This important study of Byzantine christology is at the same time a study of the Orthodox understanding of man and his salvation,. Focusing on the concept of "hypostasis" or "person," Meyendorff states that man is truly man when he participates in divine life.

In Christ, human nature is united with the hypostasis of the Logos and while remaining fully itself is liberated from sin, the source of which is the gnomic will. Because it is "en-hypostasized" in Logos Himself, Christ’s humanity is perfect humanity. In the mysterious process, which started with His conception in the Virgin’s womb, Jesus passed through natural growth, ignorance, suffering, and even death — all of experiences of the fallen humanity, which He had come to save, and He fulfilled through the resurrection the ultimate human destiny. Christ could thus be truly the saviour of humanity because in Him there could never be any contradiction between natural will and gnomic will. Through the hypostatic union, His human will, precisely because it always conforms itself to the divine, also performs the "natural movement" of human nature.

http://www.holytrinitymission.org/books/english/byzantine_theology_j_meyendorf.htm

Excerpts from
"Byzantine Theology," Historical trends and doctrinal themes
By John Meyendorff

(Please get the full version of this book at your bookstore)




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Content:

Byzantine Theology after Chalcedon.
.....Exegetical traditions. Philosophical trends. The Problem of Origenism. Pseudo-Dionysius. Liturgy.
The Christological Issue.
.....The Monophysites. The Strict Dyophysites. The Cyrillian Chalcedonians. The Origenists.
The Iconoclastic Crisis.
.....Appearance of the Movement. Iconoclastic Theology. Orthodox Theology of Images: John of Damascus and the Seventh Council. Orthodox Theology of Images: Theodore the Studite and Nicephorus. Lasting Significance of the Issue.
Monks and Humanists.
.....Theodore the Studite. Photius (ca. 820 ¯ ca. 891). Michael Psellos (1018-1078). The Trials of John Italos (1076-1077, 1082).
Monastic Theology.
.....The Origins of Monastic Thought: Evagrius and Macarius. The Great Spiritual Fathers. Opposition to Secular Philosophy. Christian Faith as Experience: Symeon the New Theologian. Theology of Hesychasm: Gregory Palamas.
Ecclesiology: Canonical Sources.
.....The Councils and the Fathers. Imperial Legislation. Codifications of Ecclesiastical Law. Authoritative Commentaries and Criticism. Synodal and Patriarchal Decrees. Ïéêïnïméa.
The Schism Between East and West.
.....The Filioque. Other Controversies. Authority in the Church. Two Ideas of Primacy. The Meaning of the Schism.
Encounter with the West.
.....The Circle of Cantacuzenos. Humanists. Palamite Theologians: Nicholas Cabasilas. Florence.
Lex orandi.
.....The "Great Church" of Constantinople. The Liturgical Cycles. Hymnology.

Doctrinal Themes.
Creation.
.....Creator and Creatures. The Divine Plan. The Dynamism of Creation. Sanctification of Nature.
Man.
.....Man and God. Man and the World. Original Sin. The New Eve.
Jesus Christ.
.....God and Man. Redemption and Deification. The Theotokos.
The Holy Spirit.
.....The Spirit in Creation. The Spirit and Man’s Redemption. The Spirit and the Church. The Spirit and Man’s Freedom.
The Triune God.
.....Unity and Trinity. Hypostasis, Essence, and Energy. The Living God.
Sacramental Theology: The Cycle of Life.
.....Number of Sacraments. Baptism and Chrismation. Penance. Marriage. Healing and Death.
The Eucharist.
.....Symbols, Images, and Reality. Eucharist and Church.
The Church in the World.
.....Church and Society. The Mission of the Church. Eschatology.
Conclusion.
.....Antinomies.


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John Meyendorff, "Byzantine Theology," Historical trends and doctrinal themes

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God is one essence in three hypostases. This Cappadocian settlement given the circumstances of the fourth century never pretended to be anything more than the best possible description of the divine mystery, not the solution of a philosophical process similar to the Plotinian "Trinity of hypostases." The Fathers always affirms that we cannot know what God is; only that He is because He has revealed Himself ¡ª in salvation history ¡ª as Father, Son, and Spirit. God is Trinity, "and this fact can be deduced from no principle nor explained by any sufficient reason, for there are neither principles nor causes anterior to the Trinity."8

Why then are this description and this terminology preferable to others? Mainly, it is because all the options then available seemed inadequate from the start. The formula "one essence, three prosopa," for example, was not able to exclude a modalistic Trinity since the term prosopon although commonly used to designate "person" could also mean "mask" or "appearance." The Cappadocian Fathers meanwhile have wanted to affirm simultaneously that God is one object and three objects, that both His unity and His trinity are full realities. "When I speak of God," writes Gregory of Nazianzus, "you must be illumined at once by one flash of light and by three. Three in properties, in hypostases or Persons, if anyone prefers so to call them, for we would not quarrel about names so long as the syllables amount to the same meaning; but one in respect of the ousia, that is, the Godhead."9

There is no claim here for philosophical consistency although an effort is made to use current philosophical terms. The ultimate meaning of the terms however is clearly different from their meaning in Greek philosophy, and their inadequacy is frankly recognized.

This is particularly true of hypostasis, a term crucial in Trinitarian theology, and in Christology. Neither in Aristotelianism nor in Neo-Platonism was the term intended to designate a person in the Christian (and modern) sense, an agent, "possessing" his own nature and "acting" accordingly, a unique subject whose absolute identity can in no way be duplicated. Against the "old Nicaeans," the Cappadocian Fathers wanted to emphasize that the Nicaean homoousion ("consubstantial") did not identify the Son with the Father on the personal level but only on the level of the ousia. "Neither is the Son Father, for the Father is one, but He is what the Father is; nor is the Spirit Son because He is of God, for the Only-begotten is one, but He is what the Son is."10 Thus, in God, the "what" is one, but the three hypostases are personal identities irreducible to each other in their personal being. They "possess divinity,"11 and divinity is "in them."12


One recognizes the hypostatic character [of the Spirit] in that He is revealed after the Son and with the Son, and in that He receives His subsistence from the Father. And the Son, in Himself and with Himself revealing the Spirit, who proceeds from the Father, shines alone with the un-begotten light and has nothing in common with the Father and the Spirit in the identity of His particularities, but is revealed alone in the characters proper to His hypostasis. And the Father possesses the particular hypostatic character of being the Father and of being independent from all causality...13


The same personalistic emphasis appears in the Greek Fathers¡¯ insistence on the "monarchy" of the Father. Contrary to the concept which prevails in the post-Augustinian West and in Latin Scholasticism, Greek theology attributes the origin of hypostatic ¡®¡®subsistence" to the hypostasis of the Father ¡ª not to the common essence. The Father is the "cause" (aitia) and the "principle" (arch¨¥) of the divine nature, which is in the Son and in the Spirit. What is even more striking is the fact that this "monarchy" of the Father is constantly used by the Cappadocian Fathers against those who accuse them of "tritheism": "God is one," writes Basil, "because the Father is one."14 And the same thought is found in Gregory of Nazianzus: "God is the common nature of the three, but the Father is their union [hen¨­sis]."15 Pseudo-Dionysius also speaks of the Father as the "source of Divinity,"16 and John of Damascus in his Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith also affirms the essential dependence of the Son and the Spirit upon the Person of the Father:


Whatsoever the Son has from the Father, the Spirit also has, including His very being. And if the Father does not exist, then neither does the Son and the Spirit; and if the Father does not have something, then neither has the Son or the Spirit. Furthermore, because of the Father, that is because of the fact that the Father is, the Son and the Spirit are; and because of the Father, the Son and the Spirit have everything that they have.17


By accepting Nicaea, the Cappadocian Fathers eliminated the ontological subordinationism of Origen and Arius, but they preserved indeed together with their understanding of hypostatic life, a Biblical and Orthodox subordinationism, maintaining the personal identity of the Father as the ultimate origin of all divine being and action: "The three [are] one God when contemplated together; each [is] God because [they are] consubstantial; the three [are] one God because of the monarchy [of the Father]."18 Developing his well-known doctrine of the divine image in man, Gregory of Nyssa defines one aspect of human personal existence which is clearly different from that of God: each human person possesses the power of reproducing himself while in God there is only "one and the same Person of the Father from whom the Son is born and the Spirit proceeds."19 Thus, the human race is in a constant process of fragmentation, and can recover its unity only through adoption by the Father in Christ ¡ª i.e., by becoming children of the one single hypostasis which generates without fragmenting or multiplying. The origin of unity in the Trinity, the Father restores the unity of creation by adopting humanity in His Son, the New Adam, in whom humanity is "recapitulated" through the activity of the Spirit.

Not an abstract intellectual speculation, the doctrine of the Trinity stands at the very centre of Byzantine religious experience: the immanent Trinity manifests itself as the "economic" Trinity, i.e., the saving revelation of God in history. This is made particularly clear in the liturgy, especially in the Eucharistic canon. As a solemn prayer to the Father by the adopted human community united in the incarnate Son and invoking the Spirit, the Eucharist is indeed the sacrament of divine unity being bestowed upon men. The same Trinitarian reality is expressed in innumerable hymns scattered throughout the Byzantine liturgical cycles. Here is a solemn hymn of Pentecost attributed to the emperor-poet Leo VI (886-912), and constituting a variation on the famous Trisagion:

Come, ¦¯ peoples,

let us venerate the tri-hypostatic Deity,

The Son in the Father, with the Holy Spirit

For before time the Father generated a Son,

sharing His eternity and His Throne;

And the Holy Spirit was in the Father,

glorified together with the Son.

One Power, One Essence, One Deity,

whom we all venerate and say:

Holy God, who created all things through the Son,

with the cooperation of the Holy Spirit;

Holy Mighty, through whom we knew the Father

and the Holy Spirit dwelt in the world;

Holy Immortal, the Spirit Comforter,

who proceeds from the Father

and abides in the Son,

Holy Trinity, glory to Thee.20

In the classical Latin Trinitarian doctrine, "Father, Son, and Spirit are only ¡®relatively¡¯ distinct."21 Whatever the interpretation given to the idea of "relation" implied in this statement, it is clear that Western thought recognized the ontological primacy of essential unity over personal diversity in God; that is that God is essentially one, except in the divine Persons who are defined in terms of relations. In Byzantine thought, however, ¡ª to use an expression from Maximus the Confessor, ¡ª "God is identically monad and triad,"22 and there is probably a tendency in both worship and philosophical formulations (as distinct from doctrinal statements) to give a certain pre-eminence to the personal diversity over essential unity. A reference to the Nicaean "consubstantial" was the Byzantine response to the accusation of "tritheism."

This reference however could not be decisive in itself simply because Greek patristic thought and particularly that of the Cappadocians always presupposed the starting point of apophatic theology: that God¡¯s being and, consequently, the ultimate meaning of hypostatic relations were understood to be totally above comprehension, definition, or argument. The very notion of God¡¯s being both Unity and Trinity was a revelation illustrating this incomprehensibility; for no reality accessible to the mind could be both "one" and "three." As Vladimir Lossky puts it: "the Incomprehensible reveals Himself in the very fact of His being incomprehensible, for His incomprehensibility is rooted in the fact that God is not only Nature but also Three Persons."23

The knowledge of God is therefore possible only inasmuch as He reveals Himself, inasmuch as the immanent Trinity manifests itself in the "economy" of salvation, and inasmuch as the transcendent acts on the immanent level. It is in the fundamental oneness of these "acts" or "energies" of God that the Greek Fathers, particularly Basil and Gregory of Nyssa, discover the decisive and existential sign of the unity of God¡¯s essence. Basil¡¯s well-known argument in favour of the divinity of the Spirit is that He has the same "energy" as the Father and the Son. Similarly, Gregory of Nyssa proves the essential unity of Father, Son, and Spirit from the unity of their operation.24 This argument also fitted into the context of the Cappadocians¡¯ polemics against Eunomius who affirmed the possibility of knowing God¡¯s essence; no knowledge concerning God they asserted was possible, except from His "energies." The "economic" Trinity revealed in God¡¯s action in the world is therefore the only possible basis for affirming that God is indeed, paradoxically and incomprehensibly, a transcendent and immanent Trinity. Gregory of Nyssa¡¯s doctrine of the "energies" is well described by G. L. Prestige:

In men..., in spite of the solidarity of the whole race, each individual acts separately, so that it is proper to regard them as many. This is not so... with God. The Father never acts independently of the Son, nor the Son of the Spirit. Divine action... always begins from the Father, proceeds through the Son, and is completed in the Holy Spirit; there is no such thing as a separate individual operation of any Person; the energy invariably passes through the three, though the effect is not three actions but one.25

In fact, the Aristotelian principle according to which each "nature" (physis) has an "energy" (energeia) ¡ª i.e., an existentially perceivable manifestation, ¡ª provides the terminological background for the patristic concept of "energy" (We find this terminology is used as well in Christology where Maximus the Confessor, for example, maintains that the two natures of Christ presuppose two "energies" or wills). However, significantly, the Aristotelian dyad, nature-energy, was not considered sufficient in itself when applied to God because in God¡¯s nature the decisive acting factor is hypostatic; hence, divine "energy" is not only unique but tri-hypostatic since the "energy" reflects the common life of the three Persons. The personal aspects of the divine subsistence do not disappear in the one "energy," and it is indeed the Trinitarian life of God which is communicated and participated in the "energy": through the "energy" therefore the divine hypostases appear in their co-inherence (pcrich¨­r¨¥sis):26 "I am in the Father and the Father in me" (Jn 14:11). Human persons though also one in nature and substance act disjointly and often in conflict with each other; in God however the pcrich¨­r¨¥sis expresses the perfect love, and, therefore, the perfect unity of "energy," of the three hypostases, without however any mingling or coalescence. The "energy," because it is always Trinitarian, is always an expression and a communication of love: "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you: abide in my love" (Jn 15:9).

It is probably in the context of the doctrine of the pcrich¨­r¨¥sis that one should understand a unique passage in Palamas, where he seems inspired by the Augustinian "psychological" image of the Trinity.27 Palamas writes, "This Spirit of the Word from on high is like the mysterious love of the Father toward the Word mysteriously begotten; it is that possessed by the Word, the beloved Son, toward the Father who begat Him; this the Son does insofar as He comes from the Father conjointly with this love, and this love rests naturally upon him."28 Since the whole approach to the Trinity in Palamas is different from Augustine¡¯s, it is certainly the result of the personalistic interpretation, which can be given to the "psychological" image being used here to suggest the Trinitarian mystery: love unites the three divine hypostases, and pours out, through their common divine "energy" or "action," upon those worthy to receive it.

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Originally posted by Starkman

Hey John,

Must be quick...must save brain!

I am not at all suggesting that Jesus is neither God nor or a person. By all means, He is both. What I am suggesting is a qualifyer for His personhood via the concept of begottenness (taking the position that Jesus is eternally begotten). That's all.

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Hebrews 1:3 Who being the brightness of [his] glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?

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Originally posted by Bobber


May I suggest that the theme of Jesus being begotten is quite a bit more easy to understand then some might think. We read about Jesus being the only begotten in John 3:16 but we need to keep in mind this was written after the resurrection. There is very little in the New Testament about this term but what there is I would say needs to define the term. We read in Hebrews the following,

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Hebrews 1:3 Who being the brightness of [his] glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?

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So hold it now....it talks about the day he was begotten...in the time of the beginning? No because Jesus always co-existed with God the Father....If we look at the above verse it reveals the time when he did it, when he had by himself purged our sins and sate down on down at the right hand on the majestcy on high....So why did Jesus have to be begotten? Because he took our place for sin and in so doing he came out of fellowship with God. "Father Father why have you forsaken me!" When Jesus rose from the dead however he became the first born from the dead....

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Because he took our place for sin and in so doing he came out of fellowship with God. "Father Father why have you forsaken me!" When Jesus rose from the dead however he became the first born from the dead....

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Bobber, you and I don't read that Hebrews verse entirely different. And at the end we agree!
"When Jesus rose from the dead however he became the first born from the dead." Yessiry Bob!

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But the "begotten" part that is in the Creed is "begotten not made," and in the liturgy that is as old is: "...birth in the flesh ... without father, begotten from the Father before the ages without mother..."

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Hebrews 1:3 Who being the brightness of [his] glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?

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Bobber, please explain to me how this verse necessarily is talking about "the day that Christ rose from the dead." I wonder whether you are reading into it. [PotOnWheel]

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Hebrews 1:3 Who being the brightness of [his] glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?

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Originally posted by Bobber

Well we see the time he's speaking of....when he purged our sins...and when he ascended on high.....then he received a more excellent name then they.

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Originally posted by Bobber

understand this is Jesus the man, the humanity, now arising as mans representive....

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and crowned him with glory and honor." Man is a little LOWER than the angels. That the Son would be HIGHER seems obvious. (Just a thought, eh? )

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Originally posted by Bobber

the High Priest of God in the Heavens.....then he from the standpoint of the ministry of High Priest received the great name....

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I agree there!

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Originally posted by Bobber

...as a resurrected man he is greater then the angels...he was greater as well before but representing man in our humanity he is as humanity greater then angels.....

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Agree.

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Originally posted by Bobber

...Again I will be to him a Father....what does he mean AGAIN? When according to God did he loose his sonship

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Being picky, it says "be to him" (act towards him), and NOT "be his Father. If one suggests a loss of Trinitiarian fellowship, then that is plain wrong.

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Originally posted by Bobber

......in a sense and only in a sense when he took upon himself our sin....he was separted from God the Father out of relationship with him

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He took upon his flesh in real experience (Personally, hypostatically) the consequences of our sin. But the RELATIONSHIP of Father and Son, of Son and Spirit, did not ever change!!!!!!

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Originally posted by Bobber

.......upon his resurrection he was begotten or brought back....I believe Hebrews 1 states all of this....

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So, you are saying that here "begotten" means restored to functioning human-to-God relationship.

If so, I can certainly accept and agree with that!!!


But that is a different "begotten" than in John 1. And I think it is also a different sense of "begotten not made" that the Creed uses.

I think that it is helpful to remember that at their time (of Nicea and such) the issue was things like "of similar substance" as the Father, or "like" God, or of the same substance/nature as the Father. And the difference in THOSE play out to be huge.


Thanks for the exchange, Bobber.

PoW

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I believe in one God, Father, Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible: And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God; begotten of the Father before all ages; Light from Light, True God from True God, begotten, not made, of One Essence with the Father, through Whom all things were made: Who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from Heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became Man: And was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried: And He rose on the third day according to the Scriptures: And ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father: And He is coming again with glory to judge the living and the dead; And His Kingdom will have no end:

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Examining John 1:18

A case in point is found in John 1:18. Here, the King James Text states, “No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.”

This key text wonderfully describes the special relationship between the Father and the Son. The Father, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, cannot be accessed apart from a mediator. The Son, who is “the only begotten Son”, comes to man in the veil of human flesh and reveals the Father to mankind.

Notice that Christ is entitled "the only begotten Son". This refers not to a begetting in time as found in other passages (Ps.2:7; Ac.13:33-34). Rather, this refers to the Son’s eternal relationship with the Father. The Son relates to the Father “as of the only begotten of the Father” (Jn.1:14).


www.learnthebible.org/Only%20Begotten%20Son.htm

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At the conclusion of the council, Emperor Justinian confessed his faith in the words of a hymn that is still sung today in the Divine Liturgy of most Eastern Orthodox churches. One translation of that hymn is:

O only-begotten Son and Word of God, who being immortal didst accept for our salvation to be made flesh of the Holy Mother of God and Ever-Virgin Mary; and without change became man; and was crucified, O Christ God, trampling down death by death; O thou who art one of the Holy Trinity, glorified with the Father and the Holy Spirit, save us!

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Originally posted by Bobber

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Hebrews 1:3 Who being the brightness of [his] glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?

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Well we see the time he's speaking of....when he purged our sins...and when he ascended on high.....then he received a more excellent name then they....the angels....understand this is Jesus the man, the humanity, now arising as mans representive....the High Priest of God in the Heavens.....then he from the standpoint of the ministry of High Priest received the great name....as a resurrected man he is greater then the angels...he was greater as well before but representing man in our humanity he is as humanity greater then angels.....Again I will be to him a Father....what does he mean AGAIN? When according to God did he loose his sonship....in a sense and only in a sense when he took upon himself our sin....he was separted from God the Father out of relationship with him....upon his resurrection he was begotten or brought back....I believe Hebrews 1 states all of this....

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Originally posted by jefscott

POW,

I'm just rejoining this thread and don't know all of what's been said, but isn't there at least 2 senses in which Christ was begotten of God - the conception of Mary and the ressurection? There may be a third at Christ's reception of the holy spirit - "This is my well beloved son, etc." There may be a 4th when He became the first-born of creation - it's rightful heir since through Him were all things created.

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• "conception of Mary" -- that's the incarnation. That's the "ever existing God appearing in the flesh. Becoming like us. But not ceasing to be God. (If you somehow think that the Son ceased being God, then we have no conversation.)


• "Christ's reception of the holy spirit" -- that, and you gotta read -- says "you are" and not "you became." It is pleasure shown, and listening ears edified. Not at all a change.