Melkites

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Patrick' post='1891723' date='Jun 15 2009, 03:32 PM']Just in case you're confounding the two, "in essence" isn't the same as "with certitude".

But, um... doesn't it stand to reason that you can only get so far with reason? Reason is only a subset of [i]human[/i] experience and interrelationship, let alone experience of God. That portion of God that you would come to know would be only a teeny subset of God, and being so heady about it might get in the way of the relationship. At least, it can play out that way in human relationships....[/quote]
Created reason is by its very nature limited, and that is why the vision of God according to the ancient Fathers transcends the intellect. To paraphrase St. Gregory of Nyssa . . . it is only one abandons all creatures and passes by all that is intelligible in creation, giving up every finite mode of comprehension, that he can finally find his beloved by faith.

[Patrick]

[quote name='Resurrexi' post='1891727' date='Jun 15 2009, 03:35 PM']According to Catholic teaching, the Divine Attributes are really identical with the Divine Essence.[/quote]

Sorry, I should have been more specific. [i]In the context of this discussion[/i], "in certitude" is not the same thing as "in essence" because not all members of the debate are using those terms synonymously. Indeed, the closer you come to [b]fully[/b] communing with a person (human or not), the less reason and certainty has to do with it. You're missing the point.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Resurrexi' post='1891727' date='Jun 15 2009, 03:35 PM']According to Catholic teaching, the Divine Attributes are really identical with the Divine Essence.[/quote]
No, that is the medieval Scholastic view of God. In the Byzantine doctrinal tradition, which follows the teaching of the Eastern Fathers, there is a real distinction ([i]pragmatika diakrisis[/i]), without a real division ([i]pragmatike diaresis[/i]), between God's essence and His uncreated energies.

Edited June 15, 2009 by Apotheoun

[pat22]

[quote name='Patrick' post='1891736' date='Jun 15 2009, 05:39 PM']Sorry, I should have been more specific. [i]In the context of this discussion[/i], "in certitude" is not the same thing as "in essence" because not all members of the debate are using those terms synonymously. Indeed, the closer you come to [b]fully[/b] communing with a person (human or not), the less reason and certainty has to do with it. You're missing the point.[/quote]
ok dude
1. lose the name, It's mine
2. get an avatar
3. hi

[Resurrexi]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1891741' date='Jun 15 2009, 05:41 PM']No, that is the medieval Scholastic view of God. In the Byzantine doctrinal tradition, which follows the teaching of the Eastern Fathers, there is a real distinction ([i]pragmatika diakrisis[/i]), without a real division ([i]pragmatike diaresis[/i]), between God's essence and His uncreated energies.[/quote]

Many of the Universal Church's dogmatic and doctrinal definitions use scholastic terminology.

Edited June 15, 2009 by Resurrexi

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Resurrexi' post='1891746' date='Jun 15 2009, 03:44 PM']Many of the dogmas and doctrines of the universal Church use scholastic terminology.[/quote]
Once again we are at an impasse, because I reject the false idea that Scholastic terminology, which is utterly foreign to my Church's tradition, is somehow normative for the whole Church.

[Resurrexi]

I reject the heretical real distinction Palamas made between the God's Essence and Attributes.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Resurrexi' post='1891760' date='Jun 15 2009, 03:52 PM']I reject the heretical real distinction Palamas made between the God's Essence and Attributes.[/quote]

[Patrick]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1891755' date='Jun 15 2009, 03:49 PM']Once again we are at an impasse, because I reject the false idea that Scholastic terminology, which is utterly foreign to my Church's tradition, is somehow normative for the whole Church.[/quote]

And yet you both are in communion with each other. Fascinating. Not casting judgment. It just surprises me how long this arrangement has been able to exist.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Patrick' post='1891777' date='Jun 15 2009, 03:59 PM']And yet you both are in communion with each other. Fascinating. Not casting judgment. It just surprises me how long this arrangement has been able to exist.[/quote]
Well, our bishops are in communion with each other, and by extension we are in communion with each other, but Resurrexi and I clearly see things quite differently, but there are rare occasions when we agree.

[pat22]

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Edited June 15, 2009 by pat22

[Patrick]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1891788' date='Jun 15 2009, 04:06 PM']Well, our bishops are in communion with each other, and by extension we are in communion with each other, but Resurrexi and I clearly see things quite differently, but there are rare occasions when we agree.

[/quote]

I'm used to unity meaning a unified mindset. For example, when I see that someone is Orthodox, I've about now taken for granted that I'll be thinking about things in about the same way.

Apotheoun, I'm curious, from your experience as a Melkite on these boards, do all or most Latin Catholics argue similarly as does Ressurexi? Or would you say he's exceptional? I'm trying to figure out how much of this back-and-forth is just you and him, and how much is Melkite-and-Latin.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Patrick' post='1891824' date='Jun 15 2009, 04:20 PM']I'm used to unity meaning a unified mindset. For example, when I see that someone is Orthodox, I've about now taken for granted that I'll be thinking about things in about the same way.

Apotheoun, I'm curious, from your experience as a Melkite on these boards, do all or most Latin Catholics argue similarly as does Ressurexi? Or would you say he's exceptional? I'm trying to figure out how much of this back-and-forth is just you and him, and how much is Melkite-and-Latin.[/quote]
Here at Phatmass it is mainly just me and Resurrexi, with an occasional interjection from a few others.

[Era Might]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1891693' date='Jun 15 2009, 04:17 PM']Scholastic metaphysics posits the idea that by reason alone a man can come to know something about the divine essence, but this idea is universally rejected by the Eastern Fathers, because created reason cannot transcend itself, and to say that it can is quasi-Pelagian.[/quote]
Suppose a man were born and raised on an island, away from any human contact. Do you believe that by reason he can learn anything about God (e.g., that there is a God)?

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1891850' date='Jun 15 2009, 04:37 PM']Suppose a man were born and raised on an island, away from any human contact. Do you believe that by reason he can learn anything about God (e.g., that there is a God)?[/quote]
If you are a Pelagian you would say that his efforts to know God according to his created intellect would save him, but if you are a Catholic you would say that salvation is not about rationalizing a belief about a supreme being, but is about the unmerited gift of grace, which only God can give.