessed is the man who has not walked in the counsel of the ungodly. Before I explain what it means not to walk in the counsel of the ungodly, I want to answer the question for you which this passage causes. Why is it, people say, that the prophet chooses to beatify the man only? Surely he has not excluded women from beatitude? Of course not! For man and woman share in one virtue, since creation also holds equal dignity for both. Hear what Genesis says: 'God created the human being in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he made them.' Those therefore who have one nature also have the same operations, and those who share the same work, receive the same reward. Why then did he mention the man, but did he remain silent about the woman? Because he thought it sufficed, since the nature is one, to indicate the whole by the leading part." (Homilies on the Psalms, 1.3)
This exemplifies a whole patristic tradition of seeing male and female as unique, yet as human creatures singularly encountered in the human relationship to sin, to virtue, to redemption. This is bound up, fundamentally, in the fact that all human creatures, male and female, are created after the image of the eternal Son. This is the message behind St Paul's comment that there is neither 'male nor female' in Galatians 3.28. On this, Theodoret of Cyr wrote:

"There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3.28). The word 'one' stands for one body (cf. 1 Cor. 11.3). For he [Christ] is our head. For his sake, then, it is fitting not to know a difference between servant and master, male and female, Jew and Greek." (Commentary on Galatians, 3.28)
So it is our unity in Christ that stands male and female together in one stead as relates to sin and redemption. Yet this does not make them one and the same (St Paul is clearly not suggesting that there aren't women, aren't men), nor does it mean that their roles are identical in life and in the Church. Already in the time of the Montanist schisms (which began as early as the second and third centuries AD), the fathers were aware of St Paul's words being used to suggest such a conflation. Writing on the practices of Montanist groups, Epiphanius of Salamis wrote:

"They have women bishops, women priests, and the rest. They say that these differ [from men] in nothing, because 'in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female'." (Haereses, 49.2.5)
The bishop's point is clear: this is an incorrect reading of St Paul's meaning. The whole patristic line of thought is clear: men and women do have differeing roles, and should have differing roles - not just in society at large but also specifically in the Church - based on their created distinctiveness; yet these roles cannot be assigned to one gender or the other having a more debased enmeshing in sin, a more exalted virtue, etc. On this sense, 'there is neither male nor female'.

Priests as icons of Christ

The distinction, as relates to the priesthood in the Church, comes in the vision of the priest as icon. This is something that has been mentioned already by others:

Concerning the idea that one cannot be ordained if he is missing a finger [...] the reasoning behind such a condition really has absolutely nothing to do with dexterity and the chance that a priest missing a finger would spill the cup. As Carol pointed out that is really a ridiculous reason. It is more related to the place of the priest as the icon of Christ, the sacrificial lamb. The sacrificial lamb was chosen from the flock as the "perfect specimen" without spot or blemish. So also our Lord was the perfect man without spot or blemish and the priest, as his icon, should be a perfect specimen, without spot or blemish. While this primarily applies to the spiritual state of the priest, as an icon it also applies to the physical condition of the priest.

Father David brought up a key point that I hope isn't overlooked. Priests are icons of Christ, spiritually and physically.

Here we have the heart of the matter regarding the maleness of the clergy: fundamentally, the clergy are icons of Jesus Christ. This is most explicit in the office of the bishop, 'in whom Christ sits enthroned' (to paraphrase Athanasius), but is equally true of all clerical orders (priests, deacons, others) who extend the bishop's ministry. In the liturgical engagement of the Orthodox worshipping life, the clergy mystically represent Christ himself, are living icons of the Lord, and thus their maleness is part-and-parcel of iconographically representing the incarnate Christ who was (and is) a human male.

This iconographic nature of the priesthood has been summarised in an accessible way in an article by a priest in the Antiochian Church (http://www.antiochian.org/midwest/Articles/The_Orthodox_Priest_An_Ikon_Of_Christ.htm):

"Now there is a third compelling reason for the male priesthood. Orthodox Christians believe that their bishops, priests and deacons are Ikons of Christ and therefore must be male because Jesus Christ is male. To understand this we must think about what an Ikon is. An Ikon is a religious symbol, but yet much more than a symbol. It is an instrument of Divine reality. It is a picture and a vision for the eyes which conveys a spiritual reality to the worshipper. We can say that an Ikon is an image of the Divine, but we must say at the same time that an Ikon has no divine power of its own. That would make an Ikon an idol and idols belong to pagan worship. An Ikon has the spiritual function to help us receive into our souls the spiritual awareness of what it depicts. For example; when we look at an Ikon depicting the crucifixion, the Ikon helps us to participate more spiritually in the wonder of Christ’s love for us and the efficacious power of His sacrifice on the cross. Looking at an Ikon in our worship is the most direct way we can visually represent Christ’s atoning death for the forgiveness of our sins. Looking at an Ikon strengthens the spiritual reality of our worship.
This vision of the iconic nature of the priesthood, helps set the question of its maleness in a proper context. This context is not (and cannot) be one of 'equality' or 'fairness', since behind any such approach lies a false conflation of human distinctiveness (i.e. the kind of perversion of St Paul's 'neither male nor female' comment that Epiphanius laments), as well as a diminished incarnational theology, that does not take seriously enough the genuine and full human nature of Jesus Christ. Rather, the context is the iconic engagement of the worshipper with Jesus Christ himself, in the living icon of the priest. For this reason, it is the case that what are essentially 'iconographic canons', similar to those that dictate the right painting of an icon, apply also to the 'painting of the clergy' - i.e., the setting apart of those in clerical roles to be proper icons. They must be men, for they become icons of a living man, Jesus Christ - in the same manner that an icon painter could not portray St John or St Maximus in wood-and-paint as a female. They must dress in a certain way, to convey the spiritual truths of Christ whom they image liturgically, just as in an icon saints must be painted in specific garments. They must comport themselves in a certain manner, just as in icons saints are depicted in certain postures and poses.

None of this has anything to do with questions of purity. This has come up in some of the posts in this thread -- e.g. in questions that ask how such perfect men could be found to be icons of a perfect Christ. But the confusion over purity and iconic engagement is a very old one. It is most obviously manifested in the Donatist schism in the early Church, where priests deemed 'impure' (for various reasons, most at that time to do with behaviour during times of persecution) were deemed unsuitable for the iconic role of living images of Christ. This the Church unequivocally condemned as an heretical view. None is pure save God alone. If ritual purity were the requirement for the priest to be icon, and so to be priest, the Church could have no clergy at all. Rather, the Church is called to submit in obedience to the canons that foster purification, rather than demand purity as some kind of prerequisite to the faith; and these canons involve authentic iconography -- in the selection of texts, in the painting of icons, in the ordination of clergy.

Finally, I note just one final comment from the thread which I find interesting:

Now when a parish has no boys willing to serve in the altar or none even available, a girl under twelve years of age who has not yet started her periods can serve as an altar girl.
This is a late practice, which in modern manifestations I've only seen in a few limited Antiochene contexts. It is interesting that it was raised here, as I was away this weekend and had a discussion on precisely this issue with some fellow clergy, monastics and laity in the Suffolk region of England. What is quite clear is that there is something incorrect about this custom, precisely because it relegates the male-only distinction of clergy (including altar servers, who have a role in the clerical iconography) back to a question of ritualistic purity, where it does not belong. The reason women are not allowed to serve at the altar has nothing to do with the fact that they are pubescent or menstrual or any other such thing; it has to do with the iconographic significance of the altar and those who serve at it.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

RichardWorthington

25-10-2008, 11:44 AM

If a man can be an "icon" or "image" of Christ why cannot a woman be an "icon" or "image" of the Mother of God?

It is clear from all this celestial symbolics that woman is to be not Christ

Swallowing a Fishbone?: Feminist Theologians Debate Christianity
by Daphne Hampson (Editor); can’t remember page number, but can find it if needed!

Much has been written about the priest being an "icon of Christ". However, is this phrase merely a simple statement (e.g. is it possible for a robot dressed up as a priest and saying his words to be described as an image of Christ?) or does it have a deeper meaning, related to our division into male and female?

As people have been desperately trying to explain why the ministerial priesthood is indeed for men only, many statements of the Bible and Fathers have been stretched to breaking point. And the phrase "an icon of Christ" it appears is one of them:

Mme Behr-Sigel writes:

the priest presiding over the assembly is also an "icon of Christ" … It is as he repeats the words spoken by Christ at the Last Supper, as he repeats his gestures (page 41)

Metropolitan Kallistos writes:

At this crucial moment {epiclesis} as throughout the eucharistic prayer, he is not Christ’s vicar or icon, but - in union with the people - he stands as a supplicant before God (page 85)

While affirming, then, the character of the ministerial priest as Christ’s icon, I do not find that this in itself excludes women from the priesthood (page 87)

The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church by Elisabeth Behr-Sigel, Bishop Kallistos Ware, WCC Publications, 2000

The body which the Son of God took from the Virgin Mary is indeed a male body. However, the term "Body of Christ" used of the Church - the fullness of Him who fills all in all - is indeed female. No longer think that men are more of an icon of Christ than women!

Consider Hermas, who wrote a book called "The Shepherd" about certain visions he saw (about 110AD). In this book the Church is described in varying forms. In one form She is seen to be an elderly lady, because "She was created first of all; that is why she is elderly; and for her the world was made." In another form She is seen to be a young bride, "behold, a young lady met me, adorned as if coming from a bridal chamber." ("The Apostolic Fathers" ed. Jack N Sparks, Light and Life Publishing; The Shepherd of Hermas p.167 (18:1) and p.179 (23:1)). However, who is this female Church figure? The angel who spoke with Hermas says the following, "I want to show you what the holy Spirit, which spoke with you in the form of the Church, showed you for that Spirit[ual being] is the Son of God" ("Apostolic Fathers" p.231, Similitude 9:1 (78:1)) [U]In other words the Incarnate Son of God appears as a woman called the Church.

Finally:

I do not suppose you are unaware that the living church is the body of Christ; for the scripture says, ‘God created man male and female’ (Genesis 1:27). The male is Christ, the female is the Church. Moreover, the books and the apostles declare that the Church belongs not to the present but existed from the beginning. For She was spiritual, as was also our Jesus, but was made manifest in the last days that she might save us. Now the Church, being spiritual, was made manifest in the flesh of Christ to show us that if any of us guard her in the flesh and it be not corrupted, he will receive her back in the Holy Spirit.

(2 Clement 14:2-3; "The Apostolic Fathers" p.67).

Richard

M.C. Steenberg

25-10-2008, 12:38 PM

Dear Richard, Andreas, Michael, Nina, fathers, and the many others in this thread,

I would like to say a few further things about the priest as 'icon of Christ', as this has emerged again in the most recent post, above.

Any attempt to explain the iconography of the priest as Eucharistic celebrant, in a way that divorces this from the maleness of Jesus Christ, is fundamentally un- or even anti-incarnational.

I have tried to craft the above statement concisely and directly, so as to avoid side-stepping the direct issue. Some old issues have been re-introduced in your most recent post, Richard, vis-a-vis all human persons as icons of Christ, etc.; but these are often points which are valid in and of themselves, but don't bear directly on the full matter being discussed. The issue here is whether the priesthood and the priest as 'icon of Christ', bears the necessity of being male, not whether all human persons, as created after the image of the eternal Son, can be and are 'icons of Christ', regardless of gender.

To the latter, the answer is an obvious 'yes', and this has substantial and secure patristic support and explanation. All human creatures have as their paradigm him whose image they bear, who is himself eternal and unchanging Image of the Father. This divine image is fully manifest in every created person, though may be soiled by sin; but there is no category of existence, whether gender or anything else, that mutes or divides it. In this sense, all are 'icons of Christ', not only be exemplification, but by their very nature. The human person is an icon of Christ, by definition - always.

But this is not really the question being addressed. The question is that of the specific iconography of the priest (really, in fact, the bishop, of whom the priest acts in stead), as the one who is celebrant of the Eucharist and the living mysteries of the Church. The Church is, as a whole, an icon of Christ, and every individual person that comprises it is also true and living icon of Christ. But this fact does not drive the Church to dismiss the valid iconography within that body - and, practically speaking, has never meant that because every person is equally icon of Christ by nature, every person thus has or ought to have the same role in the Body.

On the iconography of the priest, I wrote above:

Here we have the heart of the matter regarding the maleness of the clergy: fundamentally, the clergy are icons of Jesus Christ. This is most explicit in the office of the bishop, 'in whom Christ sits enthroned' (to paraphrase Athanasius), but is equally true of all clerical orders (priests, deacons, others) who extend the bishop's ministry. In the liturgical engagement of the Orthodox worshipping life, the clergy mystically represent Christ himself, are living icons of the Lord, and thus their maleness is part-and-parcel of iconographically representing the incarnate Christ who was (and is) a human male.

[...] This vision of the iconic nature of the priesthood, helps set the question of its maleness in a proper context. This context is not (and cannot) be one of 'equality' or 'fairness', since behind any such approach lies a false conflation of human distinctiveness (i.e. the kind of perversion of St Paul's 'neither male nor female' comment that Epiphanius laments), as well as a diminished incarnational theology, that does not take seriously enough the genuine and full human nature of Jesus Christ. Rather, the context is the iconic engagement of the worshipper with Jesus Christ himself, in the living icon of the priest. For this reason, it is the case that what are essentially 'iconographic canons', similar to those that dictate the right painting of an icon, apply also to the 'painting of the clergy' - i.e., the setting apart of those in clerical roles to be proper icons. They must be men, for they become icons of a living man, Jesus Christ - in the same manner that an icon painter could not portray St John or St Maximus in wood-and-paint as a female. They must dress in a certain way, to convey the spiritual truths of Christ whom they image liturgically, just as in an icon saints must be painted in specific garments. They must comport themselves in a certain manner, just as in icons saints are depicted in certain postures and poses.

In the clerical orders, there is a deliberate iconography, not simply of Christ in his eternity as Son of the Father, true and real God, fully and authentic human, which is the 'image' in which all humanity partakes, but of the specific incarnational reality of Jesus Christ incarnate in Galilee, forming and leading his Church, directing them to his table and offering himself as the banquet of new life. This is the iconography of Christ as shepherd of the Church, of his earthly ministry conjoined to the heavenly. And in this, what is 'imaged' is not solely the truth of Christ known and encountered in all image-bearing creatures, but the distinct, irrepeatable, and unique person of the incarnate Jesus of Nazareth. The Church teaches that the value of all human persons, male and female, as 'icons of Christ' is to be cherished and engaged with at all times; but in the clerical orders, it is the specific image of the man Jesus Christ, encountered in Galilee as minister, shepherd and celebrant, that is the subject of this particular 'icon'.

In this, the maleness of Christ is important, is indeed a critical dimension of the incarnational reality of the Son. Christ was not incarnate as a woman; to depict him as such would be as much a falsehood in the iconography of the clergy - who are icons of that incarnational shepherding and guiding - as in the iconography of paint and wood.

Calling on other imagery, such as the visions of the Shepherd of Hermas, often distract because they conflate the varied ways that symbolism works in the Church. The Church is often given the visionary symbol of a woman, as in Hermas' vision of the elderly woman and the brick wall. And Christ speaking in his Church is often conveyed similarly (in that vision, it is not simply the symbolic woman who is Church, and thus the voice of Christ - it is also the angel, the tower, and various other elements; all speaking as Church, and therefore as the Son in his Church). But the vision of Hermas has nothing whatsoever to do with the imagery of the priest-celebrant as icon of Christ the celebrant of the mysteries. It has to do with the Church as Christ's body in all its aspects (in Hermas' vision, the Church as old woman symbolizes its antiquity, its eternity and wisdom; as the wall/tower ever being built, its continual growth and newness; etc.).

It is quite possible to dismiss talk of the priest as 'icon of Christ' as an act of 'desperately trying to explain why the ministerial priesthood is indeed for men only', of a concept 'stretched to breaking point' (both of which statements I believe to be quite false); but not to engage with this imagery, or to engage with it only by attempting to relate it to imagery that is quite different in scope and focus, does a disservice to an attempt genuinely to understand the Church. The specificity of the Church's iconography is part of its incarnational depth - and it is precisely in this specificity that its embrace of all is most potently manifest.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Herman Blaydoe

25-10-2008, 03:42 PM

I think that Fr. Patrick Reardon has covered this subject rather thoroughly in his article Women Priests: History and Theology (http://novaemilitiae.squarespace.com/periodic-musings-blog/2007/1/18/women-priests-history-and-theology.html).

He also touches on the subject of icons and symbols;

We are taught in the New Testament that the husband in the Christian family, precisely as husband, can represent Christ in some way that his wife is not able to duplicate (Ephesians 5:21 -33), and that this representation has to do with his specific sex. This representation involves his being masculine and not feminine. This representation is further described as one of headship: "the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is head of the Church." The text here is something of a hard saying in our contemporary setting precisely because it is so clear and so irreducible. It says that the Christian husband, as head of the family, represents Christ who is head of the Church. This representation of Christ in headship pertains to the husband's specific sex (see also 1 Corinthians 11:3).

Now if that is true, then the answer to the question posed above must be yes: It is possible for the Christian man to icon Christ in a way that is not possible for the Christian woman. And if that is true, then there is a reasonable and possible theological basis for ordaining men and not ordaining women, and thus Torrance 's major premise is eviscerated.

Please understand, I am not making that argument myself; I am simply saying that the argument can be made on a scriptural basis. I am reluctant to craft any such theoretical argument, because I do not want to convey the impression that the Church's refusal to ordain women is based on some theological study or speculative reflection. That refusal by the Church is not founded on any sort of rational theory excogitated by theologians but on the authority of the living Apostolic Tradition. Quite simply, the ordination of women was not received from Christ and handed down to us by the Apostles. It is an alien intrusion, a meddling with Moabites, and consequently must be numbered among those novelties against which the Bible warns us.

Male headship, however, does raise an important point of Christology and Trinitarian doctrine. Prior to becoming a male in the human race, the eternal Word was already God's Son, not just his offspring. The fatherhood and the sonship in the Holy Trinity are not simply cultural names. Even if there were no such things as men and women, God could still be Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Male headship in the Church and in the Christian family, then, is not an arbitrary arrangement. It has to do with the very being of the God of Christians. Change it and you start to alter that most patriarchal/of dogmas: the doctrine of the Trinity.

One of his important points is that if an all male clergy is "wrong", then it is useful to look at how and when the Church made this "mistake".

He says:

A slight difficulty arises here, however, because it is a matter of historical fact that all generations of Orthodox Catholic Christians for roughly 2,000 years have been opposed to the ordination of women. Why? Because of the supposed vestigial Manichaeism of St. Augustine and his alleged sexual hangups? Be serious. Just where did the error come from?

The Last Supper, that's where. If we are in error, it is penultimately because the Apostles themselves got it wrong. And if the Apostles were in error, they received that error from the One who told them what to do and how to do it. And if that Person was in error, we-those among us who believe him to be the Son of God, the Savior of the world and its only hope-have a rather serious problem on our hands.

I recommend the entire article to all serious students and passionate advocates on both sides of this issue.

Herman the Pooh

Owen Jones

25-10-2008, 11:29 PM

I look at the issue of women priest (esses) from a strictly practical perspective. In the Episcopal Church, the ordination of women is directly associated with a turn toward a neo-pagan religion that has absolutely nothing to do with Christianity. It is quite unfortunate, and a very sad testimony, that many Episcopalians who were otherwise "traditional" did not recognize this or care. They said they only cared about Christian "morality." They had little or no theological sense, which is the capacity to see the truth in practical situations. And so they just let it ride. The result is that today the Episcopal Church and the Church of England really bear no resemblance whatsoever to Christianity, but is a political/social movement that is infused with neo-pagan/neo-Marxist jargon. It is essentially a form of primitive nature worship, that worships the passions of man and exalts them.

The ones who did claim to be "Anglo-Catholic" who opposed the ordination of women from the outset, did so not expressly on solid theological grounds, but from a very simplistic argument from authority. This is in a practical sense a very weak argument. Because if you are going to argue on the basis of authority, then you are bound by the new authorities, and then you have gotten yourself into a situation of dual or divided loyalties, and there is no hope for you. The way I saw it, these people were essentially sentimentalists. They were in love with Anglican sentiment, and they could not leave the Church under any circumstances because they saw this "innovation" -- a typically mild Anglican way of describing this catastrophe -- as something that could be rectified in time. They were incapable of converting to the true faith because of their essential sentimental attachment to Anglican outward forms and traditions. They should have boldly anathemitized anyone associated with women's ordination from the outset, despite being a minority faction, and sought union with Orthodoxy. But they also saw themselves as erzatz Roman Catholics, so they couldn't do that either. Many of them were also morally compromised as well, since Anglo-Catholicism in England and the U.S. had become a euphemism for homosexuality.

Not being a scholar on the subject, I suspect that there is something inherently paganistic that tends toward nature worship in any Church that has priestesses. It is symptomatic that the term "incarnational" is widely used, but takes on a quite different, radically immanentist meaning among these people. To be incarnational is to celebrate every kind of perversion as being only natural. If it is "natural" it must be good.

I could go on and on. Underlying all of this is a fundamental anger against reality as it is commonly experienced. The desire is to reshape the natural world through magical incantations. The eucharist thereby takes on this new role of a magical incantation which somehow transforms nature into man's image of himself. And transforming history into a process of transformation toward a utopian society in which no distinctions are made (except the distinction made with the reactionary, up-tight elements that seek to undermine and resist this new consciousness).

It would be no different in Orthodoxy if any "movement" toward women's ordination were to gain traction.

I firmly believe that any person, woman or otherwise, in Orthodoxy, who believes that women ought to be ordained, is suffering from a kind of spiritual malady that then progresses to the level of a theory as to why they are so unhappy and unfulfilled and alienated, believing that by some kind of liturgical revolution they would somehow be made whole. This needs to be better understood by clergy and theologians, who should not preach against women's ordination or teach against it purely on doctrinal grounds, but come to requires a deeper understanding of the spiritual malaise that underlies it.

In medical terminology, the appeal of women's ordination is a presenting symptom of an underlying disease. By just treating the symptom -- i.e. saying that it is not Orthodox, QUD -- we are allowing the patient to die.

Andreas Moran

26-10-2008, 12:37 AM

The ones who did claim to be "Anglo-Catholic" who opposed the ordination of women from the outset, did so not expressly on solid theological grounds, but from a very simplistic argument from authority . . .

I feel Owen is being unfair to at least some traditionalist Church of England priests. One such is a dear friend of mine and I know that his views about women's ordination accord with Orthodox thinking, as do many of his views. (Further, he rejects the filioque and refuses to say it and he crosses himself the Orthodox way.) It simply is not practicable to think that whole C of E parishes with their clergy could cross over to the Orthodox Church. My friend stays for the sake of the people who need his ministry for as long as he is able to give it.

Owen Jones

26-10-2008, 02:35 AM

That has been the argument that traditionalist Anglicans have used. But I guarantee that when your priest friend retires, that will be the end of it. The powers that be will make sure of it. So there will be no lasting legacy for his toils. That has indeed happened throughout the U.S. They are just waiting for all of the traditionalists to die.

RichardWorthington

26-10-2008, 09:03 PM

Any attempt to explain the iconography of the priest as Eucharistic celebrant, in a way that divorces this from the maleness of Jesus Christ, is fundamentally un- or even anti-incarnational.
...
The issue here is whether the priesthood and the priest as 'icon of Christ', bears the necessity of being male

But this is what I have found other Orthodox writers saying: that the term "the priest is an icon of Christ" need not necessarily imply that the priest has to be male. I quoted from Mme Elizabeth Behr-Sigel (who was supported by Metropolitan Anthony Bloom of Sourozh) and Metropolitan Kallistos Ware. Both agree that the iconic nature of the priesthood need not necessarily imply a male only priesthood, even though Mme Behr-Sigel’s writings are in favour of women priests (and remember, she is Orthodox, whose memory is highly spoken of in the Paris Exarchate) but Metropolitan Kallistos is against the ordination of women, albeit acknowledging that no sufficient theological (etc.) reason has been proposed.

He writes further:

Since the priest in the Divine Liturgy is a living icon of Christ the bridegroom of the Church, does it follow therefore that the priest must always be a man? Can a woman represent the bridegroom? That brings us back to my first question: In what sense does the priest represent Christ? To some it will seem patently absurd that the bridegroom should be represented by a woman. Others will respond that there is no intrinsic absurdity, provided that we make proper allowance for the subtlety and polyvalence of symbols. After all, when we speak of the Church as bride, this implies that there is a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God. If men can represent the Church as bride, why cannot women represent Christ as bridegroom?

"The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church" page 88

I am against the ordination of women to the priesthood. However, I am not only against the reasons currently put forward for this position (I have my own position, based on Adam - and not Eve - being from the dust of the earth), but also feel closer to some of the reasons being put forward in favour of women’s ordination. They just seem to be more honest and ‘aware’.

I guess that this thread is not about whether women should or should not be ordained to the priesthood (and I think that no one here has expressed such an opinion), but about how women can relate to the Orthodox Church. And this will imply showing that some of the arguments against women priests are only half-truths.

Richard

Matthew Panchisin

26-10-2008, 09:22 PM

Dear all,

I was reading through this thread and it seems to me that what Carol and Richard are presenting for our consideration comes down to appeasement or the fulfilling of a migrating agenda at best. I can see no good reason for the endeavor other than to come to the knowledge that it is very wrong.

We have seen in the long history of the Orthodox Church that the Church is not transactional, the Churches real theology is transfigurational. Part of that transfigurational theology as we can see in the writings of Saints is not solved through appeasement. Quite the contrary, the wars against sin and the wars against the Church are seen, often easily recognized as form familiarity. The satisfaction of requests that can't satisfy ones' heart is foreign to the Churches transfigurational theology. The Church stands narrowly steadfast for good reasons.

At worst, and I must say I'm sure that this is not the explicitly known intention, the Church from the earliest days has considered simony sinful. The currencies of Caesar include of equal rights, departure from Holy tradition an so on from the world. Equally men and women could cast lots with predictable results. But both can be in a much better place.

In the past some have suggested to look to the Theotokas in a way that would allow for woman to become ordained. As some can imagine, such a notion was not well received by others when discussed somewhat. It could be seen as not right in a eucharistic way, although again that for sure is not the intention. The responses of the Theotokas in right obedience's are not forced, but rather they are more assumed, I think in the chosen vessel for the sake of healings and redemption. I say assumed because her responses related to who she is, it had to happen in such a way for her because of God's love and hers. Hence we hear, 'blessed is the fruit of thy womb.' She is so Holy that, well we end up standing in awe as can be seen in the related hymnography of the Orthodox Church. In Orthodoxy, there is no confusion as to who she is, she gave birth to the Son of God.

At it's core and I think this is important to know, iconography does not 'develop' on human whims but rather it is a matter of being revealed. Calls for 'development' are being seen as strange these days. Faith, prayer and right obedience are important. I know that Orthodox iconographers are not constrained by tradition, but rather they often find much peace in obedient motions. People have painted unorthodox Icons only latter to say 'I shouldn't have done that now what do I do with such an image?' The notion of woman 'Priests' is along the lines of a forced development or exploration for the false resolution of inadequacies or some type of false restitution for woman. This is seen recurring as something that is very common among the heterodox groups.

We need only to think of the centurion who was under authority and knew it well. He knew that he had many servants who worked for him, to one he would say, go here, and the servant would go. To another, go there, and the servant would go. For him his faith translated to the healing of his servant. The servant must have been predisposed to obedience since he was said to be more like a son.

If simply asked "What happened to God?" All the books in the world could never contain a full account. It is at once expansive and narrow. We could respond in many ways. We can think of the Orthodox faith as said in the Nicene creed. 'Who, for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary, and was made man; and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate; He suffered and was buried; and the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father', we can think of the scriptures and so forth.

So forth, we can also say, and indeed should say, that nothing really happened to God, in the sense that God is not subject to our will. But when our wills are correctly disposed it is then that God is glorified therein. The Most Holy way is seen in the Most Holy Theotokas. Even so, and I found your specificity comments Father Deacon Matthew very pertinent, because in such a way ultimately every knee will bow and not through force from God. I think it is important to see that the keys come from specificity. This is to be seen by means of embracing ascetical theology, hence the wisdom of embracing the teachings of the Orthodox Church is known to be of the utmost importance. It is because of God's love and mercy that man can arise to worship the Holy Trinity precisely because of specificity. Absolute truth known in the person our Lord and savior Jesus Christ, is not just something within a playdom, intellectually or otherwise. Broad social norms or abnormalities loose there significance as does any political banquet. Because of conscience personal responsibility is not escapable and it extends to true motivations and so on. When a child plays in can be of little consequence, yet when adults behave in such ways the consequences are serious, the souls of people can be disturbed, peace sought but not found. Man sometimes wonders how Christ could throw the money changers out of the temple while the angels are coordinated in giving glory to God ceaselessly.

The teaching of the Orthodox Church is God has not preordained it for woman to seek things that can't be found in truth. When we read the writings of Saint Paul and much more in Holy writ, we can see we can not rightly look back or forward with out looking away from ourselves and always towards Christ in the Church. I don't think we can really understand much in any other way, at least that is what I perceive when we read the writings of the Saints, Church Fathers, etc. If we are supposed to know something or if something is important God can make it known to us.

It is summed up, for to woman also it is written;

Where the eagles have landed there will the carcass be.

Much in Iconography has to do with who is who without confusion. Additionally it has to do with where they are at, so the beauty of iconography in Orthodoxy is seen because of Christ. The beauty can also be seen by others to some extent since man is made in the image and likeness of God. Often times there are many different reactions, for some people it means much, for others it is of little significance.

We can not say here is the beginning of every Icon made and here is the end, but it can be said specifically in reference to the only begotten son of God as seen in the Icon of Christ. Neither can we say here is the beginning and here is the end of an apple or a tree without recognizing that which is created, was and is created by God. The full revelation of the origin is seen in creation because of the incarnation. Additional revelations which is something that is far too often seen in the west can't meet the eastside. Hopefully, that God bless us to do and forbids us not to do can be seen in the garden, the Church.

Both the OT prohibition against graven images and the NT commandment of lovingness, the Lord thy God and one another are interwoven in vestments of the Priest without confusion. At some point a woman in the vestments of Priest would see the abasement and perhaps be at a loss for words at best. If we think of the services in the Orthodox Church we quickly see that a self banishment would happen from such a spirit. Even in the fallen heterodox communities woman 'vested and serving in such places' that for instance might say 'create a clean heart in me and renew a right spirit within me' could only fall more and they may not know it while they are physically are alive. The cunningness and deceit of the devil has not changed much when it comes to both men and women.

Moving forward though, thanks be to God for the shining of the New Jerusalem and all that are blessed by God, his Church, his Bishops, Priests and Deacons and so forth even to the very least that is seen and known as great in the Kingdom of heaven. “But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled; and whosoever shall humble himself shall be exalted.”

We can see that humble service is good. People have been known to do some of the most humble types of tasks often times doing dishes, weaving baskets, chopping wood etc. so that they could pray without distractions.

I think the most important thing to remember 'happens' because of Gods' love when the Priest says The servant (a term that is often expressed by the Priest) of God (Name) receives the Body and Blood of Christ for forgiveness of sins and eternal life.

Obedience is important insofar as the Orthodox Church and the kingdom of heaven are concerned.

In Christ,

Matthew Panchisin

RichardWorthington

26-10-2008, 10:31 PM

I was reading through this thread and it seems to me that what Carol and Richard are presenting for our consideration comes down to appeasement or the fulfilling of a migrating agenda at best. I can see no good reason for the endeavor other than to come to the knowledge that it is very wrong.

Dear Matthew,

Thank you for your comments - but I think I must have expressed myself very poorly. I have no agenda. I quote from our leading Orthodox theologians to give another viewpoint. Remember, the Orthodox Church is wider than ROCOR - the Paris Exarchate are now in full communion with you. You may not agree with what they are saying, but we are all members of each other in the one true Church of Christ. Additionally, please exclude Carol from you comments - blame me for all.

Again, I repeat: I am against the ordination of women to the priesthood. But I am also against the worldliness of the arguments both in favour of and against their ordination. It has been said that the Pope was the first Protestant. For me, those in favour of women priests are no different from some (most?) of those against women priests. You mention transfiguration, that is the Life of the Spirit. Then you will be in favour of certain women being told "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." [Matt. 28:19-20].

I am not innovating, I am merely pointing out the weakness in the 'priest icon' argument. The Fathers say that the priest is an icon of Christ, but nowhere do they link this term 'icon' to maleness. Of course, they would condemn the ordination of women priests, but that does not make any reasoning based on their writings valid!

Moving forward though, thanks be to God for the shining of the New Jerusalem and all that are blessed by God, his Church, his Bishops, Priests and Deacons and so forth even to the very least that is seen and known as great in the Kingdom of heaven. “But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled; and whosoever shall humble himself shall be exalted.”

Obedience is important insofar as the Orthodox Church and the kingdom of heaven are concerned.

Will you obey Metropolitan Kallistos and accept that the iconic argument against the ordination of women priests in not strong enough?

Richard

Herman Blaydoe

26-10-2008, 10:49 PM

Will you obey Metropolitan Kallistos and accept that the iconic argument against the ordination of women priests in not strong enough?

Richard

I think too much has been made of the bishop's remarks, on both sides of this issue. They have been taken out of context and exaggerated to suit agendas, I fear. What he actually said is that not enough effort has gone into explaining the necessity of a male priesthood in a properly thorough manner. He is not saying that it needs to be re-examined or changed, simply that it ought to be explained better. Saying they are "not strong enough" implies that perhaps they ought to be simply dropped. I do not think he is saying that at all.

Herman

RichardWorthington

26-10-2008, 11:10 PM

I think too much has been made of the bishop's remarks, on both sides of this issue. They have been taken out of context and exaggerated to suit agendas, I fear. What he actually said is that not enough effort has gone into explaining the necessity of a male priesthood in a properly thorough manner. He is not saying that it needs to be re-examined or changed, simply that it ought to be explained better. Saying they are "not strong enough" implies that perhaps they ought to be simply dropped. I do not think he is saying that at all.

Herman

I agree with you - perhaps I am not expressing myself well, or in an unintentionally vague manner!

As far as I know from reading what he wrote in the book "The ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church" that he is indeed against the ordination of women priests, but that the current arguments against women's ordination do not stand up to rigourous investigation.

"not enough effort has gone into explaining the necessity of a male priesthood in a properly thorough manner" - THIS IS EXACTLY THE POINT I AM TRYING TO MAKE!!!! I may phrase it as "not strong enough", but all I mean is what you say, "it ought to be explained better"!

So, can we agree that the fact that the priest is an icon of Christ does not necessarily imply that the priest has to be a woman? I am against women priests, but this particular line of reasoning "ought to be explained better" than it is at present. (And in trying to explain it better, certain fundamental flaws may be found, or it may be made irrefutable.)

Richard
:)

M.C. Steenberg

26-10-2008, 11:24 PM

Dear Richard and others,

I've not read the entirety of Metropolitan Kallistos' article in that volume, so cannot comment on it in its fulness (and don't like to form reactions just on single extractions). However, based solely on the extract you've provided, I would certainly say that I disagree with his comments. The polyvalence of symbols cannot be used to preclude or deny the intentional specificity of symbols as employed in certain circumstances. This is a point I've tried to make in a previous post: the fact that man and woman are both icons of Christ in certain natural and symbolic contexts, does not (and must not) deny more specific symbolism of incarnational realities in others. I doubt Metropolitan Kallistos would suggest otherwise (which is why I hesitate to comment at all on the extract from his text) - though I can certainly ask him.

The male priest as icon of the incarnate shepherd Christ is not the only reason that the priesthood is male: it is one of many. Nonetheless, I would certainly - and strongly - disagree with this:

So, can we agree that the fact that the priest is an icon of Christ does not necessarily imply that the priest has to be a man?(I've corrected that quotation: I think there was a typo on the last word in the original.) With this I think one has to disagree - not simply by relying on an unexplained symbolism, but precisely because I feel that a more careful and thorough consideration of the iconography of the clerical office mandates it.

Richard, you have suggested that 'not enough effort has gone into explaining the necessity of a male priesthood in a properly thorough manner'. On this matter, I would offer this: I have attempted to do so, above, with respect to this aspect of the male priest as icon of Christ, and why this maleness is significant in the context of this specific iconography. If what you're after is a more thorough attempt to explain and explore these matters, perhaps what is best is not simply to dismiss attempts at such exploration by referring back to the fact that more exploration is needed, but actually to explore that investigation as it is encountered. I've provided some concrete points in my posts #3 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=69836&postcount=3) and #5 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70015&postcount=5) in this thread. What are your responses to these?

INXC, Deacon Matthew

RichardWorthington

27-10-2008, 09:43 AM

Dear all,

I think all these comments about priests being the icons of Christ is going way over the top: the priest being an icon of Christ may well imply that only men can be priests, but this is not a universally accepted argument in the Orthodox Church. That is all I am trying to say!!

Again, I will quote what I quoted above (post #104), with Metropolitan Kallistos' views in bold::

Mme Behr-Sigel writes:

the priest presiding over the assembly is also an "icon of Christ" … It is as he repeats the words spoken by Christ at the Last Supper, as he repeats his gestures (page 41)

Metropolitan Kallistos writes:

At this crucial moment {epiclesis} as throughout the eucharistic prayer, he is not Christ’s vicar or icon, but - in union with the people - he stands as a supplicant before God (page 85)

While affirming, then, the character of the ministerial priest as Christ’s icon, I do not find that this in itself excludes women from the priesthood (page 87)

The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church by Elisabeth Behr-Sigel, Bishop Kallistos Ware, WCC Publications, 2000

Remember, Mme Behr-Sigel writes in favour of women priests with a "patient impatience" (see page 44) with, it would seem, the blessing of Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh.

Moving on:

I've provided some concrete points in my posts #68 and #105 in this thread. What are your responses to these?

In post #105 the following is written:

… all human persons, as created after the image of the eternal Son, can be and are 'icons of Christ', regardless of gender.

To the latter, the answer is an obvious 'yes', and this has substantial and secure patristic support and explanation

Here it is stated as obvious that all humans are icons of Christ. However, when so much is written so fervently on the priest being an icon of Christ implying male only then it is not obvious!

This thread is being read by those outside of the fold of Holy Orthodoxy, though clearly in love with Her. Remembering my time outside of Orthodoxy, this is what I discovered: the Orthodox would say things without any remote awareness of how they might be misunderstood. I have looked through all the previous posts (searching for icon(s) and ikon(s)) and have found no prior reference to women also being ‘icons’ of Christ. That is why I wrote (#104),

The body which the Son of God took from the Virgin Mary is indeed a male body. However, the term "Body of Christ" used of the Church - the fullness of Him who fills all in all - is indeed female. No longer think that men are more of an icon of Christ than women!

No one up till then had stated such a thing.

Richard

RichardWorthington

27-10-2008, 10:36 AM

I've provided some concrete points in my posts #68 and #105 in this thread. What are your responses to these?

Rather, the context is the iconic engagement of the worshipper with Jesus Christ himself, in the living icon of the priest. For this reason, it is the case that what are essentially 'iconographic canons', similar to those that dictate the right painting of an icon, apply also to the 'painting of the clergy' - i.e., the setting apart of those in clerical roles to be proper icons

If I may play the "devil’s advocate" for the moment, then one comment I would make is this: the icons drawn in the 17th to 19th centuries in Russia were very Westernised and not at all in accordance with the ancient tradition. Yet some of these icons became miracle working (e.g. the one belonging to St Seraphim of Sarov). If God can bless the changing of the ancient drawing iconic tradition, then why not the priestly iconic tradition also?

If changing the tradition appals you then do not read what the Orthodox theologian Paul Evdokimov wrote:

In the post-Constantinian reaction, it was the lay people themselves who relinquished their dignity as a universal priesthood and then inevitably the bishops became more and more the point of focus of the sacred, the priestly, ‘the consecrated’. A distance was created by the indigence, the progressive impoverishment of the laity by the regrettable rejection of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. This was the great ‘betrayal of the laity’, a relinquishing of their priestly character.

http://www.exarchate-uk.org/Archive/Conference2008/Robinson.html

If, according to him, certain aspects of the church were impoverished with Constantine, surely someone else could come along and argue that part of this impoverishment included suppressing any notion of women priests?

Final point: I do not think like this, but I am aware that there are some in Orthodoxy who do. That is all.

Please do not respond with a flurry of posts against me: I am merely trying to show that arguments based on symbolism can be rather vague, even if we can convince ourselves that they are irrefutable. I am quoting from others, or giving possible counter-arguments.

Again, I repeat: I do not believe in the ordination of women priests. (And also for the record, I laughed when I read the above quotation regarding the royal priesthood: for me, to be a member of the royal priesthood, properly speaking, is to be deified: We enter the "greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation" via the "new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh" (Hebrews 9:11;10:20). Any talk of relating the royal priesthood to earthly ‘ecclesiastical activity’ is the real impoverishment of the laity.)

Richard

M.C. Steenberg

27-10-2008, 01:00 PM

Dear Richard and others,

I'm happy to read your two most recent posts, above, and thank you for them. I trust you'll understand a response to be not an attack against, but an engagement with, as per a 'discussion community' such as this!

Firstly, I would just note that while your responses did engage with two points from above (all persons as icons of Christ, and the notion of essentially 'iconographic canons' relating to the priesthood), which in some sense look at the issues around the key point of a male priesthood (i.e. that everyone is Christ's icon, and that male priests are 'iconographically' defined in their attire, posture, etc.), it didn't yet engage with some of the critical points about the nature of the priesthood itself. These have included the specificity of symbols and icons in given contexts; the specific nature of the priest as icon of Christ in his incarnate male reality as man in Galilee, shepherd of his earthly flock. Given your fairly insistent position that 'all these comments about priests being the icons of Christ is going way over the top', I'm still dearly waiting to see what you have to say about the genuinely foundational issues as to what this symbolism means.

Nonetheless, there is some interesting material in your two posts, on which I might offer a few thoughts. You wrote:

the priest being an icon of Christ may well imply that only men can be priests, but this is not a universally accepted argument in the Orthodox Church. That is all I am trying to say!!

I don't think anyone would challenge you on this. When it comes right down to it, almost nothing is a 'universally accepted argument'. The Church is not a factory of intellectual clones, and the Holy Spirit works in the hearts of many and varied people. Particularly when one is looking at a practice that has numerous foundations, as is the case with the male priesthood (as I mentioned before), different people will focus on different aspects in different contexts. There are some contexts, in this scope, where apostolic tradition will be the most-focussed-on foundation; others where it will be the theological conception of fatherhood; others where it will be the charge of Christ; others where it will be priest as icon. If I can put things quite boldly and directly for a rhetorical moment: to say that something is over-emphasised because not everyone speaks of it in the same manner, would be to affirm that nothing can be spoken of emphatically or securely, since there is essentially nothing in the Church that is articulated through a voice of uniform expression among individual pastors, theologians, saints. This could be considered a 'weakness', but in fact it is precisely the heart and soul of the Church's patristic heritage: common vision in personal expression. We do not look for uniformity of expression to confirm a things worth; we look for the living concensus of the Church in her fathers, which reveals and articulates the truth.

That being said, it is actually the case that on the matter of priests as icons of Christ, there is a great deal of concensus on the matter, with few bringing up positions of this not relating in some way to Christ's and their maleness. You have quoted two sources that would downplay this. One is Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia - though as I already mentioned, I hesitate to focus on his extracted comments, since on their own they seem somewhat discordant with what I have heard him say elsewhere (it will be good to speak with him on this matter). The other is Elisabeth Behr-Sigel, a woman as respected for her boldness as she remains controversial because of it. If I might make a comparison (which I hope you'll find amusing, given contexts!), quoting Elisabeth Behr-Sigel on the issue of women in the priesthood and associated issues, is rather like quoting Margaret Barker on 'temple theology' in the Old Testament. Of course scholars who dedicate their lives to a certain position will find affirmations for it, and means of dismissing views that might contradict it.

In the cases of the comments you've provided, however, it seems that their position on the priest as icon not necessarily involving their maleness, is connected to a conflation of imagery seen elsewhere (and I quickly add just once again, I am deeply uncertain of this being Metropolitan Kallistos' actual point: that single phrase speaks of one context - not others). In an above post, I wrote:

… all human persons, as created after the image of the eternal Son, can be and are 'icons of Christ', regardless of gender.

To the latter, the answer is an obvious 'yes', and this has substantial and secure patristic support and explanation

To this you responded:

Here it is stated as obvious that all humans are icons of Christ. However, when so much is written so fervently on the priest being an icon of Christ implying male only then it is not obvious!

Dear Richard, if you'll forgive me repeating something I've mentioned earlier, I think there is a basic issue here with you conflating symbolism - as if every mention of being an 'icon of Christ' were always to be interpreted in the same way. The kind of lack of clarity you mention could really only come about in that context - where hearing that 'the priest as male is an icon of Christ' therefore must mean that all icons of Christ must be male priests, and therefore others are not Christ's icons. But this is a confusion/conflation of images, and in my own experience, not a common one.

That all persons are icons of Christ must be one of the most discussed issues in Orthodoxy, as well as patristic study. To take the latter first, it is almost impossible to open a study on the Church fathers that deals with 'image', 'icon', anthropology, etc., which doesn't discuss the human creature as bearing Christ's image - since the common consensus of the fathers is that all human persons, male as well as female, are created in the image of God - which specifically means the image of the Son. This is brought out, for example, in St Irenaeus:
Then the Word was made manifest when the Word of God became human, assimilating himself to the human and the human to himself, so that through his likeness with the Son the human might become precious to the Father. For in times past it was said that the human was made in the image of God, but it was not shown. For the Word was still invisible in whose image the human had been made. Therefore he easily lost the likeness. But when the Word of God became flesh, he confirmed both. For he showed the image truly, becoming his own image himself; and he firmly established the likeness, making the human like the invisible God by the visible Word. (Irenaeus of Lyons, 'Adversus haereses' 5.16.2)
Representing what was already by then a common consensus, St Irenaeus states unequivocally that it is in the image of Christ that all human persons are created (and reading more thoroughly in his texts, it is beyond any doubt that he explicitly means male and female). This is reflected, too, in the later writings of St Athanasius:
What then was God to do, or what should have happened, except that he should renew again that which was in his image, in order that through it humanity might be able once more to know him? But how could this have been done, unless the very image of God were to come, our Savior Jesus Christ? For neither by human beings was it possible, since they had been created in the image, nor through angels, since they are not images at all. So the Word of God came in his own person, in order that, as he is the image of his Father, he might be able to restore the human being who is in the image. (Athanasius of Alexandria, De decretis 27.1)
Here St Athanasius takes up the yet more nuanced theme of Christ as true Image, with all human persons created 'in/after' (kata) the image of the one who is eternal Image of the Father - the Word himself. In this image of the Son is that image borne up in all human creatures, male and female. This is even more explicit in a passage presumably by St Gregory of Nyssa:
'So God created the man [anthropos, human being] in his own image'. 'The anthropos?' says the woman, 'what does this mean for me? It concerns man. For it does not say, "the female human", but by the addition of the article <it is clear that> the male is indicated.' But in order that no one by the expression 'the man [anthropos]' ignorantly moves to the male, scripture added: 'male and female he made them'. Therefore woman is equally 'in the image of God' as man. Their natures possess the same dignity, their virtues are the same, their struggles are the same, the judgement is the same. Let no one say 'I am weak'. Weakness is of the flesh; in the soul is power. (Gregory of Nyssa, Orations on Genesis 1.26)
I provide these merely as a few examples of a common patristic theme. Humanity is created after the image of the Son, the image of Christ, and this image is common to all - male as well as female.

That is from the patristic side, but the fact that all human persons, male and female, are icons of Christ, is also one of the most commonly noted anthropological themes in Orthodoxy 'in practice'. Here, simply a few examples:

I have never once heard an explanation of the practice of censing the people, and why the deacon/priest bows to them while doing so - whether made in a sermon, pastoral discussion, or liturgical lesson - that did not point out that this is because every human person is an icon of Christ.
The notion that by receiving the Eucharist, one is drawn more fully into iconic participation in Christ, is a common theme.
The sacredness of un- and new-born life is consistently raised in Orthodoxy within the context of this life as an icon of Christ (cf. here (http://incommunion.org/articles/conferences-lectures/the-sacredness-of-newborn-life))
Questions about the sacredness of the body (e.g. tattoos, body piercing, etc.) are regularly raised in the context of defacing the image of Christ.
Etc.

In all, in my own personal experience of Orthodox parish life across North America, Britain, western Europe, Greece, Russia, Scandinavia and elsewhere, all human persons as 'icons of Christ' has to be among the most commonly preached topics I've encountered.

So I find myself simply unable to accept the statement that preaching on the male priest as icon of Christ causes the reality of all human persons being Christ's icon to appear less or not obvious; this doesn't resonate with what I see, read, and experience. Most people readily understand the fact that symbolism and roles specific to contexts - and the need for specificity in some contexts does not dimish or deny the reality of others.

And this - the fact that the priest in his office as icon of Christ is a different kind of icon of Christ - is really a key issue in the discussion, which as yet I haven't heard your thoughts on, Richard. To quote my comments on it above:

In the clerical orders, there is a deliberate iconography, not simply of Christ in his eternity as Son of the Father, true and real God, fully and authentic human, which is the 'image' in which all humanity partakes, but of the specific incarnational reality of Jesus Christ incarnate in Galilee, forming and leading his Church, directing them to his table and offering himself as the banquet of new life. This is the iconography of Christ as shepherd of the Church, of his earthly ministry conjoined to the heavenly. And in this, what is 'imaged' is not solely the truth of Christ known and encountered in all image-bearing creatures, but the distinct, irrepeatable, and unique person of the incarnate Jesus of Nazareth. The Church teaches that the value of all human persons, male and female, as 'icons of Christ' is to be cherished and engaged with at all times; but in the clerical orders, it is the specific image of the man Jesus Christ, encountered in Galilee as minister, shepherd and celebrant, that is the subject of this particular 'icon'.

In this, the maleness of Christ is important, is indeed a critical dimension of the incarnational reality of the Son. Christ was not incarnate as a woman; to depict him as such would be as much a falsehood in the iconography of the clergy - who are icons of that incarnational shepherding and guiding - as in the iconography of paint and wood. Regarding the question of the 'iconography of the priesthood' - i.e. the canons and practices that lay out his dress, his composure, his actions, etc., you wrote:

If I may play the "devil’s advocate" for the moment, then one comment I would make is this: the icons drawn in the 17th to 19th centuries in Russia were very Westernised and not at all in accordance with the ancient tradition. Yet some of these icons became miracle working (e.g. the one belonging to St Seraphim of Sarov). If God can bless the changing of the ancient drawing iconic tradition, then why not the priestly iconic tradition also?

An argument for God working beyond the boundries of canonical norms has been consistently rejected by the Church as a reason to change those norms; it is, rather, a theological confession of God's power and mercy. Our God is a wonderful, majestic God, who is not confined by anything. Yet he has delivered certain rules (lit. 'canons') and orders for the well-being of his human creature, designed to aid in his or her development and growth in holiness. When canons are seen simply as 'regulations', then seeing them 'broken' yet still in the presence of holiness, drives one to say, 'Well then, let us change [or do away with] the canon.' But the canons exist, through the Church's Spirit-led wisdom, to provide for the most secure, most authentic pastoral growth and sanctification of the person. The fact that God can bring about sanctification outside of 'canonical norms' is a confession of God's power; it says nothing about a canon needing to be changed. Indeed, the canons remain the most authentic way to yield up sons and daughters to God. They are pastoral provision. The fact that it might in be possible to drive from London to Leeds up the wrong side of the motorway, into facing traffic, does not mean it is the right way. God, and his Church, do not deal in technical possibilities, but in pastoral healing.

To take up your example of icons. There have been numerous icons in the Church that have been outside canonical norms (such as the 'Old man, young man and the bird' image of the Trinity), or which were profoundly given to romantic excess (such as St Seraphim's icon of the Mother of God, as many others), which yet have seen the grace of God present through them in miracles. Yet the Church's response has not been to say that the canons broken by such images are therefore unnecessary. It is wrong to depict the Trinity in this manner, and spiritually dangerous to do so. The fact that God nonetheless reaches out to his people and sanctifies them, even in their error, does not diminish the error.

Just to sum up (I've gone on far too long already), I do not disagree that the understanding of the priest as icon of Christ is in and of itself the only reason for the priesthood being male. It is part of a dynamic of reasons, and the Church doesn't approach such matters with a 'here is an infallible reason for' mentality. However, I do disagree with a position that says that since all human persons are icons of Christ (which they are), both male and female, then the priest as icon of Christ needn't necessarily be male. I find this a weak conception of 'image'/'icon', grounded in an insufficient conception of iconic symbolism alive in differing contexts; and a bad theology of incarnation, which ultimately debases the genders in their God-created (and therefore beautiful) distinction and distinctiveness, as much as it debases the authentic personal distinctiveness of the incarnate Jesus Christ.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Fr Raphael Vereshack

27-10-2008, 04:25 PM

This is a wonderful discussion!

But I also wonder who wrote this (quoted in Richard's post above) :

Since the priest in the Divine Liturgy is a living icon of Christ the bridegroom of the Church, does it follow therefore that the priest must always be a man? Can a woman represent the bridegroom? That brings us back to my first question: In what sense does the priest represent Christ? To some it will seem patently absurd that the bridegroom should be represented by a woman. Others will respond that there is no intrinsic absurdity, provided that we make proper allowance for the subtlety and polyvalence of symbols. After all, when we speak of the Church as bride, this implies that there is a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God. If men can represent the Church as bride, why cannot women represent Christ as bridegroom?

"The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church" page 88

First off the image of Christ as Bridegroom relates to our communion with Him. This is a very awkward image to try to relate to the priesthood. For in the priesthood the focus is not on how it images forth Christ's relationship of communion with the faithful so much as the specific way in which He ministers to the faithful. Here the fact that the priesthood ministers before the Altar is surely of great significance. For the Altar represents the eternal offering & position of the Son in relation to His Father and through the Holy Spirit. In this sense the Son as male, although summing up within Himself all of humanity both male & female, relates to the specific nature of His ministry and its character.

To repeat what others have said here already, Christ's ministry is inclusive in effect, but specific in method. This is because although He sums up all of humanity, male & female, in his human nature, He is specific in Who He is as Person. Thus although the term Son for Who He is can only be remotely suggestive of the reality it does indeed point to a true characteristic of His even as the pre-eternal Logos. Thus it is no accident or cultural choice that He was humanly born as male for in some crucial way this follows from Who He really is as a pre-eternal Person. It is in this maleness then of the Person of Christ among other personal characteristics and of the specific way through which this ministers to the faithful that the priesthood relates.

A last point which risks being left out in such strong male/female discussions is that for us maleness or femaleness are not a separate aspect of who we are. Rather female & male are more intrinsic aspects of our character and part of what gives its distinct colour. To deny this distinctness for the sake of what is common to all of humanity risks a fundamental distortion on our part of how Christ means to minister to the Church.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Mary

27-10-2008, 06:01 PM

A last point which risks being left out in such strong male/female discussions is that for us maleness or femaleness are not a separate aspect of who we are. Rather female & male are more intrinsic aspects of our character and part of what gives its distinct colour. To deny this distinctness for the sake of what is common to all of humanity risks a fundamental distortion on our part of how Christ means to minister to the Church.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Dear Fr Raphael,

I love how you said that! I have been thinking, that I really really like the fact that men are male and women are female. Although I am different from my sister Nina, and do not enjoy the same things as she does, we are still very much female, and I am ever and ever so thankful that the men are not female! =)

In Christ,
Mary.

Andreas Moran

27-10-2008, 08:12 PM

I am ever and ever so thankful that the men are not female! =)

And the men are thankful that the females are not male! Vive la difference!

Mary

27-10-2008, 08:51 PM

Since the priest in the Divine Liturgy is a living icon of Christ the bridegroom of the Church, does it follow therefore that the priest must always be a man? Can a woman represent the bridegroom? That brings us back to my first question: In what sense does the priest represent Christ? To some it will seem patently absurd that the bridegroom should be represented by a woman. Others will respond that there is no intrinsic absurdity, provided that we make proper allowance for the subtlety and polyvalence of symbols. After all, when we speak of the Church as bride, this implies that there is a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God. If men can represent the Church as bride, why cannot women represent Christ as bridegroom?

"The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church" page

88

This is definitely and interesting thought. I underlined the part that strikes me as totally untrue - "... a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God." This sounds like it is based on the assumption that all relationships are sexual in nature. If this is the case, men cannot be friends with other men, unless one of them is feminine in character. And two women cannot be friends either, unless one is masculine.

There are many examples of men who've had very strong, deep friendships with other men and such friendship is still around. In the Bible, there's David and Jonathan, and Daniel and his three friends. I can't quite imagine any one of these men as feminine. But their relationships were deep and strong. And not sexual.

I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother;
you were very dear to me.
Your love for me was wonderful,
more wonderful than that of women. 2 Sam 1:26In the East Infested Cultures (Forgive me. Something isn't good, just because it's from the East.) that I grew up in, all relationships between male and female were considered to be sexual in nature, and you couldn't be 'just' friends with boys, not even your own brothers or male cousins or husbands.

I think, looking at relationships in a sexual way, limits the depths that that they can grow to. I don't know. Just my thoughts.

Mary.

PS. - examples of women with strong deep, relationships similar to the men, please? I don't know of any, off the top of my head. I've heard someone mention Naomi and Ruth, but... I'm not so sure about it. Seems all the devotion was lopsided there, coming only from Ruth.

Robert Hegwood

28-10-2008, 06:07 PM

It seems to me reducing our given sexes to sex misses something of the content of our given gender. Biological gender has a sexual expression so that life may continue, but that doesn't mean that is all there is to it. Male and female have a theological content as well and it does not operate under the same safeguards and constraints that attend to our biology. At the simplest level it is related to complete kenotic love of the other...something analogous to the relationship of the Holy Spirit with the other Persons of the Holy Trinity. Without trying to make gender claims for God I think we can see in Adam and the first family a trinitarian icon. Adam was first, from Adam Eve proceeded so to speak, but Cain (or later Seth) like the Word was begotton after the image and likeness of the Father. Adam and Cain were alike, being male and Eve being female was unlike yet complementary...other..but all are from Adam directly. So in the Word we see what some have described as the exstasis of the Father and in the Spirit His kenosis...or maybe vis versa...I'm no theologian...but my larger point is that first family teaches us something, even if it is a bit inarticulabe about the inner relatioship of the Holy Trinity and their mutual indwelling. And more to the point that sexual kind has theological meaning and content above and beyond the temporal needs of bodily reproduction. Our gender points iconically to something else within the Godhead.

Maybe even the reproduction itself points to higher things. Men reproduce exstatically...outside themselves, women reproduce endostatically (inside themselves) and give birth and sustain it kenotically (emptying themselves...first from the womb then from the paps). So in man the fatherhood of the Father is recaptiulated as in woman the brooding...life giving/nurturing of the Spirit is recaptitulated. Women give birth physically, the Church as the Bride of Christ mystically, etc. etc. So the mystical path of salvation in the Church for women is united to and expressive of the theological impress of their gender, and it is the same for man...some of whom are called be bishops and priests recaptitulating the role of the Father in the mystical life of the Church.

In the end it is about giving life first natural and then Trinitarian each according to their gifts.

I know I've said all this bady, but I hope you can see what I'm trying to say beyond the muddle that I did say.

Herman Blaydoe

28-10-2008, 06:51 PM

It is not about social reform, cultural baggage, or ideological agendas, it is about Truth, and expressing that Truth in a clear unambiguous manner.

Christ our Lord was not androgynous, He did not become incarnate as male AND female. As Father Raphael says, His incarnation is both inclusional but also specific and to change the iconic portrayal of the Truth is to change our understanding of the Truth. For those whose idea of truth is entirely relative, this would be a good thing I suppose. Change the truth to fit the situation, achieve the goal, be it social reform or to forward a particular ideology.

But Truth IS our goal, we don't change it to suit ourselves. If we change the icon of the priesthood, we change our understanding of the Trinity, even as Fr. Patrick Reardon says in his article quoted (by me (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70020&postcount=106)) earlier.

Roles are more than merely culturally defined. A husband can still be the head of the home church while staying at home and caring for the children while the wife works, regardless of what "society" thinks. The man is burdened by the responsibility of his role as spiritual head and must also be obedient to it. If he defers his responsibility, he and his family may suffer spiritually because of it.

The roles of the husband and wife are an icon of the relationship of Christ and the Church. I suspect this is also a reason why the idea of same-sex marriage is a bad idea from the Church's view (there is that three-letter word again...). Change the icon and you change what is being portrayed. If you think about it, this is part of what is destroying the Anglican Church right now, this is why they don't know what they believe any more. Iconoclasts like Spong have thrown down their icons and destroyed their truths.

Anyway, little thoughts from a little brain. If anything in these ramblings is helpful then to God be the glory, otherwise just move on to the next more edifying post.

Herman the Pooh

RichardWorthington

29-10-2008, 02:30 AM

Just a few brief clarifying comments - it is now 12:15 am and I will be falling asleep soon!

This is a wonderful discussion!

But I also wonder who wrote this (quoted in Richard's post above) :

Since the priest in the Divine Liturgy is a living icon of Christ the bridegroom of the Church, does it follow therefore that the priest must always be a man? Can a woman represent the bridegroom? That brings us back to my first question: In what sense does the priest represent Christ? To some it will seem patently absurd that the bridegroom should be represented by a woman. Others will respond that there is no intrinsic absurdity, provided that we make proper allowance for the subtlety and polyvalence of symbols. After all, when we speak of the Church as bride, this implies that there is a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God. If men can represent the Church as bride, why cannot women represent Christ as bridegroom?

"The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church" page 88

Dear Fr Raphael - it was written by Metropolitan Kallistos (in my post #111 I mentioned him in the preceding paragraph and then mentioned "He writes further").

Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia - though as I already mentioned, I hesitate to focus on his extracted comments, since on their own they seem somewhat discordant with what I have heard him say elsewhere (it will be good to speak with him on this matter).

Dear Dcn Matthew, it would be good if you could clarify his current views. He himself writes in the same book:

As regards this present piece, it represents an extensive revision of something that I originally wrote in 1978. Since then my views on the issue have altered. In 1978, I considered the ordination of women priests to be an impossibility. Now I am much more hesitant. I am far from convinced by many of the current arguments advanced in favour of women priests; but at the same time a number of the arguments urged on the other side now appear to me a great deal less conclusive than they did twenty years ago. What I would plead is that we Orthodox should regard the matter as essentially an open question. Let us not imagine that in this area everything is clarified and finally settled; for manifestly it is not, either for us Orthodox or for other Christians.

"The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church" Page 50

So he has changed his views on this - perhaps this accounts for the different understandings.

And finally,

Dear all,

Let us remember that this thread was set up to discuss women’s equality (in status, in symbolism, in activity, in spirituality, etc?) for someone it would seem in love with Orthodoxy but held back by her or other’s experiences.

I know that Monachos is not specifically a place for spiritual guidance, although such things can at times not help but enter into a discussion between fellow human beings.

As such, can I leave before going to sleep these words:

Mat 11:28 "Come to Me, all [you] who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Mat 11:29 "Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
Mat 11:30 "For My yoke [is] easy and My burden is light."

Let us try to imitate Him who welcomes us, as we welcome others.

Richard

RichardWorthington

02-11-2008, 12:13 PM

Thus it is no accident or cultural choice that He was humanly born as male for in some crucial way this follows from Who He really is as a pre-eternal Person. It is in this maleness then of the Person of Christ among other personal characteristics and of the specific way through which this ministers to the faithful that the priesthood relates.

Christ our Lord was not androgynous, He did not become incarnate as male AND female. As Father Raphael says, His incarnation is both inclusional but also specific and to change the iconic portrayal of the Truth is to change our understanding of the Truth. For those whose idea of truth is entirely relative, this would be a good thing I suppose. Change the truth to fit the situation, achieve the goal, be it social reform or to forward a particular ideology.

I have been looking into women’s ordination ever since some Anglicans left the Anglican Church and joined Orthodoxy. I did find in my readings things which I think put the above posts in perspective. I found it summed up by Metropolitan Kallistos, whom I quote in full:

While affirming, then, the character of the ministerial priest as Christ's icon, I do not find that this in itself excludes women from the priesthood. Here, then, is one weak link in the chain of reasoning asserted in the "iconic" argument. If we turn now to our second question - what is the theological significance of Christ's maleness? - we discover a second weak link in the "iconic" argument. For the Fathers, while repeatedly emphasizing Christ's humanness, have very little to say about his masculinity. Of course the particularity of the incarnation required that Christ should be born at a specific time and place, from a specific mother, as a specific human being with a real human body and a real human soul. He did not become human merely in an abstract or generalized sense, but in such a way that he could be "seen with our eyes" and "touched with our hands" (1 John 1:1). From this specificity it follows that he could not be both a male and a female at once, he had to be either the one or the other, and he was in fact a male. But this is not the point on which the Fathers choose to concentrate. What matters for them is not the fact that he became male (ανηρ, vir) but the fact that he became human (ανθρωπος, homo).

The same point is underlined in the creed: "for us humans (ανθρωπους) and for our salvation, he came down from heaven, and was incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human (ενανθρωπησαντα). If we prefer (as I in fact do) the older English version, "for us men... and became man", then we should be clear in our minds that in both the places where it occurs the word man (or men) signifies "human". It is indeed true that Christ at his incarnation became a male, but that is not what the creed is concerned to assert. The creed is referring to the salvation of the entire human race, men and women together; and so it states that Christ took the human nature that is common to us all, whether we are male or female.

Even on occasions when we might expect the Fathers or the liturgical texts to emphasize the maleness of Christ, surprisingly they often omit to do so. An example of this is the service of the Feast of the Circumcision of our Lord (1 January). This is obviously a commemoration that involves the Saviour's maleness, but the themes central to the hymnography are Christ's self-emptying, his "condescension" and his obedience to the Jewish law. While it is stressed that he became fully human, no particular significance is attached to his maleness as such.

Are we therefore to conclude that the divine choice whereby the Saviour became incarnate as a male and not as a female was purely coincidental and arbitrary? Most certainly not. In the divine economy nothing is mere coincidence.

"The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church", Pages 87-88

Food - indeed perhaps a Black Forest Gateau! - for thought.

Richard
PS. I looked at this page without signing in, and noticed the following advertisements: "How I Lost 35 Lbs Fast" and "Chocolate Dessert Recipes". Google obviously thinks this discussion has strayed!

Herman Blaydoe

02-11-2008, 02:21 PM

But neither you nor Bishop Kallistos have addressed this from Fr. Patrick:

In response, let us ask another question: Can a Christian man icon, or represent, Christ in a way that is not possible for a Christian woman? If the answer to this question is yes, then perhaps there may be a doctrinal basis for ordaining men and not ordaining women. Keep that thought in mind: if the answer is yes—if the Christian man really can icon or represent Christ in a way that the Christian woman cannot—then everything today's feminists write on this matter by way of theological reflection is beside the point.

If I have correctly understood Torrance, however, his answer to that question must be no. Indeed, it seems to me that he says repeatedly throughout his article that, in this matter of iconing or representing Christ, the male cannot do it in any way not also available to the female. Such representation always has to do exclusively with human nature as such, he contends, and never with a specific sex. Now if that is truly what Torrance {and Bishop Kallistos, added by me} is saying, then he is manifestly at odds with Holy Scripture. I take it to be the clear teaching of the New Testament that the Christian man, as male and not simply as person, can represent Christ in some way that the Christian woman cannot.

We are taught in the New Testament that the husband in the Christian family, precisely as husband, can represent Christ in some way that his wife is not able to duplicate (Ephesians 5:21 -33), and that this representation has to do with his specific sex. This representation involves his being masculine and not feminine. This representation is further described as one of headship: "the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is head of the Church." The text here is something of a hard saying in our contemporary setting precisely because it is so clear and so irreducible. It says that the Christian husband, as head of the family, represents Christ who is head of the Church. This representation of Christ in headship pertains to the husband's specific sex (see also 1 Corinthians 11:3).

Now if that is true, then the answer to the question posed above must be yes: It is possible for the Christian man to icon Christ in a way that is not possible for the Christian woman. And if that is true, then there is a reasonable and possible theological basis for ordaining men and not ordaining women, and thus Torrance 's {and Bishop Kallistos'} major premise is eviscerated.

From this I would take it that Fr. Patrick and the Apostle Paul might take issue with Bishop Kallistos' position. Bishop Kallistos might do well to re-examine his position one more time.

Or so it seems to this bear of little brain.

Herman the Pooh

Owen Jones

02-11-2008, 03:02 PM

Bp Kallistos employs capricious and specious reasoning on the subject. The fact that the Fathers do not parse the issue of Christ's maleness is because it simply was not an issue at the time. Now it is -- with the advent of feminist ideology which they would not have anticipated or comprehended. The Fathers do not speak to a lot of subjects -- nuclear physics for example. The Bible, likewise, does not speak to a lot of issues that were not pregnant at the time. This absence does not mean it is an open question.

One needs to merely pay attention to the theological and practical result in "church" organizations that have ordained women and we know the right answer to the question.

Fr Raphael Vereshack

02-11-2008, 03:11 PM

I think there is some misunderstanding in what Metropolitan Kallistos has written.

Yes, in His human nature Christ includes all of humanity.

But as Person, Christ is quite specific. Since the Fathers continually stressed the importance of this latter fact, then we can indeed say that a crucial Patristic point would concern or imply His maleness with which He was born as a Person. And as stated in a previous post, maleness even though only suggestive of the characteristics of the pre eternal Son of God, does nevertheless refer to an extremely important theological aspect of Him as Person which it would be dangerous to overlook. Without this insistence we threaten the integrity of our understanding of the Son of God as pre-eternal and incarnate Person.

A last point here about the Fathers not referring to the masculinity of Christ. While questioning this assertion (the strongest references to Christ as masculine that I have come across are in Anglo-Saxon literature where He is often portrayed as the Warrior Chief Who overthrows death in company with His cohort disciples) I would say that the emphasis is not found in the Fathers mainly because masculinity/femininity as such a distinct aspect of human personhood is a modern preoccupation. Not that it is necessarily wrong. But it does tend to exaggerate what is only one aspect of what we are.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

M.C. Steenberg

02-11-2008, 03:47 PM

I'm delighted to see the last few posts actually engaging with the core issues, rather than simply referring to certain characterisations. I was beginning to wonder whether the understanding of the incarnational specificity of Christ as male and priest as male was just going to keep being passed over, no matter how many times I mentioned it!

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Owen Jones

02-11-2008, 04:14 PM

I don't see a whole lot in the Fathers on homosexuality (properly: sodomy) either. Does that mean it is an open question for the Fathers? No, it was considered to some degree unseemly to even mention it publicly, so they are rather elliptical about the subject. Certainly not approving, but not obsessed with the subject, because it was not then an ideological fixation as it is today.

I still think Bp Kallistos is being misleading here in his words, and words are important, especially if they lead to confusion among the faithful, which his words on the subject have obviously done. He refuses, apparently, to put the issue in context, which is the catastrophic results of ordaining women in Anglicanism, the ideology behind it that has absolutely nothing to do with Christianity, and is actually the death of Christianity. Most of the women ordained and "consecrated" are in fact lesbians and marxists, which is part and parcel of the whole "movement."

And I think we can dismiss protestant churches that have women pastors and bishops as being anti-theological at their core. Gee, let's all just love each other! is their mantra. Except they basically hate and despise anyone who tries to adhere to traditional doctrine. It is the politicization of sex, pure and simple. How could the Fathers have anticipated this? Why would we expect them to have? It's like expecting them to comment on the space program as an ersatz religion -- breaking the bonds of the earth so that mankind can be liberated from his confined space!!!!

Andreas Moran

02-11-2008, 06:51 PM

I don't see a whole lot in the Fathers on homosexuality

Since the Church's teaching is that only sexual activity between a man and a woman within marriage is acceptable, surely this covers homosexual activity.

homosexuality (properly: sodomy)

Why 'properly:sodomy'? Mind you, the word 'homosexual', like the word 'television', is unfortunate: Greek prefix and Latin stem never works well.

Most of the women ordained and "consecrated" are in fact lesbians and marxists

This statement suffers from ambiguity: does it mean 'some are lesbians and some are Marxists', or does it mean 'most are lesbians who are also Marxists'? Either way the comment strikes me as unfair in being more likely an expression of prejudice than a factual observation supported by evidence.

M.C. Steenberg

02-11-2008, 10:47 PM

Father Raphael, in his post #29 in this thread (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70379&postcount=29), put quite succinctly what I have been suggesting be pondered for some time. He wrote:

Yes, in His human nature Christ includes all of humanity.
But as Person, Christ is quite specific.This seems to me the fundamental issue ignored by the argument that 'since everybody is an icon of Christ, the notion of the priesthood as iconic of Christ does not mean it has to be male'. As I've tried to spell out in several posts above (e.g. #3 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=69836&postcount=3), #5 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70015&postcount=5), #18 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70109&postcount=18)), this seems to me an extremely weak position to argue, because it fails to account for the incarnationally specific nature of Christological symbolism. To dismiss the person-specific symbolism of the specific iconography of the priest as the male person Jesus Christ, on grounds that because the nature-specific symbolism of all human persons, male and female, as icons of Christ the eternal Son, strikes me as fundamentally un-incarnationally sound. This lies behind my earlier comment (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70015&postcount=105):

Any attempt to explain the iconography of the priest as Eucharistic celebrant, in a way that divorces this from the maleness of Jesus Christ, is fundamentally un- or even anti-incarnational.Further, I find it rather out of kilter with the fathers' practice. While focussing on the specific question of Christ's maleness may not be something about which the fathers write at length (largely because it is a fairly modern preoccupation as a distinct category, and the fathers simply took it as a given - I do not believe that an 'argument from silence' has solid grounding here), nonetheless the notion of symbolic imaging being general in certain contexts, yet specific in other personal icons, is common in the patristic writings. To take an example: all human persons are icons of Eve (as tempted person, failed helpmeet, etc.); yet only the Virgin Mary could be perfect icon of Eve the person in a soteriologically significant way (a point made resoundingly strongly by Irenaeus of Lyons already in the second century; echoed by many others). There are some ways I can be an icon of Eve, others in which I cannot. The fact that I can effectively be an icon in those first ways, does not demand that I somehow have to be involved in the others; nor does either category diminish the value of the other. I can be an icon of Eve as rebellious human, as tempted and wayward co-heir to creation; but I cannot be an icon of Eve as woman. This is ordinary stock to the Fathers. So I cannot see a valid claim to the suggestion that the fathers don't understand a distinction between being an icon of Christ as respects his nature as eternal Son and Word, and being an icon of Christ as respects the uniqueness of his person as human male.

Richard, I would still dearly like you to engage with all this at some point!

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Olga

02-11-2008, 11:43 PM

Father Raphael, in his post #160 in this thread (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70379&postcount=160), put quite succinctly what I have been suggesting be pondered for some time. He wrote:

This seems to me the fundamental issue ignored by the argument that 'since everybody is an icon of Christ, the notion of the priesthood as iconic of Christ does not mean it has to be male'. As I've tried to spell out in several posts above (e.g. #68 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=69836&postcount=68), #105 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70015&postcount=105), #119 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70109&postcount=119)), this seems to me an extremely weak position to argue, because it fails to account for the incarnationally specific nature of Christological symbolism. To dismiss the person-specific symbolism of the specific iconography of the priest as the male person Jesus Christ, on grounds that because the nature-specific symbolism of all human persons, male and female, as icons of Christ the eternal Son, strikes me as fundamentally un-incarnationally sound. This lies behind my earlier comment (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70015&postcount=105):

Further, I find it rather out of kilter with the fathers' practice. While focussing on the specific question of Christ's maleness may not be something about which the fathers write at length (largely because it is a fairly modern preoccupation as a distinct category, and the fathers simply took it as a given - I do not believe that an 'argument from silence' has solid grounding here), nonetheless the notion of symbolic imaging being general in certain contexts, yet specific in other personal icons, is common in the patristic writings. To take an example: all human persons are icons of Eve (as tempted person, failed helpmeet, etc.); yet only the Virgin Mary could be perfect icon of Eve the person in a soteriologically significant way (a point made resoundingly strongly by Irenaeus of Lyons already in the second century; echoed by many others). There are some ways I can be an icon of Eve, others in which I cannot. The fact that I can effectively be an icon in those first ways, does not demand that I somehow have to be involved in the others; nor does either category diminish the value of the other. I can be an icon of Eve as rebellious human, as tempted and wayward co-heir to creation; but I cannot be an icon of Eve as woman. This is ordinary stock to the Fathers. So I cannot see a valid claim to the suggestion that the fathers don't understand a distinction between being an icon of Christ as respects his nature as eternal Son and Word, and being an icon of Christ as respects the uniqueness of his person as human male.

Richard, I would still dearly like you to engage with all this at some point!

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Fr Matthew, may I digress a little: Your post also correctly and succinctly expresses the incorrectness of portraying the pre-incarnate Christ in symbolic forms such as an androgynous or feminine angel in the "icons" known as Holy Wisdom, Angel of Blessed Silence, etc. Thank you very much for this analysis.

RichardWorthington

04-11-2008, 12:29 AM

Dear Fr Dcn Matthew, and all,

Yes, in His human nature Christ includes all of humanity.
But as Person, Christ is quite specific.

This seems to me the fundamental issue ignored by the argument that 'since everybody is an icon of Christ, the notion of the priesthood as iconic of Christ does not mean it has to be male'.

If I may appeal to accuracy: the Fathers say that the "priest is an icon of Christ". Note that I am referring to this specific phrase, yet neither to deductions made from it, nor to the priesthood in general! I would say that "the priest is an icon of Christ" need not imply a human being!! If I may appeal to simplicity: A robot dressed up in priestly vestments and programmed to say the words of institution while making certain hand movements could also be described as an "icon of Christ". All I am saying is that the exact term "the priest is an icon of Christ" could well only be talking from a very outward viewpoint. If we all could see the passages in which this phrase appears then it might help us all!

I am thinking here that Carol - and other women - need not think that they have to accept such ‘iconic’ male deductions in order to become Orthodox. That the priesthood is for men only is certain, however the reasons for it are not fixed and need not be accepted. The arguments against women’s priests are still a "work in progress", as referred to by Metropolitan Kallistos. If most people here on Monachos think that the arguments are actually finished, then fine, but not all Orthodox do, and so we do not need to accept these arguments.

As I've tried to spell out in several posts above (e.g. #68 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=69836&postcount=68/t_blank), #105 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70015&postcount=105/t_blank), #119 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70109&postcount=119/t_blank))

More soon …!

Richard

Mary

04-11-2008, 12:48 AM

Dear Fr Dcn Matthew, and all,

If I may appeal to accuracy: the Fathers say that the "priest is an icon of Christ". Note that I am referring to this specific phrase, yet neither to deductions made from it, nor to the priesthood in general! I would say that "the priest is an icon of Christ" need not imply a human being!! If I may appeal to simplicity: A robot dressed up in priestly vestments and programmed to say the words of institution while making certain hand movements could also be described as an "icon of Christ". All I am saying is that the exact term "the priest is an icon of Christ" could well only be talking from a very outward viewpoint. If we all could see the passages in which this phrase appears then it might help us all!

I am thinking here that Carol - and other women - need not think that they have to accept such ‘iconic’ male deductions in order to become Orthodox. That the priesthood is for men only is certain, however the reasons for it are not fixed and need not be accepted. The arguments against women’s priests are still a "work in progress", as referred to by Metropolitan Kallistos. If most people here on Monachos think that the arguments are actually finished, then fine, but not all Orthodox do, and so we do not need to accept these arguments.

More soon …!

Richard

Dear Richard,

You've totally lost me. And yet, your words are written in English.

A robot dressed up as a priest and programmed to speak all the right words, can be an icon of Christ?

Women don't need to accept priests as being icons of Christ?

If I weren't so sure of what I believe, you would have me tossing around worse than the worst imaginable tornado!

The reason 'arguements' are never finished, is because arguments are human. In truth, there is nothing to argue about. It is, what it is. Take it or leave it. An arguement for or against, is not going to add to it, or take away from it.

Anything having to do with God, cannot be explained and de-mystified using human words and human wisdom. You come in faith, because something draws you to Him. Whether you understand anything or not, you do get to know Him. If He says men are to be priests and women aren't, then that's the way things are. That's the way we get to know Him. Only He can explain Himself to us, and He does so, if we'll let Him. But He may not explain Himself in human terms and words. He knows how to explain Himself to your very heart.

Have you ever wondered about those who converted while watching the martyrs dying? And before the day ended, they too were martyred? In the space of a few hours, what did they know about Christ? Nothing and everything.

You agree that women shouldn't become priests. I do not understand why you say that, and yet contradict yourself in all other posts. What is it that isn't settled in your mind? Why do you feel women aren't being treated as equal with the men?

If a robot can be a priest, then why did God even create human beings?

in Christ,
Mary

Herman Blaydoe

04-11-2008, 02:31 AM

That is the sound of a rhetorical point stretched past the breaking point.

If I may appeal to accuracy: the Fathers say that the "priest is an icon of Christ". Note that I am referring to this specific phrase, yet neither to deductions made from it, nor to the priesthood in general! I would say that "the priest is an icon of Christ" need not imply a human being!!

It absolutely implies no other thing. It does not imply robots or monkeys or or any other non-human, non-male thing you can come up with. It completely implies that a priest can be nothing other than a male human being, except in the loosest, totally out-of-context logical acrobatics. I don't think we need to think very hard to figure out what was in the Fathers' minds. It certainly was not robots!

Sorry but this has been brought up more than once and once was more than enough. It makes a mockery of the Fathers, trying to reduce them down to some semantic sleight of hand.

Herman the peeved pooh

Olga

04-11-2008, 05:22 AM

Richard, I am frankly alarmed and utterly dismayed by your latest post. In fact, it is all I can do to muster an even-handed and dispassionate reply. You wrote:

If I may appeal to accuracy: the Fathers say that the "priest is an icon of Christ". Note that I am referring to this specific phrase, yet neither to deductions made from it, nor to the priesthood in general! I would say that "the priest is an icon of Christ" need not imply a human being!! If I may appeal to simplicity: A robot dressed up in priestly vestments and programmed to say the words of institution while making certain hand movements could also be described as an "icon of Christ". All I am saying is that the exact term "the priest is an icon of Christ" could well only be talking from a very outward viewpoint. If we all could see the passages in which this phrase appears then it might help us all!

Does a robot have the gift of the Holy Spirit endowed to it at baptism? Does a robot have the capacity to understand the priestly/"inaudible" prayers intoned during the Divine Liturgy, notably at the consecration of the bread and wine which will become the Body and Blood of Christ? Does a robot have a heart and immortal soul? I'm sure many of us would be interested to hear your answers to these questions.

Mary wrote, quite correctly:

You agree that women shouldn't become priests. I do not understand why you say that, and yet contradict yourself in all other posts. What is it that isn't settled in your mind? Why do you feel women aren't being treated as equal with the men?

If a robot can be a priest, then why did God even create human beings?

I, for one, am similarly confused by your recognition of the unbroken Orthodox tradition of a male priesthood, yet, in the same breath, stating that the long-standing reasons used to maintain a male priesthood are somehow lacking in rigour and finality. You can't have it both ways, my friend.

M.C. Steenberg

04-11-2008, 03:23 PM

Dear friends,

Some interesting turns in the conversation of late!

Some thoughts on the broad issue of 'icon'.

I find myself convinced that there are some fundamental misconceptions about iconography and symbolism, which lie behind what I've already said I consider to be misconceptions about the specific question of the male priest as icon of Christ, with respect to the fact of all human persons - male and female - also as Christological icons. It is probably worth our pondering these issues together, so as to make sense of an otherwise ever estranging dialogue.

The issue is brought out in this recent post by you, Richard (#35 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70446&postcount=35) in this thread):

If I may appeal to accuracy: the Fathers say that the "priest is an icon of Christ". Note that I am referring to this specific phrase, yet neither to deductions made from it, nor to the priesthood in general! I would say that "the priest is an icon of Christ" need not imply a human being!! If I may appeal to simplicity: A robot dressed up in priestly vestments and programmed to say the words of institution while making certain hand movements could also be described as an "icon of Christ". All I am saying is that the exact term "the priest is an icon of Christ" could well only be talking from a very outward viewpoint.

Fundamentally, this cannot be so. An icon is not simply a pictoral representation; and in point of fact, anything which is simply a pictoral representation, can never be an icon. A true icon binds together the subject and its representation, making manifest in the 'symbol' the genuine experience of its archetype. It is a means of encounter - mystical, yet nonetheless utterly immediate and real - with the one imaged.

In an earlier post (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=69836&postcount=68/t_blank), I quoted the following text by a priest in the Antiochian archdiocese of North America on iconography in respect to the priesthood, which seems worth presenting again:
"Now there is a third compelling reason for the male priesthood. Orthodox Christians believe that their bishops, priests and deacons are Ikons of Christ and therefore must be male because Jesus Christ is male. To understand this we must think about what an Ikon is. An Ikon is a religious symbol, but yet much more than a symbol. It is an instrument of Divine reality. It is a picture and a vision for the eyes which conveys a spiritual reality to the worshipper. [...] An Ikon has the spiritual function to help us receive into our souls the spiritual awareness of what it depicts. For example; when we look at an Ikon depicting the crucifixion, the Ikon helps us to participate more spiritually in the wonder of Christ’s love for us and the efficacious power of His sacrifice on the cross. Looking at an Ikon in our worship is the most direct way we can visually represent Christ’s atoning death for the forgiveness of our sins. Looking at an Ikon strengthens the spiritual reality of our worship." (From Fr Alistair Anderson, The Orthodox Priest as an Ikon of Christ (http://www.antiochian.org/midwest/Articles/The_Orthodox_Priest_An_Ikon_Of_Christ.htm))
Note the significance of the icon as helping the community of the faithful to 'receive into our souls the spiritual awareness of what it depicts'.

Such things lie behind the fact that icons are theological, and thus revealed, and thus a protected means of encounter with the divine. They are theological, because they are the means of true engagement with and experience of Theos, God himself. They are revealed, because all true theologia is the fruit of experience of the self-revealing God. They are protected, because true theological vision mandates its being kept pure. Alteration of a divine vision is always its debasement. So the canons relevant to icons work on the same lines as the canons relevant to all theological articulation and expression: to preserve intact the vision of God revealed to his creature, so that in the experience of the icon (as also in the experience of a genuine work of theological writing, or preaching, or counsel) the true God is experienced truly.

In this, engagement with God in the icon requires that the icon express truthfully the realities it will convey. The Church acknowledges various categories of icon: there is the broadest sense in which all created reality is iconic, as the work of God; beyond this there is the reality of fabricated icons, the 'works of mens hands' in wood, paint, text, which reclaim the elements of creation, distored by sin, and re-dedicate them to the living encounter with the Creator. These are the written icons of pen and ink that constitute the scriptures and the Church's sacred writings, and the visual icons of wood and paint that adorn the temples. And beyond these, there is the pinnacle of all iconography: the human person, created from the beginning after the 'image', as the eikon, of God. This, too, has to be reclaimed from the tarnish of sin, which takes a true icon (image) and disfigures its authentic symbolism and engagement (likeness), since man and woman will always be icons of God, yet will often 'cover up' that icon with something quite different.

In representing the divine - and perhaps it is best to focus directly on the icon of Christ, and say, 'in representing Christ' - each category or type of iconography has its own guides (canons) for authenticity. There is a real sense in which all creation images Christ, given that Christ is its creator (here the expressions of Logos spermatikos in St Justin the Philosopher; or Logos / logikos, logoi in St Maximus the Confessor); but in using the natural world as pastoral icon, there are pastoral guides (canons) given by the Church so as to see the truth in such reality. One can authentically say that a grove of trees gives an image of Christ in his care for every element of creation, in the created vision of stability that reflects and uncreated eternity, etc.; but one cannot say that a grove of trees provides a symbolic engagement with Jesus as person, since it does not bear those contours. Similarly, in crafted icons, engagement with personal realities is given authentic expression through canons that ensure the transfigured reality of the person is conveyed in the image. It is not simply the outward form of the icon that gives it this authenticity: the icon is the work of theological engagement, of revelation, of obedient expression. And so it is the whole nature of the icon that allows it to be something other than mere pictoral representation.

And in the iconography of persons, of human creatures, it is likewise the whole person that allows its iconic value to shine through. One can be an icon of the Son because one is fashioned by, and after the image of, this Son; and so authentic human existence, reclaiming the likeness of God through ascetical purification, renders living images of the true and eternal Son of the Father. This image is only an image of the Son if it is a whole human person, since this is what God crafted after his image. Should it be only the outward 'appearance' of a human person, not only is the image not present, it is in fact an anti-image -- an image precisely of a non-likeness. So, to take up the analogy of a 'robot dressed up in priestly vestments and programmed to say the words of institution while making certain hand movements', this could in fact never be an icon of Christ, in any sense, given that what is depicted is precisely a 'non-humanity' to the incarnation.

On the specific iconography of the priest.

The above is something of a segue on the general issue of 'icons', which I think it is necessary to understand if one is to make any sense of the fact that, in the Orthodox Church, the priest is understood to be an icon of Christ. It is simply not possible to relegate this to a mere outward appearance, as a way of suggesting that the maleness of the priest is not relevant (e.g. the argument that 'since a robot in vestments could be an icon of Christ, it is not necessary for a human icon of Christ to be a male'). Iconography, specifically as one addresses human persons as icons, involves the one who is doing the imaging, as much as the one who is imaged. Unlike a painted icon, which in its 'nature' is like Christ only inasmuch as it, like he in his incarnation, is material, the human icon is 'like Christ', an 'icon of Christ', in his whole being - body, soul, spirit, will, freedom, etc. The human is icon of Christ in a connected, yet altogether higher way, than the painted icon which has no soul, no will, no freedom. At times its lack of these gives it a pastoral advantage (because it has no freedom, it cannot abuse freedom, and so a well-painted icon always shows forth its image; while a human person can rebel, can image sin as much as it can image God). Yet when the human person images God authentically, one experiences a living icon at the height of God's creation - the icon of his own fashioning, rather than ours.

This comes to bear directly on the priest as human icon of the incarnate Son. As crafted by the Son and in his image, all human persons, male and female, are and can be icons of Christ. Yet of Christ's incarnate reality as a person born in Galilee, the human as icon must engage the one who symbolises with the one who is symbolised. Christ is not incarnate as an abstraction of humanity (the fathers stress that he is anthropos not to define his personhood by this nature, but as a means of showing that his incarnate reality encompasses the whole human nature; the fact that he is aner, 'male', is obvious, but that his is truly and wholly anthropos was not understood by many - then or now); rather, Christ is incarnate as a concrete human-divine person. Jesus Christ is not 'man' or 'human' generically; he is a distinct person, Jesus of Galilee in Nazareth, wholly Theos and wholly anthropos - but wholly these in the concrete personhood of his incarnate being. In this, his maleness is not arbitrary. It is a reflection in the created order of his eternal and uncreated relationship of sonship to the Father. But this does not mean that it is of relevance only to males: the reality of the human race is that it is one race, one blood; yet a race in distinction, male and female. What Christ does as incarnate human person, he does for the whole race; yet he does it as the truth of that race, which is a race in distinction, his very maleness showing forth the interconnection of male and female - since as male he acts for all.

In imaging this distinct, discrete personal reality of the Son incarnate in Galilee, the maleness of the priest is significant. It is not possible to be an icon of this specific reality as a female, for the person Jesus Christ was not a female. If one suggests that the iconography of the incarnate Christ is significant only insomuch as it relates to the abstraction of human nature, divisible from the concrete reality of specific personhood, one essentially absents the incarnation from its personal specificity -- one of the most fundamental Christological heresies, against which the Church has fought since at least the second century.

This is right at the heart of the whole issue of priests, as icons of the Son in his pastoral shepherding as incarnate human-divine person, being male as the incarnate Christ was (and is) male. And it is an issue which I have as yet never seen taken up and engaged with by any of those who would suggest that the priest as icon needn't be male. Such a position seems fundamentally untenable in the light of a genuine conception of iconography, and particularly as it relates to the incarnation of the Son. Without addressing this matter in some way, arguments for a priest being icon of Christ without being male seem positively un-incarnational and non-iconographic -- supported only by claims to extracted realities (e.g. that all human persons are icons of Christ) without placing them in proper iconographic context with respect to the priesthood (i.e. that in the priest we encounter a different scope of the iconography of Christ) and the incarnational theology this mandates. To me, simply referring to the writings of a few individuals who have done this (whomever they may be) without engaging in the root issues, is simply a side-stepping of the theological issues. I would dearly like to see some manner of engagement -- any really, at all -- with this matter by those who wish to read the priest as icon differently.

A few thoughts on the pastoral nature of this discussion.

I realise that I've gone on too long already, for which I apologise; but I don't think I can end without saying a brief word on the pastoral nature of this discussion on the maleness of the priesthood, with its connected issue of priests as icons of Christ -- and by 'this discussion' I don't mean just our conversation here, but the topic as a whole. Richard, you wrote:

I am thinking here that Carol - and other women - need not think that they have to accept such ‘iconic’ male deductions in order to become Orthodox. That the priesthood is for men only is certain, however the reasons for it are not fixed and need not be accepted. The arguments against women’s priests are still a "work in progress", as referred to by Metropolitan Kallistos. If most people here on Monachos think that the arguments are actually finished, then fine, but not all Orthodox do, and so we do not need to accept these arguments.

I would take friendly issue with a number of things in this statement. Firstly, and most importantly, I do not think it pastorally helpful, when someone feels challenged or uncomfortable with a teaching or practice of the Church, to indicate a supposed 'optional nature' to it. Precisely when we are faced with something that feels foreign, that causes us to stumble, we are often presented with the most potent opportunity for real growth and transformation. It is a disservice to those approaching the Church, to deny it its very stability and surety by making its teachings sound or appear 'optional' or 'flexible' on issues where it is precisely its firmness and stability that give it an eternal voice in a transient world. On the matter of the priesthood, the Church has always, without exception, insisted that it be male - and while the fact that the priest is an icon of Christ is one reason amongst many that this is maintained, it is nonetheless a reason that has been maintained since antiquity, and is a fundamental part of Orthodox worship and life. It goes well beyond a simple 'argument for a male priesthood': it forms part of the living, active iconography of the Church that is expressed in our liturgical demeanor, behaviours, etc.

Secondly, on the comment 'the priesthood is for men only is certain, however the reasons for it are not fixed and need not be accepted', I find this both pastorally dangerous as well as untrue. In terms of accuracy, the fact that the reasons for a male priesthood are dynamic - i.e. that there are many, which can be emphasised in different ways and to different degrees in different contexts - does not mean they are not 'fixed'. There may be some that are more or less relevant and significant to certain discussions, but the testimony of the Church's practice and the writings of her fathers on these matters are ancient, and really have not changed. On the pastoral side, echoing what I've written above, counseling that certain teaching of the Church 'need not be accepted' skirts a dangerous line of inviting self-will into one's embrace of the Church.

Thirdly, as to the comment that 'The arguments against women priests are still a "work in progress", as referred to by Metropolitan Kallistos', strikes me as inaccurate. It may well be true that a small (very small indeed) handful of individuals continue in their own right to work at articulating a male priesthood in the context of modern-day concerns and issues, but the fundamental issue is not one that the Church considers 'in progress'. It is worth noting that the writings you've cited are all viewed as extremely controversial in almost all circles; this is not the view of a Church 'in progress' on an issue, but of a few voices who wish to take the Chruch's view and express it in the context of modern-day conceptions of 'equality', 'rights', etc. This is perhaps valuable work; but we ought not confuse that project with the view of the Church.

And finally, the fact that a few voices are engaged in such a project of articulating the Church's view in the framework of modern concerns, does not mean that Orthodox Christians have the option of dismissing the Church's view while their project is at work. This is fundamentally a Protestant approach to the Church: that I shall accept what of it I like, and will reject the rest. But Orthodoxy works on the lines, not of converting the Church to one's own image by accepting only those portions of it of which one approves, but by converting the person to the image of Christ's bride, transforming what I 'accept' and 'approve of' through the ascesis of the will.

My thanks for the continued stimulating discussion by all.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Alexander Zhdanov

05-11-2008, 10:23 AM

Richard has made an appreciable error, using, as he considers, a deductive method. Anywhere nor in premises, nor in "formula" conclusion (an icon of Christ, the Man-> the Priest) there was not any robot . Whence it undertook? Thus it is impossible to name Richard's statement a tautology, it is simply fabricated.

RichardWorthington

07-11-2008, 09:01 PM

http://www.monachos.net/forum/picture.php?albumid=118&pictureid=1127

… er … whimper! … hello … urm … can I speak in safety now?!
… if so then I will continue …

Friends, Monachians, Orthodox, lend me your ears;
I come to bury error, not to praise it.
The evil of error lives after it;
Any good in it is oft interred with its bones …
(cribbed from http://www.artofeurope.com/shakespeare/sha10.htm)

… or then again, maybe not! However, I can’t help but get the feeling that we are talking past each other, as it is written in the book of Fawlty Towers:

Basil Fawlty: Ah, Manuel? There is too much butter on those trays.
Manuel: Que?
Basil Fawlty: [speaking slowly] There is too much butter on those trays.
Manuel: Ah, no senor. No "on those trays"...
[counting the trays]
Manuel: "uno, dos, tres".

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072500/quotes

It’s English, Mary, but not as we know it! However, to return to the discussion at hand:

An icon is not simply a pictoral representation; and in point of fact, anything which is simply a pictoral representation, can never be an icon. A true icon binds together the subject and its representation, making manifest in the 'symbol' the genuine experience of its archetype. It is a means of encounter - mystical, yet nonetheless utterly immediate and real - with the one imaged.

I think this is where we are misunderstanding each other, as our Lord has said,

"Show Me a denarius. Whose image (‘icon’) and inscription does it have?" They answered and said, "Caesar's." (Luke 20:24)

If every usage of the word ‘icon’ in ancient ecclesiastical works is according to Deacon Matthew’s description then I shall never look at coins in the same way again!! Perhaps I should replace my wallet with a reliquary … !!! ;)

And, lest it be stated that the above quotation does not refer to the veneration of ‘normal’ church icons, then please read the following, found in the e-library of a certain website:

… we speak of a king, and of the king's image, and not of two kings. The majesty is not cloven in two, nor the glory divided. The sovereignty and authority over us is one, and so the doxology ascribed by us is not plural but one; because the honour paid to the image passes on to the prototype. Now what in the one case the image is by reason of imitation, that in the other case the Son is by nature; and as in works of art the likeness is dependent on the form, so in the case of the divine and uncompounded nature the union consists in the communion of the Godhead.

http://www.monachos.net/library/Basil_the_Great_of_Caesarea,_Oration_on_the_Holy_S pirit_(page_2)#ch18 (paragraph 45)

This is the very passage that was quoted by those defending the veneration of icons, and yet here the term icon (image) is referred to the statues of the emperors - most of whom are not canonised as saints, and some even are regarded as heretics by our Most Holy Orthodox Church!

For St Basil, any "works of art" can be referred to as icons. The word ‘icon’ for us in English does in religious usage refer to the specific type of Byzantine art mentioned above in numerous posts. However, the point at hand is whether the isolated term "the priest is an icon of Christ" should be read as referring to a type of "work of art", or to the Byzantine iconographic tradition.

For example, let us suppose that someone wanted to put on a display in a museum of Julius Caesar and Mark Anthony. They could take, let us say, a robot and dress it up in Roman costume with humanlike features, and have it saying the words, "Friends, Romans, Countrymen …". Could this not be considered an artistic representation of Mark Anthony - or even, to use the terminology of St Basil, an ‘icon’? As educated people (I always thought these words were spoken by Caesar, not knowing the second line!!) would recognise it as such then it most certainly can be. Indeed, in order to pander to feminism, there might be two other robots near by dressed as Roman women, Julia Caesarea and Markia Antonia, to illustrate how things might have been if gender roles had been more ‘equal’! And yet these also would be recognised as an artistic representation (‘icon’!!!) of Julius Caesar and Mark Anthony, albeit with a certain ‘edge’ to it!

That is all I have been trying to say! Perhaps the phrase "the priest is an icon of Christ" is only meant to be interpreted in a very outward manner. I guess that the term comes from St Theodore of somewhere who wrote on the icons, and so could well be included in a list of how the word ‘icon’ is used. However,

On the matter of the priesthood, the Church has always, without exception, insisted that it be male - and while the fact that the priest is an icon of Christ is one reason amongst many that this is maintained, it is nonetheless a reason that has been maintained since antiquity, and is a fundamental part of Orthodox worship and life. It goes well beyond a simple 'argument for a male priesthood': it forms part of the living, active iconography of the Church that is expressed in our liturgical demeanor, behaviours, etc.

I agree, the Church has always insisted that the officiating priesthood by men only, no women. The Church has from ancient times taught that "the priest is an icon of Christ". However, that these two statements should be linked is, I believe, a very recent theory.

I am away from home at the moment and so cannot consult my little library of completely disarranged books, however I am convinced that nowhere have I read any Father saying that "the priest being an icon of Christ implies a male only hierarchy". From what I have read, when the Orthodox tried to answer questions about women priests they merely referred to the usual stuff about Eve’s sin, man the head, and so on. No mention of the priest being an icon of Christ. This only came later, while trying to answer more deeply what it is about men and women such that only a man can officiate as a priest. And at that, it seems as though they were copying Rome’s position about the priest acting in the person of Christ (changing ‘in the person of’ to ‘as an icon of’). Therefore I would be greatly surprised if anyone linked the priest being an icon of Christ with the necessity of a male only priesthood before the 1960s.

Furthermore, when Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev talks about "Women In The Church (http://www.sourozh.org/web/The_Orthodox_Faith#35)" he never mentions anywhere about the priest being an icon of Christ. Instead he writes that "From the very beginning priesthood has been a service of spiritual fatherhood". While it is interesting to see yet another Orthodox writer trying to increase the "dynamic of reasons" why the Orthodox Church does not ordain women, yet this new one also falls down: St Seraphim of Sarov told the priests-to-be to be a "mother, not a father, to the brethren". Such technicalities as this just keep things spinning round!

Indeed, he mentions this rather interesting tit-bit in the same section:

The fatherhood of the priest is not limited by his function as head and guide of the community. In fact, leadership of the community is sometimes entrusted to a woman. For example, Orthodox convents are always under the guidance of an abbess who directs not only the nuns but also the priests who serve the convent. In the convents of the Byzantine era there were female elders who had the right to hear the nuns' confessions.

A priest being guided by a woman no less!

So, given the above, replying in depth to all the iconographic statements did seem somewhat irrelevant, however, I shall accept the challenge!

And so without any further ado, I shall start on another post.

Richard
PS. Am I really the only one who thinks that all the iconic male only stuff might have gone a bit too far? I am against women priests, indeed when Carol wries, "a Church that won't even let women serve as acolytes" I feel that a greater appreciation of Orthodox life is required. I hope thatthe above quotation about priests being guided by an abbess helps. When I talk about desconesses/'presbyteras' entering the Altar in parishes then I am only thinking of them standing at the side, but with the desconesses taking communion with the clergy.

M.C. Steenberg

07-11-2008, 11:48 PM

Dear Richard,

I'm afraid I don't really know what to say to your post. The fact that the same word eikon means both image and icon in a theological sense, seems rather straightforward. If you don't want to engage with a theology of priest as icon on grounds that the word can also mean simple outward appearance, this seems an unfortunate and indefensible position; but there's really not much to say to it.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

M.C. Steenberg

08-11-2008, 12:39 AM

Dear friends,

Just to give some examples of reflection on the priest as icon of Christ in the earlier fathers:

Ignatius of Antioch:
"The bishop presides as the icon of God" (To the Magnesians, 6.1; cf. Trallians 3.1, Smyrneans 8.1)
Dionysius the Areopagite:
"The bishop brings Jesus Christ before our eyes [...]" and "shows in sensible fashion and as an icon that which is the very life of our soul: he reveals how Christ himself came out of his mysterious, divine sanctuary out of love for man and took on human form, becoming totally incarnate, though without confusion." (Ecclesiastical Hierarchy 3.13)
Germanos of Constantinople:
"The ascent of the bishop to the throne and his blessing of the people signifies that the Son of God, having completed the economy of salvation, raised his hands and blessed his holy disciples." (Ecclesiastical History and Mystical Contemplation, 26)
Theodore the Studite:
"Standing before God and men, the priest is the representation of Christ. For the Apostle says, 'There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ' (1 Tim. 2.5); thus the priest is an icon of Christ." (Seven Chapters Against the Iconoclasts, 4)
What is significant in some of these examples, is the way the bishop/priest is not simply icon, but icon as theological image of the incarnate Christ - a point that has been discussed above. See in particular Dionysius on this regard.

Regarding the connecting of the confession of the priest as icon of Christ, which goes back to the first century, to discussion of the priesthood as male, Richard you wrote this:

I am convinced that nowhere have I read any Father saying that "the priest being an icon of Christ implies a male only hierarchy". From what I have read, when the Orthodox tried to answer questions about women priests they merely referred to the usual stuff about Eve’s sin, man the head, and so on. No mention of the priest being an icon of Christ. This only came later, while trying to answer more deeply what it is about men and women such that only a man can officiate as a priest. And at that, it seems as though they were copying Rome’s position about the priest acting in the person of Christ (changing ‘in the person of’ to ‘as an icon of’). Therefore I would be greatly surprised if anyone linked the priest being an icon of Christ with the necessity of a male only priesthood before the 1960s.It has already been commented on above that this is a flawed approach to the matter of chronology and significance. It is quite understandable that you don't find the fathers speaking about the priesthood as icon in context of a defense of the male priesthood, since discussion of the priesthood as male, in the context of questions over a female priesthood, is a particularly modern concern. Father Raphael's comments on this, earlier in the thread, are worth re-reading. One doesn't find the fathers speaking of much of anything in the context of explaining / defending the male priesthood, since the fathers took this as a given. They thus articulate the nature of the priesthood with that fact assumed. When in modern discussions we do, on occasion, find ourselves in conversations where we address the maleness of the priesthood in the face of modern views that would question or challenge it, the responsibility of the Church is to take the fathers' reflections on the priesthood and its nature, and show how these relate to the question of gender -- a specific context to which they did not betake themselves, but for which their offerings on the nature of the priesthood provide the only credible foundation for articulating a genuine voice.

In this, the fact that the priest is icon of Christ is one of the most ancient aspects to the priesthood commented on in the fathers. St Paul already gives it in essence, and it is explicitly referred to and discussed in the Apostolic fathers only a generation later. By the height of the patristic period, it is being reflected on in great nuance - tying it directly to the confession of the personal incarnation of the Son, and the testimony of that Christological centre to the faith (points which have already been addressed above as having direct implications for the maleness of the priest as icon).

If the Church is to speak to the question of the gender of the priesthood, it simply cannot ignore this critical, central, ancient aspect to its discussion on what the priesthood is. It is something of an anachronistic statement of the obvious to suggest that the fathers themselves don't use confession of the priest as icon to argue for the fact that the priesthood is male. The fathers don't use anything to argue this position, since it is a given they do not address.

If we're going to speak of the priesthood in the context of why it is male, we cannot simply chose to ignore critical aspects to the articulation of the priesthood, central in the fathers' discussions, because we might wish to.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Paul Cowan

08-11-2008, 12:43 AM

St Seraphim of Sarov told the priests-to-be to be a "mother, not a father, to the brethren".

But in the context of this message he is saying to care as a mother does for her child. Not to BE a mother, but AS a mother.

Several of your points are taken out of context.

Nuns do have the ability to hear confessions with a blessing, but they may not offer absolution.

Why 1960? Vatican II? Why say we are following Rome's example? more they have followed ours and we are still behaving the same since the beginning. I don't see the misunderstanding with males being the icon of Christ as priests being males making them also icons of Christ. Melchesdich was male and a scrpitural icon of Christ. Aaron was male and an icon of Christ. Jesus was male and our High priest. Hence, we follow His example.

That is all I have been trying to say! Perhaps the phrase "the priest is an icon of Christ" is only meant to be interpreted in a very outward manner.

I agree, the Church has always insisted that the officiating priesthood by men only, no women. The Church has from ancient times taught that "the priest is an icon of Christ". However, that these two statements should be linked is, I believe, a very recent theory.

I don't agree with either of these statements. I can't prove why, but I don't agree with you Richard.

Andreas Moran

08-11-2008, 12:53 AM

Paul Cowan St Seraphim of Sarov told the priests-to-be to be a "mother, not a father, to the brethren".

But in the context of this message he is saying to care as a mother does for her child. Not to BE a mother, but AS a mother.

I'm sure this means in the context of pastoral care, not liturgical service.

Paul Cowan

08-11-2008, 01:01 AM

I'm sure this means in the context of pastoral care, not liturgical service.

That was my point. It is taken out of context.

Andreas Moran

08-11-2008, 01:05 AM

Sorry, Paul. It's just gone midnight here - I really ought to retire!

RichardWorthington

09-11-2008, 04:08 AM

Dear all,

I am sorry I have been causing so much confusion and discord - I actually desired the opposite, but perhaps did not express myself very well. (Perhaps something like "The best of intentions" …!)

In this post I desire to show how I think that the male aspect of the priesthood being an icon of Christ has been overdone. I am against the ordination of women, again I repeat, I am against the ordination of women priests. However, perhaps the best I can do is to try to reverse the symbolism and then to make a comparison.

Christ indeed became incarnate as a male man. So to parallel this let us consider the Church, Christ’s Bride. The Church is called the Jerusalem above, the mother of us all (Gal 4:26). The Church is also described as a city - the dwelling place of God, like Christ in Mary’s womb - with female imagery.

Rev 21:9 Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls filled with the seven last plagues came to me and talked with me, saying, "Come, I will show you the bride, the Lamb's wife."
Rev 21:10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,
Rev 21:11 having the glory of God. Her light was like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone, clear as crystal.
Rev 21:12 Also she had a great and high wall with twelve gates, and twelve angels at the gates, and names written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel:
Rev 21:13 three gates on the east, three gates on the north, three gates on the south, and three gates on the west.
Rev 21:14 Now the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

Now this is where things become interesting, for St Peter writes, "you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ" (1 Pet 2:5). We know that all Christians - both men and women - are a royal priesthood. And indeed all Christians - both men and women - are living stones.

However, we know that only men can be ordained as real priests, so can men also become real living stones in the Heavenly City, the dwelling place of God, or is this just for women?

As it has been posted before:

Father David brought up a key point that I hope isn't overlooked. Priests are icons of Christ, spiritually and physically.
Here we have the heart of the matter regarding the maleness of the clergy: fundamentally, the clergy are icons of Jesus Christ. This is most explicit in the office of the bishop, 'in whom Christ sits enthroned' (to paraphrase Athanasius), but is equally true of all clerical orders (priests, deacons, others) who extend the bishop's ministry. In the liturgical engagement of the Orthodox worshipping life, the clergy mystically represent Christ himself, are living icons of the Lord, and thus their maleness is part-and-parcel of iconographically representing the incarnate Christ who was (and is) a human male.
(Just an aside I’ve just thought of: deaconesses of long ago also extended the bishop’s ministry - are they therefore included with the above?)

So we must presume that if the real priests are icons of Christ "spiritually and physically" then the real living stones are icons of our Mother Church the New Jerusalem both "spiritually and physically": in other words, the living stones can in reality only be women. To paraphrase the last sentence in the above quotation:

In the kingdom of God, the living stones mystically represent the Church herself, are living icons of the "elect Lady" (2John 1:1), and thus their femaleness is part-and-parcel of iconographically representing the Church, the Body of the incarnate Christ, She who was (and is) only referred to as female."

Therefore when Revelation says of the New Jerusalem, "The construction of its wall was of jasper; and the city was pure gold, like clear glass" (Rev 21:18), then this deified state can be for women only. (Interestingly the names of the male apostles are only on the foundations and the outside of the walls: perhaps this signifies a lesser place?!) Additionally,

The issue here is whether the priesthood and the priest as 'icon of Christ', bears the necessity of being male, not whether all human persons, as created after the image of the eternal Son, can be and are 'icons of Christ', regardless of gender.

So similarly, to paraphrase:

The issue here is whether the New Jerusalem and the living stones as 'icons of the Church', bears the necessity of being female, not whether all human persons, as "born from above" (John 3:3 footnote NIV) in Holy Baptism, can be and are 'icons of the Church', regardless of gender.

So as the priests - and I wholeheartedly agree, although not with the reasoning given - can only be men, then by the same reasoning the living stones can only be women. So therefore when scripture says "the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved" (Acts 2:47) it can only imply that this deifying salvation is for women only.

Why should we be shocked that such a great salvation is for women only (albeit symbolically for men, and no more)? We are told above about "the office of the bishop, 'in whom Christ sits enthroned' (to paraphrase Athanasius)". Now as this is specifically for men only then the words of Christ "To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne" (Rev 3:21) cannot apply to women in reality, but only symbolically.

Please do not rely on my words, but those here quoted:

The question is that of the specific iconography of the priest (really, in fact, the bishop, of whom the priest acts in stead), as the one who is celebrant of the Eucharist and the living mysteries of the Church. The Church is, as a whole, an icon of Christ, and every individual person that comprises it is also true and living icon of Christ. But this fact does not drive the Church to dismiss the valid iconography within that body - and, practically speaking, has never meant that because every person is equally icon of Christ by nature, every person thus has or ought to have the same role in the Body.

So turning this quotation around we see that:

The question is that of the specific iconography of the living stones, as the ones who manifest the glorified walls of the Church, the Jerusalem above. The Church is, as a whole, the Body of Christ, and every individual person that comprises it is also a true and living icon of the New Jerusalem. But this fact does not drive the Church to dismiss the valid iconography within that body - and, practically speaking, has never meant that because every person is equally icon of the Church by nature, every person thus has or ought to have the same role in the Body.

Therefore as stated above, we are all symbolically living stones but only women have the "role in the Body" of being real living stones. This is like saying that we are all a royal priesthood but only men have the "role in the Body" of being real priests.

And lest we imagine that the phrase that there is neither male nor female in Christ implies that both men and women equally can have this same deifying salvation, we are told the following:

I can be an icon of Eve as rebellious human, as tempted and wayward co-heir to creation; but I cannot be an icon of Eve as woman.

So we men can never equally be an icon of women to be those real living stones. In fact, we should not think of ‘equality’ or ‘fairness’ at all, as an above post states:

This vision of the iconic nature of the priesthood, helps set the question of its maleness in a proper context. This context is not (and cannot) be one of 'equality' or 'fairness', since behind any such approach lies a false conflation of human distinctiveness (i.e. the kind of perversion of St Paul's 'neither male nor female' comment that Epiphanius laments), as well as a diminished incarnational theology, that does not take seriously enough the genuine and full human nature of Jesus Christ.

Any attempt to explain the iconography of the priest as Eucharistic celebrant, in a way that divorces this from the maleness of Jesus Christ, is fundamentally un- or even anti-incarnational.

If for the "the iconic nature of the priesthood" and "the iconography of the priest", then also for the iconic nature of the living stones.

So as can be seen, I, being a man, have argued against my full inclusion in the deified Body of Christ on the Last Day and His salvation. Need I really point out that I do not believe this? I am sure that some of what I have written about the femaleness of the Church and women is true, yet I disagree with the deductive methodology which I have copied from the posts here.

There is a simple way to see how incorrect this ‘deductive symbolic imagery’ can mislead. Consider the following:

… the specific incarnational reality of Jesus Christ incarnate in Galilee, forming and leading his Church, directing them to his table and offering himself as the banquet of new life. This is the iconography of Christ as shepherd of the Church, of his earthly ministry conjoined to the heavenly.

"Directing them to his table"? Yet it is about the female Wisdom that it is written:

Pro 9:1 WISDOM has built her house,
She has hewn out her seven pillars;
Pro 9:2 She has slaughtered her meat,
She has mixed her wine,
She has also furnished her table.
Pro 9:3 She has sent out her maidens,
She cries out from the highest places of the city,
Pro 9:4 "Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!"
As for him who lacks understanding, she says to him,
Pro 9:5 "Come, eat of my bread
And drink of the wine I have mixed.

Can you not see how the female imagery (iconography) is used for the one who sacrifices ("slaughtered her meat"), forming the Church ("sent out her maidens") and for the giver of the Holy Eucharist ("eat my bread … drink my wine")?

Indeed St Gregory Palamas himself wrote, "Christ ... nurses us from his own breast as a mother, filled with tenderness, does with her babies." (Gregory Palamas, quoted in George H. Tavard Woman in Christian Tradition, p. 158; University of Notre Dame Press; 1973 (http://global-dialogue.com/swidlerbooks/biblical-affirmation.htm); I have seen this quotation in the book on Palamas by Meyendorff, but am not at home to consult it.) The quotation refers to the Eucharist - are you sure all this iconic symbolism should be pressed so far?

Dear Richard,

I'm afraid I don't really know what to say to your post. The fact that the same word eikon means both image and icon in a theological sense, seems rather straightforward. If you don't want to engage with a theology of priest as icon on grounds that the word can also mean simple outward appearance, this seems an unfortunate and indefensible position; but there's really not much to say to it.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

I do acknowledge that the priest is an icon of Christ: I have engaged with your points! I now see that in post #43 that you have given some further examples. Having had a brief glance they seem impressive, but again masculinity does not seem part of these quotations.

I have printed out many pages from this thread (before it was split into two - actually, I did not print out those referring to cakes! "You can’t eat your cake and have it too!") and have not been ignoring any posts. All I am trying to point out is that overdoing the maleness of the priest may actually be spiritually damaging. After all, if what I have written above is true about women having a greater salvation then men, how you think the men here feel? I know no one here has even remotely wanted to say any such thing, denying the fullness of salvation to anyone, but can you not see how things can be misunderstood?

Please do try to refute what I have written - I do not agree with its conclusions! - but then apply the same type of refutations to the iconic maleness of the priest.

With gentleness,

Richard

Matthew Panchisin

09-11-2008, 04:45 AM

Dear Richard,

I think a lot of this conversation about the male only Priesthood in Christs' Church really relates to Orthodox life so to speak. Several months ago I read some of homilies of Saint John Chrysostom on the Priesthood, they are highly regarded writings within the Church. It is difficult for me to recall exact passages from those text but they do flow very much along the lines that Father Deacon Matthew has been presenting. So do some others that I'm able to read these days.

You have mentioned:

I do acknowledge that the priest is an icon of Christ: I have engaged with your points! I now see that in post #43 that you have given some further examples. Having had a brief glance they seem impressive, but again masculinity does not seem part of these quotations.

Anyway, St. John Chrysostom mentions some things that may be of interest in some other comments on vestments. You may notice 'new man' and 'the bishop becomes the icon of Christ' rather clearly in these text as well as many other renditions from other Church Fathers that say the same thing, I see no difference.

‘Byzantine vestments also hold a kind of functional mystical significance in that their symbolism is directed toward ‘transforming’ the celebrant as he assumes them for liturgical celebration. In accordance with the office of preparation for the liturgy, the clergyman takes on the garments of the divine. The priest is girded in purity and his outer appearance tells the congregation of the ‘new man’ as he appears in the liturgy. The deacon, moving his stole (orarion) in the manner of the movements of the angel wings, prepares the congregation for the heavenly experience. And indeed the bishop becomes the icon of Christ, as the congregation is lifted into the divine presence. It is not unusual for worshippers to kiss the hem of a cleric’s vestments (usually the sticharion or phelonian of the priest) since the liturgical experience lifts up the material world (and material substance) and sanctifies it. The vestments themselves become mystically the wings of angels, the robe of Christ, and the glorious garments of the Saints.’

It is interesting to note within the above text the more than a noticeable observation of the piety the worshippers, "It is not unusual for worshippers to kiss the hem of a cleric’s" vestments and so forth. This particularly caught my attention because I recall several weeping living stones (actually some life long friends) noticing things being changed by people that should know better.

In Christ,

Matthew Panchisin

Mary

09-11-2008, 05:38 AM

Andreas Moran

09-11-2008, 09:42 AM

‘Byzantine vestments also hold a kind of functional mystical significance in that their symbolism is directed toward ‘transforming’ the celebrant as he assumes them for liturgical celebration. In accordance with the office of preparation for the liturgy, the clergyman takes on the garments of the divine. The priest is girded in purity and his outer appearance tells the congregation of the ‘new man’ as he appears in the liturgy. The deacon, moving his stole (orarion) in the manner of the movements of the angel wings, prepares the congregation for the heavenly experience. And indeed the bishop becomes the icon of Christ, as the congregation is lifted into the divine presence. It is not unusual for worshippers to kiss the hem of a cleric’s vestments (usually the sticharion or phelonian of the priest) since the liturgical experience lifts up the material world (and material substance) and sanctifies it. The vestments themselves become mystically the wings of angels, the robe of Christ, and the glorious garments of the Saints.’

I see this passage is in quotation marks; from where does it come, please?

M.C. Steenberg

09-11-2008, 11:58 AM

Dear Richard,

I'm sorry to respond to such a long post with such a short one, but in the brief moment I have here, I must say this: Your argument in the whole of your above post ignores something absolutely critical to this topic: that Jesus Christ was incarnate as a human male. The iconic metaphor, 'you are living stones...', is utterly incomparable to this, despite the fact that you've tried to make it an absolute parallel - even altering my comments as if they could apply just by a changing of the iconographic subject. They cannot, and this lies behind what I've indicated above I believe to be a fundamentally flawed conception of true icon -- and in this specific case, the nature of Christological icon to the theology of the incarnation.

I'll respond in more detail later, but as to the specific point, I see nothing in those comments that really touches on the question, nor which engages with the Christology of priest as icon.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

M.C. Steenberg

09-11-2008, 02:08 PM

Dear Richard and others,

I'm grateful for some ongoing discussion, and thoughtful considerations. I think there is a widening gap of understanding becoming more apparent as the conversation continues, which I consider is grounded in a few fundamental issues - most of which I have already mentioned or hinted at in previous posts. These are: first, a flawed conception of iconography, and iconographic symbolism in a general sense. Second, a misperception of the specifical iconographical subject of Christ as imaged in the priest, tied into the Church's incarnational theology. And third, a flawed approach to the question of determining how patristic and ecclesiastical reflections have meaning and relevance in modern-day discussions.

Iconography in general

Much of what I would wish to say here, overlaps with what I've already written on this in the first section of an above post (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70465&postcount=39). Richard, your most recent message confirms for me some real difficulties here. If I can take what I wrote earlier as a 'given', and not re-state it (even though some of it may bear re-stating), I'd like to look specifically at a few issues from your recent post.

You wrote:

Christ indeed became incarnate as a male man. So to parallel this let us consider the Church, Christ’s Bride. The Church is called the Jerusalem above, the mother of us all (Gal 4:26 (http://biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&version=NKJV&passage=Gal+4%3A26)). The Church is also described as a city - the dwelling place of God, like Christ in Mary’s womb - with female imagery.

[A quotation of Revelation 21.9-14 follows. Then:]

Now this is where things become interesting, for St Peter writes, "you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ" (1 Pet 2:5 (http://biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&version=NKJV&passage=1+Pet+2%3A5)). We know that all Christians - both men and women - are a royal priesthood. And indeed all Christians - both men and women - are living stones.

As I've mentioned since some of my earliest posts in this conversation, I think there is a recurring problem in your argumentation, Richard, with a conflation of symbolism and imagery: often conflating the type, character and function of all icons as if they were identical; but here, even conflating icon and metaphor. I would hasten to add that these categories need not be exclusive, as if there were no overlap; but a conflation in the way you present here is quite problematic on any number of levels.

Let us begin with the specific images you call upon. The first 'couplet', as it were, is 'Christ incarnate as a male', and 'the Church, Christ's bride'. Already here you have a problem. Clearly Christ as bridegroom and Church as bride is classic patristic imagery, and deeply significant to ecclesiology and ascetical endeavour. This is a living, meaningful parallel drawn by no less than Christ himself, and consistently reflect upon by his Church. Yet as symbolic subjects, they are quite different. Christ is a personal subject; bride is a symbolic image. An effective parallelism can be explored between bridegroom and bride, and between Christ and Church as symbolic of bride and bridegroom; but between Christ and bride we speak in terms of symbolic parable. It is a true discussion, but we cannot, as it were, make any kind of 'ontological' or natural comparison between them, as if the Church as bride were a 'thing' or a 'who' in the same way Christ the person is a distinct 'who'.

You may ask whether the above is entirely situational, since you don't make a deliberate comparison in your post between 'Christ' and 'bride'. However, the conflation of symbolic subjects indicated in your brief language of them, is drawn out extensively in your address of the Church as 'city / Jerusalem', and the faithful as 'living stones'. Here you do, throughout your writing, make comparison and contrast between Christ and city, between Christ and stones, as comparable symbolic parallels -- thus you compare, as if they were somehow comparable, the priest as icon of Christ, with the faithful as icons of stones, or of a city. But this is a comparison drawn wholly out of a conflation of symbolism.

Firstly, some background. As to the imagery of stones, it seems to me very clear that Peter is referring to the prophetic words of John the Forerunner, well known among the disciples, who had said regarding faith in the blood line of Abraham: 'do not begin to say to yourselves, "We have Abraham as our father". For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones' (Luke 3.8; cf. Matthew 3.9). In the epistle of 1 Peter, he is specifically talking about those outcasts from (Jewish) society who are nonetheless members of the true inheritance of Abraham, just as John had predicted Christ would make all his disciples. The text reads:
"Coming to him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." (1 Peter 2.4-5)
He then goes on to note Christ's fulfilment of various 'stone' images foreshadowed in the scriptures: an elect cornerstone in Zion that shall not be put to shame (cf. Isaiah 28.16); the stone which the builders rejected, which has become the chief cornerstone (cf. Psalm 118.22); a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense (cf. Isaiah 8.14). Then, as if wishing to make this reference to St John's prophecy of Christ 'raising up children of Abraham from these stones', concludes the section by noting that we 'who once were not a people, are now the people of God'.

What is clear in all this, is that the 'living stones' image is a metaphor. The race of Abraham is a living bloodline; stones are dead and lifeless. Yet the Forerunner insists that, in Christ, even dead stones can become children of Abraham; and St Peter notes that, in Christ, the faithful of every nation - clean and unclean (we remember this is Peter who received the vision of all the nations being made clean in Christ) - are precisely as stones made living children by the Lord, in whom the Church is being built up, so that 'we who once were not a people, are now the people of God'. This is clearly a different use of symbolic imagery than icon proper. The stone is the metaphor for life and community created beyond the borders of expectation; of a new definition of 'race' and 'blood' that sees its centre in Christ, not in genetics. The whole usage is as a parable. Is there an iconic significance in this? Of course there is; yet in terms of authentic icon, we do not consider stones as 'icons' proper of either Christ or of the faithful (iconographic canons would expressly forbid representation of Christ as a 'cornerstone', or the faithful as stones) - precisely because the realm of symbolism is not identical. To conflate them is to diminish not only the true sense of icon, but also that of parable and metaphor.

The second image you use is that of the Church as city, as the new Jerusalem, drawn from Revelation 21.9-14. Here the Church, called 'the bride of the Lamb', is directly symbolised by the heavenly Jerusalem descending from above, and so the 'female' imagery of bride is connected to that of city -- a point of which you make much. Yet here, again, there is a deep conflation of how images and symbols are being used. The whole of this vision is precisely that: a mystical vision, a divine revelation of apocalyptic symbolism. Part of that symbolism is precisely to portray realities through things that they are not, so that their symbolic significance is drawn out. So true teaching is a scroll, purification is a coal, evangelisation is a horn, heresy is a prostitute, etc. In the passage you quoted, Christ is a lamb, and the Church is bride and city. But it is essential to note that the Church specifically testifies that, even in the context of this vision, a lamb is not an icon of Christ, but a symbolic representation of Christ's character. There was some confusion over this in early iconographic customs, and eventually the Church had to make explicit in her iconographic canons that Christ cannot and must not be pictorally represented as a lamb - precisely on grounds of incarnational theology. Christ symbolised as lamb in the revelation, does not make lamb an icon of Christ. Similarly, the Church as bride and city. These are authentic symbols of the Church in her character, but are not icons of the Church per se.

The root issue in both comparisons -- stones and city -- is of a deeply conflated and misperceived sense of visual imagery and symbolism. This, then, comes out very clearly in the comparison of such symbols with the priest as icon of Jesus Christ.

The specifical iconographical subject of Christ as imaged in the priest, tied into the Church's incarnational theology

In the bulk of your recent post, Richard, you took these two supposed contrasting parallels (priest as icon of Christ with stones as icons of the faithful; and priest as icon of Christ with the city as icons of the faithful) and explored them in various ways -- largely by taking my own comments on the priest as icon of Christ, from earlier posts, and re-writing them with your own imagery inserted. But the fundamental issue of conflated and misperceived symbolism causes problems here at every turn. Right from the outset we have this:

So we must presume that if the real priests are icons of Christ "spiritually and physically" then the real living stones are icons of our Mother Church the New Jerusalem both "spiritually and physically": in other words, the living stones can in reality only be women.

This cannot be, in any sense. Firstly, what sense does it make to speak of imaging 'spiritually' a stone? Or, more to the point, a stone 'spiritually' imaging a living member of the faithful? Setting aside for one moment the (critical) fact that stones are not icons of the faithful in this way, nonetheless, even in the iconic symbolism of the natural world, symbols don't represent personal natures. I would fall back on something I wrote earlier:

In representing the divine - and perhaps it is best to focus directly on the icon of Christ, and say, 'in representing Christ' - each category or type of iconography has its own guides (canons) for authenticity. There is a real sense in which all creation images Christ, given that Christ is its creator [...]; but in using the natural world as pastoral icon, there are pastoral guides (canons) given by the Church so as to see the truth in such reality. One can authentically say that a grove of trees gives an image of Christ in his care for every element of creation, in the created vision of stability that reflects and uncreated eternity, etc.; but one cannot say that a grove of trees provides a symbolic engagement with Jesus as person, since it does not bear those contours.

The same could easily be said of stones and persons; much less cities and persons. Of bride, we must go back - again and again - to the question of symbols and their different forms. But at the very basic level here, it is simply nonsensical to say that 'living stones can in reality only be women'. This is an utter abasement of how symbolic imagery works, possible only by completely distoring the nature of symbol in all of its manifestations.

Later, you make your first alteration of my comments as an attempt to give an example of your reasoning. I had written:

In the liturgical engagement of the Orthodox worshipping life, the clergy mystically represent Christ himself, are living icons of the Lord, and thus their maleness is part-and-parcel of iconographically representing the incarnate Christ who was (and is) a human male.

You re-wrote this as:

In the kingdom of God, the living stones mystically represent the Church herself, are living icons of the "elect Lady" (2 John 1:1), and thus their femaleness is part-and-parcel of iconographically representing the Church, the Body of the incarnate Christ, She who was (and is) only referred to as female."

The is a non-sequetor of a dramatic kind. The only way you've managed it is to begin by conflating the degrees and types symbols, turning visionary symbol into 'living icon' in a way the Church has for centuries explicitly forbidden; and having done that, taking an abstracted gender (that of 'bride', the gender of which is not in fact the gender of a person, but of a symbol - utterly different from the gender of Jesus as human person) and applying it to other symbols as if it were a personal gender (thus the 'gender' of stones bound up in the 'gender' of Church); and then drawing out the logical reverse, to show that a 'female' Church must be imaged by 'female' stones, and thus female persons.

At no point are any of those individual constructions accurate, much less the whole they are taken to form. You bring it to a climax by noting: 'Therefore when Revelation says of the New Jerusalem, "The construction of its wall was of jasper; and the city was pure gold, like clear glass" (Rev 21:18), then this deified state can be for women only.' Clearly you are being absurd here, trying to demonstrate a logical absurdity; I don't suspect for a moment that you believe deification applies only to women. Clearly you're trying for a rhetorical argument ad absurdam. But that form of argument only works if you take accurate points, miss-apply them, and continue so until an absurdity is reached. However, you've grounded your whole arguments on points that are absurd from their beginnings (I'm using that as a technical term here, not as a personal slight, Richard!), and so the absurd extreme you show them to reach is an utterly artificial one -- one which doesn't at all show an absurdity or flaw with the notion of male priest as icon of Christ, but rather with the very distorted approach by which you're trying to show that his maleness is not essential to this.

Later, you perform another re-writing of my comments. I had written this:

The issue here is whether the priesthood and the priest as 'icon of Christ', bears the necessity of being male, not whether all human persons, as created after the image of the eternal Son, can be and are 'icons of Christ', regardless of gender.

Which you re-wrote as follows:

The issue here is whether the New Jerusalem and the living stones as 'icons of the Church', bears the necessity of being female, not whether all human persons, as "born from above" (John 3:3 footnote NIV) in Holy Baptism, can be and are 'icons of the Church', regardless of gender.Again, this re-writing is entirely grounded in false imagery. Conflating the types of symbol, you imply that the symbolic connection of 'stones' and 'Jerusalem' to the faithful of the Church is in some way comparable to the natural iconography of a male human person to the male person Christ (which it is not); then, removing the key point in my comment, that the true iconography of Christ in the person, which is part of his/her ontological nature as created 'in the image of God', you replace this with a comparison between being 'born from above' and (presumably) the descent of the heavenly Jerusalem -- which contrast is utterly incomparable; ontology and spiritual re-birth are never confessed by the Church as one-and-the-same -- ultimately to question whether stones as 'icons of the Church' can be realised in persons of both genders.

These are two examples of your modifications of my comments; I could go on with all the rest, but I don't think doing so would raise any points not already addressed in commenting on these. Suffice it to say that I believe the same fundamental problems occur in each.

Throughout, a serious miss-application of symbolic types seems to be a root problem; then, built on this, there is an ongoing divorce of general imagery from the question of the incarnationalism of specific Christological icons. This is a point I've raised time and time again in this conversation, and which, Richard, you've still never taken up -- each time, you simply revert back to other symbolic comparisons. The result is that, while the various examples cited all have problems of their own which go back to some root issues in iconography and symbolism, the key ingredient central to this specific discussion on priests as icons of Christ -- namely, whether a human person who is not male, can authentically be icon of the male person Jesus Christ in the specific context of incarnate pastor in Galilee -- continues to be ignored.

Determining the relevance of patristic and ecclesiastical reflections to modern-day discussions

In all this (and I do promise to wrap up on this point, as I've gone on for too long), there seems a deeply-rooted hesitancy to engage on that specific and central matter, grounded in a stated belief that the writings of the fathers on the priest as icon, are not themselves directly interested in the question of the priest's maleness. Following very much the line of various Anglican writers on the question, in articles found rather easily on the world wide web, you suggest this connection of 'priest as male' and 'priest as icon of Christ' to be something very modern, emerging in the 1960s, etc.; and your point in this seems - intentionally or otherwise - to be that such comparisons are somehow wrong or flawed, and as such you seem quite unwilling to engage with them. But to my mind, this raises a far more fundamental issue of the relevance of the fathers to the ongoing life of the Church, and their voice in the modern world.

I would like to bring back into the discussion two comments made earlier in the thread, one by Owen and one by Father Raphael:

The fact that the Fathers do not parse the issue of Christ's maleness is because it simply was not an issue at the time. Now it is -- with the advent of feminist ideology which they would not have anticipated or comprehended. The Fathers do not speak to a lot of subjects -- nuclear physics for example. The Bible, likewise, does not speak to a lot of issues that were not pregnant at the time. This absence does not mean it is an open question.

A last point here about the Fathers not referring to the masculinity of Christ. While questioning this assertion [...] I would say that the emphasis is not found in the Fathers mainly because masculinity/femininity as such a distinct aspect of human personhood is a modern preoccupation. Not that it is necessarily wrong. But it does tend to exaggerate what is only one aspect of what we are.

As I mentioned in my own post above, suggesting that, since the fathers don't speak of this iconography specifically in the context of questioning the maleness of the priesthood, therefore it is not something significantly implied in their comments or towards which those comments can and should be applied, represents a flawed approach to chronology and significance. To repeat myself: If the Church is to speak to the question of the gender of the priesthood, it simply cannot ignore this critical, central, ancient aspect to its discussion on what the priesthood is. It is something of an anachronistic statement of the obvious to suggest that the fathers themselves don't use confession of the priest as icon to argue for the fact that the priesthood is male. The fathers don't use anything to argue this position, since it is a given they do not address.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

M.C. Steenberg

09-11-2008, 02:36 PM

In pondering over this discussion, it seems like the identification of a few key points for consideration might provide a helpful map forward for fruitful discussion.

These are the key issues that, from my own perspective, lie at the heart of the matter, apart from the address of which it cannot really be discussed:

All human persons are created in the image of God, which the fathers note is the image of the Son. This means male as well as female, and implies an iconic connection to the Son as part of the ontological being of the person (i.e, part of his or her nature, not simply an external symbol or representation).
In the incarnation, Christ thus ‘came unto his own’, becoming one of the creatures that already showed forth his image. In doing so, he entered fully into the gendered distinction of the human race, becoming a male human-divine person. As the whole race is bound up in his image, including its multiple genders, his becoming human was and is an act for the whole race; yet he becomes authentically human, and so is himself gendered as are all humans; he is a male not an androgyny, and precisely as male confirms the sacredness of all gender, of the whole race.
The confession of the incarnation, which is bound up in the resurrection and also the bodily ascension into heaven, is that Christ as male (i.e. as truly incarnate human person) continues as such eternally. Christ does not ‘stop being incarnate’ at the resurrection. He retains his body, his humanity, forever.
The priest as icon of this Christ, which is part of the definition of the priesthood commented on in the fathers from the very first, is one who makes present, in icon, this incarnate Lord. As true icon of the highest sort—the living image of the living Christ—the priest makes present in this manner the incarnate Christ of Galilee, eternal Son of the Father in his full humanity. This is distinct from the way in which every human person, male and female, is an icon of the Son in his eternity (a fundamental and true reality of Christian anthropology), and is a specific connection to the person incarnate as chief shepherd and pastor in Galilee.
Though the fathers are not preoccupied with the modern notions of sex and gender, and take the fact of priests being male as a given and assumed part of their whole role and office, including this iconic significance, rather than commenting on its specifically, nonetheless the confession of priest as icon does have immense significance when these modern questions are raised. This relevance lies first and foremost (though not exclusively) in the arena of imaging precisely and specifically the male person whom the incarnate Christ was and is, so as thereby to give expression to the authentic testimony of Christ’s own incarnation: namely, that in the distinction of male and female is an authentic part of human nature, and in its affirmation discloses the true unity of the whole race.

Others may have specific key points they think are missing from the above; I am very keen to read them.

It strikes me that, for this conversation to have depth as it continues, such key points need to be addressed directly - not by side-stepping them with secondary comparisons, but by exploring head-on what is said and what is implied.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Robert Hegwood

10-11-2008, 12:53 AM

Fr Raphael Vereshack

10-11-2008, 03:51 PM

I would add a point that the person of the Pre eternal Logos is referred to as Son of God not only in the sense of His relationship of origination with the Father. The person of the Word of God pre eternally is Son also in the sense of what He is as distinct Person. Since what is distinct refers to His pre eternal characteristics as person then among these needs to be looked into the male title of Son also as pre eternal.

What needs to be made clear is that even though the Fathers recognized that such titles as Father, Son & Holy Spirit for the Holy Trinity were only extremely remote in the manner in which they represent the divine reality, that still they are absolutely fundamental in a referential sense to who the Persons of the Holy Trinity are. They are thus meant as true symbols and not metaphors for an abstract understanding of origination. Or to say it another way we cannot see such titles as only relative as if we could just as well say that 'the Daughter comes from the Mother'.

Although this needs a lot of expansion we can then briefly say that the ascription of the male name Son to the pre eternal Word of God does refer to a real characteristic.

In pondering over this discussion, it seems like the identification of a few key points for consideration might provide a helpful map forward for fruitful discussion.

These are the key issues that, from my own perspective, lie at the heart of the matter, apart from the address of which it cannot really be discussed:

All human persons are created in the image of God, which the fathers note is the image of the Son. This means male as well as female, and implies an iconic connection to the Son as part of the ontological being of the person (i.e, part of his or her nature, not simply an external symbol or representation).
In the incarnation, Christ thus ‘came unto his own’, becoming one of the creatures that already showed forth his image. In doing so, he entered fully into the gendered distinction of the human race, becoming a male human-divine person. As the whole race is bound up in his image, including its multiple genders, his becoming human was and is an act for the whole race; yet he becomes authentically human, and so is himself gendered as are all humans; he is a male not an androgyny, and precisely as male confirms the sacredness of all gender, of the whole race.
The confession of the incarnation, which is bound up in the resurrection and also the bodily ascension into heaven, is that Christ as male (i.e. as truly incarnate human person) continues as such eternally. Christ does not ‘stop being incarnate’ at the resurrection. He retains his body, his humanity, forever.
The priest as icon of this Christ, which is part of the definition of the priesthood commented on in the fathers from the very first, is one who makes present, in icon, this incarnate Lord. As true icon of the highest sort—the living image of the living Christ—the priest makes present in this manner the incarnate Christ of Galilee, eternal Son of the Father in his full humanity. This is distinct from the way in which every human person, male and female, is an icon of the Son in his eternity (a fundamental and true reality of Christian anthropology), and is a specific connection to the person incarnate as chief shepherd and pastor in Galilee.
Though the fathers are not preoccupied with the modern notions of sex and gender, and take the fact of priests being male as a given and assumed part of their whole role and office, including this iconic significance, rather than commenting on its specifically, nonetheless the confession of priest as icon does have immense significance when these modern questions are raised. This relevance lies first and foremost (though not exclusively) in the arena of imaging precisely and specifically the male person whom the incarnate Christ was and is, so as thereby to give expression to the authentic testimony of Christ’s own incarnation: namely, that in the distinction of male and female is an authentic part of human nature, and in its affirmation discloses the true unity of the whole race.

Others may have specific key points they think are missing from the above; I am very keen to read them.

It strikes me that, for this conversation to have depth as it continues, such key points need to be addressed directly - not by side-stepping them with secondary comparisons, but by exploring head-on what is said and what is implied.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Fr Raphael Vereshack

10-11-2008, 04:22 PM

With respect to Fr. Deacon Matthew's reference to St. Ignatius,

Doesn't the question clarify if we speak less in terms of priest and more in terms of bishops. According to St. Ignatius a Bishop occupies a place in the church we today might well iconic of the Father, if I am not mistaken. Priests are priests in relation to the deputizing grace of the Bishop who shares his priestly grace with them. Christ is the image of the Father and fatherliness is bound up in the very fabric and nature of priesthood and pastor.

All questions of iconic representations of Christ in priesthood it seems to me necessarily need relation back the font of this grace in the Church, the Bishop. And St. Paul tells us what to look for in a bishop starting with let him be the husband of one wife...and we are back at the question of headship. There is a theological meaning in maleness that finds particular expression in priesthood as a function/aspect of the grace of the episcopacy.

So it seems to this peanut in the gallery.

Dear Robert,

We need to keep in mind Fr Dn Matthew's basic point about the priesthood of the incarnate Christ and how this relates to Who He is as distinct person of the Holy Trinity. It is in this sense that the priest is an icon of Christ in a unique way.

On the other hand St Ignatius's description of the bishop representing the place of the Father refers more to the point of the hierarchical nature of the divine order to which we then as the faithful are to be obedient to. Similar to the point previously made by Fr Dn Matthew there is the need not to confuse loosely applied images with a particular and personal characteristic- the priesthood- of the incarnate Christ.

Maybe at this point in the discussion we need to back up a bit and engage ourselves more concerning the Church's understanding of the person of Christ.

We must not have any understanding of Christ's incarnation as if the pre eternal Word became ma' as if he put on something extra (ie humanity) on top of what He really is (ie divine). I am not saying this is necessarily a conscious intention on anyone's part here but often without realizing it we have adopted a two layer Christology that really ends making Christ's humanity only something relative. In terms of this discussion with such a two layered Christology, Christ's maleness truly would be only relative rather than an inseperable aspect of who He is as incarnate Person.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

M.C. Steenberg

10-11-2008, 04:47 PM

Above, Fr Raphael wrote, as another essential point in considering this matter:

I would add a point that the person of the Pre eternal Logos is referred to as Son of God not only in the sense of His relationship of origination with the Father. The person of the Word of God pre eternally is Son also in the sense of what He is as distinct Person. Since what is distinct refers to His pre eternal characteristics as person then among these needs to be looked into the male title of Son also as pre eternal.

Thank you for this note, Father, which brings into relief some of the deeper Christological dimensions of the matter. Part of the great mystery of the incarnation is that the 'becoming' of Christ did not cause him to be 'other' than he eternally has been; the 'coming to his own' is more than only an identification of humanity created as icon (eikon, 'image') of the Son - it is also an identification of the Son's eternal nature as saving person. Whenever we are close to forgetting this, we are reminded of the testimony of Christ as the one 'who was slain before the foundation of the world' (cf. Revelation 13.8; 1 Peter 1.20). The incarnation reveals the taking up of the whole of human nature, but also the eternal nature of the divine Son in his unique personhood. There are two sides to this: on the one, the eternity of the Son reveals contours to the authentic nature of his divine-human person; and on the other, his humanity, and his incarnate life, reveal also the contours of the eternal person that the Son always is. So we cannot fully (or even partially) divorce the Son as eternal God, and person in this abiding sense, from the Son as encountered person, human and divine, in Galilee.

You continued:

What needs to be made clear is that even though the Fathers recognized that such titles as Father, Son & Holy Spirit for the Holy Trinity were only extremely remote in the manner in which they represent the divine reality, that still they are absolutely fundamental in a referential sense to who the Persons of the Holy Trinity are. They are thus meant as true symbols and not metaphors for an abstract understanding of origination. Or to say it another way we cannot see such titles as only relative as if we could just as well say that 'the Daughter comes from the Mother'.

Here is another dimension where the incarnation of the Son, which the revelation of God again and again shows to be eternally known in the divine will (the fathers speak of this time and again, from the first century onwards), reveals directly the nature of God as Trinity, and the true nature of the persons who are God as Trinity -- Father, Son and Spirit. When Philip asks for Christ to show him the Father, the Son replies, 'he who has seen me, as seen the Father' (cf. John 14.9). The Son, incarnate as divine-human person, reveals in his abiding person the nature of God as Father, and so too Spirit. So 'sonship' and 'fatherhood' can never be abstracted from the tri-personal reality of God as revealed in the incarnate Son - a point which is often ignored in discussions of re-conceiving trinitiarian relationships in modern terms, where the 'old fashioned' exegesis of the fathers is assumed to have used 'father' and 'son' in a manner purely of relational expression -- which, as you might say, could just as easily be 'mother' and 'daughter', or any other relational terms that indicate a similar connection. But this is to take trinitarian theology apart from the incarnation of Christ: a fundamental error.

All this is perhaps a little dense. Yet it relates directly to the present discussion, since it offers a glimpse at the fact that what is indicated in the patristic (and later)discussions of priest as 'icon of Christ' is fundamentally an aspect of incarnational theology; and when we discuss the matter today, we cannot afford, even for a moment, to absent it from this essential foundation.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

M.C. Steenberg

10-11-2008, 05:00 PM

Dear Robert,

Thank you for your comments, which I found interesting.

Doesn't the question clarify if we speak less in terms of priest and more in terms of bishops. According to St. Ignatius a Bishop occupies a place in the church we today might well iconic of the Father, if I am not mistaken. Priests are priests in relation to the deputizing grace of the Bishop who shares his priestly grace with them. Christ is the image of the Father and fatherliness is bound up in the very fabric and nature of priesthood and pastor.

This is very interesting, and indeed there are some ancient patristic sources that discuss the bishop as in some sense an icon of the Father. Nonetheless, this is rather a minority view, and fairly rare. In the writings of St Ignatius, it is expressly of Christ that the bishop is icon. When he speaks of the varying symbolisms in the offices (e.g. at his Epistle to the Trallians 2, 3), he notes that the bishop is the icon of Christ, the presbyters - when in cohort with the bishop - the council of Christ's apostles (sometimes the Sanhedrin; e.g. Trall. 3), and the deacons the angelic ministers. It is clear in all his epistles that the standard 'pattern' he is addressing is one in which each city has its own bishop, and each city a single church, and so it is essentially always the bishop who is celebrant - and so in this context the priests are symbols of the apostolic community surrounding Christ. As the Church's ecclesiology developed and the Church expanded, the pattern of the Eucharist always being celebrated by the bishop became less common, as bishops were not located in every city. This is where the priest as bishop's 'hand', standing in his stead when he is not present, develops; and in this context, the 'iconography of the bishop' is moved to that of the priest for those services where it is priest, and not bishop, who is celebrant and pastor. Yet this is always done as the priest acting 'in absentia' for the bishop - which is why the episcopal throne is always present in the Church, and remains empty until the bishop serves.

It is also the foundation for so much of the 'active iconography' of the priest. For example, a priest gives the blessing, and the faithful ask it, and kiss his hand as he bestows it, when the bishop is absent. But when the bishop is present, the priest does not bless, and the faithful should not approach the priest for the blessing when in the presence of the bishop. This is because the priest always bestows the bishop's blessing, which it is inappropriate for him to do when the bishop himself is present.

Relating this back to the question of this thread, I would say this: the theology of the bishop as icon of Christ is fundamentally the same as the theology of priest as icon of Christ, since the priest as celebrant is the bishop as celebrant, present through his priests at those communities at which he is unable to be present himself.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Andreas Moran

10-11-2008, 05:28 PM

I'm reminded that icons of Christ as 'Great High Priest' show Him in bishop's vestments.

191

M.C. Steenberg

10-11-2008, 05:55 PM

I am reminded, through Andreas' providing the above icon, that one dimension of this issue on which we've not yet touched is the reciprocal relationship of priest as an icon of Christ, and Christ as icon of true priest -- as himself the Great High Priest, as proclaimed in scripture (and indeed as proclaimed in the icon Andreas provided). Not only is the priest an icon of Christ, but Christ is the true icon and image of the priesthood.

Andreas Moran

10-11-2008, 07:24 PM

Yes, what I was thinking was that perhaps we might say that Christ as the type of priest 'oversees' priesthood and thus is 'episkopos'.

RichardWorthington

11-11-2008, 09:22 AM

I would add a point that the person of the Pre eternal Logos is referred to as Son of God not only in the sense of His relationship of origination with the Father. The person of the Word of God pre eternally is Son also in the sense of what He is as distinct Person. Since what is distinct refers to His pre eternal characteristics as person then among these needs to be looked into the male title of Son also as pre eternal.

Dear all,

I am quite confused about this symbolism/imagery/iconography: "the male title of Son also as pre eternal". Christ is the Wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1:24), and I recall a hymn in which He is addressed as Word and Wisdom of God. Wisdom is a female figure. St Athanasius the Great links the terms Word and Wisdom:

‘The Lord created me a beginning of His ways, for His works (Prov. viii. 22 LXX) if it be the Wisdom of God, in whom all things originate have been framed, that speaks concerning Itself, what ought we to understand but that ‘He created’ means nothing contrary to ‘He begat?
…
Wisdom made herself a house (Prov. ix. 1.): Now it is plain that our body is Wisdom’s house which It took on Itself to become man; hence consistently does John say, ‘The Word was made flesh’ (John i. 14)
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf204.xxi.ii.iii.vi.html , Para 44

Observe that the Father begat the Son Who is the Word Who is Wisdom, and Wisdom is a female figure. The Father eternally begat Mother Wisdom. In the next paragraph (45) Athanasius quotes the book of Wisdom 9:2 as applying to Christ, linking it to "Who is the Image of the Invisible God, the Firstborn of every creature" (Col. i. 15–17). Yet in the Book of Wisdom, before Solomon prays for Wisdom (his prayer starts at chapter 9:1) we read of this same Wisdom that she is "their mother" (of good things, 7:12), and that Solomon "desired to take her for my bride" (8:2). Yet not only does Athanasius not hesitate to link the phrase "the Image of the Invisible God" to Mother Wisdom, but the book of Wisdom also directly applies this ‘iconography’ to Her, "For she is a reflection of eternal light, a spotless mirror of the working of God, and an image of his goodness" (7:26)

The title ‘Son’ therefore refers to ‘begotten’ and not to anything particularly male, for He is also from before His Incarnation (in which He did take upon Himself a male body from Mary’s womb) given female titles.

Moreover, I wrote above:

… the specific incarnational reality of Jesus Christ incarnate in Galilee, forming and leading his Church, directing them to his table and offering himself as the banquet of new life. This is the iconography of Christ as shepherd of the Church, of his earthly ministry conjoined to the heavenly.

"Directing them to his table"? Yet it is about the female Wisdom that it is written:

Pro 9:1 WISDOM has built her house,
She has hewn out her seven pillars;
Pro 9:2 She has slaughtered her meat,
She has mixed her wine,
She has also furnished her table.
Pro 9:3 She has sent out her maidens,
She cries out from the highest places of the city,
Pro 9:4 "Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!"
As for him who lacks understanding, she says to him,
Pro 9:5 "Come, eat of my bread
And drink of the wine I have mixed.

Can you not see how the female imagery (iconography) is used for the one who sacrifices ("slaughtered her meat"), forming the Church ("sent out her maidens") and for the giver of the Holy Eucharist ("eat my bread … drink my wine")?

I have found this confirmed in the writings of Athanasius also:

(after quoting prov 9:1-5)
For the bread of Wisdom is living fruit, as the Lord said; 'I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever (John 6:51).'
Letter 7, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/2806007.htm

The bread of Proverbs is the Eucharist of the Son of God, yet here with female ‘iconography’.

In writing all this I have no intention of trying to promote the possibility of women priests or of changing the Trinitarian formula to "Mother, Daughter, Holy Grand-daughter". Yet I cannot help but feeling that most people in this thread have only a black-and-white approach: either all male, or we will have the worst excesses of modern feminism. I try to give a balance and am therefore accused of these same excesses. I have no ‘ecclesiastical titles’ and so therefore perhaps am easy to dismiss, but please listen to St Athanasius the Great.

Finally, how does "male confirms the sacredness of all gender" (point 2 in #54)?

Richard

PS I have been asked for a reason why I am against women priests: gut instinct, based on trying to live according to the Divine Liturgy. Is this so unreasonable? If we can produce no logical reasoning then this does not therefore imply that we can change things. But more later… !! ;)

Olga

11-11-2008, 11:22 AM

Dear Richard

Here is an excerpt from a post of mine from another thread (to save me typing much the same thoughts)"

"First and foremost, iconography is, above all else, concerned with the revelation of God in Trinity: of the incarnation of the Son and Word of God which has allowed the sanctification of fallen creation (matter), including humanity (made in the image of God)**; of the signs and wonders of the Divine revelation in both the Old and New Testament periods; and, in its portrayal of the saints, their transfiguration from mere men and women into those who have attained deification, a "oneness with God" and full participation of the heavenly life with God and in God, through the conduct of their earthly lives and their steadfast witness to the true faith. They have become true icons and reflections of the Divine. The word godly is most apt to describe them.

(** St John of Damascus sums this up beautifully: "Of old, the incorporeal and uncircumscribed God was not depicted at all. But now that God has appeared in the flesh and lived among men, I make an image of God who can be seen. I do not worship matter, but I worship the Creator of matter, who through matter effected my salvation. I will not cease to venerate the matter through which my salvation has been effected." "

You wrote:

Observe that the Father begat the Son Who is the Word Who is Wisdom, and Wisdom is a female figure. The Father eternally begat Mother Wisdom. In the next paragraph (45) Athanasius quotes the book of Wisdom 9:2 as applying to Christ, linking it to "Who is the Image of the Invisible God, the Firstborn of every creature" (Col. i. 15–17). Yet in the Book of Wisdom, before Solomon prays for Wisdom (his prayer starts at chapter 9:1) we read of this same Wisdom that she is "their mother" (of good things, 7:12), and that Solomon "desired to take her for my bride" (8:2). Yet not only does Athanasius not hesitate to link the phrase "the Image of the Invisible God" to Mother Wisdom, but the book of Wisdom also directly applies this ‘iconography’ to Her, "For she is a reflection of eternal light, a spotless mirror of the working of God, and an image of his goodness" (7:26)

The title ‘Son’ therefore refers to ‘begotten’ and not to anything particularly male, for He is also from before His Incarnation (in which He did take upon Himself a male body from Mary’s womb) given female titles.

There are several threads on this forum which deal with the uncanonicity of pre-incarnational, symbolic representations of Christ, including Holy Wisdom, Angel of Blessed Counsel, and Angel of Great Silence. These include the threads "Brass and Printed Icons", "Icon of Christ Emmanuel", "Icon of Christ as Holy Wisdom", "Icons of Christ", and "Status of Print and Digital Icons". You would do well to look through them.

It is true that Christ is indeed referred to liturgically in these poetic OT terms, most notably during the hymn God is with us (S'nami Bog, Meth'imon o Theos) which is sung at Great Compline, which forms part of the Vigil service for some of the great feasts of the Church: the Nativity of the Lord, Theophany, and the Annunciation. It is no accident that Compline replaces Vespers for these feasts, as they are all concerned with the appearance of God Incarnate, be it His conception, His birth, and, for Theophany, the simultaneous manifestation of all three Persons of the Holy Trinity. Vigils have a prefigurative essence, the theme being the anticipation of the coming of the Saviour into the world, which is then fulfilled by the Liturgy the following day, which commemorates Christ's earthly life, mission, death and resurrection.

But such liturgical imagery does not give licence allowing the portrayal in icons of the "types and shadows" of Christ; these are but personifications of an attribute of Christ. In the same way the Lamb of God was decreed uncanonical as an iconographic subject, so too for these images. These types and shadows were once useful, but are now inadequate in proclaiming the revealed, incarnate God.

Christ has been revealed to us in the flesh, in His incarnate self. To speak of wisdom as feminine (which, after all, is but a grammatical gender), as some sort of "feminine side of Christ" falls flat when one considers the word Logos, which in most languages, ancient and modern, is either masculine or neuter in grammatical terms.

Fr Matthew has very clearly distinguished between proper iconographic symbolism and metaphorical imagery. The paragraph below is particularly good and useful, the bold is my emphasis:

"Let us begin with the specific images you call upon. The first 'couplet', as it were, is 'Christ incarnate as a male', and 'the Church, Christ's bride'. Already here you have a problem. Clearly Christ as bridegroom and Church as bride is classic patristic imagery, and deeply significant to ecclesiology and ascetical endeavour. This is a living, meaningful parallel drawn by no less than Christ himself, and consistently reflect upon by his Church. Yet as symbolic subjects, they are quite different. Christ is a personal subject; bride is a symbolic image. An effective parallelism can be explored between bridegroom and bride, and between Christ and Church as symbolic of bride and bridegroom; but between Christ and bride we speak in terms of symbolic parable. It is a true discussion, but we cannot, as it were, make any kind of 'ontological' or natural comparison between them, as if the Church as bride were a 'thing' or a 'who' in the same way Christ the person is a distinct 'who'."

M.C. Steenberg

11-11-2008, 12:06 PM

Dear Richard,

You've raised some interesting points in your recent post, and I'm grateful to see some thoughtful responses to the specific questions over female imagery of 'Wisdom', already put forward by Olga.

Just a few remarks of my own. Firstly, I for one at least take it as accepted that you are not attempting to advocate a female priesthood. I say this to reassure you, as you re-state the point often. From my vantage point at least (and I suspect so also of most others), I do not suggest that you are, and don't want you to feel you have continually to say as much. I take you wholly at your word that you accept the Church's priesthood as male and not female, but struggle with certain articulations of it.

Nor do I think there is any stock it all in claiming that you are not taken seriously without an 'ecclesiastical title', as in your last post. Some of the most consistently insightful, experienced and authoritative voices in this forum are not clergy; and those of us who are, certainly would not claim to be insightful, experienced, or authoritative. I think you'll find, if you look openly at the forum, that it is marked out by all voices being taken seriously and engaged with, so long as they also show a willingness to take seriously and engage with comments made in response to them.

It is here that I, personally, have struggled with this particular conversation - not because I am (or others are) unwilling to listen to and engage with your thoughts, reflections, observations and comments, Richard; but because you seem unwilling actually to engage with the comments and thoughts of others, when they are offered in engagement with yours. You've raised quite a number of different questions regarding confessions of the priest as icon of Christ and what this has (or, you query, has not?) to do with the priest as male, and members have given generally thoughtful and reasoned responses to as close to each point as is possible in a moving and flowing discussion of this kind. Yet it does seem that, at each response, when challenges are raised to your reading or statements, you don't engage with those, but simply move on to another set of observations. For example, the matter of conflated imagery and problems with definition of 'icon' have been raised in response to your comments almost from the first, but you've yet to consider these; the distinction between general and specific images has been raised, but you've not responded to this; the matter of incarnational theology lying at the root of the question has been raised, but you've not engaged with this. The recent exchange of posts has been a case in point: Having felt this was an ongoing issue, I identified a series of key points that seemed in need of direct address in order to consider the matter (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70729&postcount=54); but rather than engaging with any of them, you moved off into another issue - one that is not wholly unrelated, nor uninteresting; but yet again, it means that the various key issues already raised in response to your comments have been left behind, unengaged with.

I say all this not to whinge or complain, nor to draw an unpleasant portrait of you, Richard. This kind of thing is a constant challenge of on-line discussions, which take place in little pockets of broken time in many people's lives - not in the face-to-face interactive dialogue that forces engagement with one another's points, else the conversation breaks down utterly. I raise these things because I sense a frustration growing in you as well - that your points are not being heard, or are being dismissed out of hand. I certainly don't think that has been the case in this thread, though it may be beginning to become so - but for the reasons I've tried to articulate. A constructive discussion involves mutual engagement. I don't think it is fair to suggest that 'most people in this thread have only a black-and-white approach: either all male, or we will have the worst excesses of modern feminism'; I think that by and large members have shown utterly the opposite. The points you've seen raised in this thread have not stated that the priesthood is male simply because it is, nor have they argued that the priest as icon of Christ needs be male simply as a fait absolu; they have, rather, given reflections on the question that dive into the mysteries of the incarnation, of icon, of image, of Trinity, of creation, etc. This is anything but black-and-white.

Your points are being heard; but are others? I, for one, would still like very much to know your thoughts on some of the key issues that have been raised in response to your comments.

We could start, for one, with the notion of the distinction between icon and symbolic metaphor.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

M.C. Steenberg

11-11-2008, 01:08 PM

Dear friends,

Your recent post (#63 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70792&postcount=63)), Richard, raised some additional specific points. Here are my thoughts on each:

On the Son as Wisdom

I am quite confused about this symbolism/imagery/iconography: "the male title of Son also as pre eternal". Christ is the Wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1:24), and I recall a hymn in which He is addressed as Word and Wisdom of God. Wisdom is a female figure.

It is important to note that Wisdom is not a female 'figure', but a female title. Let us keep first of all in mind that this has at its root a grammatical femininity (Gr. sophia is a feminine noun, as all Greek nouns are gendered male, female, or neuter). At the grammatical level, a noun's gender is not sex-specific; and so all manner of inanimate objects are not neuter but masculine or feminine; and some personal nouns are abstracted from sex (such as a 'young child' in Greek, who is neuter grammatically, despite [obviously] being male or female in sex; so too the Holy Spirit, who is grammatically neuter despite being a personal subject).

But beyond this grammatical level, Wisdom as feminine also expresses characteristics of true wisdom, which particularly biblical and patristic writers see reflected often most potently in feminine imagery. So we have this from the Wisdom of Solomon:

"Wisdom is radiant and unfading
and is easily perceived by those who love her;
for she is found by those who seek her.
She comes upon those who long to know her beforehand.
He who rises early in the morning to seek her
will not grow weary;
for he will find her sitting at his gates.
...
I will tell you what wisdom is, and how she came to be,
and I will hide no mysteries from you;
but I will search her out from the beginning of creation
and make her knowledge clear."
(Wisdom of Solomon 6.12-14, 22)
Here 'wisdom' is personified in feminine imagery, at least in large part because the author conceives wisdom's attributes, and the authentic seeking out of wisdom, to be parallel to the attributes of the faithful female and the authentic male-female relationship. But this is not to give wisdom an ontology of the female. Wisdom is not 'woman', nor female in a natural sense.

The same is echoed in the Wisdom of Sirach:

"All wisdom comes from the Lord
and is with Him forever.
...
The Lord Himself created wisdom.
He saw and numbered her
and poured her out on all his works
in the midst of all flesh according to His gift;
and He provided for those who love Him."
(Wisdom of Sirach 1.1, 7-8)
This is a passage taken by the fathers of the Church as profoundly incarnational. Wisdom is 'from' the Father and 'with him forever': thus God's wisdom is the Son proper - the Son who is 'Word and Wisdom and Power of God', as the Church's hymnography puts it. But the passage also speaks of the incarnation: of wisdom 'created' in the cosmos, as the Son takes created nature to himself, 'pouring her our on all his works in the midst of all flesh' (vv. 7-8).

In your post, you quoted St Athanasius from his second discourse against the Arians, in which he comments specifically on Proverbs 8.22 (which says of Wisdom, 'the Lord created me in the beginning...'), a text famously used by the supporters of Arius to argue that the Son in his divinity is a creature. Here it is worth taking St Athanasius' comments more fully:

"We have gone through this much before the passage in the Proverbs, resisting the insensate fables which their hearts have invented, that they may know that the Son of God ought not to be called a creature, and may learn lightly to read what admits in truth of a explanation. For it is written, 'The Lord created me a beginning of His ways, for His works'; since, however, these are proverbs, and it is expressed in the way of proverbs, we must not expound them nakedly in their first sense, but we must inquire into the person, and thus religiously put the sense on it.
...
"For in this passage, not as signifying the essence of His godhead, nor His own everlasting and genuine generation from the Father, has the Word spoken by Solomon, but on the other hand His manhood and economy towards us. And, as I said before, He has not said 'I am a creature', or 'I became a creature', but only 'He created'." (Ad Arianos 2.19.44, 45)
What is perhaps most significant of all in this passage, certainly when taken in its whole context, as that St Athanasius identifies Wisdom precisely with the incarnate Jesus Christ who is male. He explicitly rejects claims that Wisdom here articulates a principle of 'godhead'. In Sirarch we see clear expression that if Christ is Wisdom incarnate, he is also Wisdom eternal; yet the idea that Wisdom itself is a 'feminine figure' is countered by the consistent patristic insistence that Wisdom made visible, made tangible, is the male incarnate Jesus Christ.

Once again, I think the root confusion in the application of this matter to the question at hand (that of male priest as icon of Christ), is a conflation of symbolism - which is here extended to a conflation of titles, especially as titles such as Wisdom are conveyed in certain modes of imagery (which St Athanasius explicitly notes in the text: 'these are proverbs, and it is expressed in the way of proverbs, and we must not expound them nakedly'). To say 'The Father eternally begat Mother Wisdom' is a conflation of a serious kind. We certainly don't see this confusion in the fathers. Yet it is a confusion seen throughout this paragraph:

Observe that the Father begat the Son Who is the Word Who is Wisdom, and Wisdom is a female figure. The Father eternally begat Mother Wisdom. In the next paragraph (45) Athanasius quotes the book of Wisdom 9:2 as applying to Christ, linking it to "Who is the Image of the Invisible God, the Firstborn of every creature" (Col. i. 15–17). Yet in the Book of Wisdom, before Solomon prays for Wisdom (his prayer starts at chapter 9:1) we read of this same Wisdom that she is "their mother" (of good things, 7:12), and that Solomon "desired to take her for my bride" (8:2). Yet not only does Athanasius not hesitate to link the phrase "the Image of the Invisible God" to Mother Wisdom, but the book of Wisdom also directly applies this ‘iconography’ to Her, "For she is a reflection of eternal light, a spotless mirror of the working of God, and an image of his goodness" (7:26)

Again, our chief problem here is not with a theology of Wisdom (which at any rate is probably outside the scope of this particular discussion), but with the way references to Wisdom are being read. The references to Wisdom in the Wisdom of Solomon 7.12, 8.2, etc., are not ontological descriptors, but what St Athanasius calls images 'of a figurative nature', 'expressed in the way of proverbs', of which he specifically says 'Therefore it is necessary to unfold the sense of what is said, and to seek it as something hidden, and not nakedly to expound as if the meaning were spoken "plainly", lest by a false interpretation we wander from the truth' (44). When one wishes to consider the 'ontology of Wisdom', as it were - the true nature of Wisdom as title for God - St Athanasius, consonant with the fathers as a whole, looks to the incarnate Son, Jesus Christ. It is he -- and when we use 'he' of Christ it is different than using 'she' of Wisdom; since of Wisdom it is the gender of a title, in Christ it is the gender of a person -- who shows forth the true ontological reality of the Son as Wisdom.

On the incarnation and Christ as male for all

Towards the end of your post, Richard, you ask a question on a different theme:

Finally, how does "male confirms the sacredness of all gender" (point 2 in #54 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showthread.php?p=70729#post70729))?

This refers back to a point I made in this way:

In the incarnation, Christ thus ‘came unto his own’, becoming one of the creatures that already showed forth his image. In doing so, he entered fully into the gendered distinction of the human race, becoming a male human-divine person. As the whole race is bound up in his image, including its multiple genders, his becoming human was and is an act for the whole race; yet he becomes authentically human, and so is himself gendered as are all humans; he is a male not an androgyny, and precisely as male confirms the sacredness of all gender, of the whole race.

This was actually a summation of something I'd written in an earlier post (#39 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70465&postcount=39)), where I wrote:

This comes to bear directly on the priest as human icon of the incarnate Son. As crafted by the Son and in his image, all human persons, male and female, are and can be icons of Christ. Yet of Christ's incarnate reality as a person born in Galilee, the human as icon must engage the one who symbolises with the one who is symbolised. Christ is not incarnate as an abstraction of humanity (the fathers stress that he is anthropos not to define his personhood by this nature, but as a means of showing that his incarnate reality encompasses the whole human nature; the fact that he is aner, 'male', is obvious, but that his is truly and wholly anthropos was not understood by many - then or now); rather, Christ is incarnate as a concrete human-divine person. Jesus Christ is not 'man' or 'human' generically; he is a distinct person, Jesus of Galilee in Nazareth, wholly Theos and wholly anthropos - but wholly these in the concrete personhood of his incarnate being. In this, his maleness is not arbitrary. It is a reflection in the created order of his eternal and uncreated relationship of sonship to the Father. But this does not mean that it is of relevance only to males: the reality of the human race is that it is one race, one blood; yet a race in distinction, male and female. What Christ does as incarnate human person, he does for the whole race; yet he does it as the truth of that race, which is a race in distinction, his very maleness showing forth the interconnection of male and female - since as male he acts for all.

As is a consistent patristic proclamation on Christology since the disputes with Apollinarius and before, the only way Christ is salvific incarnationally, is by his being truly and wholly human (anthropos). And humanity is a gendered creature. If Christ were to be 'human' apart from gender, he would in fact not be human at all. Not only was Christ not an androgyny, in salvific terms he could not have been, since humanity is by his own fashioning gendered - for 'male and female he created them'. So for Christ to be human means for him to be either male or female. As various contributions have hinted at, his human maleness is connected to his eternal nature as Father's Son; but the critical point in this context is that only as true human could Christ save, and true humanity is a living distinction of male and female. Humanity is a single race in distinction; and it is precisely in its distinction that its unity as a race is found. And for just this reason, Christ as male is salvific for the whole race, since he is truly and authentically part of the distinction of the race, which makes him truly and authentically part of the true race of which all humans are members.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Herman Blaydoe

11-11-2008, 02:13 PM

In writing all this I have no intention of trying to promote the possibility of women priests or of changing the Trinitarian formula to "Mother, Daughter, Holy Grand-daughter"

And I hope nobody else is either because this would be heresy on several levels. It would be just as ridiculous to refer to the Holy Trinity as Father, Son and Holy Grandson. The Holy Spirit does not proceed from the Son, the Son is not the father of the Holy Spirit. Either way represents a serious misunderstanding of Trinity!

Fr Raphael Vereshack

11-11-2008, 04:17 PM

Dear Richard,

You wrote:

I am quite confused about this symbolism/imagery/iconography: "the male title of Son also as pre eternal". Christ is the Wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1:24), and I recall a hymn in which He is addressed as Word and Wisdom of God. Wisdom is a female figure. St Athanasius the Great links the terms Word and Wisdom:

Part of what I wrote yesterday in my post to Robert (who I mistook for yourself until others pointed out my mistake) was motivated by the sense that a more fundamental problem concerns your understanding of the incarnate Person of Christ. Again, forgive me if in fact it is me not seeing clearly your intent; but in what you write in the quote above there is the same problem. So perhaps it would be best if we begin from this.

Simply put, Christ's maleness is a personal characteristic while His wisdom refers to His nature. What does this mean? In Patristic thought the hypostatic refers to what is distinct while nature refers to what is common or shared. In other words only Christ as the second Person of the Most Holy Trinity is humanly male while all three Persons of the Holy Trinity share in wisdom (otherwise you would end up in the absurd position of all Three being the same Person since all share the one characteristic of wisdom). So we have it that Christ as now incarnate Person is male while as being coessential with the Father & Holy Spirit He is wisdom.

This is the sense as I take it of what Fr Dn Matthew is getting at. Christ's male priesthood is a personal characteristic of His incarnate reality. Priests within the Church then must be male because of how they must be icons of this personal characteristic of the Incarnate Christ.

I am trying to think of some other similar ways in which the priest is to be an icon of Christ. I could be wrong but perhaps there is something similar in the canonical requirements about the priest's moral character. A large degree of this is perfectably understandable from a standpoint of the moral requirements for the priesthood. But a very good question often comes up of why the past for which one has repented of should bar one now from the priesthood. If repentant sinners who did grievous things can now be saints why should the very same still bar one from the priesthood?

This I think does touch on the present discussion in some way. As a layman any repentant Christian can find him/her self back in fullness among the ranks of the members of the Church. However the same cannot follow for the priesthood since this must accord more closely with the personal image of Christ. Of course priests sin and repent since they are human. They also did so before they were ordained. But the particular character of this movement must have been (and while they are priests it must continue to be) more in accord with the personal & illumined human characteristics of Christ. Not any sin can be accepted- even if repented of, even if it leads to great sanctity- because the priesthood must image forth the personal Christ in a particular and abiding way.

Just as lack of maleness is no fault (and I sense this is also what is behind your questions) and one is not eternally condemned for sins repented of: still such things still do prevent the icon of Christ from shining forth if we are not obedient to this standard.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Owen Jones

11-11-2008, 05:54 PM

Let's back up just a bit and observe that the doctrine of the Trinity is not a self-evident truth, and while it is arguably a revealed truth, it took a long time for the Church to develop it doctrinally, and then only in the response to certain heresies. The underlying issue is how does a transcendent God connect with physical nature? How can this God be both transcendent and immanent at the same time? A monad cannot do that in any intelligible way. So then the various attributes of the persons of the Trinity, as well as their shared nature, becomes of paramount importance, because it is the essence of our faith, and of reality, that we share in the divine nature.

Now, if the Second Person of the Trinity is also a male type person, where does the female aspect enter into the economy of salvation? And the answer, quite obviously, is in the role of the Theotokos. The Romans bend this somewhat into positing, at times, that she is almost a fourth person of the Trinity, with the Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. Our lack of exposition in our preaching on the role of the Theotokos is a major problem. All males can emulate the virtues, the divine virtues that the Theotokos exemplifies, and also correspond to her role in the economy of salvation, and likewise all females can emulate Christ's virtues, but they are at the same time distinct. They are complementary while not competitive.

So all this talk about female priests is simply a lack of understanding of the Theotokos in the economy of salvation. Like somehow it is a diminished role. Hey, without her....If we want to talk about uniqueness...

Mary

11-11-2008, 08:12 PM

Observe that the Father begat the Son Who is the Word Who is Wisdom, and Wisdom is a female figure. The Father eternally begat Mother Wisdom.

This is a very mathematical reasoning. If x=y and y=z, then x=z. It doesn't work here.

PS I have been asked for a reason why I am against women priests: gut instinct, based on trying to live according to the Divine Liturgy. Is this so unreasonable? If we can produce no logical reasoning then this does not therefore imply that we can change things. But more later… !! ;)
Thank you for making that clear! So, your gut knows something that your logical reasoning doesn't understand! So does my gut! What is unreasonable is that you are trying to make us come up with a logical explanation for what we also know in our guts to be true, when it's obvious that guts are superior to logic!

Why is it ok for your gut to be confident, but not mine? Is it possible to come up with a logical reason for everything your gut knows to be true? If your gut found the truth without logical reasons, then why don't you trust the guts of others to also find the truth, without all this excessive reasoning? And if all our guts seem to be arriving at the same truth, in spite of the fact that we're male & female, Greek and non-Greek, slave and free, black and white, cradle & convert, old & young, dumb & smart, titled and untitled, short and tall, skinny and fat, etc etc.... isn't that the most amazing proof that our guts have found the Truth? You want to substitute such divine proof, with inferior, human logic?

Please forgive me for all this guttural talk. My gut is telling me I"m hungry.

In Christ,
mary.

Mary

11-11-2008, 08:19 PM

I am trying to think of some other similar ways in which the priest is to be an icon of Christ. I could be wrong but perhaps there is something similar in the canonical requirements about the priest's moral character. A large degree of this is perfectably understandable from a standpoint of the moral requirements for the priesthood. But a very good question often comes up of why the past for which one has repented of should bar one now from the priesthood. If repentant sinners who did grievous things can now be saints why should the very same still bar one from the priesthood?

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Dear Fr Raphael,

this is very interesting. What kind of past would prevent one from becoming a priest?

in Christ,
mary

Fr Raphael Vereshack

11-11-2008, 10:46 PM

Dear Fr Raphael,

this is very interesting. What kind of past would prevent one from becoming a priest?

in Christ,
mary

Sins from one's past that could be classified as 'mortal sins'; divorce regardless of who was 'at fault' (this is another good example of the point I was trying to convey in my post- why should I be 'held back' from being a priest for a sin that wasn't mine?); and in general any sin that is deemed by one's spiritual father (usually this is some sin mentioned in the canons) to bar you from the priesthood.

I know that the over riding concern here is in the 'moral presentation' of the priest. But I would also argue that there is a concern that he be an icon of Christ. Following again from my last point- for the laity they may repent and even become saints with the very same sins (eg St Mary of Egypt). So part of what must concern the priesthood is not only his personal 'moral presentation'. It must also concern that he be able to be an accurate enough icon of Christ which involves the tone of his whole life.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Mary

11-11-2008, 11:03 PM

Sins from one's past that could be classified as 'mortal sins'; divorce regardless of who was 'at fault' (this is another good example of the point I was trying to convey in my post- why should I be 'held back' from being a priest for a sin that wasn't mine?); and in general any sin that is deemed by one's spiritual father (usually this is some sin mentioned in the canons) to bar you from the priesthood.
In Christ- Fr Raphael

What about the sins that come out of not being able to control one's tongue? Are they, in general, also considered mortal sins? There have been times, I've accidentally overheard or found myself at a table with someone in black, who is talking in the same way as the lay people, and it makes me extremely uncomfortable. A person with such a tongue, even if he doesn't speak that way every day, isn't a very good representation of Christ, is he? Or maybe, it's just me. Perhaps I'm just more sensitive to what comes out of people's mouths. I dunno.

in Christ,
mary

Michael Stickles

12-11-2008, 12:08 AM

What kind of past would prevent one from becoming a priest?

There are a number of canons which deal with this sort of thing. Two of the clearest are Canon 8 of Neocesarea (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.viii.iv.iii.viii.html) (which bars a layman whose wife was convicted of adultery from entering the ranks of the clergy), and Canon 36 of Carthage (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.xv.iv.iv.xxxvii.html) (which forbids ordination as a deacon, priest or bishop unless the whole of one's household has become Christian [i.e., Orthodox]). The explanatory note to Canon 9 of I Nicea (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.vii.vi.xiv.html) lists several other things which were considered a bar to the priesthood, though I'm not sure where they got that list.

That's not to say there are never exceptions, but I imagine that this answer (http://www.oca.org/QA.asp?ID=169&SID=3) to a question on the OCA site (regarding whether a man who remarried after a divorce which was not his fault, could be ordained a priest) probably sums up the general attitude towards exceptions quite well:

The Tradition of the Orthodox Church is that both the priest as well as his wife must have been married only one time - to each other. And this would apply regardless of whether the person is no longer married due to divorce or to widowhood.

There have been a few rare exceptions to this, but I emphasize that in each case it is a "rare" exception, if not an abnormality which is not generally in keeping with the Tradition and canons of the Church.

In Christ,
Michael

Olga

12-11-2008, 05:00 AM

And I hope nobody else is either because this would be heresy on several levels. It would be just as ridiculous to refer to the Holy Trinity as Father, Son and Holy Grandson. The Holy Spirit does not proceed from the Son, the Son is not the father of the Holy Spirit. Either way represents a serious misunderstanding of Trinity!

Well put, Herman. If I may digress a little from the theme of this thread, the above heresy has been rendered in "iconographic" form for centuries, in the form of the Paternity (Otechestvo) image which arose in Russia in about the 16th century.

There is a related image, of more recent (possibly no earlier than late 20th C) origin, called Maternity. This image reflects Richard's quite correct comment on the folly of "changing the Trinitarian formula to "Mother, Daughter, Holy Grand-daughter".

Here are examples of these uncanonical images:

http://zhekino.com/prosopon/photos/01.jpg Paternity (this image is a variation of the usual depiction of the Holy Spirit as a dove in Christ's lap. A miniature "wisdom" figure takes its place.)

http://zhekino.com/prosopon/photos/02.jpg Maternity

Mary

12-11-2008, 01:58 PM

Wow. These icons give me the creeps!

Michael, thanks for the links.

mary

RichardWorthington

12-11-2008, 02:43 PM

Three slightly deaf old ladies met at a street corner.
"Windy, isn’t it?", said the first.
"No, it’s Thursday", said the second.
"So am I. Let’s all go and have a cup of tea", replied the third.

The above is a joke I was told when I was little, but I think it sums up well what is going on here. The thing is, you all have been stating that you have been engaging with my points, and I have been saying that I have been trying to engage with yours. And yet we both think that there are major points which the other has glossed over!

I think it is therefore clear that we are so misunderstanding each other that it is probably pointless to keep on going round in circles. I have been printing out large chunks of this thread (and so have been trying to engage - honestly!!) but my head is still spinning.

I will therefore bow out of this thread regarding discussing symbolism/iconography, although there are some points which I think do need to be addressed (unless it is just part of the completely not grasping what the other is saying!).

I am just lost with all this talk of iconography, imagery, figure, symbolism, etc. To me the phrase "the priest is an icon of Christ" could just as easily have been translated from Greek as "the priest is an image of Christ". The word ‘iconography’ does indeed bring to mind the artistic pictures in the Orthodox Church tradition. The word ‘imagery’ does not. When I read recent posts mentioning in depth differing representations of Christ (e.g. the lamb vs true likeness) then I think that it is almost totally irrelevant to the discussion of priest as image of Christ.

For example, Metropolitan Kallistos has been quoted (in context!) quite a few times, and we have differed over the level of importance of what he has been saying. However, this is how he draws his piece to a close. After mentioning that he is not convinced that the priest being an icon of Christ in itself denies the priesthood to women, he writes:

Are we therefore to conclude that the divine choice whereby the Saviour became incarnate as a male and not as a female was purely coincidental and arbitrary? Most certainly not. In the divine economy nothing is mere coincidence. We cannot say that it was necessary for God to become incarnate as a male, since human ideas of necessity are not to be imposed on the uncreated Trinity. But, if it was not necessary, such a choice may surely be seen as congruous. Since the second person has been revealed to us as the eternal Son of God, not as God's daughter, it is profoundly appropriate that he should be born on earth as the new Adam, not the new Eve. And because he was born on earth as the new Adam and not as the new Eve, throughout the New Testament Christ is consistently seen as the bridegroom, while the Church is his bride (Matt. 9:15, 25:1-12; John 3:2; Rev. 21:2,9; 22:17).

Since the priest in the Divine Liturgy is a living icon of Christ the bridegroom of the Church, does it follow therefore that the priest must always be a man? Can a woman represent the bridegroom? That brings us back to my first question: In what sense does the priest represent Christ? To some it will seem patently absurd that the bridegroom should be represented by a woman. Others will respond that there is no intrinsic absurdity, provided that we make proper allowance for the subtlety and polyvalence of symbols. After all, when we speak of the Church as bride, this implies that there is a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God. If men can represent the Church as bride, why cannot women represent Christ as bridegroom?

On one point, at any rate, we should be in no doubt whatsoever. Symbols have a far-reaching and incalculable significance, and if we change them we may be altering far more than we realize. When flouted they can have a devastating "backlash". A symbol, as we all know from experience, has the advantage of being easier to comprehend than a verbal explanation, while at the same time conveying truths that lie too deep for human logic. In literature and in art, in worship and in the family, there is a powerful symbolism of words and things, extending down to the hidden roots of our being; and, when the symbolism is ignored, our life is tragically impoverished.

The question, then, that faces us is this, and perhaps it is going to take us a long time to find the answer: Does the exclusively male character of the Christian priesthood form an integral element of that revealed God-given symbolism, with which we tamper at our peril? If, for example, we Orthodox were to start ordaining women priests, would we shortly afterwards find ourselves invoking "our Mother who art in heaven", and baptizing in the name of "the Mother and the Daughter..." as certain Western Christians have already begun to do? Or is it in fact possible to proceed to the ordination of women priests, and at the same time to maintain intact the Church's traditional forms of worship and liturgical invocation?

As before when reviewing the arguments from Christian anthropology, so now in our evaluation of theological symbolism, we are brought to the same conclusion: there are no easy answers. "Truly thou art a God that hidest thyself (Isa. 45:15). Let us, then, have the courage to approach the question of women's ministry in the Church with an open mind and an open heart. The Orthodox Church has no intention in the immediate future of altering its existing practice of ordaining only men to the priesthood, and perhaps it never will do so. But as Orthodox let us at least explore, with a rigour and humility that we have not so far displayed, the deeper reasons for our existing practice. Let us make the questions of the contemporary West our own questions; let us acknowledge that the question of women priests is a question posed also to us.

"The ordination of women in the Orthodox Church", pages 88-89

Now it has been discussed somewhere before the we might not agree with the description of priest as image of bridegroom, but in this passage he does link the terms "living icon", "the subtlety and polyvalence of symbols", and "theological symbolism". This just confirms my confusion: I know that it is wrong to symbolically depict Christ as a lamb, but to what extent are we getting tied up in knots over the subtle shades of meaning in the words icon, image, symbol, figure, representation, etc.?

Mary kindly pointed out above:

PS I have been asked for a reason why I am against women priests: gut instinct, based on trying to live according to the Divine Liturgy. Is this so unreasonable? If we can produce no logical reasoning then this does not therefore imply that we can change things. But more later… !! ;)

Thank you for making that clear! So, your gut knows something that your logical reasoning doesn't understand! So does my gut! What is unreasonable is that you are trying to make us come up with a logical explanation for what we also know in our guts to be true, when it's obvious that guts are superior to logic!

Why is it ok for your gut to be confident, but not mine? Is it possible to come up with a logical reason for everything your gut knows to be true? If your gut found the truth without logical reasons, then why don't you trust the guts of others to also find the truth, without all this excessive reasoning?

To answer the point that I am "trying to make" you "come up with a logical explanation", please read the following post:

Firstly, and most importantly, I do not think it pastorally helpful, when someone feels challenged or uncomfortable with a teaching or practice of the Church, to indicate a supposed 'optional nature' to it.
…
while the fact that the priest is an icon of Christ is one reason amongst many that this {a male only priesthood} is maintained, it is nonetheless a reason that has been maintained since antiquity, and is a fundamental part of Orthodox worship and life. It goes well beyond a simple 'argument for a male priesthood': it forms part of the living, active iconography of the Church that is expressed in our liturgical demeanor, behaviours, etc.

I am not trying to make anyone come up with a logical explanation, just merely acknowledge that certain ‘logical explanations’ are not central to the Orthodox Faith, and so a catechumen should not be refused entry if he/she refuses to assent to it. It is not I who am trying to enforce a logical reasoning!

The point that the priest being an icon of Christ implying a male only priesthood is ancient is mentioned again:

Why 1960? Vatican II? Why say we are following Rome's example? more they have followed ours and we are still behaving the same since the beginning. I don't see the misunderstanding with males being the icon of Christ as priests being males making them also icons of Christ.

So please let me quote from the start of Metropolitan Kallistos’s piece:

How hard it is for us Orthodox to speak with our own true voice! Since the fall of Byzantium, all too often we have borrowed our theological categories from the West, sometimes using Roman Catholic arguments (especially when opposing Protestantism), and sometimes using Protestant arguments (especially when opposing Roman Catholicism). As George Samarin, the friend and editor of the Russian Slavophile thinker Alexis Khomiakov, had occasion to observe, writing in 1867: "Our Orthodox school of theology was not in a position to define either Latinism or Protestantism, because in departing from its own Orthodox standpoint it had itself become divided into two, and each of these halves had taken up a position opposed to its opponent, Latin or Protestant, but not above him."' Instead of uncritically adopting Western presuppositions, Samarin continues, we Orthodox need to look at Roman Catholic and Protestant controversies with creative independence, approaching them from a distinctively Orthodox perspective.

Samarin's observations still remain timely today, one hundred and thirty years after they were written, and in particular they are applicable to the current debate about the ordination of women to the priesthood. Hitherto this has been largely a Western debate. The question has been posed to us Orthodox as it were "from the outside", and we have not yet made it truly our own question. When we intervene in the discussion, we are in danger of doing exactly what Samarin deplores: of taking over the criteria and arguments of non- Orthodox writers, without articulating an independent Orthodox standpoint, firmly based on patristic principles. Orthodox opponents of the ordination of women priests have often relied, for example, on the papal statement concerning women and the priesthood Inter Insigniores (15 October {page 50} 1976), without enquiring how far the conception of priesthood assumed in this document in fact corresponds to the Orthodox understanding.

Needless to say, we Orthodox need to listen attentively to what is being said at present in the West by opponents and by supporters of women priests alike, for there is much that we can and should learn from both sides. Even more important than listening to the words spoken in the West is a willingness to take account of the experience of Western Christians, of their joys, and more particularly of their sufferings. For this is a debate that has generated incalculable pain, bewilderment and anger among both the protagonists and the opponents; and we Orthodox should not be indifferent to this. But we have also to weigh these Western statements and to evaluate this Western experience in light of our own Tradition. So far as the formulation of an authentically Orthodox position is concerned, are we not still at the very beginning? In recent years, it is true, there has been an increasing output of articles in Orthodox journals from such writers as Thomas Hopko, Deborah Belonick, Kyriaki FitzGerald and Nonna Verna Harrison. In particular, a significant contribution has been made by Elisabeth Behr-Sigel, whose articles over the past twenty years have been marked by courage and critical insight. But we still await, from the Orthodox side, an extended and fully-argued study in depth.

"The Ordination of Women in the Orthodox Church", page 49, underlining added for emphasis

Please note: I am not trying to defend Metropolitan Kallistos (although I will do if I happen to agree with him!), but merely quote from recognised church writers to give other Orthodox opinions.

However, can we agree that it may be a widespread opinion that the priest being an icon of Christ implies a male priesthood, yet it is not obligatory to agree with this logical reasoning? This is all I am trying to say by challenging imagery/symbolism. That no woman can become a priest is clear, but not the reasons. Some previous posts I feel were far too heavy handed with Carol. Knowing what Metropolitan Kallistos has written, can you blame me for trying to dilute things a bit?

There are a few unfinished bits remaining, so I will still be posting here (with probably a good flurry of ‘counter-posts’!), but I now consider the whole debate on iconography vs symbolism closed - unfinished, but closed as in 'no point in continuing'. If you do wish to re-open it for me then please feel free, but since my head is still spinning after resting over night I think we will only be going round in circles again!

With many good intentions, even if the subsequent actions do not quite live up to those intentions,

Richard
:)

Fr Raphael Vereshack

12-11-2008, 03:16 PM

What about the sins that come out of not being able to control one's tongue? Are they, in general, also considered mortal sins? There have been times, I've accidentally overheard or found myself at a table with someone in black, who is talking in the same way as the lay people, and it makes me extremely uncomfortable. A person with such a tongue, even if he doesn't speak that way every day, isn't a very good representation of Christ, is he? Or maybe, it's just me. Perhaps I'm just more sensitive to what comes out of people's mouths. I dunno.

in Christ,
mary

In terms of this discussion we need to keep in mind that although the priest is called to be an icon of Christ he is not identical to the person of Christ. This means that although he is called to be an icon of Christ he still has his own personal struggles that Christ calls him to.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Owen Jones

12-11-2008, 05:00 PM

Metro Kallistos' comments, quoted above, if accurate, is pure gobbledegook. And quoting Behr-Sigel? Well, she plays pretty fast and loose with the language, saying things like -- the icon is not a naturalistic representation. Well, duh! This is typical. The subtle premise is that the rest of us are just a bunch of unspiritual simpletons who look at everything literally and just presuppose that the icon is a naturalistic representation, nothing more. But we need to take our cue from these deep spiritual thinkers who struggle a lot and feel each others' pain. Behr-Sigel also makes the common mistake of conflating deaconnesses and deacons historically. Well, I guess she does think we are all stupid. It's like the Episcopalian deep thinkers that discovered, aha, that there were presbyteras in the early Church!!!! Well, guess what, we have several presyteras in my parish!!!!

Look, the problem, such as it is, is a general passivity among the laity, which frankly I do not see as coming from anything top down. The clergy are not forcing anyone to be passive. If anything, in my parish, the clergy are frustrated with the passivity of the congregation, by and large, and wish us to be more devoted, more active, more knowledgeable in the faith, not more passive. So if people feel a certain leftoutedness in their Church, they should take a good hard look at themselves and work on changing themselves than expecting the Church to change. That is the fundamental problem. People feel uncomfortable. A kind of vague unease. There religious lives are not as fulfilling as they expect them to be. And so then their solution? Reform the Church!

Now, my sin, if anywhere, is in the opposite direction. I want the laity fired up. I want us to be active and innovative in developing both our inner and outer lives. Not wait around for priests to tell us what to do or how to think, but organize a group to work out a plan, for example, to introduce Orthodoxy to our communities, in our colleges and universities, but first to work more intensely on developing our own inner spiritual resources. Must we always just wait around for a priest to tell us what we can and cannot do? That's not the priest's fault. It's our fault.

To organize study groups centered around both practical and theoretical texts from our tradition so that we are better formed and better informed. And then ask ourselves tough questions. Are we really living a Christian life to its fullest?

Who are the lay people in our community who are the most pious and most knowledgable in the faith? Let's go ask them how they do it. Let's copy what they do. Instead, we want to get into these stupid discussions about whether or not there were ordained female deacons 1800 years ago. Insipid, stupid, ridiculous junk.

Andreas Moran

12-11-2008, 05:09 PM

This means that although he is called to be an icon of Christ he still has his own personal struggles that Christ calls him to.

'For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.' (Romans 3:23)

RichardWorthington

12-11-2008, 11:47 PM

Metro Kallistos' comments, quoted above, if accurate, is pure gobbledegook. And quoting Behr-Sigel? Well, she plays pretty fast and loose with the language, saying things like -- the icon is not a naturalistic representation. Well, duh! This is typical. The subtle premise is that the rest of us are just a bunch of unspiritual simpletons who look at everything literally and just presuppose that the icon is a naturalistic representation, nothing more. But we need to take our cue from these deep spiritual thinkers who struggle a lot and feel each others' pain.

Owen, given what you've written above, I know you'll love this comment of Behr-Sigel's, from near the end of her peice:

Orthodox theological thinking on the possibility of women's ordination to the priesthood is still in its early stages. But, as I have attempted to show, it is progressively being clarified in dialogue between Orthodox themselves and in dialogue with representatives and theologians from other churches. However, for the moment this dialogue is confined to a minority mostly made up of theologians, men and women, with a Western background. There is a great gulf between this limited group and the mass of Orthodox people, particularly in Eastern Europe. As in the early days of the Church, those who feel that they are free in Christ and freed by Christ from certain stereotypes and taboos must avoid scandalizing the "weak", who in other areas may be the spiritually "strong". But we must never give way to threats from obscurantist fundamentalists, who are often Westerners who are recent converts to the Orthodox Church.

It must, however, be admitted that in its present state any decision to ordain women to the priesthood would almost inevitably give rise to schism in the Orthodox Church. In view of this risk, we must be patiently impatient. The greatest gift of the Spirit, to which we are all called to aspire, is the gift of agape, the love which "is patient" and "always hopes" (1 Cor. 13:4,7).

The ordination of women in the orthodox church, p 44

Whoa!!!!

Richard ;)
PS I thought I wouldn't highlight any 'interesting' bits, but leave them to be found ...
PPS what do you mean 'if accurate'?!? I scanned the pages in and had the computer automatically recognise the text. I then checked it afterwards.

Herman Blaydoe

13-11-2008, 02:38 AM

(Quoting Elizabeth Behr-Sigel) Orthodox theological thinking on the possibility of women's ordination to the priesthood is still in its early stages. But, as I have attempted to show, it is progressively being clarified in dialogue between Orthodox themselves and in dialogue with representatives and theologians from other churches.

Yeouch! Right... Orthodoxy has so much to learn from the Anglican and Protestant Churches (she is obviously not talking about the Catholics!). But she is right—clarification IS happening, but perhaps not in the manner she thinks.

However, for the moment this dialogue is confined to a minority mostly made up of theologians, men and women, with a Western background.

Which is exactly what Owen is referring to, even this bear of very little brain can figure that one out.

There is a great gulf between this limited group and the mass of Orthodox people, particularly in Eastern Europe.

She is referring to, of course, that mass of Orthodox people that endured untold suffering and persecution, defending the Hope that is in them. What kind of gulf is it I wonder? Ignorance? Or perhaps a wisdom to which she may be clueless?

Well, she certainly knows what SHE wants, regardless of what God may want. Maybe she will convince Him? Sorry but I see this as a perfect example of isogesis, coming up with the conclusion you want and then manipulating the analysis to support it. Shaping theology to your life, rather than shaping your life to theology.

Herman the Pooh

Owen Jones

13-11-2008, 04:03 AM

I heard plenty of this garbage in the Episcopal Church, and the term obscurantist fundamentalist is the typical sloganeering of left-wing fanatics who took over the Church back in the '60's. Now they've succeeded in completely destroying it.

I know Bishop Kallistos. He's been in my home. I admire him personally for some things. But if this is the stuff he is touting, and has been touting (I frankly have not been following this sort of thing for many years) then he needs to be anathemitized, if not officially by other bishops, then certainly by the laity in their hearts. This cannot be allowed to stand.

The people who come into Orthodoxy as converts in the UK and the US are not fundamentalists. They are coming into Orthodoxy precisely because it is not fundamentalist, and this is a slur and a slander against many well meaning, pious, God-fearing people who know why they are Orthodox, and are willing to put up with a lot of frustrations institutionally for the privilege of being in God's true house.

Thanks for the quotes.

Michael Stickles

13-11-2008, 05:37 AM

I can't agree with the characterization of Metropolitan Kallistos' remarks as "pure gobbledegook". And I think a few of the quotes Richard provided make some very important points (whether Metropolitan Kallistos intended those points to be taken the way I'm taking them is another matter).

But as Orthodox let us at least explore, with a rigour and humility that we have not so far displayed, the deeper reasons for our existing practice. Let us make the questions of the contemporary West our own questions; let us acknowledge that the question of women priests is a question posed also to us.

One of the first things I noticed when moving into Orthodoxy was not just that it had different answers to theological questions; rather, it asked the questions differently, and that's why it arrived at different answers. Often the answers didn't make sense to me until I understood how the question was asked.

The question of women priests is asked in the West in terms of "Why can't women be priests?", but when you add in the cultural presuppositions, what is often being asked is really "What inherent inferiorities or defects are you claiming that women have which justify you preventing them from ministering in the Church in all the ways that men do?" This is most definitely the wrong question, and it cannot be answered accurately and fully in that form.

We need to take the question and "make it our own", which to me means reframing it in Orthodox terms, but in a way that the Western mind can understand. Thus the need for "rigour" (to frame the question both accurately and - for the Western mind - understandably) as well as "humility" (to be willing to engage and explain in the questioner's language, rather than making dogmatic pronouncements in terms that aren't fully comprehensible to them - or worse yet, to just say "it's Holy Tradition, so shut up").

Needless to say, we Orthodox need to listen attentively to what is being said at present in the West by opponents and by supporters of women priests alike, for there is much that we can and should learn from both sides. Even more important than listening to the words spoken in the West is a willingness to take account of the experience of Western Christians, of their joys, and more particularly of their sufferings. For this is a debate that has generated incalculable pain, bewilderment and anger among both the protagonists and the opponents; and we Orthodox should not be indifferent to this. But we have also to weigh these Western statements and to evaluate this Western experience in light of our own Tradition.

What I said above forms the context in which I understand these sentences from Metropolitan Kallistos. What we "can and should learn" from the West is not their doctrine, but their language; not just what meanings are conveyed by the words, but what experience, what pain, what longings, what hopes and fears. Then when we evaluate their words and experience "in light of our own Tradition", we will be able to respond appropriately and intelligibly. If we don't first learn their language, we have nothing to say to them, because nothing we say will be understood rightly.

I have not read the book Richard provided the quotes from, so I have some degree of uncertainty in how to interpret quotes like this:

Since the priest in the Divine Liturgy is a living icon of Christ the bridegroom of the Church, does it follow therefore that the priest must always be a man? Can a woman represent the bridegroom? That brings us back to my first question: In what sense does the priest represent Christ? To some it will seem patently absurd that the bridegroom should be represented by a woman. Others will respond that there is no intrinsic absurdity, provided that we make proper allowance for the subtlety and polyvalence of symbols. After all, when we speak of the Church as bride, this implies that there is a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God. If men can represent the Church as bride, why cannot women represent Christ as bridegroom?

He could be asking that last question rhetorically (i.e., implying that women can represent Christ in that way); he could be asking it on his own behalf (implying that he's unsure of the answer himself); or, he could simply be presenting it as a question which he believes we have not addressed with the "rigour and humility" that it deserves. From the overall tone of the quotes provided, I'm assuming the last interpretation for now.

The short quote from Behr-Sigel doesn't leave nearly as much uncertainty; the broad outline of her views is pretty clear. However, I do note that what Metropolitan Kallistos said about her was simply:

In particular, a significant contribution has been made by Elisabeth Behr-Sigel, whose articles over the past twenty years have been marked by courage and critical insight.

I can easily see how he could have this opinion of her work without necessarily agreeing with it. Just reading the two paragraphs Richard quoted gave me insights into aspects of that particular pro-women's-ordination mindset which I had not been aware of before.

In Christ,
Michael

Olga

13-11-2008, 08:10 AM

Here is a link to an article by Mme Behr-Sigel which is relevant to this discussion:

http://www.stnina.org/journal/art/2.2.2

Let readers make of this what they will.

M.C. Steenberg

13-11-2008, 08:56 AM

Dear friends,

I am particularly grateful to Michael for his recent post. Re-reading the extracts from Metropolitan Kallistos' contribution to the volume that's been quoted in this thread, I 'hear' him speaking in his familiar tones, which are so hard to capture in writing -- namely, his general belief that dismissing questions, rather than asking them, is the purview of the closed-minded. Yet, to ask a question does not mean that one implies an answer; and further, to ask a provocative question does not mean to suggest the provocative response. Re-reading his passages in that light, as I was helpfully reminded by Michael's message to do, I can see more of the 'familiar Bishop Kallistos' in those words than previously -- on earlier reading, I had wondered just how he had got so far from his comments in an earlier volume on precisely the same topic, which I had occasion to read just three weeks ago, and which are so different in tone. But, as Michael notes, I see nothing in the remarks quoted above that suggest a 'position' or a 'response': only an engagement with the questions. And on this general approach, I can only say that I agree -- namely, that discovering the questions that people ask in certain contexts (particularly in western contexts that have been so influenced by a history of 'answers' of a particular sort), allows a response that speaks to, rather than outside of, that culture and context.

That is what is so critical in discussions like this: to take the topic into the realm of questions and articulations that truly matter, rather than simply the intial queries or categorisations that people may, from whatever context or perspective, bring to the discussion. If Metropolitan Kallistos' use of provocative questions is aimed at this (which is what I 'hear' when I visualise those words spoken in his demeanor, even if I find it challenging to 'see' them in written form on the page), then it seems a useful project. I would still like to know - as I don't think these quotations reveal - his actual thoughts on the question in their own right.

But Michael's point on 'asking the right questions' is precisely key to this topic. And this is why I so fervently believe that to dismiss the theology of priest as male as icon of Christ, as somehow not essential to the issue, is to elect to ignore something absolutely fundamental to the Orthodox understandings incarnation, salvation, and worship. It is to come to one's conclusions by asking the wrong set of questions, and thus being satisfied (or dissatisfied) with what will always be the wrong set of answers.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 10:00 AM

At the moment I am reading Archmandrite Vasileios' (Abbot of Iveron Monastery, Holy Mountain) The Christian Life as True Marriage.

"Then the soul achieves repose (after what, for most people is a long struggle). In a manner beyond speech and knowledge, it composes itself for rest in the surpassingly good and true bed of God, where that terrible mystery of the union is accomplished, transcending understanding and reason, through which God becomes one flesh and one spirit with the Church, with the soul, and the soul with God "For the two shall be one flesh (Genesis 2:24), but I speak concerning Christ and the Church'(Ephesians 5:32). 'But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit'(1Corinthians 6 : 17). So once the soul becomes unified and is concentrated in itself and on God, the reason (logos) which once divided it in its thinking into many parts no longer exists..... in absolute communication, the soul recognises the principles and causes of things; whereas before becoming the bride of the Word and God it was subject because of those things to the methods of division.

St. Maximus the Confessor

"The Fathers use the language of marriage to speak about the relationship between the soul and God... They use the language of marriage for the relationship between man and God in he Kingdom of heaven, where there is no possibility of physical marriage. In other words, they refer to the strongest and most all-embracing communion and union on earth - as that of the bride and bridegroom is - in order to speak about the ineffable and indescribable qualities of the total mingling of the divine marriage which is accomplished between the soul and the Word.

The Fathers do not speak improperly or hesitantly about some love, some eros in spiritual life, something vague and debatable, as if it were a substitute for the fleshly eros which to them "is not true eros, but an idol, or rather a lapse from real eros." (St. Dionysius the Areopagite)

The soul has no sex, it is neither female nor male. The true marriage is that between the soul and God.

Can anyone tell me what the basis for only men becoming priests is? This is something that I do not know.

Effie

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 10:16 AM

I did find this :

"The reason for this is because the Orthodox Church follows the teachings of Jesus Christ, the Bible and the practices of the Holy Apostles. When Jesus chose people for His Ministry on earth, He called twelve male disciples to go and preach to the whole world. Then they chose another 70 male disciples, and so on for over 2,000 years. This is also in keeping with the Old Testament practice of choosing men to become priests of the Temple and rabbis of synagogues. "

A lot of people believe that the wording of the New Testament has been tampered with. We do know however how highly
Our Lord Jesus Christ regarded the women who travelled with him, even accepting their money to pay for expenses Luke 8:3.

None of the Apostles were with him when he was crucified except for his cousin St. John (his mother and our Panayia were apparently related). All the women, however, were there to support him.

"MAT 27:55 "Many women were there, watching from a distance.
They had followed Jesus from Galilee to care for his needs.
Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and
Joses, and the mother of Zebedee's sons."

Mary Salome was the mother of St. John and St. James and she is believed to be the Theotokos' relative.

"Wife of Zebedee. Mother of Saint John the Apostle, and Saint James the Greater. May have been a cousin of the Blessed Virgin Mary. One of the "three Marys," the holy women who ministered to Jesus during his earthly ministry, and may have accompanied him on his travels. Witnessed Christ's death on the cross, his entombment, and his resurrection. Mark mentions Salome as one of the women who came to anoint the body of Jesus on the morning of the Resurrection.

I have read that in the early church, women were independent and established their own communities, ruling themselves (an early convent system). But then, because the men in the church were not happy with the independence of these women, these communities were destroyed.

I cannot offer a link for the above, because it is only in my memory and not something that I have just found out.

I will try to find a source or further information about this.

Effie

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 10:20 AM

I found this concerning the matter of women being priests in the Early Church :

"Consider a tombstone from late fifth-century southern Italy: 'Leta, the priest (presbytera), lived 40 years, 8 months, 9 days. Her husband set this up for her'. Or a Latin inscription from Salona in Dalmatia, dated earlier in the same century: 'I Theodosius purchased this grave plot from the holy priest (presbytera sancta) Flavia Vitalia for three gold pieces'. Two notices that would seem to attest the existence of female priests - not unusual in the world of Graeco-Roman antiquity, except that these women were Christians. As late as the fifth and sixth centuries AD women like these were found exercising priestly authority in Christian churches in locales as diverse as the cities of Asia Minor, Greece, Gaul, Sicily and southern Italy. It is also known how very unusual most of these cases were.

http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst;jsessionid=JbwPsLcGqxvtg35dKmkzy zR8CYdXBLGRySTzh4gKcL6kbvcFDwvG!-484091661?docId=5000174288

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 10:39 AM

There were women (the above I mentioned) at the Lord's side, always. Were there also women present at the Last Supper?

Exodus 12
"The LORD said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, 2 "This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year. 3 Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb [a] for his family, one for each household. 4 If any household is too small for a whole lamb, they must share one with their nearest neighbour, having taken into account the number of people there are."

The whole family were always present at the Passover meal.

Would Jesus Christ have excluded the women.

"Corinthians 11:23-25

23For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 24and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me." 25In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me."

Amen, I say to you, I shall not drink again the fruit of the vine until the day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God."

Would not the above have included all those who were present at the meal, both men and women?

We are not told that any women were present, but this doesn't make sense if Jesus was following the Jewish tradition.

Just some questions that tease my mind.

Effie

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 11:04 AM

I also found this in The St. Nina quarterly

http://www.stnina.org/journal/art/1.1.3

Andreas Moran

13-11-2008, 11:15 AM

I find it symptomatic that a debate such as this takes place in the west. I cannot imagine this taking place in Russia. The 'freedom' we have in our libertarian, intellectualist, materialist culture may not be the healthy climate we assume it to be but rather a virulent atmosphere which can poison the Orthodox mind. Christ gave us commandments, not topics for intellectual debate. Christians should be 'douloi', slaves, of Christ: slaves do not debate their master's commands. We should consider that the culture in which we live is more dangerous than outright persecution. As Herman rightly notes (
She is referring to, of course, that mass of Orthodox people that endured untold suffering and persecution, defending the Hope that is in them. What kind of gulf is it I wonder? Ignorance? Or perhaps a wisdom to which she may be clueless?), you know Orthodoxy and its wisdom when you've suffered for it.

Here is a link to an article by Mme Behr-Sigel which is relevant to this discussion:

http://www.stnina.org/journal/art/2.2.2

Let readers make of this what they will.

I know what I made of it: the divine services a 'shell of opaque customs and rituals'??

No wonder my wife sometimes remarks how hard it is for westerners to be Orthodox.

Olga

13-11-2008, 01:27 PM

I have now perused a number of articles on the St Nina Quarterly site, and I am increasingly of the opinion that these women are indeed attempting to make the Church in their own image. The article on altar girls is, and, even more so, the appended responses supporting the article are, frankly, chilling. Herman's words are most apt:
... I see this as a perfect example of isogesis, coming up with the conclusion you want and then manipulating the analysis to support it. Shaping theology to your life, rather than shaping your life to theology.

Their "mission statement" speaks volumes:

The St. Nina Quarterly is a publication dedicated to exploring the ministry of women in the Orthodox Church and to cultivating a deeper understanding of ministry in the lives of all Orthodox Christian women and men. We profess firm faith in our Church's teaching that each of us is created in the image of God and called to grow into His likeness. We believe that all persons are endowed with gifts of the Holy Spirit in ways that uniquely express the fullness of their humanity and contribute to the fullness of the entire community of believers.

Our mission is the discovery and cultivation of these gifts for the nurturance of the entire Body of Christ. To this end, we will strive to educate, inform, and provide space for an ongoing, creative dialogue aimed at reaching across all boundaries to support and encourage the growth and vitality of the God-given ministries of all of our sisters and brothers in Christ.

Andreas Moran

13-11-2008, 01:56 PM

I just 'phoned my wife in Moscow and we had a little chat about this topic. She said that the intellect has mesmerised western man for centuries and especially since the so-called Enlightenment [blame the French and Scots!]. He uses it as the measure of all things. He cannot imagine life without it. It has destroyed Christianity in the west. I asked her if she had ever questioned the Church's having male priests and whether it had ever been an issue in Russia. She said that when she first was involved in the Church in the late '80s and early '90s, there was such grace; it was so strong. Then followed a period of thinking about and questioning things about the Church including the male priesthood. Why are women treated like this? Why are they considered inferior?, and so on and so forth. Questioning turned to disturbance which turned to anger and resentment. Grace withdrew. The mind became alienated from the heart. She became aware that she was struggling with the Church and with God. In the services she felt nothing. By God's mercy she experienced the pain of missing the grace she had had before. She confessed and re-ordered her mind to make it humble and accepting. Peace returned and her mind became friends again with her heart. I asked her if there had ever been any movement for a greater role for women in the Church in Russia. She said the worst that happened in Moscow was that a priest translated the services into Russian and served the liturgy in Russian. There were other novelties. She went to one such liturgy out of curiosity; it was just like a western service, she said: no grace. The priest refused to change and he was confined to a monastery. But even he never argued for women priests. In the late '90s, she took to going to a church still under the influence of Fr Alexander Men. Her spiritual father told her that she must stop going to that church and if she didn't she should never come to see him again for she would be free. The most terrible words a person can hear from a spiritual father are, 'you are free': it means they are on their own.

Fr Raphael Vereshack

13-11-2008, 03:12 PM

Interesting turn the discussion has taken since I had a look through it yesterday!

I'm still not impressed by Metropolitan Kallistos' words on this particular subject however. Sensitivity and understanding to the whole question of women & priesthood-yes.

However a real Patristic answer to this is needed- and that according to the whole argument made by the Metropolitan himself in this article. This after all in fact is what sensitivity & understanding mean in terms of the Church.

Otherwise the impression is given that the challenging questions & the attitude behind them have pre eminence over any answer that can be given.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Michael Stickles

13-11-2008, 03:47 PM

St. Maximus the Confessor

"The Fathers use the language of marriage to speak about the relationship between the soul and God... They use the language of marriage for the relationship between man and God in he Kingdom of heaven, where there is no possibility of physical marriage. In other words, they refer to the strongest and most all-embracing communion and union on earth - as that of the bride and bridegroom is - in order to speak about the ineffable and indescribable qualities of the total mingling of the divine marriage which is accomplished between the soul and the Word.

The Fathers do not speak improperly or hesitantly about some love, some eros in spiritual life, something vague and debatable, as if it were a substitute for the fleshly eros which to them "is not true eros, but an idol, or rather a lapse from real eros." (St. Dionysius the Areopagite)

The soul has no sex, it is neither female nor male. The true marriage is that between the soul and God.

Can anyone tell me what the basis for only men becoming priests is? This is something that I do not know.

These quotes combined with the question bring an idea to mind. I haven't read anything like this in the Fathers (which doesn't say much, given how little I've read in them), so I might be completely off-base, but let me throw it out for review and correction.

First, instead of asking "why must a priest be male?" or "why can't a woman be a priest?", let's start with "what is the ministry of a priest?" And it seems to me that central to the ministry of the priest is the celebration of the Eucharist.

Now, Scripture tells us that marriage is a type of Christ and the Church. One parallel is that the union of a man and a woman in marriage (potentially) brings forth new life - a child - in the woman's womb, while the union of Christ and His Church brings forth new life - His life - within the Church. Could not the celebration of the Eucharist be another marriage-like parallel?

The priest enters the sanctuary, which could be seen to represent the "womb" of Christ's virgin bride, the Church. And there he presides over the consecration of the Eucharist, representing Christ who overshadows the offered gifts just as the power of God overshadowed the Theotokos when the Holy Spirit came upon her - then to bring about the conception of Christ in His humanity; now to bring about the life-giving presence of Christ in the Mysteries.

Thus, the maleness of the priest is important not just because he represents Christ, but because one of the contexts in which he does so is one which the Scriptures specifically represent in sexual terms. Thus - in that context at least - the sexual identity of the priest as male is completely relevant to his being able to represent Christ.

This also brings to mind at least a possible answer to the question Metropolitan Kallistos presented:

After all, when we speak of the Church as bride, this implies that there is a sense in which all of us - men and women alike - are feminine in our relationship to God. If men can represent the Church as bride, why cannot women represent Christ as bridegroom?

It seems to me that we are feminine in our relationship to God collectively, not individually. In the Scriptures Paul speaks of the marriage relationship in terms of the woman as a figure of the Church as bride, and the man as a figure of Christ as Bridegroom. Marriage is the context within which those representations are to be understood. Now, if a man - as an individual - can represent the Church as bride, what context is this done in, and who represents the Bridegroom in that context? I can think of no such context.

In contrast, in the context of the liturgy and in particular the celebration of the Eucharist, it seems to me that the priest - as individual - represents Christ the Bridegroom, with the parish - collectively - representing the whole of the Church, His bride.

I present these ideas not in the spirit of a teacher answering a student's question, but of a student submitting an answer to an essay question. Do feel free to pull out the red pens and start correcting :)

In Christ,
Michael

Andreas Moran

13-11-2008, 04:02 PM

These quotes combined with the question bring an idea to mind. . . .

I wouldn't like to assess this attractive notion but I do wonder if it fits in with the Eucharist as making present that which already exists: re-creation as opposed to procreation.

RichardWorthington

13-11-2008, 04:13 PM

I have read that in the early church, women were independent and established their own communities, ruling themselves (an early convent system). But then, because the men in the church were not happy with the independence of these women, these communities were destroyed.

Dear Effie,

You are asking many good questions! However, they are biased by the standard 'proof texts' of what the Fathers said. When I started looking at these issues, I found passages of the Fathers which easily balanced the so-called 'misogynistic' passages. I will find the notes I made and put them in the equality mother thread of this thread.

However, for now please re-read the following (quoted in#41):

In fact, leadership of the community is sometimes entrusted to a woman. For example, Orthodox convents are always under the guidance of an abbess who directs not only the nuns but also the priests who serve the convent. In the convents of the Byzantine era there were female elders who had the right to hear the nuns' confessions.
http://www.sourozh.org/web/The_Orthodox_Faith#35

How much misinformation there is around (and I think at times there has been a deliberate effort to keep misinformation in order to bolster a radical counter-position!)

Richard

RichardWorthington

13-11-2008, 04:16 PM

RichardWorthington

13-11-2008, 04:20 PM

Would not the above have included all those who were present at the meal, both men and women?

We are not told that any women were present, but this doesn't make sense if Jesus was following the Jewish tradition.

Who was or was not present fundamentally does not matter. The Last Supper is also a reference to the (hidden) temple traditions - the (male) Word and (female) Wisdom were seeen as two aspects of the same Lord, but with differing practicalities for men and women.

Richard

Fr Raphael Vereshack

13-11-2008, 04:20 PM

Michael Stickles wrote:

Scripture tells us that marriage is a type of Christ and the Church. One parallel is that the union of a man and a woman in marriage (potentially) brings forth new life - a child - in the woman's womb, while the union of Christ and His Church brings forth new life - His life - within the Church. Could not the celebration of the Eucharist be another marriage-like parallel?

The priest enters the sanctuary, which could be seen to represent the "womb" of Christ's virgin bride, the Church. And there he presides over the consecration of the Eucharist, representing Christ who overshadows the offered gifts just as the power of God overshadowed the Theotokos when the Holy Spirit came upon her - then to bring about the conception of Christ in His humanity; now to bring about the life-giving presence of Christ in the Mysteries.

...in the context of the liturgy and in particular the celebration of the Eucharist, it seems to me that the priest - as individual - represents Christ the Bridegroom, with the parish - collectively - representing the whole of the Church, His bride.

I haven't time to get to my books right now. But if I recall correctly such images of Christ as Bridegroom and the Church as Bride are used very commonly throughout Patristic literaure (eg St Gregory of Nyssa'a Commentary on Song of Songs?; and of course the hymnography of Holy Week).

I cannot remember in this literature if this is specifically carried over to the human priesthood. But since it obviously pertains as you say to Christ's pre-eternal and incarnate Priesthood then it would provide a true image for the human priesthood also.

In a nice way though which I hadn't quite thought about in exactly these terms we can see an equality of all- men & women- by the fact that all according to these images are as the Bride. In other words the humans who are priests are simultaneously an image of the Bridegroom Christ in His priesthood & also symbolic brides as members of the Church. A point from St Maximus however is that unity between God & man and between man & woman is only found within the new unity of the Church. Otherwise all fall into disunity & conflict.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

M.C. Steenberg

13-11-2008, 04:26 PM

Dear friends,

Let us try to keep this topic to its focus as much as are able - which is the question of the maleness of priests in relation to the priest being icon of Christ.

If other dimensions to the maleness of the priesthood are of interest for discussion, perhaps these could be in a different thread, so as to keep things somewhat focused.

Many thanks, INXC, Dcn Matthew

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 06:18 PM

Presbytera is the title of a priest's wife! Some in the West forgot this practice until recently and so I guess misinterpretted the references.

Richard

Richard, that is how this word is used today. It is really the feminine form of the word "presbyteros" which means priest or "he who is the oldest", or "elder" perhaps or "he who came before me".

The word "presbyteros" is also used as a term of honour.

There is sometimes more than one meaning for a particular word and this perhaps confuses us even more.

We don't call priests here presbyteros but iereus (holy). This change occurred in the 6th century A.D. When addressing priests we say pater, or papas, so his wife is addressed as Papadia (the feminine form).

Effie

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 06:33 PM

Now, Scripture tells us that marriage is a type of Christ and the Church. One parallel is that the union of a man and a woman in marriage (potentially) brings forth new life - a child - in the woman's womb, while the union of Christ and His Church brings forth new life - His life - within the Church. Could not the celebration of the Eucharist be another marriage-like parallel?

In Christ,
Michael

Michael, as you referred to pregnancy resulting from the union of the Soul and God, you might be interested in the following which is from the book I mentioned above :

"Living in this atmosphere of beauty and keeping the commandments in the warmth of divine tenderness, you are filled with gratitude and ask nothing more.

But He comes and mysteriously bestows on you something that goes far beyond your petitions and your expectations, and floods your being: and it is the Lord Himself.

"The Word of God, who once for all was born in the flesh, always in His compassion desires to be born in spirit in those who desire Him. He becomes an infant and moulds himself in them through the virtues." St. Maximus, Philokali II

There is conceived within you the personified light which illumines our thoughts. There enters into you a little leaven which leavens the whole lump. By grace you carry Christ as a babe in the womb.

"Blessed is he who has seen the light of the world take form within himself; for he has Christ within him like a babe in the womb, and is reckoned as a mother of Christ" St. Symeon

You do not speak, or move, or act without reference to this "pregnancy". You do not make sudden movements. You do not quarrel. You forgive everyone. You judge no one - you have no time or inclination or mission to do anything of that sort, so as not to miscarry the baby you have conceived. This is the grace given......

"From this, joy begins to well up within you. And then you find afflictions sweeter than honey." Abba Isaac

Herman Blaydoe

13-11-2008, 06:37 PM

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 07:10 PM

Icons of Christ

It is the High Priest, Jesus Christ, who actually performs the sacraments through His Holy Spirit, whilst the priests are His visible servants on earth for the performance of these sacraments.

We do not worship icons but what they represent. So priests are considered to be "icons of Christ".

As to whether they should be female or male, I leave that to more learned people.

We are all created equal in the eyes of God, despite what Tertullian claims, and this is what is important. Our Church is a part of society and we are all aware that there were very few periods of time in man's history when society was not male dominated.

St. Paul said :

"You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise. (NIV, Galatians 3:26-29)".

Personally, whether a priest is a male or a female doesn't seem that important to me (please forgive me if I am totally outside the Orthodox teaching here). I don't go to church for the priest. I respect him as a representative of Christ when he officiates in church. My relationship with my God is what is important to me. In church and outside of church.

Effie

Effie Ganatsios

13-11-2008, 07:39 PM

Dear Effie,

This is addressed and debunked rather thoroughly in the article Women Priests: History and Theology (http://novaemilitiae.squarespace.com/periodic-musings-blog/2007/1/18/women-priests-history-and-theology.html), posted previously.

Herman

Thank you Herman. The author of the above article translates the word presbytera as simply the wife of a priest. He might be right or wrong. That is how it is translated today of course.

The author is also right that there is no feminine form for the word iereus (priest) as far as I am aware, but he also mentions the 6th century as the time when this word replaced the word presbytoras.

The author included this sentence in his argument : "That notion cannot be dated prior to some two decades ago, I think, when feminism began its intense feeding frenzy. "

Intense feeding frenzy? Are women sharks?

Herman, I don't know if what I posted added anything positive to this discussion, (I hope it did or at the very least raised some points to think about). I will stop now and just read the interesting and informative posts from other members who know much more about this subject.

Effie

Andreas Moran

13-11-2008, 09:49 PM

At the time of writing this post, the Google ads. at the foot of the page are entitled, 'Sexy Polish Girls' and 'Early Fathers CD'. Quite a contrast!

Ah! 'Sexy Polish Girls' has been replaced by 'Cost Effective Divorce': is the second consequent upon the first?

Now, it's 'Meet Orthodox Singles'. Interesting logical progression.

RichardWorthington

14-11-2008, 12:00 AM

These are the key issues that, from my own perspective, lie at the heart of the matter, apart from the address of which it cannot really be discussed:

1. All human persons are created in the image of God, which the fathers note is the image of the Son. This means male as well as female, and implies an iconic connection to the Son as part of the ontological being of the person (i.e, part of his or her nature, not simply an external symbol or representation).
(the underlining is mine, for emphasis)

Father Deacon Matthew, and others - we have very different views of the creation of humanity! St John of Damascus says:

But they will perhaps ask, what then is the meaning of "male and female," and "Be fruitful and multiply?" In answer we shall say that "Be fruitful and multiply" does not altogether refer to the multiplying by the marriage connection. For God had power to multiply the race also in different ways, if they kept the precept unbroken to the end. But God, Who knoweth all things before they have existence, knowing in His foreknowledge that they would fall into transgression in the future and be condemned to death, anticipated this and made "male and female," and bade them "be fruitful and multiply." Let us, then, proceed on our way and see the glories of virginity: and this also includes chastity.

On the Orthodox Faith, Book 4, Chapter XXIV.--Concerning Virginity.
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Nicene_and_Post-Nicene_Fathers:_Series_II/Volume_IX/John_of_Damascus/An_Exact_Exposition_of_the_Orthodox_Faith/Book_IV/Chapter_24

"God had power to multiply the race also in different ways, if they kept the precept unbroken to the end". I gather there are two patristic viewpoints as to how gender is related to our original pristine state: 1) before the Fall our parents were totally genderless with gender being part of the fallen ‘garments of skin’, or 2) they had gender only because of God’s foreknowledge of the Fall.

In other words, gender - being male and female - was not created by God to be a part of unfallen human nature; it exists at most due to God’s foreknowledge of the Fall. Also remember these words, "For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven" (Matt 22:30): would gender be so fundamental to us if it were to cease its function?

Yet I do not say this to despise gender: I am married, and I love my wife as wife. God Himself uses gender in our salvation:

He uses the male gender beard when the priest puts on his Epitrachelion (the long double-dangly thing that hangs round his neck). Look at a priest wearing it: is it not a sacramental extension of the beard? As he says when putting it on, "Blessed be God who pours out upon His priests His grace, like precious ointment upon the head that ran down upon the beard, even upon the beard of Aaron, that ran down to the skirts of his garment." (see http://www.annunciationgoc.com/worship09b3.htm ; thanks Nina for the link!)

He uses the female gender when he became incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary, and suckled on her breasts. Note He did not have to use her gender. He could have taken a piece of her little finger and formed it into a baby. (Teaser: if it could be the hand and voice of a woman, then why not the hand and voice of a man? - to parody the reasoning behind women priests!)
So all this then leads to an interesting question: Since Christ received human nature "in its undeceived and pure state", which as quoted above implies genderless neither male nor female, then what is His relationship to the two genders?

I think that Adam and Eve had an absolutely identical nature before the Fall. They were not divided at all, but distinguished by their mode of origin, as in the Trinity. When they fell, then it was like they were totally bandaged from head to foot. Gender then became part of the bandaging, with beards and breasts (etc!) drawn upon the bandaging accordingly.

Christ then became incarnate as a human being. He united with Himself our unfallen human nature "in its undeceived and pure state", which is neither male nor female. I have been told that what He did not create He did not assume. So by nature He united Himself to our unfallen genderless human nature "without separation, without confusion". Yet He is the Good Physician of our souls and bodies. So it is by will that He united Himself with our fallen gender-bearing nature.

So to speak, He became an unfallen, deathless, ‘suffering-less’ human, and then wrapped Himself in the soiled bandages of our current fallen, death-bearing, suffering human nature. As a baby He was wrapped in swaddling bands by someone else, enslaved to and unable to be free from them, but as the Incarnate God He Himself wrapped Himself in our fallen humanity. This means that He can take it off again if He so chooses (which He never will want to do out of His love for us in our lowly state), or more particularly can mend and heal it from within because He is not enslaved to it.

Therefore the Master of all willingly became enslaved to human nature, but not enslaved to the effects of the Fall. He became hungry and so on because He had willed the bandages to have the upper part in everyday life, showing that He despises neither us nor our lowly state, for He is the Healer of Mankind. Yet what about the Transfiguration - when the Divine Light shone and in so doing caused the unfallen human nature to have the upper part over the bandages! He is not enslaved to the bandages and so can do this easily. That is why for His life-giving death and death-destroying Resurrection He says, "No one has power to take My life from Me", for His unfallen human nature itself could protect the fallen part by His divine will ("from the Father"), and so, "I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again" (John 10:18).

And it is this same Transfiguration - deification - that He gives to us, with His own glorious divine light shining from within us, bringing out again our beautiful unfallen nature on top of our fallen part, which in itself has been cleansed but kept as a wonderful trophy for the victory over the devil. What then, is becoming like the angels, neither marrying nor given in marriage, a throwing aside of gender? Should we fear something will be lost to us if gender becomes in effect nothing to us? No! Our current gender is like a plastic ring with a plastic jewel on it. Young girls wear such things. Yet what if the girl grows up into a woman still wearing this plastic ring because she knows no better? Trying to take it off will seem like an insult. Yet Christ the Bridegroom removes the plastic covering to show a pure golden band with all manner of precious stones on it. Nothing is lost - save the cheap plastic covering - but all is gain, both for men and women equally.

But Christ had to have bandages with a male gender on them (He was born as a male boy) - what then about the female gender? Eve came from Adam’s side, and the Fathers state that when Christ’s side was pierced the Church came out. So to speak, I think the blood from His side is like the impure menstrual flow which He purifies: He draws on His own bandages the female gender alongside the male gender He had from birth. From one point of view the Incarnate God is seen as male, called Jesus Christ, yet from another point of view the Incarnate God is seen as female, called the Church, the Body of Christ. For me, Christ is simultaneously and identically both the Second Adam and the Second Eve.

Finally - sorry to labour the point - humanity is made in the image of the Holy Trinity:

Without trying to make gender claims for God I think we can see in Adam and the first family a trinitarian icon. Adam was first, from Adam Eve proceeded so to speak, but Cain (or later Seth) like the Word was begotton after the image and likeness of the Father

{St John of Damascus writes something similar in Book 1, Chapter VIII.--Concerning the Holy Trinity, of his "On the Orthodox Faith".}

Also Philo, writing in the 1st century AD, has a similar view of gender and origin:

When he wrote of the ‘daughter’ of God, he explained that the feminine gender only indicated her second place in the divine order, in contrast with the Maker who is masculine (Flight 50-51).

Quoted from "The Revelation of Jesus Christ", Dr Margaret Barker, page 207, writing on the "woman clothed with the sun" (Rev 12:1)

So we should not be trying to read gender (male or female roles or relations) into God, but looking for the different modes of origin (unbegotten, begotten, proceeding) in humanity. All (male) men are from the dust of the earth (unbegotten), all women are from Adam’s side (proceeding), yet we all - both men and women - are born (begotten) and so are like the Son of God.

So as before, I would suggest that the priesthood is linked to origin and not to gender (those from the dust of the earth offering the world to God). After all, how can something as fundamental as offering the creation to God and of channelling the Creator down - applying to men and women respectively - be linked to gender when St John of Damascus indicates that gender is at most an afterthought of a forethought? So the maleness of the priests is not fundamentally a part of the iconography of the priesthood. It is their origin "from the dust of the earth" which is related to the priestly iconography, but for practical purposes is merely hidden under the terminology of maleness. This could explain why we were getting nowhere talking about iconography and symbolism, having differing understandings of the place of gender in humanity!

Can anyone tell me what the basis for only men becoming priests is? This is something that I do not know.

I do not here refer to ‘headship’, male imagery or iconography, or certain ‘provocative’ verses of scripture. Effie, I know what I have written may well sound exceedingly strange, but think about it from the viewpoint of our inheritance with "the saints in the light" (Col 1:12), i.e. deification. Remember that in Christ all is gain, nothing is lost. If something appears lost then it is because we do not have the full picture of deification! All the benefits of Christ’s ‘Adam-ly’ Priesthood are equally and identically found in all the baptised regardless of gender, as are all the benefits of the Church’s ‘Eve-ly’ giving birth to Christ (Rev 12:1-2). (Eve is from the side of Adam, and so she is closer, in this metaphor, to God because Adam is from the lowly dust; hence the union between God and humanity occurs via a woman, Mary, and all women are included in her veneration.) Yet there is no confusion of the origins in the baptised, some being from dust, others from Adam’s side.

Well, that’s my opinion anyway!

Richard

Herman Blaydoe

14-11-2008, 02:22 AM

RichardWorthington

14-11-2008, 07:50 AM

I think that Adam and Eve had an absolutely identical nature before the Fall. They were not divided at all, but distinguished by their mode of origin, as in the Trinity. When they fell, then it was like they were totally bandaged from head to foot. Gender then became part of the bandaging, with beards and breasts (etc!) drawn upon the bandaging accordingly.
Interesting conjecture, but that is all it is, conjecture. The Church does not base its theology on conjecture, but on revelation, regardless of what we think.

I gather there are two patristic viewpoints as to how gender is related to our original pristine state: 1) before the Fall our parents were totally genderless with gender being part of the fallen ‘garments of skin’, or 2) they had gender only because of God’s foreknowledge of the Fall.

St Gregory of Nyssa expresses the first opinion ("before the Fall our parents were totally genderless with gender being part of the fallen ‘garments of skin’ ") below:

On the Soul and the Resurrection (St. Gregory of Nyssa)
… we will say that the Resurrection is the reconstitution of our nature in its original form . But in that form of life, of which God Himself was the Creator, it is reasonable to believe that there was neither age nor infancy nor any of the sufferings arising from our present various infirmities, nor any kind of bodily affliction whatever. It is reasonable, I say, to believe that God was the Creator of none of these things, but that man was a thing divine before his humanity got within reach of the assault of evil; that then, however, with the inroad of evil, all these afflictions also broke in upon him.
…
Seeing, then, that all the infusions of the life of the brute into our nature were not in us before our humanity descended through the touch of evil into passions, most certainly, when we abandon those passions, we shall abandon all their visible results. No one, therefore, will be justified in seeking in that other life for the consequences in us of any passion. Just as if a man, who, clad in a ragged tunic, has divested himself of the garb, feels no more its disgrace upon him, so we too, when we have cast off that dead unsightly tunic made from the skins of brutes and put upon us (for I take the coats of skins to mean that conformation belonging to a brute nature with which we were clothed when we became familiar with passionate indulgence), shall, along with the casting off of that tunic, fling from us all the belongings that were round us of that skin of a brute; and such accretions are sexual intercourse, conception, parturition, impurities, suckling, feeding, evacuation, gradual growth to full size, prime of life, old age, disease, and death.
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/2915.htm

Whether we were totally identical before the Fall or not is quite irrelevant; the division into male and female either is not there, or is there only as foreknowledge of the Fall.

I found the following passage in a book of the life of Maria of Olonets:

The separation into male and female was made by God in foreknowledge of the Fall. It is a temporary condition, meant only for this world. In Heaven, we are told, there will be neither male nor female.
"Maria of Olonets", St Herman of Alaska Brotherhood, page 103 (start of chapter 14: Women of God)

Which ever way we look at it, gender cannot be a fundamental feature of Christ’s priesthood – He uses it (as outlined above) as He loves our maleness and femaleness, but seeks to take us to above gender. Therefore the maleness of the priest is not part of the iconography of Christ’s priesthood, although I would add that the origin of the priest (from dust) is part of His Priesthood.

Richard

Olga

14-11-2008, 08:39 AM

RichardWorthington

14-11-2008, 02:23 PM

Richard, I fail to see anything in the quote from St Gregory of Nyssa you provided which suggests a genderless prelapsarian humanity. St Gregory only talks of bodily functions and needs, and of the inevitable physical decline and mortality of human beings, not an absence or acquisition of a gendered nature.

Olga,

Whether I have misunderstood St Gregory of Nyssa or not, it still seems as though the fundamental point of the Fathers is being ignored: gender is not part of God's plan for humanity. I know this may sound harsh, that is why I wrote so long above, showing that God does nevertheless use our gender as He loves us. In Christ all is gain, nothing is lost.

(And please, let us not read any legalistic morality into this; God is beyond such things, and so too should we be. As Christians we should be renouncing not only immorality, but also morality in the same way. If in renouncing morality we slip somewhat into immorality, then so what? God cares about people and how we are, not about law codes. I say this so no one thinks I am at all linked to the ancient Gnostics who forbade sexual intercourse, or even Catholicism, which seems to have struck a bizarre balance of allowing sexual intercourse for procreation, but giving the impression that sexual pleasure is sinful. Life in the Spirit - i.e. deification - transforms us into children of Light.)

If Christ is a priest forever, then priesthood cannot be related to gender! To think that gender is the prime distinction between Adam and Eve is to ignore our creation in the image of God: there is something much deeper, which distinguishes but does not divide.

Trying to be gentle and understanding,

Richard

Herman Blaydoe

14-11-2008, 03:00 PM

Olga,

Whether I have misunderstood St Gregory of Nyssa or not, it still seems as though the fundamental point of the Fathers is being ignored: gender is not part of God's plan for humanity. I know this may sound harsh, that is why I wrote so long above, showing that God does nevertheless use our gender as He loves us. In Christ all is gain, nothing is lost.

Gotta go with Olga here. This is what you are reading into St. Gregory's writing, not what St. Gregory actually wrote.

(And please, let us not read any legalistic morality into this; God is beyond such things, and so too should we be. As Christians we should be renouncing not only immorality, but also morality in the same way. If in renouncing morality we slip somewhat into immorality, then so what? God cares about people and how we are, not about law codes. I say this so no one thinks I am at all linked to the ancient Gnostics who forbade sexual intercourse, or even Catholicism, which seems to have struck a bizarre balance of allowing sexual intercourse for procreation, but giving the impression that sexual pleasure is sinful. Life in the Spirit - i.e. deification - transforms us into children of Light.)

Sorry but that sounds positively Gnostic to this bear of little brain. The were Gnostics who engaged in sex simply to show how "above it all" they were. This reads like something that C. S. Lewis would write, coming from Satan in his book, "That Hideous Strength". Sorry, but that is how it strikes me.

If Christ is a priest forever, then priesthood cannot be related to gender! To think that gender is the prime distinction between Adam and Eve is to ignore our creation in the image of God: there is something much deeper, which distinguishes but does not divide.

There is, I suspect, indeed a valid point in this statement somewhere. There is, as C. S. Lewis has said, a deeper image, but the mistake is to exclude gender as part of that deeper image, that is, that gender itself has a deeper image as well. You are basically saying that gender is evil when all is said and done, that which is "created" is evil and only the "spiritual" is good.

That is Gnosticism, plain and simple. Good luck with that. Hope it works out for you, but many of us will just leave it on the table, thank you very much.

Herman the Pooh

Michael Stickles

14-11-2008, 03:08 PM

Which ever way we look at it, gender cannot be a fundamental feature of Christ’s priesthood – He uses it (as outlined above) as He loves our maleness and femaleness, but seeks to take us to above gender. Therefore the maleness of the priest is not part of the iconography of Christ’s priesthood, although I would add that the origin of the priest (from dust) is part of His Priesthood.

This seems to me to be a non sequitur. The statement "gender cannot be a fundamental feature of Christ’s priesthood" cannot lead to the conclusion "the maleness of the priest is not part of the iconography of Christ’s priesthood" unless you also assume the premise "features of an icon cannot have parabolic meaning instead of direct and literal correspondence".

In other words, for the gender of the priest to be an integral part of the iconography of Christ's priesthood, it is not necessary that gender itself must be a fundamental feature of Christ's priesthood; only that gender provides a proper portrayal of some part of Christ's priesthood. An example of what I'm referring to is seen in icons of the child Christ with the Theotokos which show Him as child-sized but with adult features. This is not because He had adult features as a child, but because this parabolically represents the fact that in His divinity He was still the all-knowing Son of God who had been from the beginning, even while in His humanity He was a child.

This portrayal works not because of what adult features will mean in the resurrection - if "adult features" would even have meaning in describing a glorified body - but because of what they represent to us now, here, on our fallen earth. Likewise, whatever meaning the gender of the priest might have in relation to him being an icon of Christ derives from the meaning and symbolism of gender now, as we experience it, and not in its meaning or non-meaning in prelapsarian or post-resurrectional existence.

In Christ,
Michael

Fr Raphael Vereshack

14-11-2008, 04:00 PM

Richard Worthington quoted St John of Damascus:

But they will perhaps ask, what then is the meaning of "male and female," and "Be fruitful and multiply?" In answer we shall say that "Be fruitful and multiply" does not altogether refer to the multiplying by the marriage connection. For God had power to multiply the race also in different ways, if they kept the precept unbroken to the end. But God, Who knoweth all things before they have existence, knowing in His foreknowledge that they would fall into transgression in the future and be condemned to death, anticipated this and made "male and female," and bade them "be fruitful and multiply." Let us, then, proceed on our way and see the glories of virginity: and this also includes chastity.

This does not at all imply that God created man without gender. That after all is why He created two distinct human creatures- common in nature and distinct not only in name but also in an essential aspect of their being- male & female; so that man should not live in isolation but in a communion as in the image of the Holy Trinity itself. This is how God created: 'and it was good'. Otherwise we have a dualist creation (ie the creation was not created as good).

This then that you have written is certainly not correct:

"God had power to multiply the race also in different ways, if they kept the precept unbroken to the end". I gather there are two patristic viewpoints as to how gender is related to our original pristine state: 1) before the Fall our parents were totally genderless with gender being part of the fallen ‘garments of skin’, or 2) they had gender only because of God’s foreknowledge of the Fall.

What changes at the Fall is that man falls into sensual pleasure so that his original nature becomes distorted. This affects what Adam & Eve are as male & female so that this aspect of what they are is also affected. This indeed is what the 'coats of skin' refers to- as it were a layer of sensuality on top of their true nature & distorting this so that male and female become as it is now known with its sensual manner of procreation and being.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

M.C. Steenberg

14-11-2008, 04:09 PM

Dear friends,

I feel I should begin by saying that introduction of yet another issue into the general fray - one which is valid and interesting - strikes me, frustratingly, as a continuing side-stepping of some of the other fundamental matters identified above.

That said, there are a number of problems in some of what has been posted more recently. I'm sure reflections on more significant points in further detail will come in due course; but for the moment, I can only articulate a few of the problematic issues:

First, there is a serious misreading of some of the patristic comments on the transition from 'genderless' to 'gendered' in reading the account of creation. This is one of the most nuanced aspects of some (not, by any means all) fathers' reflections on creation, and it is incorrect to paint with with a broad brushstroke of suggesting that gender was not intended by God to be part of 'unfallen nature'. This is a surface level reduction of certain quotations, and a highly problematic one.

Secondly, as to St John's words in particular (which in this passage seem indebted to St Gregory of Nyssa): they do not suggest that, because God has the power to sustain and multiply a race by means other than sexual procreation, so sexual procreation was a mandated, necessary aspect of the race's existance. Do keep in mind this is a chapter of the tract dedicated to the value and virtue of virginal life. St John's point is that sexual relationships are the only 'natural' modes of existence, is not authentic to divine creation. God could multiply the race by other means, if so he wished. That he creates male and female and commands 'go forth and multiply' doesn't, says St John, have to mean that God commands everyone to a married and child-rearing state. God can multiply a race by any means he wishes; the fact that he charges man to marry and multiply cannot be taken as God commanding out of necessity -- nor should people use such a view to impose a married, rather than virginal, state on Christian followers. This is St John's point in that text; it is certainly not a passage arguing that a distinction between male and female is not part of the created order and eternal to God's will for the human race.

Thirdly, St Gregory's words from On the Soul and Resurrection are being similarly misused. The passage quoted makes absolutely no mention of humanity before sin being 'totally genderless, with gender being part of the "garments of skin"'. What it does describe is the state of 'passionate indulgence' that arises from sin; and he ascribes the 'garments of skin' to 'conformation belonging to a brute nature' - i.e., to the habituation of passonate attributes which are taken on as a new 'skin' in that state of passionate indulgence. He views sexual intercourse as a passionate 'accretion' taken on man's existence after the manner of beasts; like St John later, he is of the belief that God could have sustained and multiplied the race without such intercourse. But it is quite noteworthy that St Gregory does not indicate being 'male and female' as something 'cast off'.

Fourthly, the characterisation of Christ 'using' gender in the salvation economy, in the terms described, is quite unfounded. The mention of the epitrachilion as image of beard (as per the psalm verse quoted when it is donned) is quite correct as per that detail, but a deep conflation of imagery when it comes to Christ as gendered. The statement that Christ 'uses' female gender by becoming incarnate of the Theotokos, when he 'could have taken a piece of her little finger and formed it into a baby', is not only false, but specifically refuted by patristic writers as early as the second century as a 'Gnostic' heresy.

Fifthly, characterising Christ's incarnate humanity as 'in its undeceived and pure state' (quoting St Gregory Palamas), but then stating that this 'implies genderless neither male nor female', is an absolute non-sequetor grounded in an errant reading of a few extracts from the fathers. The various points made in development of this (that Adam and Eve 'had an absolutely identical nature before the Fall'; that their only distinction was 'their mode of origin'; that Christ 'united Himself to our unfallen genderless human nature'; that only out of will as economia 'He united Himself with our fallen gender-bearing nature'; that the Son 'became an unfallen, deathless, ‘suffering-less’ human, and then wrapped Himself in the soiled bandages of our current fallen, death-bearing, suffering human nature' -- all these are deeply problematic statements based in that flawed reading; and all have been specifically refuted by various fathers at various points in the Church's history.

Sixthly, description of humanity as created in the image of God as Trinity, as per modes of origin, flies desperately in the face of centuries of patristic exegesis which show that humanity is created in the image of the Son, of Christ, and by being an image of the Son is borne up into the life of the Trinity and show's forth the Trinity in image -- just as it is by looking at Christ that one sees the Father, knows the Spirit. In the patristic texts, discussion of humanity as created 'in the image of the trinity' generically is exceedinly rare; and when it is used, is specifically referred to this Christological basis. The foundational patristic confession is that humanity is created in the image of the Son - which the fathers have stressed since the second century. The idea that the divine image in humanity is a theological principle relating to origins and natures, is a specific 'Gnostic' tenet that receive direct rebuff in the patristic corpus.

Seventhly, the idea that, because creation as male and female is in some patristic writings connected to the fact of God's foreknowledge of sin, it is therefore not part of God's true plan or intention for creation, is a theological non-starter. Everything, every aspect of creation, is fashioned in the context of God's eternal knowledge, which includes his 'foreknowledge' of sin. This does not make it a second-thought, or a lesser state.

Eighthly, the idea that Christ 'seeks to take us to above gender' is both unbiblical and un-patristic. St Paul confesses that male and female do not divide worth, value or potential; father after father notes that the transcendence of the passions bound up in gender and intercourse are critical to spiritual growth -- but nowhere do we see Christ 'taking humanity above gender'. If anything, he affirms it radically.

Ninthly, the boiling of all this down to a statement that 'gender is not part of God's plan for humanity' is simply unsupportable from a patristic or broader Orthodox position; and the complete lack of justification for such a statement is not mediated by claims that 'God does nevertheless use our gender as He loves us' (which is false, and fundamentally Gnostic).

Tenthly, to state that 'If Christ is a priest forever, then priesthood cannot be related to gender!' is fundamentally to misunderstand gender, and the incarnation.

I'm sorry if I've been rather direct in the above; but we're now stepping into territory that is simply wrong, and has been proclaimed as wrong by fathers of the Church for nearly two millennia. I find it immensely frustrating to hear these ancient arguments re-hashed, as if the very things the fathers expended so much energy articulating as incorrect, can now be claimed - and what's more, as if they are authentic to the fathers themselves.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Owen Jones

14-11-2008, 04:11 PM

One complaint I have is the use of the term "gender." This is a grammatical term. I do not have a gender. I have a sex. A particular sex. I am a member of the male sex. It may seem like a small item but when we cannot even handle the language then there is a much larger problem.

Regarding iconography, that is not a good starting place. You can't start with iconography to explain anything. Because iconography presumes all kinds of other things to begin with. And that problem is reflected in the arguments we are seeing here over iconographic meaning.

So where do you start? The New Testament utilizes typological understanding to convey meaning. Christ speaks in figures and types. In the Book of Acts, Stephen and others continue in this vein, making the case to their Jewish interlocutors that Christ is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets, and because the religious leaders cannot see this, because their spiritual eyes are blinded, they persecuted Christ, just as they persecuted the prophets.

The typological case is carried over into the Fathers and it is the core of our hymnography and iconography to this day. But there are problems today in relying only on typology as the means by which we understand the significance of Christ and how we incorporate that understanding into our lives. Because we did not start out as Jews.

I would encourage everyone to read Plato's Symposium, because it represents a philosophical anthropology that is the basis of everything else. Without a philosophical anthropology, we have no rational starting point to talk about anything else, and Plato does it with humor and style. I am not counseling that we jettison our tradition. Only that we appreciate the fact that without an understanding of what man is, we are nowhere. And there are certain limitations in relying solely on Old Testament figures and types for what we need to know today about what it means to be a person. That is because there are all kinds of challenges to the question that the Fathers never could have anticipated, that form a constant background today culturally, to everything that is relevant to the question of what it means to be a human being. As Christians we are not immune to the cultural/historical/intellectual confusion that is all pervasive. This underlying confusion about what it means to be a human being is at the root of all other intellectual/theological and moral problems.

M.C. Steenberg

14-11-2008, 04:13 PM

Dear Owen, in broad strokes I agree with you. The priest as icon of Christ has never been the first port of call in articulating who and what the priest is. But there is a serious problem when this fact is used to deny that such a proclamation is necessary when the priesthood is considered in its various dimensions - which I think is consonant with what you are saying.

Owen Jones

14-11-2008, 04:36 PM

Of course. Just because A is true, does not mean that B is not true. Surely priesthood is a derivative idea. That it is derivative of something else does not in any way undermine its significance for what it is. But it is not something in and of itself. And of course this is the key to understanding Orthodoxy and the symbolic nature of Orthodox theology. Man is not some thing. Man is a symbol that incorporates thingness as just one of its essential components.

Because "things" like priesthood have been around so long, we make certain assumptions about it that are not sound. The alternative -- to question the foundation of everything -- is equally unsound.

This, I fear, is the fundamental flaw in the minds of people who say that, because the traditional arguments for a male priesthood are somehow incomplete, in that they were never really fully developed or something along those lines, that therefore it is an open question. If you want to go that route, then, of course, everything is an open question. Including the people who are questioning the idea of a male priesthood. Perhaps they should first be required to establish that they exist! Perhaps they should prove why I have to accept that? Every argument they give me, I will simply say that their argument is incomplete, inconclusive, not dispositive, and so the fact of their existence to me remains an open question!

Robert Hegwood

14-11-2008, 05:08 PM

A couple of points on the thread so far.

With regard to Fr. Deacon Matthew's excursus as to what is wanting in some of the discussion as it has progressed, especially to the point certain ideas are being rehashed that have been patrisitically refuted long ago...and the frustration that arises from seeing these things debated as if acceptable...let me take a breath...as I am wont to be long winded...and suggest that some of us have no formal or particularly deep patristic education and so by being corrected by those who have we are given opportunity learn of theological pitfalls we had not foreseen...in short we get to benefit from the patristic education of others. For example the thread of discussion concerning the first family of man serving in iconic ways for the relationships in the Holy Trinity vs all humanity in the image of the Son. Personally I would like to learn more what the Fathers have said on this point and how much these two poles of thought are actually opposed...can they be simultaniously true, or must one trump the other in order to preserve a correct anthropology?

I am greatful to have pointed out the slipperly gnostic slope that reasons too much towards gender/sex being a superfluous or stop gap measure for humanity in light (or in shadow) of the fall.

So Fr. Deacon please do not get frustrated...for my part I'm learning things about the fathers I did not know...so please guide and correct on.

Secondly Fr. Deacon Matthew is quoted as saying:
as if the Church as bride were a 'thing' or a 'who' in the same way Christ the person is a distinct 'who'."

I must admit to not being fully convinced of this point...or rather to say I am more open to the possibliltiy of the Church being a who than not...though in ways I don't quite understand. This is for three reasons. First St. Paul goes to some lengths to teach that Christ is the head of the Body and that members of the Body are all members of each other...that is to say in some sense by the Spirit we constitute an organism. Secondly, at the end of the Apocolypse we see and hear the Bride speak as a distinct person "The Spirit and Bride say, 'Come'". Thirdly, in the visions of St. Hermas he saw the Church three times as a person...a woman who identified herself as the Church. Granted visions can have a good bit of important but not necessarily literal imagery to get across its message...but then again sometimes it is more literal than we might otherwise expect at first glance...so I am very receptive to the idea that the Chruch as a corporate organism might in some sense be a who. And in my limited understanding so far this whoness is in some sense invested in/iconically expressed by the Theotokos, the unwedded bride...the first member of the Body of Christ (so far as I know) to whom all others have been added.

For all I know I could be swinging at pitches in the dark...but that's why I come here to learn from those better taught in such things than myself.

As for gender, I tend to think human gender has theological meaning and is not just a temporary physiological reproductive necessity for this world. Malenes and femalemess as a relationship express something about God perhaps in a way similar to how divine eros and natural eros are compared.

I also agree with the post which says a big part of answering the question surrounding male priesthood and Christ lies in developing a keener theological insite into what is theologically at stake or what God has invested in the creation and ordering of human gender. We need some deeper more searching work on our anthropology and its meaning.

As a final point I would like to parse St. John Chrysostom whose cut to the chase pragmatism at times might well help resolve the momentarily irresolvable, "Is it the Tradition? Ask no further."

Anthony

14-11-2008, 06:01 PM

Alexander Ignatiev

15-11-2008, 12:03 AM

What about the priesthood of Melchizedek, as described in Hebrews? Surely this is also a reference to maleness in priests?

Melchizedek is the priest of the Most High God who greets Abraham, and to whom Abraham tithes for the glory of God. In Hebrews, the priesthood of Melchizedek is contrasted with the priesthood of Aaron, which is a priesthood of the house of Israel, and thus not eternal; whereas the priesthood of Melchizedek is eternal and universal.

Michael Stickles

16-11-2008, 02:45 AM

I am glad someone has pointed this out - "gender" for me too is primarily a grammatical term (which does not necessary correlate to biological sex at all).

Though with the qualification that in the "social sciences" it has become customary to use "sex" for biologically determined differences and "gender" for culturally conditioned ones. I don't particularly like this, but at least the distinction (when consistently so used) is perhaps doing some useful work in the context of the nature / nurture debate.

But here, at any rate, I would have thought we are talking about sex.

When I was growing up, we used "gender" to refer to male or female in their total aspect - biological and cultural - whereas "sex" normally referred to that aspect of gender specific to the sexual relationship between men and women (not just marital relations, but courtship and etc.). Culturally conditioned differences were referred to as "gender roles". So, my background in the terms would lean towards using "gender" instead of "sex".

Yet another example of the need to define terms adequately so everyone's understanding is on the same page.

In Christ,
Michael

Anthony

16-11-2008, 02:11 PM

Modern usage does indeed seem to be changing (or to have changed) in that direction. And it is not for me to criticize it.

Owen Jones

16-11-2008, 03:01 PM

Modern usage has changed specifically for Orwellian reasons. As a grammatical term, gender can mean masculine, feminine or neuter. Fantastic. Let's replace the term sex with the term gender so we can confuse the issue and cloud the differences between the TWO sexes. How many genders do we now find in the political lexicon? Well, there is male, female and "transgendered!"

It's like so-called "inclusive" language which is the destruction of the language for purposes of ideological manipulation of mass consciousness. If others want to play those games and wish to be oblivious to ideological mind games that are essentially totalitarian in nature, fine, but count me out. When I am chairing a meeting I am the chairman, not the chairperson.

I'm sure this post will get kicked or deleted for being off topic, but language is never off topic. Solzhenitsyn was perhaps the most noted critic of the ideological destruction of language for purposes of political manipulation and we ignore this at our peril. Gee, it's kind of like: the Fathers never really addressed that issue! Therefore it must be an open question!!!

Andreas Moran

16-11-2008, 04:58 PM

I entirely agree with Owen. The robust way he puts his point is entirely justified. Language is a divine gift to man to equip him to praise and worship God and to be in communion with his neighbour. We should, in all circumstances, use the gift of language in the best way we possibly can.

(Which is why I'd like the 'Edit' feature to remain a little longer!)

Anthony

16-11-2008, 05:06 PM

Yes, my objections to the overuse of "gender" are certainly because I associate it with "political correctness". It is either intended as a euphemism, or (very often, I think) reflects the desire of feminists (especially) to emphasize the role of social conditioning at the expense of biological inheritance.

I merely meant that I hadn't intended in my earlier post to criticize other people's use of language in this forum.

(Edit: This post was in reply to Owen's. It seems I wasn't quick enough.)

Owen Jones

16-11-2008, 05:23 PM

It is not just a question of social conditioning or biological inheritance, of course, but what is it that we are created to be? My maleness is somehow iconic. I was created as a male type person for some reason beyond just fulfilling my biological destiny. It is more than just a pragmatic function, just as the priest serves more than just a pragmatic function. This is why, IMHO, marriage is the primordial sacrament, from which everything else is derived. (I wrote a paper on this in seminary, for which my homosexual liturgics prof gave me an A!!!).

Rick H.

16-11-2008, 09:36 PM

. . . what is it that we are created to be?

All conversations such as this, here on monachos, have eventually wound down to this question. In another thread Fr. Raphael masterfully worked his way to this question/statement. But, things seem to just fizzle out once we arrive at this very point. I wonder if any have any further input on this question lest we hold up one paper doll string to represent what it is that men are created to be (maleness), and another string of dolls to represent what it is that women are created to be (femaleness).

195

Owen Jones

16-11-2008, 10:18 PM

Well, perhaps we can say this mystery is no mystery. When you get right down to it, after you have analyzed and picked apart and examined, we don't know what a person is. A person is a mystery. Same with a rose. Isn't it obvious? You can analyze all of its internal component parts, its biochemical processes, etc. But we can't really say what it is. So what do we say? We say that its existence, and its exemplary beauty, glorifies its maker. It exists for the purpose of glorifying its maker. So you say, fine, that's a rose. It's pretty. It smells nice. I use it to adorn my table. To give to my girlfriends. It makes them tingle when I do that. But the world is not so nice or pretty, nor are its people. Most people stink. So how does a stinker glorify its maker? Ah, and that's the rub. Because it points to a very special kind of maker. Who is also a mystery.

Now, define a priest for me and tell me absolutely why it can only be a male, or why it could and should also be female. Give me the exact answer using all the right terms with exactitude, so that I will know without doubt. And while you are at it, tell me what a rose is.

Anna Stickles

16-11-2008, 10:23 PM

I wonder if any have any further input on this question lest we hold up one paper doll string to represent what it is that men are created to be (maleness), and another string of dolls to represent what it is that women are created to be (femaleness).

Rick,

Mike and I were talking about this when he originally looked the word Perichoresis up in response to Mina's question. (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showthread.php?p=70331#post70331)

"dear friends,
what does the term " Perichoresis" imply?"

"Thanks for raising a key theological question, Mina. While others can do better than I, perichoresis refers to the mutual indwelling of each of the "persons" of the Trinity, or mutual glorification (from John's Gospel) without in any way diminishing the distinctiveness of each person. It is, of course, the most sublime of all Christian doctrines, from which everything else flows."

"I believe this comes from the verb "perichoreo", which means "to come round to, come to in succession". It's formed from "peri" meaning "around", and "choreo" which means "to give way to, make room for another". Kind of a neat word picture..."

Maybe marriage is the most sublime sacrament because the marriage relationship is the most perfect picture we can have on this earth of perichoresis. And also, the uniqueness of this type of giving and receiving is wrapped up in the very nature of the biological and psychological differences in the sexes -this is not something that a friendship can be so truly an icon of. -The iconographic nature of marriage could make a thread in and of itself.

Jonathan Michael

17-11-2008, 12:18 PM

PS. - examples of women with strong deep, relationships similar to the men, please? I don't know of any, off the top of my head. I've heard someone mention Naomi and Ruth, but... I'm not so sure about it. Seems all the devotion was lopsided there, coming only from Ruth.

How about the Theotokos and her cousin, St. Elizabeth? I'm thinking particularly of the Icons of the Visitation, like this one:

http://www.godsib.net/images/320_Godsib_Mary-Elizabeth_icon1.jpg

Rick H.

17-11-2008, 03:26 PM

Thanks Anna. You have been making some pretty great contributions here recently for a 'junior poster' :). I appreciate the turn this conversation has taken as you introduce the doctrine of perichoresis as it relates to the above question/statement (viz. what we are created to 'be'). And, as you share the quotes from Mike and Owen I think we move farther along here than in the past especially as we allow room for a distinctiveness in relationship. Aquilla was not Priscilla. I am not my wife, but there is a union and a communion and a true oneness there (for which I am greatly blessed). There is an interdependence present, we have common goals. Possibly this speaks to the topic of this thread as it relates to the Church and Church polity more directly. But, as it relates to the above question/statement and the doctrine of perichoresis, my mind turns once again to the words of the Apostle Paul when he wrote of a mutual apprehension/embrace to the Phillipians: "Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus." And, as we might consider the doctrine of cooperation in this we could really confuse things with great speed, but herein lies an irony of sorts I think because while we are now talking about the Trinity, the Church, and marriage (and sanctification) at the same time which would seem to blow this thread apart (as well as send the above question back into oblivion) . . . these things need to be considered as a whole as well as in distinction. In the end, possibly the words of the Apostle are most appropriate as he wrote of the relationship of Christ and the Church as being a great mystery.

Rick H.

17-11-2008, 03:27 PM

On another note, in another life, when the subject of women as presbyters/priests would come up it was common for some in favor of this to appeal to a trajectory (biblical, historical, cultural, etc.) . . . I really haven't read more than the last few posts in this thread. I am wondering if this has been discussed so far in this thread or if there are any Orthodox schools of thought which embrace these overall trajectories as evidence that women should be priests?

Herman Blaydoe

17-11-2008, 03:44 PM

Rick H.

17-11-2008, 03:56 PM

I don't have time to read this whole article Herman, but after skimming it it seems to be broken down into the countering of two propositions:

1.) An appeal to ancient precedent(s) to justify the ordination of women to the ministry of presbyter

2.) The premise that "there is no intrinsic or theological ground for the exclusion of women."

This really has nothing to do with a conversation about trajectory. Possibly, some others here are familiar with this train of thought and could point to this being found within Orthodoxy or not?

M.C. Steenberg

17-11-2008, 03:59 PM

Dear friends,

Just another reminder that this thread is for discussion of the priest as icon of Christ, in relationship to the priest as male. It is not for general discussion on the question of women and the priesthood.

Thank you to everyone for the assistance in the difficult task of keeping things focussed.

INXC, dcn Matthew

RichardWorthington

18-11-2008, 10:13 AM

http://www.monachos.net/forum/picture.php?albumid=33&pictureid=1137

(The picture will only show if you’re signed in.)

The above is a picture of me at my wedding. It is in the monastery church at Kitaev in Kiev. The relics of Blessed Feofil of the Kiev-Caves Lavra are there. In fact, there are two instances in his life which are very relevant to this part of the thread. There was a monk Nikolai who was healed of ceaseless lustful thoughts by him, but also a postulant Nikifor whom he mystically directed to marriage. (See the attached Feofil text document for more.)

Does this not point to the balance which we have in Holy Orthodoxy? Both marriage and monasticism are blessed. Neither monasticism nor marriage (with the genders involved) are evil; we may not embrace either with perfection, but they are not evil, and God gives His grace.

In my above post (#109) I mentioned that I understood the Fathers to teach either "1) before the Fall our parents were totally genderless with gender being part of the fallen ‘garments of skin’, or 2) they had gender only because of God’s foreknowledge of the Fall". However, I have been reading a book called "Deification in Christ", by Panayiotis Nellas. Here he refers to Saint Methodius of Olympus (died ca. 311) who writes against Origen (and so, I presume, also against those who deny the goodness of our physical bodies). In particular he writes about the ‘garments/coats of skin’:

II. … Before the preparation of these coats of skins, the first man himself acknowledges that he has both bones and flesh; for when he saw the woman brought to him: "This is now," he cried,[5] "bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh." And again: She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of man.[6] For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh." For I cannot endure the trifling of some who shamelessly do violence to Scripture, in order that their opinion, that the resurrection is without flesh, may find support; supposing rational bones and flesh, and in different ways changing it backwards and forwards by allegorizing. And Christ confirms the taking of these things as they are written, when, to the question of the Pharisees about putting away a wife, He answers: "Have ye not read that He which made them at the beginning made them male and female; and said, For this cause shall a man leave his father,"[7] and so on.
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Ante-Nicene_Fathers/Volume_VI/Methodius/From_the_Discourse_on_the_Resurrection/Part_I

So our physical bodies are good and not evil, as is the distinction into man and woman. Again I repeat, "And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?" (Mat 19:4-5, KJV).

And further, gender - having sexual organs and the various differing approaches to life between the sexes - is good no matter how we look at it. For let us assume that gender did not exist before the Fall but was only contained in the garments of skin. Yet the skins used were those of animals, which also were created by God as good. Therefore gender is itself also good, and indeed very good. The fact that certain distortions have appeared in the whole creation - both in humanity and ‘animal-ity’ - due to our sin still does not take away that fact that gender is good, and in no way evil.

However, regarding gender there could be a little hiccup: clearly, the Son of God became incarnate as a male man. So how does this affect the female gender? Is there a possibility of some taking gender distinctions too far to imply a lesser status or even a lesser salvation for the females of our species?

We have been talking a lot about the role of maleness and the priest being an icon of Christ. Indeed, following on from all this living iconography - so to speak - one has raised the following point:

What about the priesthood of Melchizedek, as described in Hebrews? Surely this is also a reference to maleness in priests?

Melchizedek is the priest of the Most High God who greets Abraham, and to whom Abraham tithes for the glory of God. In Hebrews, the priesthood of Melchizedek is contrasted with the priesthood of Aaron, which is a priesthood of the house of Israel, and thus not eternal; whereas the priesthood of Melchizedek is eternal and universal.

Mr Ignatiev - it is my opinion that you, out of all the people here, have asked the best question of all. It has been said that, "In Orthodoxy, not only the answers, but the very questions are different". If all of this iconography of the "maleness of priests as 'icons of Christ'" is taken as stated, then surely it implies that the priesthood of Melchizedek is for men only. And yet what is the priesthood of Melchizedek?

Hbr 6:19-20 This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil, where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become High Priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

Hbr 9:7-8 But into the second part {the Holiest of All} the {Levitical} high priest went alone once a year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people's sins committed in ignorance; the Holy Spirit indicating this, that the way into the Holiest of All was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was still standing.

Hbr 10:19-21 Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God

As only Levitical priests entered the Holiest (Holy of Holies) in the earthly Jerusalem so only priests of the order of Melchizedek can enter the Holiest in the heavenly Jerusalem. All Christians are anointed with holy oil, and we have all heard of the "royal priesthood". However, all ancient Israel were called "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (Exd 19:6), but only a few - and these men only - were allowed to enter the Holy Place.

So therefore if the iconography of the male priesthood is as it appears to me on this thread, then all Christians are priests according to the order of the Melchizedek in Christ (mirroring all of ancient Israel), but only men are the real priests who can enter the Holy Place in the heavens. And yet the words of St Paul about Melchizedek are applied by both St Gregory Palamas and St Maximos the Confessor as proof of deification, of becoming "uncreated by grace", that is becoming without beginning as mentioned in Hebrews 7:3. ("A Study of Gregory Palamas", Fr John Meyendorff, page 178.)

I think we can all agree that men and women are equally and identically saved by Christ. Mr Ignatiev I am in no way accusing you of thinking of against such things, but you have by your question pointed out the fundamental flaws inherent in the iconographic approach to the male priesthood.

Now when I picked up the above-mentioned book "Deification in Christ", I did realise that my terminology could be improved - hence this post. However, I also had my interpretation of St John of Damascus (and also of St Gregory of Nyssa) well confirmed, however I think I will write another post on this. After all, a grasp of humanity’s relation to gender is fundamental when considering the maleness of priests as 'icons of Christ'.

So to sum up - is gender good? "Saint John Damascene and his disciples placed sexual pleasure first among the ends of marriage" - I rest my case. (For reference see the attached text file.)

Seeking to be gentle to all, failing due to my stupidities, forgive me,

Richard

Herman Blaydoe

18-11-2008, 02:20 PM

Richard,

I must say the latest post was very confusing, at least for this bear of little brain. You quote St. Methodios and go on to say:
Again I repeat, "And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?" (Mat 19:4-5, KJV).
But then you go on to say, in seeming direct contradiction:
For let us assume that gender did not exist before the Fall but was only contained in the garments of skin.
I am at a loss to understand why you insist on saying gender did not exist before the Fall in the face of "IN THE BEGINNING...MALE AND FEMALE... When do you think the beginning began? Before or after the Fall? Or am I missing something here? Perhaps I fail to understand how you define "gender"?

And this stuff about Melchizedek. You are aware, of course, that the Levitical priesthood and the royal priesthood of Melchizedek are two different things, right? And that although Melchizedek was a "type" of Christ, he wasn't actually Christ. And I am totally lost here:
As only Levitical priests entered the Holiest (Holy of Holies) in the earthly Jerusalem so only priests of the order of Melchizedek can enter the Holiest in the heavenly Jerusalem.
Where does this come from? It seems a somewhat (to be polite) unjustified conclusion, and I must say I have no idea as to what it means.

And again, this is a real stumper:
So to sum up - is gender good? "Saint John Damascene and his disciples placed sexual pleasure first among the ends of marriage" - I rest my case. (For reference see the attached text file.)
The reference seems somewhat questionable from an Orthodox view, I suspect the translation and would prefer to see some reputable corroborating evidence to back it up before accepting it prima facie. And as to what it has to do with a male priesthood? Sorry, I, for one, am lost in a logical fog here.

In the beginning, He made us male and female, and pronounced it good. No argument. We were male and female before the Fall, yes? And I think the problem of definition of "gender" and "sex" does, in fact, add to rather than lessen the confusion. How can we be male and female before the fall but be "without gender" until after the fall? What does it mean to be male and female and yet be "genderless"? I fear the argument here is becoming nothing more than:

They are the same even though they are different!
No, the are different even though they are the same!

And this in the face of the fact that the Church has not been conflicted for 2000 years. The historical precedent is clear, and the reasons why clearly laid out, except in the minds of those who desire to obfuscate to forward an agenda. Please note that I am not accusing Richard of having an agenda, but I cannot help but fear his reasoning reflects the influence of those who do have that agenda.

Oh bother!

Herman the very confused Pooh

Father David Moser

18-11-2008, 03:56 PM

However, regarding gender there could be a little hiccup: clearly, the Son of God became incarnate as a male man. So how does this affect the female gender? Is there a possibility of some taking gender distinctions too far to imply a lesser status or even a lesser salvation for the females of our species?

An interesting point. Because woman was taken from man, not as a separate creation, but as an "elaboration" on the original, Christ, being male assumes not only all men but all women as well (woman having been given her substance from man). If Christ had been incarnate of a woman (such foolishness, please bear with me as I make my point), this would be much more than a "little hiccup", it would be a major problem for then only a part of man (that which had become woman) would have been redeemed (that which is not assumed is not redeemed) and there would be a need for some separate salvation for men. This does not imply a lesser status for women, but it does preserve the created order. Woman is not lesser than man, but equal and not separate (bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh)

All these metaphysics are giving me a headache (or maybe its the cold that brewing in my sinus - who knows).

Fr David Moser

Fr Raphael Vereshack

18-11-2008, 04:21 PM

Richard Worthington wrote:

If all of this iconography of the "maleness of priests as 'icons of Christ'" is taken as stated, then surely it implies that the priesthood of Melchizedek is for men only. And yet what is the priesthood of Melchizedek?

As only Levitical priests entered the Holiest (Holy of Holies) in the earthly Jerusalem so only priests of the order of Melchizedek can enter the Holiest in the heavenly Jerusalem. All Christians are anointed with holy oil, and we have all heard of the "royal priesthood". However, all ancient Israel were called "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (Exd 19:6), but only a few - and these men only - were allowed to enter the Holy Place.

I don't see how the image of Melchizedek applies to the issue of maleness of priests as icons of Christ.

Melchizedek in Hebrews 5:6 and especially Hebrews 7 is an image of Christ's eternal & divine priesthood in counterpoint to the Levitical priesthood. It speaks of how we should approach Christ because He offered the ultimate sacrifice of Himself once and for all rather than the earthly sacrifices of the Levites.

Now, as Hebrews points out because the Levitical priesthood is earthly, it must offer daily sacrifice since human sin is constant. However as Christ is sinless He offers Himself once and for all.

Again I do not see how this really enters on the subject of the maleness of priests as icons of Christ. If anything the image of Melchizedek which is placed within the largely liturgical context of the book of Hebrews would connect better to how the Eucharist is an eternal offering on the Altar around which the Church gathers.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Herman Blaydoe

18-11-2008, 05:26 PM

Mechelsedek was a priest
Both men and women believers are members of the priesthood represented by Mechelsedek
We refer to our pastors as priests
Therefore women must not be excluded from the priesthood.

Almost sounds logical, doesn't it? Of course you really have to throw out or ignore a lot of stuff to get to this, but hey, as long as you get the answer you want, what's the problem?

We engineers would say some significant variables have been overlooked in this equation.

Herman the non-Euclidian Pooh

M.C. Steenberg

20-11-2008, 12:06 AM

Dear Robert,

I was moved by your post above (#121, back on page 7), which was very much on the mark. You are quite right, that consideration of points that have received condemnation in the Church are worth exploring, lest we go through precisely what I think is happening in some of the thoughts being put forward in this discussion: the repeating of past errors.

So, to expand a bit on the points I raised in the post to which you were referring (my #114 above):

On the first three points, I was addressing what is simply a misreading of the texts of St Gregory and St John. I don’t think there was anything in my remarks on those points that was in reference to a specific heretical concept from the past; rather, a simple matter of misapplication of the words of these fathers. This is true for a number of the other points as well. Speculations on Christ taking on an ‘undeceived and pure state’ which is therefore ‘genderless’, is simply an errant reading of the fathers, as are things like Christ ‘taking us above gender’ and the like.

But as to echoes of specific heresies: I drew a connection between the assertion that Christ ‘uses’ the female gender by becoming incarnate of the Theotokos when he ‘could have taken a piece of her little finger and formed it into a baby’, to the so-called ‘Gnostic’ teachings that have been rampant since the second century and earlier. In particular, this relates to the concept of Christ ‘using’ humanity as a kind of abstract tool—which was a common assertion among many of the groups usually lumped under the ‘Gnostic’ title—where the actual details of human personal reality and authentic nature are abstracted from human existence. This is, foundationally, a denial of genuine incarnation. The specific assertion that Christ could have become incarnate by a manipulation of the nature apart from normal procreation and generation, is refuted explicitly by St Irenaeus in the 170s AD; and by other fathers after.

There are in fact a number of Gnostic tenets in some of what has been put forward in this discussion recently. Abstracting the divine image from the person of the Son to a generational / relational concept, was current as a theory as far back as the Valentinians and Barbeliotes (early second century), who, in various texts that we still possess, speculate on humanity ‘in the image of God’ in precisely these terms—i.e., as indicating the generational relation of the aeons, etc. But the fathers insist time and again that the ‘image of God’ in which man is fashioned is that of the Son. It has trinitarian dimensions, of course, because the Son is Son of the Father, together with the Holy Spirit the divine Trinity. To argue that man being ‘in the image’ is to speak in term of generational origins and relations, is to echo views that the fathers specifically refuted.

There is more on these concepts that might be fruitfully discussed in a thread on Gnostic and demiurgical conceptions of creation; but in the context of this thread, I think they are largely tangents that divert focus from the real issue.

Thank you, though, for the useful reminder!

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Andreas Moran

20-11-2008, 09:31 AM

Originally Posted by RichardWorthington

However, regarding gender there could be a little hiccup: clearly, the Son of God became incarnate as a male man. So how does this affect the female gender? Is there a possibility of some taking gender distinctions too far to imply a lesser status or even a lesser salvation for the females of our species?

An interesting point. Because woman was taken from man, not as a separate creation, but as an "elaboration" on the original, Christ, being male assumes not only all men but all women as well (woman having been given her substance from man). If Christ had been incarnate of a woman (such foolishness, please bear with me as I make my point), this would be much more than a "little hiccup", it would be a major problem for then only a part of man (that which had become woman) would have been redeemed (that which is not assumed is not redeemed) and there would be a need for some separate salvation for men. This does not imply a lesser status for women, but it does preserve the created order. Woman is not lesser than man, but equal and not separate (bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh) Fr David.

The point raised here made me think of the teaching of Fr Sophrony, especially as explained by Fr Zacharias and Metropolitan Hierotheos. We can think of 'man', or 'mankind' as corresponding to the Greek word 'anthropos'. Mankind was made male and female but men and women are, as it were, consubstantial in having a common essence or nature just as the Holy Trinity has a common essence. Christ was incarnate to save mankind. So, the particularity of sex does not affect the salvation of any part of mankind. Then, as the Holy Trinity is of one essence but three hypostases, so mankind consists of persons or hypostases, both men and women. It is as hypostasis that each person is in the image of God. The shared essence of mankind cannot exist without form and so we are individual corporeal persons, though our current corporeality is the result of the Fall. (In the case of the angels, their shared essence does not have corporeal form but each angel is a hypostasis.) Christ, as Logos, assumed that created human nature, the essence of mankind, which is shared by men and women alike, and assumed a created hypostasis as a man with particular characeristics. Christ was in His incarnation, perfect man whereas each member of mankind, whilst having the image of God, must strive by ascetic endeavour to attain to that likeness which Christ possessed as perfect man. If this is right, I see no possibility for salvation being partial as between men and women.

I would add that from Fr Sophrony we learn that because God is revealed to us as hypostatic, we know that we have a relationship and we pray to God as a person. Our ascetic effort, propelled by repentance, is due to our knowing that we have offended against God as a person we love and not against any ethical code.

All this, I think, ties in with what has been suggested in the thread on the perichoreisis of the Holy Trinity and the idea that the Holy Trinity is the beginning and end of everything.

Owen Jones

20-11-2008, 02:53 PM

Sometimes it is helpful to state the obvious, and from the above post we can say that there is no such thing as partial salvation, and I know of nothing in the Christian tradition that says that femaleness is partially human, or that females share in the gift of salvation only partially. Everything must therefore be evaluated in relation to salvation, and what contributes to salvation, both individually and as a whole. When we focus on the particularity of our individual Church experiences, this is something to reflect upon. Perhaps instead of thinking about all the times I have felt "slighted," I should ask, how am I contributing to the salvation of the faithful, and to Creation as a whole?

Andreas Moran

20-11-2008, 06:13 PM

Perhaps instead of thinking about all the times I have felt "slighted," I should ask, how am I contributing to the salvation of the faithful, and to Creation as a whole?

No 'perhaps' about it! Owen's useful point here adds a further dimension to the issue, namely, that when we sin, our sin blights all mankind. It's a bit like smoking; others suffer the effects as with 'passive smoking'. Conversely, all ascetic efforts benefit all mankind and creation.

M.C. Steenberg

20-11-2008, 07:42 PM

Owen has, as is customary, drawn things together well. This goes back to a point discussed earlier in this thread: namely, the way in which the salvation effected in Christ as male, is the salvation of the whole race, precisely because Christ was a true member of that race, which includes his male sex.

Similarly, on our theme of the priest as icon of Christ, this indicates the universality of the priest's representation, precisely in his maleness.

The incarnation allows no less. This returns me, as other thoughts have before, to an observation that I've been given no cause to question by any of what has come in the thread thus far:

Any attempt to explain the iconography of the priest as Eucharistic celebrant, in a way that divorces this from the maleness of Jesus Christ, is fundamentally un- or even anti-incarnational.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Robert Hegwood

20-11-2008, 08:57 PM

There seems to be some point of (dare I say) necessary correspondance between the image and the thing itself whether that correspondance is natural or revealed....I know the above muddles what I'm try to get at...

Consider the Eucharist. Wherever the Orthodox faith has gone the Eucharist always involves the gifts of bread and wine made from wheat and grapes. If you go to Japan you don't consecrate rice cakes as the Lamb or sake as the Blood. Nor if in some tropical clime would we substitute sweet potatoes and tuba (coconut wine) or Mango schnapps. We don't even use close substitutes like barley flour or rye flour for wheat flour. The gifts always have to be made from wheat flour and fermented grape juice...no exceptions that I know of. That specificity with regard to the Holy Gifts is important...though admittedly I don't entirely understand why except...this is what Christ used, so this is what we use. But that is sufficient.

So it seems to me even if we can't quite find the precise anthropological nail to hang a reason for Christ's maleness having importance with regard to priesthood, the fact remains of Christ's personal maleness as well as the personal maleness of those appointed to guide the Church (the Apostles). Since Christ had no trouble bucking a tradition He considered ill founded He would equally have had no trouble naming female apostles among the 12 if the only bar was essentially cultural. So His choice of leadership in conjunction with His own Person, His own specific humanity indicates even if it does not explain that there is some critical relationship between His maleness and the grace of priesthood.

Mary

21-11-2008, 03:47 AM

So it seems to me even if we can't quite find the precise anthropological nail to hang a reason for Christ's maleness having importance with regard to priesthood, the fact remains of Christ's personal maleness as well as the personal maleness of those appointed to guide the Church (the Apostles). Since Christ had no trouble bucking a tradition He considered ill founded He would equally have had no trouble naming female apostles among the 12 if the only bar was essentially cultural. So His choice of leadership in conjunction with His own Person, His own specific humanity indicates even if it does not explain that there is some critical relationship between His maleness and the grace of priesthood.

I think, there are some qualities of maleness, that are unique and beautiful, and that no female can replicate. And when I see women wanting what has been set aside for men, it strikes me as being sort of extremely self centered and mean, a sort of disregard for what God has created and set apart. There are some things, that only men can give, a kind of strength, a kind of solidness. And I don't mean anything physical, because there are some women who are physically stronger than men... it's something else, much deeper.

And on the level of personal preferences and opinions, although not connected to priesthood... I find it much more agreeable to my ears to hear men chanting and reading. Even if a woman has a deep voice, it's still not a male voice.

And... it's not just me, maybe I'll take a survey sometime but i've met others of the same opinion... =)

In Christ,
Mary.

Anna Stickles

21-11-2008, 04:55 AM

Olga

21-11-2008, 04:56 AM

I find it much more agreeable to my ears to hear men chanting and reading. Even if a woman has a deep voice, it's still not a male voice.

My dear Mary, the "agreeability" of a voice to one's ears has more to do with the "colour" and clarity of the reader's or singer's voice, rather than the depth of pitch of the voice.

I might have to send you some recordings I have of Orthodox female choirs (monastic and layman) singing in Byzantine style. Superb.

Andreas Moran

21-11-2008, 12:07 PM

It's two years since we went to the early-morning liturgy at Aghiou Stephanou women's monastery at Meteora, but we still can't forget the chanting there by the sisters. 'We knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth.'

Mary

21-11-2008, 02:27 PM

I would heartily agree with you Mary. Each has their own unique type of strength that they bring to the relationship that complements the weaknesses in the other. Men are more centered in themselves, and women more centered in others. Women tend to be receivers, men initiators.

I haven't read this whole thread so maybe it was mentioned before, but it seems to me that in some ways humanity, both men and women, is always 'female' in relation to God and this is why Christ is male and priests as an icon of Christ must be male. There is a trend in our society to deny the differences between the sexes, and maybe this is the main problem in this issue. Both men and women in our culture are often in the middle of an identity crisis. Being out of touch with their own nature they try to define for themselves what their gender means.

Anna, while I do agree with some of what you say, I'm afraid there's something else, there's something more - that defines maleness and femaleness. And it has nothing to do with the strengths and weaknesses of one or the centered-ness or the receiver/initiator aspects. I think those apply to both, and depend more on personality than on being male or female.

I mean, you can't say that being weak and on the receiving end is a feminine trait, and therefore in some ways, all humanity relates to God, in a female way.

The way men relate is male and the way women relate is female, regardless of who is on the giving/receiving end. I've only experienced this with my kids... both are on the receiving end right now, because they're still little. Both their needs are also the same, they need to know they're loved, they need to know they are safe. And yet, the way they receive from us, is different... my son is male and my daughter is female. They both give... the way they show their love, is different.

I think, the way men relate to God is not feminine. It is masculine. Just like when two men are very close friends... like David and Jonathan in the Bible, neither one was feminine, they were both incredible warriors. I think, that's the kind of relationship that men might have with God - Christ tells his disciples that they are his friends, not his servants...

But, I"m just speculating, since I've never been a man, so please feel free to educate me. =)

I do fully agree with you that most of our problems are rooted in the way society has been trying to obliterate the differences between men and women, and that we're all losing our identities. That's another reason, I think men do not relate to God in a female way.

mary

Mary

21-11-2008, 02:37 PM

My dear Mary, the "agreeability" of a voice to one's ears has more to do with the "colour" and clarity of the reader's or singer's voice, rather than the depth of pitch of the voice.

I might have to send you some recordings I have of Orthodox female choirs (monastic and layman) singing in Byzantine style. Superb.

Oh, I dunno, I've heard women's voices that are clear as a bell and a pleasure to listen to, but I can't listen to them all day, like I could listen to men's. But I haven't heard any Byzantine chanting by women, so, I'll take you up your on that offer. =)

It's two years since we went to the early-morning liturgy at Aghiou Stephanou women's monastery at Meteora, but we still can't forget the chanting there by the sisters. 'We knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth.'

Could be because my mom overdid the use of her voice, while my dad was mostly quiet... I just can't imagine heaven, with the constant sound of a female voice, in fact, it has already put a damper on my expectations of what heaven is like..... Can't you just see me, plugging my ears and screaming and running away as fast as I can? =)

mary

Owen Jones

21-11-2008, 02:58 PM

Consider the Eucharist. Wherever the Orthodox faith has gone the Eucharist always involves the gifts of bread and wine made from wheat and grapes.

But this is precisely what many "liberal" Christians argue with, particularly Episcopalians, who say that there should be an American eucharist -- Coca cola and moon pies, maybe?

Rick H.

21-11-2008, 03:34 PM

Actually Owen I think that the American version would be an RC and a Moon Pie! :)

Anna Stickles

21-11-2008, 09:33 PM

Mary,

I don't think you are quite understanding what I am saying. The way men relate with each other is not the same way a man relates to a woman. I do not relate to other women the way I relate to my husband or oldest son. I specifically include my oldest son because he is 17 now and a man, not a child anymore. The relationship has had to change drastically (or is in the process of changing - I am slow and stubborn about change and this has resulted in a lot of turbulence), in a way my relationship with my teenage daughters has not had to change. Nor has my son's relationship with his father had to change like this. Wait till your son turns 12-13. Then you will see. :)

Christopher Dombrowski

21-11-2008, 11:00 PM

Father David brought up a key point that I hope isn't overlooked. Priests are icons of Christ, spiritually and physically. Doesn't this help affirm that they should be men?

We all know that men and women are different and there are some things that are separated by gender. In this thread the focus is the priesthood and child bearing. Does the fact that the priesthood is for men only seem like such an inequality because it is in The church?

Do those that see this as such a stumbling block to Orthodoxy also feel the same way about anything else that separates men and women? Please don't take offense to this, but what about things like clubs or attire? Should men not be able to wear a dress and heels if he wants? Should we make all social or civic clubs allow both men and women to join?

What are the other inequalities that exist that are objectionable? Is it just the fact that women aren't allowed to be priests?

I can say that I've known men who want to know what it is like to carry and bear a child and feel very cheated to not be able to. I have yet to meet a woman who wants to be a priest. Before I was Orthodox, I did know some that wanted to be the head pastor of their church or thought that they should be able to be a priest, but they also didn't believe that priests are necessary or have any idea of what they do in The Orthodox church. I'm sure they're out there, but I have yet to meet an Orthodox woman who wants to be a priest. I would be curious to hear from her.

As brought up previously, it is very obvious that women have a tremendous and special place in Orthodoxy. They are not devalued or considered lesser participants in The church. There are simply different roles.

Please forgive my rambling and do not take offense to my uneducated views. I speak only from my heart and truly mean no offense.

sophia

So you don't think women can be icons of Christ?

Mary

21-11-2008, 11:27 PM

Mary,

I don't think you are quite understanding what I am saying. The way men relate with each other is not the same way a man relates to a woman.

No... I probably don't understand what you're saying. Kinda ironic, seeing that we're both speaking English, and probably saying the same thing! You say the way men relate to each other is different from how a man relates to a woman. But you also said, "... in some ways, humanity, both men and women, is female in relation to God..."

That's what confuses me. Christ was born as a man. He was a true man, and a real man, so the way he related to his disciples would've been the same as man to man, not man to women... the way the disciples related to him was not feminine... they weren't women. I hope I haven't confused you. I've confused myself.

On another note, (or tone), the results of my unofficial survey are in. Regarding male voices. I didn't like the way our choir director did the trisagion at Divine Liturgy this morning. I asked her if a musically challenged person could comment on music, and she told me to go ahead and I told her I didn't like it. It turned out, of the four melodies that she does, that's her favorite! Talk about getting your foot in your mouth. But she was cool about it, and wanted to figure out why I didn't like it. I didn't like it because it was too light and airy, not enough gravity and solidness to it. I told her I really really really love the Trisagion, because it has the power to draw my scattered mind together and focus it. I sort of rely on it to help me pay attention to the next part of the service. And this melody didn't do the job.

Then she said the most interesting thing, she said... maybe it would work with men's voices instead of women's... that men's voices are just in general, easier to listen to, and that she likes men's choirs better. So the verdict is in, from a Pro, who loves music and sings in several choirs, including a women's choir.... Men sound good.

So, Christ had to be a man, and priests have to be men because, if they're not, they can't have male voices, and no one will listen to them. Taking surveys sure is fun. I should do it more often. =)

in Christ,
mary.

PS - please forgive me, for being so light and airheaded. I had to much wine after communion today, and also, I didn't hear the right Trisagion....

Fr Raphael Vereshack

21-11-2008, 11:48 PM

Mary wrote:

That's what confuses me. Christ was born as a man. He was a true man, and a real man, so the way he related to his disciples would've been the same as man to man, not man to women... the way the disciples related to him was not feminine... they weren't women. I hope I haven't confused you. I've confused myself.

This is exactly the point and probably what would have first been thought of before fairly recent times.

In other words Christ's manner of relating to His disciples and to all others was according to His incarnate reality as a man.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Anna Stickles

22-11-2008, 12:58 AM

This is exactly the point and probably what would have first been thought of before fairly recent times.

In other words Christ's manner of relating to His disciples and to all others was according to His incarnate reality as a man.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

I guess this truth is too simple to stay in our mind in these confusing and muddled times. We make everything too complicated. Thanks for keeping us on track, Father.

Olga

22-11-2008, 08:33 AM

Then she said the most interesting thing, she said... maybe it would work with men's voices instead of women's... that men's voices are just in general, easier to listen to, and that she likes men's choirs better. So the verdict is in, from a Pro, who loves music and sings in several choirs, including a women's choir.... Men sound good.

May I comment on the bolded words, Mary? One of the most important skills of a choirmaster/mistress is to select musical arrangements which are suitable for the number and capabilities of the singers in the choir. The wrong piece in the hands of a choir without the necessary wherewithal can indeed sound dreadful. At times, a choirmaster needs to tweak an existing musical arrangement to allow the choir to do the piece justice. Perhaps this was the problem with the Trisagion you heard - it may well have been originally scored with only male voices in mind, and may not have been successfully reworked for a female or mixed choir.

In my experience, female voices tend to sound shrill and jarring if the piece is pitched too high, and/or if sopranos sing with too much vibrato.

Andreas Moran

22-11-2008, 09:45 PM

A further point occurs to me after re-visiting p. 8 of this thread. Christ took upon Himself our human nature in order to save mankind. He deified this nature by His ascension and sitting at the right hand of the Father. But salvation needs to be made to operate in the world at all times, and this Christ does by His Church through His priests who effect the sacraments of the Church. Christ's incarnation was complete and effective only because he assumed, in addition to our nature, a hypostasis which was male. If Christ's priests are to be His agents of salvation, they must be male or else the assumption of the male hypostasis by Christ is rendered nugatory and the incarnation is incomplete. I have no authority for this point; it just occurred to me.

RichardWorthington

23-11-2008, 01:49 AM

Christ's incarnation was complete and effective only because he assumed, in addition to our nature, a hypostasis which was male.

Dear Andreas,

I also find it difficult to understand all these ancient Greek words we are supposed to understand to grasp the basics of God's love for mankind via the Incarnation.

However, Christ did not assume another hypostasis, whether male, female, or whatever. By hypostasis I generally think of the English word 'who' (and not even 'person' as that word can have different shades of meaning).

So, WHO is the pre-incarnate God? Answer, the Son of God.
WHO was born of Mary? Answer, the Son of God.

If there was another hypostasis for the human nature taken from Mary, then the answer to the second question would be different from the first!!

Don't worry, this is not your fault at all, just that of an ecclesiastical organisation which thinks that ramming ancient Greek words down our throats will help us fall in love with the salvation offered to us in Christ.

It doesn't help. As one young man said when he heard a tape of an Orthodox Big Name Speaker: "Oh - you have to be cleaver to be Orthodox". The love of God manifest in the life of Christ is a pearl of great price, which when we can see it from within ourselves will cause us to sell the sinful passions. Ancient Greek words never did inspire me.

With kindness,

Richard

RichardWorthington

23-11-2008, 01:54 AM

Christ's incarnation was complete and effective only because he assumed, in addition to our nature, a hypostasis which was male.

Oh sorry, I've just remembered to mention this.

He did not assume another 'person'/hypostasis, but He did assume a human personality, which indeed is that of a male human. (Using the common English usage of 'personality'.)

Richard

RichardWorthington

23-11-2008, 02:03 AM

http://www.monachos.net/forum/picture.php?albumid=33&pictureid=1139 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/album.php?albumid=33&pictureid=1139)

If a picture says a thousand words, then what does an icon say?

Here I see a man depicted, a man who came into this world via the womb of a mother. He took flesh and blood from her womb, being joined to it by a placenta. He came forth, and was recognised as a male child.

Yet the icon also identifies Him as The Being, the One Who Is. We are told that He was sinless, so what of the nature of His human body? - Is it real or a phantom? Is it fallen or unfallen? Is it male only, or both male and female, or neither male nor female?

Christ’s body: real or phantom?

Regarding Christ taking on a human body I wrote the following:

He uses the female gender when he became incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary, and suckled on her breasts. Note He did not have to use her gender. He could have taken a piece of her little finger and formed it into a baby. (Teaser: if it could be the hand and voice of a woman, then why not the hand and voice of a man? - to parody the reasoning behind women priests!)

Here I wrote that Christ uses/ utilises/ makes use of the female body of His mother Mary by uniting to it as described above (womb and placenta producing a male Child). Did He have to make use of the female parts of her body? Speaking of Christ becoming incarnate as a male man, Metropolitan Kallistos writes, "We cannot say that it was necessary for God to become incarnate as a male, since human ideas of necessity are not to be imposed on the uncreated Trinity. But, if it was not necessary, such a choice may surely be seen as congruous" (see post #77). So therefore it was not necessary for Christ to use her female parts "since human ideas of necessity are not to be imposed on" God, but He chose to out of love for female humanity. So as a technicality, it could have been a part of her little finger that He used to become incarnate, but it would never have been because He is the Creator of both the creation and its created order. He is not going to overthrow the order He Himself has set in motion. (Indeed, using a similar reasoning does show the shallowness of some of the arguments in favour of women priests.)

Now to me this is fairly self-evident, yet I was rebuked for it:

Fourthly, the characterisation of Christ 'using' gender in the salvation economy, in the terms described {referring to my quotation above}, is quite unfounded. … The statement that Christ 'uses' female gender by becoming incarnate of the Theotokos, when he 'could have taken a piece of her little finger and formed it into a baby', is not only false, but specifically refuted by patristic writers as early as the second century as a 'Gnostic' heresy.

Reading this, I was most confused and confounded. Why would our dear deacon Matthew want to deny the reality of the incarnation? If Christ did not suckle "on her breasts" (part of "the terms described") then to what extent did He become a real human, and not just a phantom? The early Fathers clearly refuted the idea of Him being only a phantom. I was puzzled and perplexed. Then He clarified his position:

But as to echoes of specific heresies: I drew a connection between the assertion that Christ ‘uses’ the female gender by becoming incarnate of the Theotokos when he ‘could have taken a piece of her little finger and formed it into a baby’, to the so-called ‘Gnostic’ teachings that have been rampant since the second century and earlier. In particular, this relates to the concept of Christ ‘using’ humanity as a kind of abstract tool—which was a common assertion among many of the groups usually lumped under the ‘Gnostic’ title—where the actual details of human personal reality and authentic nature are abstracted from human existence. This is, foundationally, a denial of genuine incarnation. The specific assertion that Christ could have become incarnate by a manipulation of the nature apart from normal procreation and generation, is refuted explicitly by St Irenaeus in the 170s AD; and by other fathers after.

So it is just as well that I did not reply with the first thoughts and emotions that entered me. If I had have done then I would be quoting from the same Fathers to which Deacon Matthew refers in order to refute his own seeming position that Christ did not use Mary’s body or suckle on her breasts. (After a few minutes it did twig what Deacon Matthew was referring to, but it is just as well that, if I cannot uproot my passions, I at least try to wait to limit their fiery darts …)

Perhaps it would be interesting to see how the word ‘use’ appears in an English dictionary:

use [v. yooz or, for past tense form of 9, yoost; n. yoos]
–verb (used with object)
1. to employ for some purpose; put into service; make use of: to use a knife.
2. to avail oneself of; apply to one's own purposes: to use the facilities.
3. to expend or consume in use: We have used the money provided.
4. to treat or behave toward: He did not use his employees with much consideration.
5. to take unfair advantage of; exploit: to use people to gain one's own ends.
6. to drink, smoke, or ingest habitually: to use drugs.
7. to habituate or accustom.
8. Archaic. to practice habitually or customarily; make a practice of.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/use

I had in mind number 1 above, soon afterwards relating it to God’s love for humanity ("God does nevertheless use our gender as He loves us", #113); Deacon Matthew, it seems, had read my words with the meaning of number 5; hence the single quotation marks around the word "use" and the accusation that my claim of God lovingly using our gender being "false, and fundamentally Gnostic" (#117)!

Is it any wonder I initially thought he was trying to deny the reality of the incarnation of the God of love? Fortunately, my gut instinct suggested I was misunderstanding him ("Surely he would never deny something as basic as the Nicene creed?!?") … then again, perhaps instead of a similar gut instinct, it is only me that makes everyone else’s stomach turn …

;)

Richard, "The Heretic’s Heretic"
PS. For the next two questions regarding Christ’s body ("Is it fallen or unfallen? Is it male only, or both male and female, or neither male nor female?") I’ll write another post.

Paul Cowan

23-11-2008, 03:00 AM

Round and round and round we go.....

1) Either you guys are talking past each other
2) you are not reading what the other is writing
3) you are reading what the other is writing and disregarding it
4) you are reading what the other is writing and don't care what is being said
5) you are reading what the other is writing and it doesn't make sense to you so you are reinterpreting what you want.
6) perhaps you just like to banter

Ancient Greek versus common modern day English? Come on.

Jesus the Christ was male. He was not female! He did not have both genitalia nor did He have no genitalia.

He gathered to Himself 12 male apostles and 70 male disciples. He was ministered to by these as well as many females.

The maleness of priests as 'icons of Christ'

What does this mean exactly? Has anyone really addressed this in these many pages? Priests are males else they would be called priestesses and an icon is something that represents its original. Since Jesus was a male, it follows that priests will be males also. Perhaps my underdeveloped brain just can't grasp the intricacies you all are presenting, but it seems to me your 21st century logical minds are getting in the way of how simple the answer really is.

What is love? ask a 4 year old (http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/20899.htm)

a four year old child whose next door neighbour was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there. When his Mother asked what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said, "Nothing, I just helped him cry"

simplisticly,
Paul

Matthew Panchisin

23-11-2008, 07:22 AM

Dear Owen,

The great problem with the book by Bishop Kallistos or the stuff he is said to be touting???? is it uses Orthodoxy to open the curtain for the stage of theological soap opera's with many different people. It is an unavoidable fruit from such endeavors. That is a significant problem because theology is not some subject to play around with, poor God, in your remarks, that says something very wonderful.

In Christ,

Matthew Panchisin

Andreas Moran

23-11-2008, 09:20 AM

Dear Richard, Paul and others,

I'm not a theologian and I've not read enough to count even as an amateur! A few years ago, after trying to understand what people at the monastery here were talking about, I gave up. I said, 'if I hear the word "hypostasis" again, I shall scream!' I found myself drifting away from the influence of Fr Sophrony - admiring him from afar, if you will. When I married Lydia, I found that she attributed to Fr Sophrony the sorting out of her deep spiritual crisis and I felt drawn inot his writings again. I found that whilst I could pray simply I couldn't understand simply because none of this stuff is simple if you get into it. You don't have to be clever to be an Orthodox Christian - thank God! But if you want to delve into it all and understand it, the fact is that those who have delved before have formed a terminology which gives us theological thinking tools. You don't have to delve, and you can be saved if you don't. My first wife didn't delve at all but was greatly blessed. But if you choose to delve, then, as I've said, there's a terminology for theology just as there is for law, engineering, medicine, computers and anything else.

As to the word 'hypostasis;, Fr Zacharias says that Fr Sophrony thought this word so useful as a theological tool that he wanted the word to be used in any language so that precision and consistency were maintained. It does mean 'person' but he wanted to create a link between human personhood and the concept of the person as it exists in the Holy Trinity. Instead of having all the different langugaes using their own words for 'person' he thought it would be better always to use the Greek word. Fr Sophrony wanted to understand as far as possible just what it is that God has revealed about Himself to us starting with Moses. What was important to him (Fr Sophrony) was the fact that God revealed Himself to us starting with Moses that He is not some abstract principle.

I think the answer to Paul's point is that we have been trying to explain to ourselves why priests have to be men because of the argument outside the Church that this isn't a necessity and that women can be priests.

Apart from all that, I woke up wondering if Christ's male personhood ('hypostasis') was deified along with His human nature (which men and women share) and if so whether that had any implications for the female of the species.

Owen Jones

23-11-2008, 03:00 PM

Yes, Virginia, theology is not abstract.

My pet peeve with theological language and the way it is bandied about is that it is really not a subject matter. It constitutes a symbolic form of existence. In the early Church, when adult conversions were still the norm, the standard was that theology was not taught until the last step of the process. A person was catechized first, and this catechesis was based on the practice of ascetic disciplines that were designed to first purify the body and the intellect, and then illuminate the mind so that when it came time to expose the newly illumined to theological concepts they would be ready to receive them. The theologian is therefore one who has advanced or progressed so to speak to the degree that a perfected intellect has acquired certain prophetic gifts. These prophetic gifts do not mean, except in some exceptional cases, the power of clairvoyance. It means that the intellect has acquired the capacity to see through the veil of material reality, so to speak, and begin to see things as they really are -- to see God in things (and in the processes underway between things). It also means that the hidden meaning of Scripture is revealed -- the true spiritual intent of Scripture. Which is the whole conflict of the New Testament. Only those with eyes to see and ears to hear could understand Christ's words -- specifically the true meaning of Scripture (being at that time the OT) -- or when Steven lectures the Pharisees on the true meaning of Scripture.

Today, we do things just backwards. When instructed, whether as a convert to Orthodoxy, or as a young adult or adult member of the Church attending some class, or simply while listening to a sermon, the approach is to pass on theological concepts as if they constituted valid historical data. This "information" is then treated as if it were the truth that we are to behold, when in fact we have learned nothing, beheld nothing.

So to say, for example, that we can look at an icon and, given the right information as to what it is intended to convey, we can then have an adequate theological knowledge of the iconography is to me just an absurdity.

This is not to say that we should all shun any and all theological discourse, unless we have lived in a cave for thirty years first. Heaven forbid! But what it does mean is that none of us should be so quick to claim that we know what anything means.

As for the case of Fr. Sophrony, my only concern would be that he has some appreciation for the status of his listeners. It is fine and good to focus on this one issue, but are we capable of even beginning to understand his intentions, when our culture from birth treats all such relationships psychologically, as if psyche were some independently existing thing that exists in relationship to other things, or when our religious culture treats information as self-evident truth, when it isn't. Just an explanation is insufficient.

It strikes me that a one year course in actually working through the Ladder of Divine Ascent -- directed by priests or laymen who have actually done this themselves, and not just "studied" them -- would be a good antidote to this problem of theology being abstract. I'm not saying that, mirible dictu, the result would be that everyone would all of a sudden agree on every theological issue, such as the maleness of the priesthood, but it would be a step in the right direction. St. Thomas used to make the distinction between fides informata and fides formata, an informed faith and a formed faith, and each is less than worthless without the other.

So, I suppose if I had the discipline and real faith and desire to not only understand but to enter into the reality depicted in a certain icon, I would stand before it and venerate it first --- maybe for a year or so -- before seeking any kind of knowledge about it.

RichardWorthington

23-11-2008, 04:50 PM

1) Either you guys are talking past each other
…
Jesus the Christ was male. He was not female! He did not have both genitalia nor did He have no genitalia.

Dear Paul,

Sorry to ‘banter’ on. This thread has been very emotionally difficult for me to engage in: no wonder Carol did not want to! The main misunderstandings, as perceived by me, are as follows (I will be referring back to my original post #109 which has caused so much blossoming and flowering in this thread):

What do we mean by male?

It may seem a fairly simple question, but actually it is not:

An interesting point. Because woman was taken from man, not as a separate creation, but as an "elaboration" on the original, Christ, being male assumes not only all men but all women as well (woman having been given her substance from man). If Christ had been incarnate of {my note, presumably ‘as’ is meant here?} a woman (such foolishness, please bear with me as I make my point), this would be much more than a "little hiccup", it would be a major problem for then only a part of man (that which had become woman) would have been redeemed (that which is not assumed is not redeemed) and there would be a need for some separate salvation for men. This does not imply a lesser status for women, but it does preserve the created order. Woman is not lesser than man, but equal and not separate (bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh)

{emphasis mine}

Here we have the crux of the matter. Compare these phrases:

1) "Christ, being male assumes not only all men but all women as well"
2) "woman having been given her substance from man" … "preserve the created order"

We seem to be using the term ‘male’ for two very different things, but which is natural for us given the usage of language. Are we talking about the sexual organs and attributes which we have in common with the animals, or about Eve being taken from Adam? Being ‘male and female’ and having differing origins are two totally separate concepts. The animals have ‘male and female’, but not the differing origins that we humans have, therefore the concepts are different.

‘Man’ and ‘male human’ are practically synonymous, as are ‘woman’ and ‘female human’, but only because of the Fall! I have consistently been referring to deification: what do you think humanity looks like from the vantage point of the vision of the divine Light, or indeed from the Resurrection of Christ?

Funnily enough, I believe that the Son of God became incarnate as the second Adam. This fundamentally has nothing to do with being male:

10. For as by one man’s disobedience sin entered, and death obtained [a place] through sin; so also by the obedience of one man, righteousness having been introduced, shall cause life to fructify in those persons who in times past were dead.(Rom. v. 19). And as the protoplast himself Adam, had his substance from untilled and as yet virgin soil ("for God had not yet sent rain, and man had not tilled the ground", Gen. ii. 5.), and was formed by the hand of God, that is, by the Word of God, for "all things were made by Him," (John i. 3.) and the Lord took dust from the earth and formed man; so did He who is the Word, recapitulating Adam in Himself, rightly receive a birth, enabling Him to gather up Adam [into Himself], from Mary, who was as yet a virgin. If, then, the first Adam had a man for his father, and was born of human seed, it were reasonable to say that the second Adam was begotten of Joseph. But if the former was taken from the dust, and God was his Maker, it was incumbent that the latter also, making a recapitulation in Himself, should be formed as man by God, to have an analogy with the former as respects His origin. Why, then, did not God again take dust, but wrought so that the formation should be made of Mary? It was that there might not be another formation called into being, nor any other which should [require to] be saved, but that the very same formation should be summed up [in Christ as had existed in Adam], the analogy having been preserved.

St Irenaeus, Against Heresies: Book III, Chapter XXI
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.ix.iv.xxii.html

St Irenaeus in the above links the second Adam Christ with the first Adam. Being male (i.e. having male genitalia) is not mentioned, only an "analogy with the former as respects His origin".

However, not only did the Son of God become incarnate as the second Adam, but also took upon Himself the male gender/sex. Having a specific sex can create a dividing barrier in our minds, but at the crucifixion the Incarnate Son of God also took upon Himself the unique origin of women, "being from Adam". He did this when His side was pierced, blood and water flowing out, yet with no new human person being formed. He is therefore equally and identically the second Adam and the second Eve, with the second Eve part usually being referred to as "the Bride, the Church, the Body of Christ". What am I saying that is so bizarre? (True, to this clear patristic stuff I also added my own interpretation that by having blood and water flow out Christ also inscribed upon Himself a representative of female genitalia, so to speak. Nothing dubious, just making an analogy.)

So Christ walking on earth was male only, which is necessary for Him to have been a proper human being like us. But not wanting any possible distance between men and women He also took upon Himself to become like Eve as well. Whether ‘like Eve’ we refer to origin only ("from the side of Adam") or also add gender/sex I will leave open.

Is being ‘male and female’ fundamental to God’s plan for humanity?

I quoted from St John of Damascus and also St Gregory of Nyssa, although I was then accused of taking things our of context and the like. Knowing the potential difficulties arising, I did forward my original post #109 to my Athonite spiritual father, Archimandrite Maximos Lavriotes. He agreed with me (I have a very good teacher in Christ!). So then I asked him for more references, and he mentioned St Maximos the Confessor, and fortunately I have found them in English:

In effecting this all-embracing union of all things in Himself, He began with our own division: He became perfect man, from us, for us, and in conformity with us, possessing everything that is ours without omitting anything except sin, and in no way needing the addition of anything that is naturally connected with marriage. At the same time and by the same token He revealed, in my opinion, that there also happened to be another method of increasing the human race, a method foreknown to God, which would have prevailed if the first man had kept the commandment and had not descended to the level of the beasts by abusing his own faculties, thus bringing about the distinction between male and female and the division of nature. Man, as I have said, had no need at all of this division in order to come into being, and it is possible for him to be without it in the future, there being no need for these things to endure permanently. For in Christ Jesus, says the divine Apostle, there is "neither male nor female" (Gal 3:28).
…
He first united us to ourselves in His own person through the abolition of the distinction between male and female. He demonstrated that, instead of being men and women, clearly divided by sexual distinctions, we are properly and truly only human beings, called to total transfiguration in accordance with Him, and bearing safe and altogether unimpaired His image, which is in no way affected by any of the marks of corruption.

"Deification in Christ", Panayiotis Nellas, pages 214 and 215, emphasis mine, translation of Ambigua, PG 91, 1304D-1312B.

Here are the exact words of the translation of St Maximos the Confessor. I have not misunderstood the Fathers at all - not due to any greatness on my part, but due to the accuracy of my teacher. I have found Vladimir Lossky saying the same things, but I think I have provided enough quotations. Being male and female are not fundamental to humanity, and so therefore cannot be used as ‘fixtures’, so to speak, for the priesthood. What is fixed in the "total transfiguration {i.e. deification, which I have been talking about} in accordance with Him" is our origins, from dust, from Adam.

Being divided into neither male nor female, but keeping our unique origins, solves all.

Gen 8:21 And the LORD smelled a soothing aroma. Then the LORD said in His heart, "I will never again curse the ground for man's sake, although the imagination of man's heart [is] evil from his youth; nor will I again destroy every living thing as I have done.

The offering of the earth to God is done by those like Adam, as he is from the ground. Yet as our human nature is fundamentally not divided into male and female and so has all in common, then what one has so too has the other, equally and identically.

Hence only those like Adam can be priests (the ‘soothing aroma’ is mentioned frequently in Leviticus, as also in our Liturgy), but those like Eve are for all intents and purposes priests also, being identical to those like Adam.

Similarly, only those like Eve can bring the Incarnate Creator into humanity (being ‘from Adam’ places them on a higher plane than being ‘from dust’, so to speak), but those like Adam are for all intents and purposes mothers of God also, being identical to those like Eve.
So Adam is the link to the earth and the whole of creation, and Eve is the link to the Creator. And it is in the union of these two (becoming "one flesh", but having nothing to do with sexual intercourse) that the whole of creation is brought into union with the Creator. Here there are no ancient Greek words or complicated theological expressions, but simple common language. How can I put things simpler?

Now as being male and female is not fundamental to humanity - and so therefore somewhat exterior to us when viewed from deification - what did Christ take upon Himself? He took on both the fundamentals (unfallen-ness) and the externals (fallen-ness) of human nature. He raised up the unfallen part to His own throne on high, and healed the fallen part, keeping it as a trophy, so to speak. As St Maximos says,

He who alone is free and sinless then chose of His own accord, because He is good and compassionate, to enter into our transgression and to become man. … And when He had loosed the bonds of bodily birth on our behalf within His own person, He gave to us who believe in His name power through the birth which is spiritual and freely chosen to become children of God instead of children of flesh and blood.

"Deification in Christ", page 220, Amigua PG 91, 1345C-1349A

He took on the division into male and female, becoming male ("enter into our transgression"). He then, however, loosing "the bonds of bodily birth" destroyed the division. Clearly it is not humanity that He destroyed, but something external to us, destroying the division to give us all healing. What is the problem with this?

Please now read again my original post #109. Is it clearer now? If you disagree with anything I have written, please do say so in order to have a dialogue with me.

I have refrained from quoting from every statement in every post so as to keep the length down. I hope that my clarifications here will answer those points I have not directly addressed.

So the tradition of male priests is kept, but so too is the tradition that our salvation is equally and identically for both men and women. Carol, does this help?

Finally:

Anyway, St. John Chrysostom mentions some things that may be of interest in some other comments on vestments. You may notice 'new man' and 'the bishop becomes the icon of Christ' rather clearly in these text as well as many other renditions from other Church Fathers that say the same thing, I see no difference.

‘Byzantine vestments also hold a kind of functional mystical significance in that their symbolism is directed toward ‘transforming’ the celebrant as he assumes them for liturgical celebration. In accordance with the office of preparation for the liturgy, the clergyman takes on the garments of the divine. The priest is girded in purity and his outer appearance tells the congregation of the ‘new man’ as he appears in the liturgy. The deacon, moving his stole (orarion) in the manner of the movements of the angel wings, prepares the congregation for the heavenly experience. And indeed the bishop becomes the icon of Christ, as the congregation is lifted into the divine presence. It is not unusual for worshippers to kiss the hem of a cleric’s vestments (usually the sticharion or phelonian of the priest) since the liturgical experience lifts up the material world (and material substance) and sanctifies it. The vestments themselves become mystically the wings of angels, the robe of Christ, and the glorious garments of the Saints.’

Yet St John Chrysostom also mentions the vision of angels during the Liturgy. Which is better - the mystical symbol and icon, or the reality? This is why it is so inadequate to talk about the maleness of priests as ‘icons of Christ’: we are supposed to be going beyond the icons into the reality of divine life!

The theologian is therefore one who has advanced or progressed so to speak to the degree that a perfected intellect has acquired certain prophetic gifts. These prophetic gifts do not mean, except in some exceptional cases, the power of clairvoyance. It means that the intellect has acquired the capacity to see through the veil of material reality, so to speak, and begin to see things as they really are -- to see God in things (and in the processes underway between things). It also means that the hidden meaning of Scripture is revealed -- the true spiritual intent of Scripture.

Owen, well said! I have had quotations of St Gregory Palamas accused of Gnostism, I have had St Symeon the New Theologian maligned, I have had St John Cassian dismissed. Will we now listen to St Maximos the Confessor, or disown him also?

Will I be accused of being in delusion? I merely have a teacher who taught the way of God more accurately to me than the leading bishops and theologians of the Orthodox Church. Am I therefore against Orthodoxy? No!! Does not the chaos in Orthodoxy itself speak volumes? (For example, I heard that the early Parisian theologians were educated in ‘Uniate’ theological colleges: hardly a good place to learn about the deification that kills the papal claims dead! I have also heard of Orthodox theologians claiming that St Maximos the Confessor should not be a saint because he wrote some things which are, in effect, beyond their comprehension. So much for venerating the Fathers!)

But if you want to delve into it all and understand it, the fact is that those who have delved before have formed a terminology which gives us theological thinking tools.

Christian theology is salvation, union with God, deification. It is a failure of the big people in Orthodoxy that such a link is not made. If they knew about the vision of Light within themselves they would be speaking with their own language, and not that of official terminology where it will not be understood by the faithful.

Please, if you do disagree with me, then wait a while to let your emotions cool. Then post to engage in a two-way dialogue.

Trying to be kind and gentle to all, but struggling to keep my emotions focused on uplifting all equally,

Richard

M.C. Steenberg

23-11-2008, 05:43 PM

I have returned from a weekend spent between southern England and a pilgrimage in Walsingham in Norfolk, and come back to find myself again frustrated by this thread. I find Paul’s comments (in post #168 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=71202&postcount=168)) very much reflective of my own.

Paul, as to your specific question:

The maleness of priests as 'icons of Christ'

What does this mean exactly? Has anyone really addressed this in these many pages?One of my frustrations with this thread has been that the ongoing displeasure by some at the fact of the priest as icon of Christ relating to his maleness, has led to side-matter after side-matter that may or may not be connected (and often isn’t, since often these side-issues have themselves been deeply problematic: regularly grounded in false readings); but all of which have essentially served to avoid actually responding to the articulation of the real issue - something that happened extremely far back.

Here is precisely what it means to speak of ‘the maleness of priests as icons of Christ’, gleaned from various posts above:
“In the liturgical engagement of the Orthodox worshipping life, the clergy mystically represent Christ himself, are living icons of the Lord, and thus their maleness is part-and-parcel of iconographically representing the incarnate Christ who was (and is) a human male.”

“Now there is a third compelling reason for the male priesthood. Orthodox Christians believe that their bishops, priests and deacons are Ikons of Christ and therefore must be male because Jesus Christ is male. To understand this we must think about what an Ikon is. An Ikon is a religious symbol, but yet much more than a symbol. It is an instrument of Divine reality. It is a picture and a vision for the eyes which conveys a spiritual reality to the worshipper. We can say that an Ikon is an image of the Divine, but we must say at the same time that an Ikon has no divine power of its own. That would make an Ikon an idol and idols belong to pagan worship. An Ikon has the spiritual function to help us receive into our souls the spiritual awareness of what it depicts. For example; when we look at an Ikon depicting the crucifixion, the Ikon helps us to participate more spiritually in the wonder of Christ’s love for us and the efficacious power of His sacrifice on the cross. Looking at an Ikon in our worship is the most direct way we can visually represent Christ’s atoning death for the forgiveness of our sins. Looking at an Ikon strengthens the spiritual reality of our worship.”

“The question is that of the specific iconography of the priest (really, in fact, the bishop, of whom the priest acts in stead), as the one who is celebrant of the Eucharist and the living mysteries of the Church. The Church is, as a whole, an icon of Christ, and every individual person that comprises it is also true and living icon of Christ. But this fact does not drive the Church to dismiss the valid iconography within that body - and, practically speaking, has never meant that because every person is equally icon of Christ by nature, every person thus has or ought to have the same role in the Body.”

“In the clerical orders, there is a deliberate iconography, not simply of Christ in his eternity as Son of the Father, true and real God, fully and authentic human, which is the 'image' in which all humanity partakes, but of the specific incarnational reality of Jesus Christ incarnate in Galilee, forming and leading his Church, directing them to his table and offering himself as the banquet of new life. This is the iconography of Christ as shepherd of the Church, of his earthly ministry conjoined to the heavenly. And in this, what is 'imaged' is not solely the truth of Christ known and encountered in all image-bearing creatures, but the distinct, irrepeatable, and unique person of the incarnate Jesus of Nazareth. The Church teaches that the value of all human persons, male and female, as 'icons of Christ' is to be cherished and engaged with at all times; but in the clerical orders, it is the specific image of the man Jesus Christ, encountered in Galilee as minister, shepherd and celebrant, that is the subject of this particular 'icon'.”

“In this, the maleness of Christ is important, is indeed a critical dimension of the incarnational reality of the Son. Christ was not incarnate as a woman; to depict him as such would be as much a falsehood in the iconography of the clergy - who are icons of that incarnational shepherding and guiding - as in the iconography of paint and wood.”

“Any attempt to explain the iconography of the priest as Eucharistic celebrant, in a way that divorces this from the maleness of Jesus Christ, is fundamentally un- or even anti-incarnational.”
All these are from page one of the thread. Since then, there have been some remarkable tangents, together with some good remarks and reflections on valid points; but continual digressions into other matters have too often come instead of actual reflection on these key issues.

At this stage, I see little fruit in continuing the conversation in this manner. Richard, your last post, like some before it, has been deeply manipulative of my own comments, which I do not find helpful. Nor do I think it a valid approach to wind the discussion into all manner of ornate, intricate side-issues, rather than addressing clearly those at the core of the question - side issues which, because they are often incorrect in the technical specifics they raise, and have to be responded to as such - only then to lament that it’s all become complex and detailed rather than demonstrative of love, etc. This is simply rhetorical manipulation of a conversation.

The simple matter is that the priest is an icon of Christ in a unique way, and in this way, his maleness matters – and indeed, matters in a way that makes his maleness part-and-parcel of how he can be priest. Absolutely nothing that has been written in this thread has offered anything that would challenge this: those message which have tried, have done so by quite flawed readings, which to my mind are not only incorrect (that much to me is eminently clear from a patristic standpoint), but deeply unpastoral—despite their stated intention—and theologically as well as ascetically dangerous.

Richard, in your latest post you ask if people disagree with anything you’ve written, to ask you about it so as to have dialogue. Yet you must do the same. I’ve asked you since the beginning of this conversation to engage with some specific matters, which you never have. These are enumerated in my post #54 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70729&postcount=54); and more recently I’ve specifically indicated details of your more recent comments (in my post #117 (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=70901&postcount=117)). But it is always simply more and more side-issues. Can you, will you, please go back to the key issues I asked you about before, and give some response (perhaps post #54 is a good starting point: those points in specific, without tangents).

But really, I start to wonder now whether further chatter of this kind is really quite un-pastoral in a larger context.

I apologize to all if this my remarks here are unduly firm. I have tried to be open to ongoing discussion in this area; but I do really feel it is becoming inappropriate.

INXC, Deacon Matthew

Mary

23-11-2008, 06:15 PM

Please, if you do disagree with me, then wait a while to let your emotions cool. Then post to engage in a two-way dialogue.

Richard

Sorry, I can't wait. You are twisting words and concepts and coming up with all kinds of weird and bizzare unrealities.

What's your problem with a man being a man and a woman being a woman? Why do you have to try to mix the two up with imaginary concepts and speculations? Doesn't that make your head hurt? Is it so hard to accept things as you see them?

The blood and water flowing from Christ's side DID NOT turn him into a "Second Eve". Will you quit insulting Him? He was a MAN. He didn't have to become a woman in order for women to feel a part of Him. What makes you think that being either one or the other creates a division? I see no division, except in your strange thoughts. I am a part of Him, as a woman, and I love every aspect of being a part of Him as a woman.

Andreas:

Apart from all that, I woke up wondering if Christ's male personhood ('hypostasis') was deified along with His human nature (which men and women share) and if so whether that had any implications for the female of the species.Perhaps this passage has a clue:

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church. For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones. “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.

Eph. 5:25-32I was just thinking.... since Paul seems to be talking about Christ and husbands at the same time, and women are a part of the Church, that this is how Christ, being born as a True Man, also sanctifies women, who are a part of True men.

How a husband can sanctify his wife, is beyond me. But I don't have trouble believing that Christ can sanctify me, although how He does it, is still a mystery.

in Christ,
mary

Andreas Moran

23-11-2008, 07:41 PM

For me, earlier posts in this thread have given a complete response to the original question. If I may, I just want to make a comment about Fr Sophrony since Owen and Richard have mentioned him. Fr Sophrony was a theologian in the fullest sense indicated by Owen in the first paragraph of his last post. What makes him a great theologian is that he writes and speaks from experience, not from study. It is worth bearing in mind that as a Russian, he was not subject to the western tendency to see things on the psychological plane or to regard information as truth (though information may be true).

Christian theology is salvation, union with God, deification. It is a failure of the big people in Orthodoxy that such a link is not made. If they knew about the vision of Light within themselves they would be speaking with their own language, and not that of official terminology where it will not be understood by the faithful.

The first sentence of this quote from Richard is true as is well known. I don't think the second sentence is right. All modern theologians/writers on the spiritual life say exactly this, and no one more so than Fr Sophrony. He writes and speaks all the time about about the vision of Light which he knew experientially. Fr Sophrony does write in a loose and seemingly unstructured manner which is his own language and so different from the usual style of theologians. But he also had to express himself in a way which would persuade contemporary theologians of the truth of what he experienced. He charged his followers, notably Fr Zacharias, to tell theologians on their own terms about his teaching. Nevertheless, he could also touch the hearts of non-theologians and change their lives, even those who did not read his books.

RichardWorthington

02-12-2008, 11:34 AM

What's your problem with a man being a man and a woman being a woman?

I have no problem: I am happy to be a man, and happy that my wife is a woman!

Why do you have to try to mix the two up with imaginary concepts and speculations? Doesn't that make your head hurt?

I quoted above (#172) the words of St Maximos the Confessor: "He first united us to ourselves in His own person through the abolition of the distinction between male and female. He demonstrated that, instead of being men and women, clearly divided by sexual distinctions, we are properly and truly only human beings, called to total transfiguration in accordance with Him"

No speculation here - just patristic quotations, confirmed by other Orthodox theologians (whom I will quote soon in another post, if I remember!)

Is it so hard to accept things as you see them?

"What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before!" (John 6:62) I have consistently been referring to deification and the Vision of the Divine Light, having been taught by an Athonite priest-monk. As St Maximos himself writes, "total transfiguration in accordance with Him".

The blood and water flowing from Christ's side DID NOT turn him into a "Second Eve".

Augustine of Hippo writes the following on John 19:34:

2. "… one of the soldiers with a spear laid open His side, and forthwith came there out blood and water." A suggestive word was made use of by the evangelist, in not saying pierced, or wounded His side, or anything else, but "opened;" that thereby, in a sense, the gate of life might be thrown open, from whence have flowed forth the sacraments of the Church, without which there is no entrance to the life which is the true life. … This was announced beforehand, when Noah was commanded to make a door in the side of the ark, whereby the animals might enter which were not destined to perish in the flood, and by which the Church was prefigured. Because of this, the first woman was formed from the side of the man when asleep, and was called Life, and the mother of all living. Truly it pointed to a great good, prior to the great evil of the transgression (in the guise of one thus lying asleep). This second Adam bowed His head and fell asleep on the cross, that a spouse might be formed for Him from that which flowed from the sleeper’s side. O death, whereby the dead are raised anew to life! What can be purer than such blood? What more health-giving than such a wound?

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf107.iii.cxxi.html

It is from Christ’s side that His Spouse comes, She Who is the Church. But as has been pointed out, the Church is not a separate person, not another ‘who’. So ‘who’ is His Spouse, if not Christ Himself, as the Church is His self-same Body!!! There are not two bodies, but one!! As you quoted, "the two shall become one flesh: This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church" (Eph. 5:25-32)

Indeed, not only can Deacon Matthew quote from page one, but myself also:

I do not suppose you are unaware that the living church is the body of Christ; for the scripture says, ‘God created man male and female’ (Genesis 1:27). The male is Christ, the female is the Church. Moreover, the books and the apostles declare that the Church belongs not to the present but existed from the beginning. For She was spiritual, as was also our Jesus, but was made manifest in the last days that she might save us. Now the Church, being spiritual, was made manifest in the flesh of Christ to show us that if any of us guard her in the flesh and it be not corrupted, he will receive her back in the Holy Spirit.

(2 Clement 14:2-3; "The Apostolic Fathers" p.67).

Will you quit insulting Him? He was a MAN. He didn't have to become a woman in order for women to feel a part of Him. What makes you think that being either one or the other creates a division? I see no division, except in your strange thoughts.

God came forth from Mary’s womb as a male child and grew up into a male man. Regarding division, please see the above patristic quotation from St Maximos.

I am a part of Him, as a woman, and I love every aspect of being a part of Him as a woman.

Most excellent - this is a wonderful phrase!

Mary, apologies for any upset, but the things we are discussing go very deep. Please do remember that, despite what I say about being male and female, I am married. Please do not read anything ascetically bizarre into what I write, or what St Maximos has written.

Trying to be helpful and gentle,

Richard

M.C. Steenberg

02-12-2008, 01:42 PM

I maintain as before that your reading is a misreading. The fact that certain comments you raise can be justified individually with a specific text is neither here nor there: one must look at the larger testimony of things.

Archimandrite Maximos has given you a pointer towards St Maximus’ Ambigua 41, of which you’ve quoted extracts. Go and read the entire thing, together with his others. It is absolutely essential to note that St Maximus is discussing the union of all persons in the Logos, which is a transcending of the logoi ‘tropoi’ to the true and united logoi of creatures in the Logos himself. But it is equally clear that in St Maximus, it is Christ as male person that accomplishes this, precisely in and through that distinction. In his maleness, Christ transforms the distinction of male and female into a non-division -- not as indistinct or surpassed, but is a distinction of nature that no longer poses the possibility of a division of theology. That is his entire scope in the reflections on Logos/logoi in the Ambigua. The deified state of humanity in Christ is as male and female: we know this first-hand because we have seen this deified reality in Christ transfigured, in Christ glorified in the resurrection -- in both cases fully male. St Maximus shows that, in this deified life, the natural distinction of male and female is not divisive to the true union of all in the one Logos. There is 'neither male nor female' as categories that would divide humanity's relation to the Son, for Christ has united what would divide, so that true humanity, which is male and female, is a whole humanity sanctified and transfigured in Christ.

You continually suggest that you are looking at things with an eye toward deification; but so are others. Deification is not an absention of created nature: it is its perfection. Even if you take St Maximus and St Gregory, who are the chief two among the few fathers who consider a possibility of a ‘double creation’ in which sex is an aspect of the second (and on this, St Maximus is directly reading and reflecting on St Gregory), their comments do not absent Christology from its foundationally ‘sexed’ nature in the incarnation. St Maximus, for his part, takes the notion of ‘differentiation’ as surpassed in Christ, yes; but this is taken in the context of his larger comments (and indeed, he addresses it in the context of ‘ambigua,’ ‘difficulties’ on which to reflect). Rather like your usage of texts by St John, you’ve provided only very provocative extracts, without the broader sense, and hence terms are misapplied. I addressed the context and specifics of your passages from St Gregory and St John above.

I am sensing more and more that there is a deeply, deeply flawed conception of ‘deification’ in your theology, which is what is leading to such an insistent stance on something against which there is such a preponderance of patristic and liturgical evidence.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

RichardWorthington

03-12-2008, 06:13 PM

Dear Fr Deacon,

Thank you for your recently reply. I think things are indeed being clarified. As such, I think that quite a few of the disagreements between our viewpoints can be classed as being on the ‘surface’, and not going very deep. Therefore I will refrain from going over old ground and replying fully to your previous post, knowing that we will never agree because we need to sort out the foundations of our disagreements first. I do not believe I have been avoiding the main issues at all by going off on a tangent; we simply have such a different foundation that things do indeed look completely different.

However, there is one thing from your previous post which I would like to address, as it relates the manner in which this thread has been dealt with.

Richard, your last post, like some before it, has been deeply manipulative of my own comments, which I do not find helpful.

I would like to know how I have manipulated your words.

It is not I who added single quotation marks to the word "used" in order to completely change the meaning where I wrote about Christ lovingly using Mary’s female gender. It is not I who have accused people of the strangest of the early Gnostic-type heresies simply because I used the terminology regarding begotten being part of the image of God (St John of Damascus describes as an "analogy" the Son’s begottenness and Seth’s birth, see post #109, where I also quoted from Mr Hegwood.)

Indeed, to be accused of denying the Nicene Creed was quite a shock.

My conscience is clear regarding this thread: I have always tried to act with gentleness and understanding, waiting to reply so my emotions would re-arrange themselves from defensiveness due to their attacks into joyful sharing in Christ. My emotions at present are indeed amicable towards all in this thread, although inclined to be somewhat more matter-of-fact.

Also, my conscience is clear as to how I have tried to foresee possible misunderstandings. Before mentioning my view that being male and female are not fundamentally part of unfallen human nature, I did indeed mention that I was married. I even emphasised this, saying, "I love my wife as wife" (#109). In no way have I been trying to promote any ‘ascetically dangerous’ views; indeed I was surprised that monastic and celibate people had never heard of such things!

Anyway, I will in my next post reply in detail to your post #54.

Richard

RichardWorthington

03-12-2008, 06:30 PM

Dear all,

As requested, I will here reply to Fr Dcn Mtthew’s post #54 point by point:

1. All human persons are created in the image of God, which the fathers note is the image of the Son. This means male as well as female, and implies an iconic connection to the Son as part of the ontological being of the person (i.e, part of his or her nature, not simply an external symbol or representation).
The discussion on the extent to which male and female is part of unfallen humanity is still on going. I started addressing this point in post #109.

2. In the incarnation, Christ thus ‘came unto his own’, becoming one of the creatures that already showed forth his image. In doing so, he entered fully into the gendered distinction of the human race, becoming a male human-divine person. As the whole race is bound up in his image, including its multiple genders, his becoming human was and is an act for the whole race; yet he becomes authentically human, and so is himself gendered as are all humans; he is a male not an androgyny, and precisely as male confirms the sacredness of all gender, of the whole race.

I wrote above in post #4 (on page 1, no less!) that "The body which the Son of God took from the Virgin Mary is indeed a male body", and repeated this view many times (e.g. #48, "Christ indeed became incarnate as a male man."). See, I replied to your point before you had even posted it! But to clarify:

"In doing so, he entered fully into the gendered distinction of the human race, becoming a male human-divine person." - I agree fully without reservations, as is to be expected.

"As the whole race is bound up in his image, including its multiple genders, his becoming human was and is an act for the whole race;" - I agree, although we are still discussing the precise relationship of gender to humanity, and so while I can say "including its multiple genders", I would mention that we might disagree on what this exactly means. (And lest I am accused of denying women a part in His image by saying this, I am trying to point out a deeper understanding of the distinction between men and women so that their inclusion in His image is perceived to be far greater than keeping to a worldly understanding of gender.)

"yet he becomes authentically human, and so is himself gendered as are all humans; he is a male not an androgyny, and precisely as male confirms the sacredness of all gender, of the whole race." - I agree fully, as is to be expected, but can also add that as He was born of a female according to the natural laws of nature (conception and birth pangs excepted), that this too "confirms the sacredness of all gender".

Interestingly enough, I was looking back over what I had written, and had queried this last part (end of post #63), which I had forgotten. Due to the position of the thread at that time, I remember I had interpreted it as meaning that maleness (=having male genitalia) somehow included femaleness in itself, so that femaleness could be ignored. Hence my above instinctive balance (regarding being born of a female) to your statement. Note that way before now I wrote, "God Himself uses gender in our salvation" (post #109) - even if I was then accused of the worst of Gnostic types of heresies when all I was trying to do was to affirm gender! Perhaps having a week’s break from this thread has done us all some good. Wow, we really were talking past each other!!
:)

3. The confession of the incarnation, which is bound up in the resurrection and also the bodily ascension into heaven, is that Christ as male (i.e. as truly incarnate human person) continues as such eternally. Christ does not ‘stop being incarnate’ at the resurrection. He retains his body, his humanity, forever.

Of course I believe this! Do you think I am denying the Nicene Creed? I have not found any direct reference to me saying this before your post #54, although in post #109 I mentioned that Christ "never will want to" cast aside His male gendered body (part of the previously mentioned "fallen gender-bearing nature") "out of His love for us in our lowly state".

Significantly, I too will keep my male body - and my wife her female body - in the Resurrection. As I mentioned in the same post #109 regarding "neither marrying nor given in marriage": "Our current gender is like a plastic ring with a plastic jewel on it. … Yet Christ the Bridegroom removes the plastic covering to show a pure golden band with all manner of precious stones on it. Nothing is lost - save the cheap plastic covering - but all is gain, both for men and women equally". Here the male sex and female sex is kept, but transfigured. Why should this sound so strange?

4. The priest as icon of this Christ, which is part of the definition of the priesthood commented on in the fathers from the very first, is one who makes present, in icon, this incarnate Lord. As true icon of the highest sort—the living image of the living Christ—the priest makes present in this manner the incarnate Christ of Galilee, eternal Son of the Father in his full humanity. This is distinct from the way in which every human person, male and female, is an icon of the Son in his eternity (a fundamental and true reality of Christian anthropology), and is a specific connection to the person incarnate as chief shepherd and pastor in Galilee.

Well I can vaguely agree with what I think you are trying to say, if I am generous with specifics, but am equally aware of misunderstandings.

"As true icon of the highest sort—the living image of the living Christ—the priest makes present in this manner the incarnate Christ of Galilee, eternal Son of the Father in his full humanity." Can you clarify what you mean? Clearly the priest’s visage does not change ("true icon of the highest sort" "makes present in this manner the incarnate Christ"). The only making present of Christ by the priest as his priestly function that I know of is the change of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of our Lord. Now I know that it is heretical to state that the Eucharistic is an icon of Christ. I could have field day refuting this point of yours, but I am generous enough not to think that you are wanting to deny the basics of our holy Faith!

The only ‘making present of Christ’ within ourselves in a true visible way that I know of is in deification: I have been told by my Athonite SF that in the Resurrection when I look at you, Fr Deacon, I will see the features of Christ simultaneously with your own. Moreover, I will see my own features in you, and you will see yours in mine! Such is becoming "one Body" in the Eucharist. Our unique distinctions are not destroyed, but overcome to allow full unity - and physical bodily indwelling - as an image of the (bodiless) Trinity. But this has nothing to do with being an ordained priest.

I will put down my thoughts on point 5 in my next post.

However, to sum up:
Point 1 - I started to address sometime ago, and this discussion is still on going.
Point 2 - The point about Christ being male I stated on page 1, and so did not really need to reply to this point at all if my posts had been taken into account.
Point 3 - I have said nothing nor hinted at anything that could imply that Christ’s body stopped being male after the Resurrection. I clarified my position in the same post in which I started to address point 1.
Point 4 - This point is vaguely worded and open to possible heretical interpretations. I acknowledge that no heretical intentions were present, but does mean that I am unable to comment fully at this moment in time.

Richard

RichardWorthington

03-12-2008, 07:00 PM

(continued from above)
Dear All,

5. Though the fathers are not preoccupied with the modern notions of sex and gender, and take the fact of priests being male as a given and assumed part of their whole role and office, including this iconic significance, rather than commenting on its specifically, nonetheless the confession of priest as icon does have immense significance when these modern questions are raised. This relevance lies first and foremost (though not exclusively) in the arena of imaging precisely and specifically the male person whom the incarnate Christ was and is, so as thereby to give expression to the authentic testimony of Christ’s own incarnation: namely, that in the distinction of male and female is an authentic part of human nature, and in its affirmation discloses the true unity of the whole race.

"take the fact of priests being male as a given and assumed part of their whole role and office": of course, absolutely true and I wholeheartedly agree with this.

"this iconic significance" - which iconic significance, point 4 needs to be clarified.

"the arena of imaging precisely and specifically the male person whom the incarnate Christ was and is": Hmmm. I found an earlier post of Fr Dcn Matthew's with early patristic quotations:

Ignatius of Antioch:

"The bishop presides as the icon of God" (To the Magnesians, 6.1; cf. Trallians 3.1, Smyrneans 8.1)

I looked these references up (in the order below), but found something slightly different:

exhort you to study to do all things with a divine harmony, while your bishop presides in the place of God, and your presbyters in the place of the assembly of the apostles,
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.iii.vi.html

In like manner, let all reverence the deacons as an appointment of Jesus Christ, and the bishop as Jesus Christ, who is the Son of the Father, and the presbyters as the sanhedrim of God, and assembly of the apostles.
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.iv.iii.html

See that ye all follow the bishop, even as Jesus Christ does the Father, and the presbytery as ye would the apostles; and reverence the deacons, as being the institution of God
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf01.v.vii.viii.html

The word ‘icon’ does not appear in these quotations, however the web pages said they included both shorter and longer versions, so perhaps I have missed something. Nevertheless, to try to refer these to a male gender seems strange:

"your bishop presides in the place/icon of God": God is mentioned here, not Christ; God is beyond all gender.
"your presbyters in the place/icon of the assembly of the apostles": are we going to read some deep iconic significance into the maleness of the apostles? Are the apostles made present too? Surely all that matters here is the exhortion to "harmony", "reverence ", and "following", and so to obey those who rule over you? There seems to be nothing innate here, just good outward order following from a good inward disposition.

Dionysius the Areopagite:

"The bishop brings Jesus Christ before our eyes [...]" and "shows in sensible fashion and as an icon that which is the very life of our soul: he reveals how Christ himself came out of his mysterious, divine sanctuary out of love for man and took on human form, becoming totally incarnate, though without confusion." (Ecclesiastical Hierarchy 3.13)

Now here is the translation I found:

The Hierarch makes known these things to those who are living religiously, by bringing the veiled gifts to view, by dividing their oneness into many, and by making the recipients partakers of them, by the utmost union of the things distributed with those who receive them. For he delineates in these things under sensible forms our intelligible life in figures, by bringing to view the Christ Jesus from the Hidden within the Divine Being, out of love to man, made like unto us by the all-perfect and unconfused incarnation in our race, from us, and advancing to the divided condition of ourselves, without change from the essential One, and calling the human race, through this beneficent love of man, into participation with Himself and His own good things, provided we are united to His most Divine Life by our assimilation to it, as far as possible; and by this, in very truth, we shall have been perfected, as partakers of God and of Divine things.
Following the link http://www.monachos.net/content/patristics/patristictexts/347-denys-ecclesiastical-hierarchy-link

Well, the translations use totally different terminologies, but I think are indeed saying the same things:

The hierarch/bishop walks out of the sanctuary bringing "the veiled gifts to view" and gives them to the faithful to eat and drink. In so doing it is an image (the infamous word "icon"?) of Christ Jesus coming down from the heavenly sanctuary/"Hidden", who became incarnate as evidenced by our eating Him. Again, no innate iconography here, just a pure outward symbolism of the bishop physically walking out of the sanctuary holding the Bread/Body and Wine/Blood. You wrote, "See in particular Dionysius on this regard": I have done, and see nothing here to justify some deep male only iconography. The iconography does not refer to the bishop’s person, but to his actions. (A woman too can walk while holding things!!)

Germanos of Constantinople:

"The ascent of the