By Prince Evgeny Nikolaevich Trubetskoy
By asserting the limitless autonomy of subjective non secular expertise, Berdyaev assaults Fr. Florensky exactly for his aspiration to subordinate this expertise to some goal starting; in different phrases, for the truth that he invests within the perception a psychological content material impartial of the inside expertise of the individual. And reproaches Fr. Florensky as a result of he affirms exterior revelation and “calls for a transcription of non secular expertise by way of transcendent ontology.” From Berdyaev’s viewpoint, all that is rational scholasticism, which ought to be rejected. The subtle non secular psychology of Fr. Florensky “passes with him into scholastic theology; the dogma of the Trinity, as exterior and transcendent to mystical expertise, inevitably seems to be theological’. Theology all the time rests on the concept of exterior revelation, and is against mysticism as resting on the concept of inside revelation. Theology is transcendentalism, mysticism is immanentism.” In Berdyaev’s opinion, “scholasticism in disguise” is a candle. P. A. Florensky is “inevitable punishment for any admission of dogma to and in religious life, to and in mystical expertise”.[14]
The precept that N. A. Berdyaev opposes to Fr. Florensky, is absolute freedom – the “cognitive eros” that’s not restrained by dogma, nor by logic, nor by any goal rules in any respect; extra exactly: a boundless arbitrariness of subjective mysticism. As Berdyaev himself admits, the attribute function of his “new” non secular consciousness is his conviction that “at current the world is coming into an period of anthropological revelation, the tip of which should be taken upon by man himself, at his personal threat and worry; that divine revelation passes into and thru man and continues. That is coming into the age of non secular maturity”.[15]
For the reader who’s not less than considerably aware of the historical past of Christian and Protestant non secular sectarianism specifically, there may be hardly something very new and important on this “new” non secular consciousness. As a warning to Fr. Florensky, nonetheless, N.A. Berdyaev’s viewpoint retains some significance, which is why we have to dwell on it right here for a bit.
It’s apparent that this limitless freedom of the human particular person – “at his personal threat and worry” to find out the true revelation, means in apply a ultimate cancellation of the latter, an entire lack of any frequent non secular rules that bind individuals in a single. The place the criterion for the reality of revelation is just the subjective “non secular expertise” of the person, there are clearly as many conflicting revelations as there are individuals. Clearly, such a view is self-defeating. Within the eyes of Berdyaev, does his subjective revelation deserve any higher respect in comparison with this goal revelation of the Church in opposition to which he’s rebelling? Within the identify of what, on what grounds? In any case, Berdyaev’s references to his “intuitions” can not have an exterior authoritative that means for different individuals, and even for the one who skilled the “instinct”, there may be all the time a attainable doubt: was it an genuine revelation, a subjective hallucination or an apparition of Devil within the picture of the Angel of Mild. Those that deny, like Berdyaev, any goal criterion in faith, for him these doubts are unconditionally insoluble.
Thus, the weak spot of Berdyaev’s non secular viewpoint is greater than apparent for Fr. For Florensky, it could not be a severe hazard if he stood fully persistently and firmly on the viewpoint of the dogmatically determinable and particular goal revelation. Sadly, nonetheless, within the church views of Fr. Florensky noticed an inconsistency, because of which he was defenseless in opposition to Berdyaev’s objections, and the non secular subjectivism of the latter grew right into a severe hazard for him.
The supply of this hazard lies exactly within the aforementioned tendency of Fr. Florensky to alogism—in his fascination with that present modern development in non secular philosophy which proclaims the subjective expertise of particular person “non secular expertise,” unverified by thought, because the supreme criterion in faith. On this route, he makes a particularly important concession exactly at this level, the place non secular subjectivism ought to meet the strongest resistance from his aspect – within the instructing in regards to the Church – and exactly with this he provides Berdyaev the chance to carry a straightforward victory over him. As we’ve already seen, on the subject of Christological questions or the mutual relationship of the individuals of the Holy Trinity, Fr. Florensky insisted on the necessity for such “mathematically exact” dogmatic definitions that will exclude the potential of completely different non secular interpretations from the viewpoint of “particular person non secular expertise.” Regardless of the “experiences” of this expertise could also be, it doesn’t rely upon the discretion or “inspiration of the person” whether or not he’ll regard the Son of God as “one-person” or “sub-divine”, whether or not he’ll acknowledge in Him one or two natures, whether or not he’ll he believes or he won’t consider within the inseparability and non-fusion of those two natures.
Such must also be the viewpoint on the Church. Right here, too, a agency dogmatic definition is required, which might educate individuals to differentiate the true church from the false one and, on this sense, set some restrict earlier than subjective “dare.” Nevertheless, attributable to some unusual inconsistency, each time it involves the Church, Fr. Florensky is attacked by some worry of thought and he turns into an apologist for logical, and within the given case additionally dogmatic formlessness.
He finds that the Church, because the fullness of divine life, “can’t be laid within the slender grave of logical definition.” “Let,” he says, “neither I nor anybody else give you the chance, and definitely not succeed, to outline what ecclesiasticism is!” Let those that strive to do that problem one another and mutually deny the method of ecclesiasticism! This very indeterminacy of ecclesiasticity, its elusiveness for logical phrases, its ineffability, doesn’t all this show that ecclesiasticity is a particular life, a brand new life given to man, however, like all life, inaccessible to cause” (p. 5).
When Fr. Florensky speaks of dogmatic definitions regarding different mysteries, he isn’t misled by the paradox of the phrase “definition.” He is aware of properly that to “decide” dogmatically, this doesn’t imply to exhaust the non secular thriller by way of a reasoning method, to put it down and not using a residue in ideas. He isn’t disturbed by the appliance to those mysteries of ideas resembling “Being”, “essence”, “Individual”, “nature”, and so forth. sub., as a result of he properly understands that within the given case the ideas under no circumstances declare to be an exhaustive expression of what they denote, however solely play a essential function of limitations to thought, guarding a sure content material of religion in opposition to its attainable mixing with one thing unfaithful or impure. Why, then, on the subject of the Church, does he deny the necessity for these epithets, and assume it attainable to go away on this case the non secular feeling of the person with none extremely sanctified dogmatic, psychological assist?
In relation to the Church, he replaces this dogmatic criterion with an aesthetic one – in his thought, the one criterion for ecclesiasticity is magnificence. “Sure, there may be, he says, a particular religious magnificence, and it, elusive to dogmatic formulation, is on the identical time the one true solution to decide what’s Orthodox and what’s not.” Those that know this magnificence are the religious elders, the masters of the “artwork of artwork”, because the holy fathers name asceticism. Non secular elders have, so to talk, “acquired a ability” in recognizing the goodness of the religious life. Orthodox style, Orthodox look are felt, however not topic to arithmetical calculation; Orthodoxy is proven, not confirmed. That’s the reason for everybody who desires to know Orthodoxy, there is just one means: the direct expertise of Orthodoxy”.
And proper right here the query arises: the place is it, this quick expertise, and the way do every of us, imperfect and sinful people, distinguish it from non-immediate expertise? Since solely Christ is with out sin, even the expertise of the best of saints can’t be acknowledged as infallible. And, lastly, the place are these holy elders of the “orthodox style” whom I ought to belief – in our church, within the Roman church, or with the schismatics, and through which sect? If they’re exactly right here, in Orthodoxy, isn’t there a vicious circle right here: will we solely know from the “specialists” and the “outdated males” the place the true Orthodoxy is! If we begin to test the expertise of those “specialists” from our personal imperfect expertise, we’ll in all probability by no means know with certainty the place this true “Orthodox style” is: whether or not among the many Previous Believers, whether or not among the many Imyaslavtsev, or among the many Roman Catholics, or within the Holy Synod? The aesthetic criterion is unable to present us something however an infinite variety of conflicting solutions. Alternatively, he provides N. A. Berdyaev the chance to put Fr. A Florentine query to which the latter can not give the least passable reply.
“If ecclesiastical life is life within the Spirit, and if the criterion for an accurate church life is Magnificence, then why then Jacob Böhme, for instance, isn’t in ecclesiastical life, why did he not reside within the Spirit? In keeping with the exterior, formal standards for ecclesiasticism, Böhme was a Lutheran and a heretic-gnostic – within the judgment of the official Roman Catholic and Orthodox consciousness; in line with the standards of Spirit and Magnificence, nonetheless, he was an authentically ecclesiastical Christian. Why, in line with the inner standards of the Spirit and Magnificence, from the church ought to be excommunicated and acknowledged as heretics the various mystics, individuals of the righteous life, of the genuine life within the Spirit and Magnificence, who don’t match into the exterior, formal, official standards?”. [16] ] And so, N. A. Berdyaev accuses Fr. Florensky in inside contradiction.
“The church doesn’t have any exterior, formal indicators and standards, it’s a life within the Spirit and in Magnificence. That is the one thesis of a candle. Florensky. His different thesis, which he makes use of all through his guide, feels like this: solely that life in Spirit and Magnificence is religiously permissible, right, justified, which is ecclesiastic in line with the formal, exterior standards of ecclesiasticity. Every little thing non-Orthodox within the literal, non secular and exterior formal sense of the phrase is suspicious, unhealthy, all it is a allure and even fornication”.[17]
Right here the considered Fr. Florensky is subjected to a sure stylization, however actually in his guide there are fluctuations between two diametrically opposed standards for churchness: subjective, aesthetic, handed to him from the “new” non secular consciousness, and goal, which was given by the Church itself. I absolutely agree with the proposal to choose between one and the opposite, and I feel that the aesthetic criterion, as decidedly incompatible with the “orthodox theodicy” of Fr. Florensky, ought to be supplied solely and completely because the property of N. A. Berdyaev. Among the many duties of the Orthodox theologian is to obviously understand and precisely formulate this goal criterion for ecclesiality, which might allow us to navigate the unsure, contradictory indications of particular person “non secular expertise” and style. In any other case, we threat dropping the very consciousness of the unity of the Church. The inevitable logical finish to which the criterion of “orthodox style” leads is a lack of common consciousness and an anarchy of particular person experiences, within the place of ecclesiastical harmony. The indicators of this incipient anarchy are current in Berdyaev’s “dares”; sadly for him Fr. Florensky doesn’t combat again strongly sufficient; in a few of its positions, a collision between particular person style and the target rules and norms through which the Church itself expresses its understanding of ecclesiality may also be traced.
Take, for instance, the angle of Fr. Florensky to Roman Catholicism: following the Slavophiles on this respect, he denied the very existence of religious life, and subsequently of ecclesiasticism, amongst Roman Catholics. “The place there is no such thing as a religious life, one thing exterior is required, resembling the availability of ecclesiasticism. A given place, the pope or a given totality, a system of positions, the hierarchy – right here is the criterion for ecclesiasticity of the Roman Catholic” (p. 6). Such is the evaluation of Roman Catholicism from the viewpoint of the outdated Slavophiles, to whose teachings Fr. Florensky (p. 608). In the meantime, it’s not troublesome to persuade ourselves that this Slavophile “style” is in full contradiction with the common custom of our church. The Orthodox Church acknowledges the fact of all Roman Catholic sacraments – from Baptism to Ordination. Which in flip implies that, considering the clear inadmissibility of the blasphemous thought that ecclesiastical sacraments will be carried out exterior the Church, our church thereby acknowledges the Roman Church as a church. Here’s a graphic illustration of the hole that may exist in particular person circumstances between the target ecclesiastical understanding of the Church and the person style of people, even when they have been essentially the most pious Orthodox.
For Fr. It could not have been significantly troublesome for Florensky to keep away from this collision with ecclesiastical custom, if in his instructing in regards to the Church he adopted the identical technique which he utilized with success in different areas of non secular instructing. The chapter “About Sophia”, for instance, in his guide is an excellent try to appreciate and consolidate in ideas this understanding of “Sophia – the Knowledge of God”, which was really expressed within the lifetime of the Church, particularly in its worship and in her icon portray. Right here he isn’t afraid to rationalize church expertise, however for some cause, on the subject of the Church, his viewpoint radically adjustments – right here for him “idea” means the tip of religious life!
In the meantime, the understanding of ecclesiality, which has been expressed in the entire lifetime of our church, in its sacraments, in its worship and in its relation to different church buildings and non secular societies, will be logicized, that’s, it may be realized and expressed in ideas, throughout the identical limits and to the identical extent as her understanding of “Sophia” and different non secular mysteries. After all, these ideas can not exhaust the fullness of the religious lifetime of the Church, however in them we discover agency rules for distinguishing and separating the ecclesiastical from the non-ecclesiastical. The principle, goal criterion by which the Church acknowledges one from the opposite has already discovered its expression when St. Ap. Peter confessed Christ: “Son of the Dwelling God.” Which, in line with the Savior, turns into the inspiration stone of the Church (Matt. 16:15-18). As within the phrases of St. Ap. John, who teaches us to differentiate the Spirit of God from the spirit of deception (1 John 4:2-3). This criterion is the precise, actual incarnation of God: the manifestation of Christ, the Son of God, who got here within the flesh. This criterion, in fact, is expressed not within the letter, however within the that means of the sacred texts. It’s the incarnation of God taken in its common that means of content material and that means of all of the lifetime of mankind and creation. Not one thing else, however a social incarnation of the God-man Christ, His common physique desires to be the Church itself: the place this steady lively God-incarnation is current, there she is, and outdoors of it she is nothing. Right here we’re given, as in a grain, the entire instructing of the Church about herself; right here can be the explanation for the inclusion in it of all these human communities through which the thriller of the incarnation is continually at work; and right here once more is the explanation for excluding from all of it these societies which don’t acknowledge this secret or for another causes don’t possess it!
Intently associated to that is the formal signal by which the Church distinguishes itself from all different purely human organizations. By the sacraments, the Incarnation of God takes place constantly within the Church, and the authority to carry out the sacraments belongs solely to the apostles and their successors, who’re ordained by them, and subsequently solely this Church will be the atmosphere of the particular Incarnation of God, to be the physique of Christ, which has apostolic succession. On this means, the assertion of Fr. Florensky, that the idea of the Church is sort of indefinable. This idea is outlined dogmatically by the Church itself, which within the Creed itself calls itself “conciliar and apostolic”; The church, subsequently, defines itself by way of clear logical phrases, enabling in plenty of circumstances to precisely distinguish the ecclesiastical from the non-ecclesiastical. And these definitions, these exterior formal indicators, though they don’t exhaust and don’t faux to exhaust the important content material of the Church, they essentially logically derive from this content material, type along with it an inseparable entire. The incarnation of God, the humanity of God, the deification of males, the sacraments, the hierarchs-mystagogues, these human mediators within the divine-human thriller that takes place within the Church – all these are completely different expressions of the identical that means, models of an inseparable important and, on the identical time, logical system. As a result of the logical and the important within the Church are one and the identical. From right here additionally it is clear how groundless the worry of Fr. Florenski to outline the Church in ideas: each congregationalism, apostleship, and succession are all ideas not solely definable, but in addition strictly outlined. Anybody who is aware of the teachings of the Church can precisely convey their that means, and the Church, which is aware of nothing in regards to the “aesthetic” criterion of Fr. Florensky, isn’t afraid to precise his important essence in them. If we’re informed that the dogmatic definitions which the Church provides to herself are incomplete and imperfect, that many questions regarding the Church stay unanswered in them, for instance, the query of the grounds and limits of the dogmatic authority of council decrees, then this won’t be an objection in opposition to what has been mentioned right here, however a sign of the necessity for brand new dogmatic definitions and, subsequently, for brand new duties earlier than ecclesiastical thought. To level out the incompleteness of the present definition doesn’t imply to disclaim its existence, however to hunt its completion. In any case, the demand for a definition of ecclesiality by way of phrase and thought means ecclesiality to be affirmed, not erred to. After the Logos, having change into flesh, Himself expressed Himself in human language, after He united with human speech and thought, by this actual fact He already sanctified each the one and the opposite. And useless worry of thought should be deserted. This alogism, which denies the embodiment of the Phrase of God in human speech and human thought, thereby commits a sin in opposition to the thriller of the Incarnation. That’s the reason it, like many different delusions, should be minimize off within the identify of the criterion of the Incarnation.
It’s particularly necessary for us to ascertain right here that this criterion by which the Christian is acknowledged from the non-Christian, the ecclesiastical from the non-ecclesiastical, isn’t transcendental, however immanent in thought, i.e., in it we’ve not solely a residing but in addition a logical criterion. In any case human nature is deified within the Church, this deification can be skilled by thought itself: with out ceasing to be human, thought turns into deified. And subsequently, even on this act of deification, no violation of her legal guidelines, i.e., of logical legal guidelines, is required of her: the superhuman, the divine, which she is named to precise, is a crowning, not an abrogation, of the logical.
Logic is exactly one of many attribute distinguishing options of the church’s understanding of faith as a brand new non secular consciousness. In the meantime, whereas Berdyaev teaches us to understand the “instinct” of non secular expertise with none psychological examination and consideration, the criterion of St. Ap. John, by whom the Church is guided, subordinates all of the “revelations” of subjective expertise to the judgment of discursive thought: “Beloved, don’t consider each spirit, however check the spirits to see whether or not they’re from God, as a result of many false prophets have appeared on the earth” (1 John 4:1).
The that means of those phrases is clearest of all: each spirit, each international and our personal, is to be subjected to a psychological check in the best way of evaluating its testimony with the looks of Christ come within the flesh. To do that is to not be happy with the proof of “orthodox style”, however to topic this proof to essentially the most extreme criticism: all that, after examination, seems to be in clear and irreconcilable contradiction with the thriller of the Incarnation, should be with the very this and rejected. The criterion of St. Ap. John accommodates in himself the explicit demand that the divine humanity ought to be the start of a logical connection of all our ideas about religion. And within the achievement of this requirement is concluded this psychological foretaste of the Tabor mild, which can be the best activity earlier than the human thoughts.
I might finish with this, however in conclusion I want to repeat as soon as once more that my criticism comes from a constructive and deeply sympathetic angle in the direction of the guide of Fr. Florensky: the that means of this criticism of mine is diminished to the want that he would assume by way of the deep thought that lies on the foundation of his guide. Really, the Mild of Tabor isn’t a fleeting phenomenon, however an everlasting actuality through which all our earthly sins, sufferings and contradictions discover therapeutic; and it shines not solely within the different aspect of the universe, but in addition “enlightens each man that cometh into the world” (John 1:9). And that’s the reason even right here, on this life, this common transformation begins, which is able to finish and change into evident sooner or later resurrection of each creature. Even right here, on the prayer of the apostles, Christ got here down from the mountain and manifested the therapeutic of the raging life. This Tabor mild coming down from above brings with it not solely bodily therapeutic, but in addition religious therapeutic: the entire composition of man should restore its misplaced wholeness in it: the spirit, the physique, the center, and the thoughts. With all his nature, man should take part on this ascent of the mountain, and subsequently additionally together with his thought – doesn’t our thought share the frequent lot of this sinful life, which periodically rages “and suffers badly, as a result of it usually falls into fireplace and infrequently into water” (Matt. 17:15). It was solely due to their unbelief that the apostles couldn’t heal these contradictions in life. In the identical means, it is just due to our unbelief that these contradictions of thought stay unhealed, that are expressed in its manifold leaps and wanderings.
Full religion, rising above doubt, should herald that common therapeutic, which is expressed not solely within the transformation of the center and within the spiritualization of the flesh, but in addition within the enlightenment of the thoughts. This revelation of the holy ascetics of our church concludes the achievement of the expectations of Russian non secular thought. In it and Fr. Florensky has discovered his Pillar and Assist of Fact. Allow us to want him to proceed to construct on this basis, which is so properly and firmly laid.
Supply in Russian: Trubetskoy, E. N. “Svet Favorsky and the transformation of the thoughts” – In: Russkaya mysl, 5, 1914, pp. 25-54; the premise of the textual content is a report learn by the writer earlier than a gathering of the Russian Spiritual and Philosophical Society on February 26, 1914.
Notes:
[14] Berdyaev, N. A. “Stylized Orthodoxy” – In: Russkaya mysl, January/ Бердяев, Н. А. „Стилизованное православие“ – В: Русская мысль, Январь, 1914, p. 114.
[15] Ibid., p. 121.
[16] Ibid., p. 117.
[17] Ibid.
