"Протоиерей Иоанн Мейендорф. Byzantine Theology " - читать интересную книгу автора

Gregory of Nyssa.8
Thus, as most historians of Byzantine theology should admit, the
problem of the relationship between philosophy and the facts of Christian
experience remains at the centre of the theological thought of Byzantium,
and no safe and permanent balance between them has ever been found. But is
really such a balance possible if "this world" and its "wisdom" are really
in permanent tension with the realities of the kingdom of God?

The Problem of Origenism.

Recent research has cast a completely new light on the history of
Origenism in the fifth and sixth centuries. The publication of the works of
Evagrius Ponticus has in particular clarified the issues, which divided
rival monastic parties in Egypt, in Palestine, and in other areas of Eastern
Christendom.
While the Trinitarian problematics of Origen served as one of the
starting points for the Arian controversies of the fourth century, his views
on creation, the Fall, man, and God-man relations fascinated the first Greek
intellectuals to the point of inducing them to join the monastic movement.
In his system, monastic asceticism and spirituality find a justification,
but contradict the basic presuppositions of Biblical Christianity. As a
result, Origen and his disciple Evagrius were condemned in 400 by Theophilus
of Alexandria and in 553 at Constantinople II. But even these condemnations
did not preclude the lasting influence of their systems, which served as
background for the integrated Christian philosophy of Maximus the Confessor.
Origenism thus remained at the centre of the theological thought of
post-Chalcedonian Eastern Christianity, and its influence on spirituality
and theological terminology did not end with the condemnation of the
Origenistic system in 553 but continued at least until the iconoclastic
crisis of the eighth century.
Origen was undoubtedly the most successful of the early apologists of
Christianity. His system made the Christian religion acceptable to
Neo-Platonists, but the acceptance of Christianity on Origenistic terms does
not necessarily imply the rejection of the basic Neo-Platonic concepts of
God and of the world. If the Cappadocian Fathers, for example, after reading
Origen in their student years, were finally led to orthodox Christianity,
others, such as their friend and contemporary Evagrius Ponticus, developed
Origenism in a quite different direction.
In his famous De principiis, Origen first postulates creation as an
eternal act of God. God has always been the all-powerful Creator, and "we
cannot even call God almighty if there are none over whom He can exercise
His power." But since Origen is very careful to refute the Aristotelian
doctrine of the eternity of matter, he maintains that the ever-existing
created world is a world of "intellects," not of matter. The basic
Platonizing spiritualism implied here will always appeal to monastic circles
looking for a metaphysical justification of asceticism. The next step in
Origen's thought is to consider that the "intellectual" world, which
includes "all rational natures - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
the Angels, the Powers, the Dominions, and other Virtues as well as man
himself in the dignity of his soul - are one unique substance."10 A later