Talk:Eastern Orthodox theology

Recent major edits
Thanks for the recent major edits to the article. They generally look good, although as is the case with the main article, we still need to bring some citations to bear.

A note of Wikipedia etiquette, though: Please don't mark such edits as "minor." Minor edits are edits which fix things like grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc. These were definitely major content edits, involving 38 separate edits and replacing and deleting a significant portion of content. &mdash;Preost talk  contribs  02:14, 17 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Thank you, I am aware of wikipedia etiquette. But actually, if you look at each edit one-by-one, you see that each is concerned merely with tidying up some poorly-turned phrases or removing stray comments. The fact that I made a series of such edits doesn't really affect the fact that each edit taken on its own is minor. I won't squabble over the matter, though.
 * As always, Maxim662 09:55, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

On the renaming of the article
I have reverted the renaming of the article as 'Eastern Orthodox Church theology', for the following reasons:
 * 1) 'Eastern Orthodox theology' is the most commonly established usage in English for designating the theology of the Eastern Orthodox Church.
 * 2) 'Eastern Orthodox' is a standard and adequately specific means of adjectivally qualifying something as pertaining to the Eastern Orthodox Church.
 * 3) 'Eastern Orthodox Church theology' is a confused locution. It may be grammatically confused (since 'Church' and 'theology' are both nouns), or it may mis-title the article, since the article is about Eastern Orthodox theology generally, and not simply about Eastern Orthodox ecclesiastical theology.

A number of articles pertaining to Eastern Orthodoxy have been changed in this way. I suggest it would be better for such changes to be discussed before being made, and the most obvious forum for that would be the Eastern Orthodoxy wikiproject.

Best, Maxim662 20:35, 18 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Maxim: So how would you deal with the problem of those who may confuse this with Orthodox Judaism which is called only Orthodoxy many times. Indeed, when mentioning "Orthodoxy" (the Jewish kind) the method is to dab it thus: Orthodoxy ( Orthodoxy ) and this should likewise be done with Eastern Orthodox Christianity. In any case, what do the words "Eastern Orthodox" alone mean? Eastern Orthodox what? Is it not the Eastern Orthodox Church's theology that this article deals with? IZAK 02:29, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, of course, when a Jewish context is given, then it makes perfect sense to speak of Orthodox Judaism as 'Orthodoxy' without any qualification. Similarly, given a Christian context, then to speak of Eastern Orthodoxy as 'Orthodoxy' without any qualification likewise makes perfect sense.

And indeed, had this article been called 'Orthodox theology', without qualification, it would have been ambiguous whether it was about Orthodox Christianity or Orthodox Judaism.

But this article is not entitled 'Orthodox theology', but 'Eastern Orthodox theology', and in English, 'Eastern Orthodox' refers to Orthodox Christianity, and not to Orthodox Judaism. It is simply not the case that there is any significant usage in English of referring to Orthodox Judaism as 'Eastern Orthodox' or 'Eastern Orthodoxy'. But, on the other hand, it is well established in English to use the expression 'Eastern Orthodoxy' unqualified to designate Orthodox Christianity, and to use 'Eastern Orthodox' to designate that which pertains to Orthodox Christianity.

Best, Maxim662 13:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Maxim: While arguments based on English language usage alone may shift some of the arguments in your favor, it is neither here nor there, because as you have admitted, the words "Orthodox" and "Orthodoxy" can be confused causing confusion, which is the central problem I am grappling with here, and which should be clarified in titles and article headings. We are dealing here with a problem relating more to Disambiguation and how best to set the names of articles so that they convey maximum clarity, when not everyone is an expert on "Orthodoxies" of varying kinds. IZAK 05:48, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Izak, I am weary of this. There is no ambiguity here, since, in English, no Jewish group is called 'Eastern Orthodox'. So there is nothing to be disambiguated. You are pretending an ambiguity exists when it does not exist.

You have missed my point RE Orthodoxy. I said that were 'Orthodoxy' used on its own then it would be ambiguous. But 'Orthodoxy' used within the construction 'Eastern Orthodoxy' is not ambiguous, since 'Eastern Orthodoxy' is not ambiguous. In the same way, to have an article entitled 'Union' would be ambiguous, but to have one entitled 'European Union' is not ambiguous. I'm sure you understand now.

Best, Maxim662 18:02, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Neutrality
I added the neutrality tag; I didn't see a dispute in the recent history. The language in the article appears to flip-flop between having a neutral discussion of theology and (accidentally?) making theological statements as fact, e.g.

God is merciful to all. The Orthodox believe that there is nothing that a person (Orthodox or non-Orthodox) can do to earn salvation. It is rather a gift from God.

This first and third state something as fact, and the middle one is (correctly) presented as a tenet of Orthodox Theology. If I had a bunch of time, I would clean it up myself. Quamaretto 00:39, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Is that necessary? One would think that on a page titled "Eastern Orthodox Christian theology," the views detaield therein would be representative of Eastern Orthodox Christian theology and not necessarily hard facts.


 * I agree. It is obvious that any statements made in the article are about Eastern theology, and it would be most uneconomical to say "Orthodox belive that..." before every sentence. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 199.245.199.129 (talk) 15:13, 4 May 2007 (UTC).

"particular to that communion"
The lead sentence reads "The theology of the Eastern Orthodox Church is particular to that Christian communion." What is the intent of this sentence? Who would consider that the theology would not be "particular" to that communion? Or, conversely, what theology is not particular to the communion that holds that theology? In short, the sentence seems trite and I propose to delete it. --Richard 18:42, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm to blame
Hi, it's me AmanUwellCant and I just want to say that when I added a ref (#8) to John Romanides' concept of Ancestral Sin I had noticed I deleted all that followed. I tried to fix it; to no avail. I apologize but if there is someone more tech savvy out there I beg you to restore the article w/ the rest of the text that was for some reason deleted. If you have the time, I would be more than happy to hear why I screwed up as to avoid making the same mistake in the future. Cheers and Happy New Year! —Preceding unsigned comment added by AmanUwellCant (talk • contribs) 09:36, 5 January 2009 (UTC) Matthew 19:14 Proves Jesus did not accept the Western notion of Original SIn. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.193.184.18 (talk) 14:53, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

New article on Phyletism just created
Just wanted to let anybody who is interested know that I have created an article on Phyletism and am seeking help in expanding the article. --Richard (talk) 05:21, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

New article on Palamism
I have created a new article on Palamism. Much of the description of the theology was taken from the leads of other articles such as Theoria, Theosis (Eastern Orthodox theology), Tabor Light and Essence-Energies distinction. As a result, the article started out as a mish-mash of text that was disjointed rather than flowing smoothly. I have worked to remedy some of that but it still needs work. I would like some fresh eyes to look at the article from the perspective of a reader coming to this article without any knowledge of the various components of the doctrine. My question is: does the article do an adequate job of presenting the key components of the doctrine? Of course, the details of each component should be covered in the subsidiary article on that component. The Palamism article should just summarize the key details of each component.

Thanks in advance for your assistance.

--Pseudo-Richard (talk) 17:36, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Christology section
Christology section is not quite good enough. First para:
 * Orthodox Christians believe in the dual nature of Christ. etc...

The para describes a theology they have in common with every major Christian denomination except the Oriental Orthodoxes; needs to be clarified. Next para:
 * Orthodox Christians believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah, Saviour and Son of God and that he was begotten before all ages.

Now this might seem acceptable if it didn't contradict a statement from the previous section Trinity:
 * The Father is the eternal source of the Godhead, from Whom the Son is begotten eternally and also from Whom the Holy Spirit proceeds eternally.

In my logical universe is begotten eternally implies is begotten now but since was begotten before all ages indicates a concluded act and so implies is not begotten now, some kind of clarification is needed. Or it is just a defect theological system? Rursus dixit. ( m bork3 !) 19:55, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Skepp "Eastern Orthodox Christology has not changed since the Christian Church started." Is this a neutral statement. I think it should be deleted as it cannot be shown. —Preceding undated comment added 16:03, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

Recent Vandalism to article
Here is Hierotheos Vlachos' teaching on hell LoveMonkey (talk) 16:58, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

When does hell begin?
I'm a bit confused about the discussion of the Orthodox view of hell. I'm not an expert on Eastern Orthodox theology, so please correct me if I'm misunderstanding something here. The article says the following:

"The Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Churches teach that both the elect and the lost enter into the presence of God after death, and that the elect experience this presence as light and rest, while the lost experience it as darkness and torment. [...] the souls of the departed - in either Heaven or Hell - do not receive 'Final Judgment' until 'Judgment Day'."

As currently worded, the section seems to say the following: the wicked experience hell immediately after death, but they do not receive a final judgment until judgment day.

However, while reading about Orthodox theology, I've sometimes encountered a somewhat different view. For example, consider the following passage from the webpage that LoveMonkey links to in the section just above this one:

"Here hades, not Hell, is being referred to. For Hell will begin after the Second Coming of Christ and the future judgement, while the souls of sinners experience hades after their departure from the body. According to the teaching of the holy Fathers, hades is an intelligible place, it is the foretaste of Hell, when a person receives the caustic energy of God."

If I understand this passage correctly, it says the following: the wicked experience a "foretaste" of hell immediately after death, but they do not experience hell until judgment day.

Do Orthodox theologians disagree about when hell begins? Or should we change the article to say that hell doesn't begin until judgment day? --Phatius McBluff (talk) 02:22, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

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Redirect-proposal
This article started as a copy of the theology-information at Eastern Orthodox Church, and seems to be in a poorer state thatn the present section overthere. May I suggest to replace this page with a redirect to Eastern Orthodox Church? Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   13:43, 26 June 2017 (UTC)

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"Eastern theology" listed at Redirects for discussion
An editor has identified a potential problem with the redirect Eastern theology and has thus listed it for discussion. This discussion will occur at Redirects for discussion/Log/2022 January 2 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Veverve (talk) 01:50, 2 January 2022 (UTC)