Orthodoxy

Now that I've read Naming Infinity (which I mean to blog a bit more about, but I've been busy) I thought I'd dabble a little bit in Pavel Florensky's The Pillar and the Ground of the Truth, adapted from the very same thesis that Nikolai Luzin read on his journey to converting from atheism to Christianity.

The first letter of PGT, "To the Reader," contains some profound statements of what makes Orthodoxy different from Catholicism and Protestantism. Florensky introduces as a main topic this thing called ecclesiality--which he insists cannot be defined!

Ecclesiality--that is the name of the refuge where the heart's anxiety finds peace, where the pretensions of the rational mind are tamed, where great tranquility descends into our reason. Let it be the case that neither I nor anyone else can define what ecclesiality is!

After meditating on this for a little while, he briefly outlines what for him is the fundamental problem with both Catholicism and Protestantism:

Where there is no spiritual life, something external must exist as an assurance of ecclesiality. A specific function, the pope, or a system of functions, a hierarchy--that is the criterion of ecclesiality for Roman Catholics. On the other hand, a specific confessional formula, the creed, or a system of formulas, the text of the Scripture, is the criterion of ecclesiality for Protestants. In the final analysis, in both cases what is decisive is a concept.... But by becoming the supreme criterion, a concept makes all manifestation of life unnecessary.

And finally, he offers what he feels to be the strength of Orthodoxy:

The indefinability of Orthodox ecclesiality, I repeat, is the best proof of its vitality.... There is no concept of ecclesiality, but ecclesiality itself is, and for every living member of the Church, the life of the Church is the most definite and tangible thing that he knows. But the life of the Church is assimilated and known only through life--not in the abstract, not in a rational way.... What is ecclesiality? It is a new life, life in the Spirit. What is the criterion of the rightness of this life. Beauty. Yes, there is a special beauty of the spirit, and, ungraspable by logical formulas, it is at the same time the only true path to the definition of what is orthodox and what is not orthodox. [emphasis added]

...

That is why there is only one way to understand Orthodoxy: through direct Orthodox experience.... [O]ne can become a Catholic or a Protestant without experience life at all--by reading books in one's study. But to become Orthodox, it is necessary to immerse oneself all at once in the very element of Orthodoxy, to being living in an Orthodox way. There is no other way.

In short, my initial reaction is, "Wow."

It's no wonder so many people in the West are discovering Eastern Christian theology and finding it refreshing. To me, the emphasis on beauty as a genuine measure of orthodoxy is profound, and something in me tells me it's just what I'm looking for.

I wonder where Florensky will take me?