Since the 11th century, the Roman Catholic Church has professed that the Holy Spirit “comes from the Father and the Son.” In the Nicene Creed, without discussing the issue at the Ecumenical Council, the Bishop of Rome made an addition from the Son.
How did it happen! The doctrine of the origin of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son first appeared in the early sixth century, in Spain, during the Spanish Church’s struggle with the West Goth Arians. The Arians not only humiliated the Person of the Son of God, but also denied His oneness to God the Father, recognizing in Him sonship by grace, not by oneness, recognizing in him a perfect creation.
It is possible that, defending the Svangelian doctrine of the Son of God, formed in Nicaea, the Spanish bishops, an appendix to the Creed "comes from the Son" wanted to emphasize the equality of the Persons of the Holy Trinity, namely: the oneness of the Son to the Father. This insert expressed the personal opinion of individual bishops of Spain.
And only in the VIII century the idea of the eternal origin of the Holy Spirit and from the Son began to openly justify and defend the scholars of France and Spain, and in the early IX century (809) was held, under the personal chairmanship of Charlemagne, Aachen Council, which considered this issue. Due to the disagreement of the participants, the fathers of the council did not agree and left Article VIII of the Creed unchanged.
But Charlemagne, the first of the Western emperors, finally broke away from the Byzantine emperor, wanting to emphasize his independence from Byzantium and his importance in the Church, appealed to Pope Leo III to approve "recently appeared" about the Holy Spirit and make it the Nicene Creed. Pope Leo III, at the request of Emperor Charlemagne, and to prevent the possibility of distorting the Nicene Creed, Leo III ordered the text of the Nicene Creed to be carved on two silver tablets, one in Greek and the https://123helpme.me/buy-compare-and-contrast-essay/ other in Latin, and laid these boards. near the tomb of the Apostles Peter and Paul with the inscription: "I am a Lion, I laid these boards out of love for the Orthodox faith and its preservation"…
Unfortunately, these measures did not lead to anything: with the assistance of Emperor Charlemagne and by his decree, in his dependent countries, the new dogma began to spread rapidly.
Introduction to the Nicene Creed "and from the Son" condemned and Pope John VIII, acknowledged that the annex was made "senseless" (879), and his successor Hadrian III, a personal enemy of the Patriarch of Constantinople Photius, the doctrine of the origin of the Holy Spirit "from the Father and the Son" raised to the degree of dogma. Thus, under the influence of secular power and human passion, the new dogma, by the end of the tenth century, spread throughout the West, except the city of Rome.
In Rome itself it was formally introduced "and from the Son" in the Nicene-Constantinople Symbol, by order of the German Emperor Henry I, Pope Benedict VIII in 1014. Let us turn to the gospel. “And when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me.”" (John 15:26). The Savior says that – (I) the Holy Spirit will be sent by Him to the apostles, and (2) that the Holy Spirit comes from the Father. Here are two different states, two different phenomena: the origin of the Holy Spirit and His message to the world.
But Roman Catholics, paying attention to the words “that comes from the Father" it is said that these words not only exclude this thought, because the Father and the Son are one and all that the Father has, the Son also has. This conclusion and only. And in no way can such a conclusion be considered the basis for a new dogma; Roman Catholics allow, in this case, a mixture of two understandings: the essence of the essence and the different properties of the Persons of the Holy Trinity. The Roman conclusion can lead to the merging of the Persons of the Holy Trinity, because, if we follow their logic, applying it to the words “that from the Father born" it is possible to come to the absurd, namely, that the Son was born of Himself and of the Holy Spirit, since they are one in essence.
It is impossible not to pay attention to the time in which Christ says: “What comes from the Father" and – “I will send him"; this difference of time, emphasized by Christ Himself, indicates the property of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity – the origin from the Father and His message to the world through the Son for the sanctification of the world and the revelation of the Truth, announced by the Son from the Father of the world.
Roman Catholics are also called upon to say: “He (the Holy Spirit) will receive from Me and inform you" (John 16:15); “God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts" (Gal. 4: 6). “He will receive from Me" – will the Holy Spirit receive from what belongs to the Savior – the Son of God? The answer to this question is in the words “and let you know"… Whoever reads without prejudice the entire text of the 16th chapter of the Gospel of John, verses 12-15, does not doubt that the words “And when He, the Spirit of Truth, comes, He will guide you into the whole truth, for He will not speak of Himself, but what he hears he will say, and what is to come he will tell you"
And here Roman Catholics mix two dogmatic points – the dogma of personal qualities of the Hypostases, the dogma of the oneness of the Persons of the Holy Trinity is connected with it. “It is said of the Holy Spirit that he is not ofThe Son, or through the Son, he has being, but that which proceeds from the Father is peculiar to the Son, as being one with Him." says Blessed Theodoret. Therefore, the Holy Spirit is one in essence with the Father and the Son, He is the Spirit of the Father and the Son, and God is the one and only and inseparable Trinity. This Truth was received by us from the Redeemer Himself, preserved by the Apostles, and expounded to us by the Ecumenical Councils. The Roman Catholics withdrew from it.
This is the ditch by which the Roman Church distinguished itself from the Catholic Orthodox Church, which remained faithful to the teachings of Christ and the Apostles. This doctrine of the Church and of the Pope is absolutely not accepted by us Orthodox. It exudes a non-Christian spirit. We face the danger of replacing Christ with man, of replacing the Church, this great living organism, the Pope.
History has clearly shown us how constantly and persistently over the centuries this desire of the Roman bishop to preside in the universe grew, how the papal theory grew, nurtured in the spirit of pride and bodily understanding of the Church, nurtured by intrigue and politics.
The Eastern Church professes the dogma of the origin of the Holy Spirit in the very words of the Lord Jesus Christ, which He said to the apostles: "And when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me." (John 15:26). What could be purer than this confession? For the very words of Jesus Christ: "What comes from the Father" the Holy Fathers of the Second Ecumenical Council decreed in the Creed "What comes from the Father" leaving it to the common sense of every Christian to understand them as they speak.
The apostles receive the Holy Spirit through the laying on of hands (Acts 8:17). Mark of Ephesus at the Council of Florence drew the attention of members of the Western Church who competed with him to the composition of the words of the Symbol: "The intention of the holy Fathers should be taken into account here.
After all, these words constitute the development of cathedral theology. It was desirable for this council to clearly show the image of the union of the Holy Spirit with the Father and the Son. And how perfectly he defines the attribution of the Holy Spirit to the Father and the Son. If He says so: The Holy Spirit is united by these Fathers with the Father and the Son as "that proceeds from the Father, that with the Father and the Son the same worship and glory" that is, simultaneous and essential. If the council recognized its origin from both, why not say: "comes from the Father and the Son, and with Him is the same worship and glory"? The same should be said if this were the opinion of the Council.
Since in the first case the Fathers did not mention the Son when they wanted to show equality and oneness, it is obvious that they did not recognize the origin of the Holy Spirit and from the Son; otherwise they would not have missed it, especially when they were expounding the dogma. And that this exposition is the most perfect, and not semi-perfect, is evident from the fact that none of the following councils made a new clarification on this explanation, and did not add the origin of the Father and the Son.
Despite this, all councils banned it by their decrees. But the Council of Florence recognized the appendix – "and the Son"… That is why the Eastern Church did not recognize this council as correct, as contradicting both the Word of God and the seven Ecumenical Councils, equally recognized by both the Eastern and Western Churches.
The doctrine of purgatory
For several centuries since its founding, the early Christian Church has embraced all the various Christian communities that have existed in various parts of the world. These communities together formed a single and inseparable whole. In all these communities there were the same foundations of faith, the same dogmas, the moral foundations of the Christian life, the sacraments, and the basic rules of church improvement.
It was not until the fifth century that some ecclesiastical abolitions began to appear in the Roman Church, which in the eleventh century led to the final rupture, the fall of the Roman Church from the Ecumenical Church.
Detached from the Ecumenical Unity, from the voice of the whole Church expressed at the Ecumenical Councils, the Roman Church gradually replaced it with the voice of one man, the Pope. Admitting various news in the doctrine, the representatives of the Roman Church, placed above the ecumenical councils, began to introduce a new doctrine, new dogmas.
All these innovations in the Western, Roman Catholic Church arose from a misconception of the relation of reason to the Word of God. Seeking in the Scriptures and the Sacred to justify the pre-scholastic-logical constructions, which are given the meaning of the dogmas of the faith, Latin theologians have departed, among other things, from the general church doctrine of the afterlife of man. This will be discussed later.
According to the teachings of the Scriptures, the life of men on earth is only the pre-dawn time of the morning of the great day of eternity, as the Apostle Paul testifies. 15.53).
Thus, by God’s providence, all people are destined for eternity. They enter it through the door of death, as Archbishop Ambrose of Tver theologians say: “Eternity is a word incomprehensible to the limited human mind. Only the eternal mind can comprehend its entire space.