Christianity

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II. Historical Context a history of contexts -
2.. Christian Hellenism

• Apostles used the Greek Hebrew Scriptures
  (the Septuagint)
• From Hellenistic Judaism to a Christian
  Hellenism
• Apostles wrote Letters Gospels in Greek
• Liturgy celebrated in Greek
• but also Arabic, then Slavonic, English, et
  cetera . . .
• Following St Paul, the Ancient Councils would
  use the precision of Greek thinking to
  protect Apostolic teachings from pagan
  misunderstanding splitting hairs
  over the divinity humanity of Christ-God

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325 AD - First Ecumenical Council held at Nicea
Called by Constantine to settle disputes
over Arius' teaching about the person of Christ.
The creed of the council of Nicea (1st part of
the Ancient Creed)
381 AD - 2nd Ecumenical Council held at
Constantinople to settle dispute over
Macedonius teaching against the person of the
Holy Spirit . Held in the Church of St. Eirene,
still stands today in Istanbul Turkey.
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The Western part of the Empire fell to the
barbarians beginning at the end of Augustines
lifetime 430 AD. He died the year before the
3rd Council.
The Eastern part of the Empire continued until
the time of Columbus.
1st 325 2nd 381 Councils - Defended the
divinity of Christ the Holy Spirit
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3rd 431 Council - Defined Christ as Incarnate
Word Mary as Theotokos
4th 451 Council - Defended Christ as Fully God
Perfect / Fully Man
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5th 553 Council - Re-affirmed doctrines of
Trinity identity of Christ
6th 680 Council - Affirmed humanity of Christ
by insisting on the reality of His human will
action.
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7th 787 Council - Affirmed icons as showing
reality of incarnation
In the East no single person ever dominated
Christian thinking across the ages as Augustine
would in the West. The West forgot the East
and moved on. For this reason, there is still
this missing half to the Western memory of
Christianity. Next we look at Eastern
understandings of the Fall, Redemption,
Salvation.
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1. The Fall of Adam Eve
Latin West (Augustine) We are Fallen from
Perfection Autonomy
Shows Augustines preference for
legal language

• AE were free meaning self-governed
  (autonomous), legally responsible.

• Augustine's opinions never influenced the
  East.

• The Fall Breaking Divine Law.

• Having chosen to break Gods Law we are
  justly guilty punishable.

• All Men sinned in Adam, therefore, all
  inherit his guilt, are born in sin
  are now incapable of co-operation (synergy)
  with God.
• We lost Adams ability to choose good over
  evil.
• we are all damned en masse before our birth.

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Christian East We are Fallen from oneness with
God

• - from sharing His Divine Life

• We were not created for a life separate,
  independent, or autonomous from God.
• That they may be one even as we are one.
  
• we must be one with God to be fully
  Human.
• We inherit (by being born into it) a
  world fallen from oneness with God
  
• but each one of us sins for
  ourselves
• we are NOT guilty for Adams sin.

• We were created as two sexes - male female
• free to participate in Gods life grow
  from glory to glory in a humanity at one
  with Gods own divinity.
• AE tried to live by fruit of the Created
  world, instead of from God.
• This choice changed Creation the result
  of the Fall has real not legal consequences
  death enters the world.
• We are fallen into a world where death runs
  through life like dark veins of impurity in white
  marble, where choosing good often means
  real pain suffering.
• We remain capable of co-operation with God,
  but oneness with Him - Eternal Life - is
  beyond us until God becomes incarnate
• changes the world by destroying the power
  of death over us - but only in Christ.

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2. Redemption / Salvation
According to Western Christianity Augustines
legal language explains everything
well enough . . .

• WESTERN CHRISTIAN AIM legal
  justification before God
• Jesus Christ dies on Cross and pays the price
  (redeems), guilty condemned Adam Eve
  all mankind, so we can be set free (saved) from
  a just punishment (our eternal damnation).
• All we can do is accept this redemption.
• By this, the
• Medieval Roman Church meant accept sacraments
  teaching authority of the Church / Pope.
• Protestant Reformers meant accept Christs
  payment by making your own declaration.

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Christian East
Redemption
Salvation are an act of God accomplished by
Christ who is fully God and fully man -- a divine
action spread out in time -- so as to include
bring us into that action.

• The other part of this action is our
  Salvation.
• This action is one that we must share in by
  living our life in Christ.
• Only Christ, the God-man, could make this
  possible, but now our life is there - given
  to us to be lived!
• This part is the actual content of our life.
• We do it together with others, in spiritual
  struggle, prayer, fasting, for the
  repentance to live that life with our
  brothers sisters in the community that is
  the New Creation.
• For the next five slides welluse icons to see
  how Eastern Christians understand God has made
  this possible.

• One part of this action, our Redemption, is
  spread out through the single divine act
  that is Christs birth, life, death,
  resurrection, ascension.
• That is a life only He could live, but He did
  so at one with our humanity so that we
  might share in His sacramental life at one
  with His divinity
• The Redemption part is Gods whole gathering
  together (recapitulation) of all the acts
  that need doing that we cannot do if we are
  going to be able to live life as He meant for
  human beings to be able to live it.