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Filioque clause
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Filioque, Latin for "and (from) the Son", was added in Western Christianity to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. This insertion emphasizes that Jesus, the Son, is of equal divinity with God, the Father, while the absence of it in Eastern Christianity emphasizes that the Father is the only one cause of the two other persons.
Et in Spiritum Sanctum, Dominum, et vivificantem: qui ex Patre Filioque procedit.
(And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son.)
The doctrine expressed by this phrase, as inserted into the Creed, is accepted by the Catholic Church, by Anglicanism and by Protestant churches in general.
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Filioque, Latin for "and (from) the Son", was added in Western Christianity to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. This insertion emphasizes that Jesus, the Son, is of equal divinity with God, the Father, while the absence of it in Eastern Christianity emphasizes that the Father is the only one cause of the two other persons.
Et in Spiritum Sanctum, Dominum, et vivificantem: qui ex Patre Filioque procedit.
(And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son.)
The doctrine expressed by this phrase, as inserted into the Creed, is accepted by the Catholic Church, by Anglicanism and by Protestant churches in general. Christians of these groups generally include it when reciting the Nicene Creed. Nonetheless, these groups recognize that Filioque is not part of the original text established at the First Council of Constantinople in 381 and they do not demand that others too should use it when saying the Creed. Indeed, the Roman Catholic Church does not add the phrase corresponding to Filioque (?a? t?? ????) to the Greek text of the Creed, even in the liturgy for Latin Rite Catholics. Pope John Paul II recited the Nicene Creed several times with patriarchs of the Eastern Orthodox Church in Greek according to the original text.
At the 879-880 Council of Constantinople the Eastern Orthodox Church anathematized the "Filioque" phrase, "as a novelty and augmentation of the Creed", and in their 1848 encyclical the Eastern Patriarchs spoke of it as a heresy. It was qualified as such by some of the Eastern Orthodox Church's saints, including Photios I of Constantinople, Mark of Ephesus, Gregory Palamas, who have been called the Three Pillars of Orthodoxy. On the other hand Saint Maximus the Confessor wrote in defence of the Roman use of the Filioque, maintaining that it was a legitimate variation of the doctrine that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son; and Metropolitan John Zizioulas has declared that a recent document of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity "constitutes an encouraging attempt to clarify the basic aspects of the Filioque problem and show that a rapprochement between West and East on this matter is eventually possible".
The Filioque became a point of contention between the Eastern and Western Churches in 867, when Patriarch Photios I of Constantinople declared it heretical. The controversy over the phrase contributed to the East-West Schism of 1054 and, despite agreements among participants at the Second Council of Lyon (1274) and the Council of Florence (1439), reunion has not been achieved. A Greek Orthodox theologian has pointed to the 1054 schism as the most striking example of how practice, rather than theological differences, causes schisms: "The local Churches coexisted for centuries with the 'Filioque' before Church events brought the problem to a head in the period of Photios the Great, but there was no schism, and in the 1054 period the 'Filioque' was dormant. It came back and was intensified after this to justify it and make it fixed."
History of the insertion in the Nicene Creed
Origin of the Nicene Creed
The First Council of Nicaea of 325 ended its Creed with the words "And in the Holy Spirit." In 381, the First Council of Constantinople added to this the words, "the Lord, the Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father …" This last phrase comes from .
"The acts of the Council of Constantinople were lost, but the text of its Creed was quoted and formally acknowledged as binding, along with the Creed of Nicaea, in the dogmatic statement of the Council of Chalcedon (451). Within less than a century, this Creed of 381 took on a normative role in the definition of the Christian faith, and by the early sixth century was even proclaimed in the Eucharist in Antioch, Constantinople, and other regions in the East. In regions of the Western churches, the Creed was also introduced into the Eucharist, perhaps beginning with the Third Council of Toledo in 589. It was not formally introduced into the Eucharistic liturgy at Rome, however, until the eleventh century."
Insertion of the Filioque
"No clear record exists of the process by which the word Filioque was inserted into the Nicene Creed in the Christian West before the sixth century. The idea that the Spirit came forth 'from the Father through the Son' is asserted by a number of earlier Latin theologians, as part of their insistence on the ordered unity of all three persons within the single divine Mystery (e.g., Tertullian, Adversus Praxean 4 and 5). Tertullian, writing at the beginning of the third century, emphasizes that Father, Son and Holy Spirit all share a single divine substance, quality and power (ibid. 2), which he conceives of as flowing forth from the Father and being transmitted by the Son to the Spirit (ibid. 8). Hilary of Poitiers, in the mid-fourth century, in the same work speaks of the Spirit as 'coming forth from the Father' and being 'sent by the Son' (De Trinitate 12.55); as being 'from the Father through the Son' (ibid. 12.56); and as 'having the Father and the Son as his source' (ibid. 2.29); in another passage, Hilary points to John 16.15 (where Jesus says: 'All things that the Father has are mine; therefore I said that [the Spirit] shall take from what is mine and declare it to you'), and wonders aloud whether 'to receive from the Son is the same thing as to proceed from the Father' (ibid. 8.20). Ambrose of Milan, writing in the 380s, openly asserts that the Spirit 'proceeds from (procedit a) the Father and the Son', without ever being separated from either (On the Holy Spirit 1.11.20). None of these writers, however, makes the Spirit’s mode of origin the object of special reflection; all are concerned, rather, to emphasize the equality of status of all three divine persons as God, and all acknowledge that the Father alone is the source of God’s eternal being."
The phrase Filioque first appears as an interpolation in the Creed at the Third Council of Toledo, at which Visigothic Spain renounced Arianism, accepting Catholic Christianity. The anti-Arian addition underlined the equality of the Son with the Father, denied by Arianism, which held that the Son is a creature, and that there was a "then" when the Son did not exist.
It has been argued that the Filioque was already used in the Nicene Creed before the Third Council of Toledo and that the Council was quoting what it believed to be the exact text. The use of Filioque was defended by Saint Paulinus II of Aquileia at the Synod of Friuli, Italy in 796, and it was endorsed in 809 at the Council of Aachen.
The Council of Aachen (809) was held because some Eastern monks protested to the Pope about the use of the phrase in a Western monastery in Jerusalem. Pope Leo III approved the doctrine yet opposed adding "Filioque" to the Creed. He had the Creed in its original form engraved on two silver tables, one in Greek, the other in Latin, and placed them at the tomb of Saint Peter, writing: "I, Leo, have placed these for love and protection of the orthodox faith".
However, the Filioque continued to be included in the Creed as sung generally throughout the West, though in Rome itself the Creed was only read, not sung, and did not include the interpolation. But in 1014, at the request of the German King Henry II who had come to Rome to be crowned Emperor, and was surprised at the different custom in force there, Pope Benedict VIII, who owed to Henry his restoration to the papal throne after usurpation by Antipope Gregory VI, had the Creed, with the addition of Filioque, sung at Mass in Rome for the first time.
Since then the Filioque phrase is included in the Creed as used throughout the Latin Rite, except where Greek is used in the liturgy. Eastern Catholic Churches such as the Maronites and those of Byzantine Rite, which are in full communion with the Holy See, have never used the Filioque.
The Roman Catholic Church fully recognizes that the original text of the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed does not include the Filioque and when quoting that text, as it did in the 6 August 2000 document, Dominus Iesus on the unicity and salvific universality of Jesus Christ and the Church, quotes it without that addition.
Conflict
According to John Meyendorff, the Western efforts to get Pope Leo III to approve the addition of Filioque to the Creed were due to a desire of Charlemagne, who in 800 had been crowned in Rome as Emperor, to find grounds for accusations of heresy against the East. The Pope's refusal to approve the interpolation avoided arousing a conflict between East and West about this matter.
The Photian controversy
However, controversy about the question broke out in the course of the disputes surrounding Photius of Constantinople. In 858, Patriarch Ignatius of Constantinople fell out of favour with Byzantine Emperor Michael III and was removed from his position. He was replaced by the layman Photius, a distinguished scholar, imperial secretary and ambassador to Baghdad. Ignatius was exiled to Terebinthos and resigned his position under pressure. Photius later even had a synod declare Ignatius's patriarchate invalid. Both Photius and Emperor Michael as well as the partisans of Ignatius appealed to Pope Nicholas I, who eventually in 863 deposed and excommunicated Photius and recognized Ignatius as the legitimate patriarch.
Photius, with the support of Emperor Michael, rejected the Pope's judgment. To rally the Eastern Churches to his course he issued an Encyclical to the Eastern Patriarchs denouncing the Latin Church for differences in customs and, most importantly for the Filioque, which he deemed heretical. This latter element, appearing for the first time, is of special importance, as it moved the issue from jurisdiction and custom to one of dogma. In 867, he assembled a synod excommunicating Pope Nicholas and condemning Latin "aberrations".
Photius's importance endured in regard to relations between East and West, as he was the first theologian to make the Filioque a contentious issue and to accuse Rome of heresy in the matter. He is recognized as a Saint by the Eastern Orthodox Church and his line of criticism has often been echoed later, making reconciliation between East and West difficult.
Theology
New Testament
While the phrase "who proceeds from the Father" is found in , no similar statement about the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Son is found in the New Testament. However, support for the idea that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son has been sought in several passages. In Jesus says of the Holy Spirit "he will take what is mine and declare it to you", and it is argued that in the relations between the Persons of the Trinity one Person cannot "take" or "receive" (???eta?) anything from either of the others except by way of procession. Other texts that have been used include , , , where the Holy Spirit is called "the Spirit of the Son", "the Spirit of Christ", "the Spirit of Jesus Christ", and texts in the Gospel of John on the sending of the Holy Spirit by Jesus ( , ).
speaks of God pouring out the Holy Spirit "through Jesus Christ our Saviour", while speaks of Jesus himself pouring out the Holy Spirit, having received the promise of the Holy Spirit from the Father.
The Eastern Orthodox interpretation is that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and is sent (on Pentecost day) from the Father through the Son (ex Patre per Filium procedit). The Latin West states that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son together (ex Patre Filioque procedit).
Church Fathers
All the Fathers, of both East and West, agree that the relationships of the Father with the Son and the Holy Spirit are distinct: the Son is "begotten" of the Father; the Holy Spirit "proceeds" (verbs ??p??e?es?a?, p?????a?, procedere) from the Father. Father, Son and Holy Spirit are one in essence but distinct in personhood.
Constantine Platis refers to three Greek Fathers as saying that the Holy Spirit proceeds (??p??e?es?a?) from the Father only: St. Dionysius the Areopagite, On the Divine Names 2:5: Blessed Theodoret, PG 76:432; St Gregory Palamas, A NT Decalogue 6.
The Greek Father Saint Cyril of Alexandria spoke of the Holy Spirit proceeding (p?????a? not ??p??e?es?a?) from Father and Son. In his struggle against Nestorianism, he spoke of the Holy Spirit as belonging to the Son (t? ?d??? t?? ????) and several times spoke of the Holy Spirit proceeding (p?????a?) from the Father "and the Son", alongside the phrase preferred in the East: "through the Son", the former indicating the equality of principle, the latter the order of origin. On the other hand, his Nestorian opponents Theodore of Mopsuestia and Theodoret denied that the Holy Spirit derives his existence from or through the Son.
The formula most used in the East in relation to the Son when speaking of the procession (??p??e?es?a?) of the Holy Spirit from the Father is through (d??) the Son. Platis gives as sources: St Dionysius the Great of Alexandria, Letter to Dionysius, Bishop of Rome 2:8-9; St Hilary of Poitiers, De Trinitate 12:57, 8:19-20, 2:1; St John of Damascus, Orthodox Faith 1:12.; St Tarasius of Constantinople, [Mansi, Sacrorum conciliorum 12:1122.]; and St Gregory of Sinai, On Commandments and Doctrines 27.
Already in the fourth century the distinction was made, in connection with the Trinity, between the two Greek verbs ??p??e?es?a? (the verb used in the original Greek text of the 381 Nicene Creed) and p?????a?. In his Oration on the Holy Lights (XXXIX), Saint Gregory of Nazianzus wrote: "The Holy Ghost is truly Spirit, coming forth (p?????a?) from the Father indeed, but not after the manner of the Son, for it is not by Generation but by Procession (??p??e?es?a?)". The original is "p????? µ?? ?? t?? ?at???, ??? ????? d?, ??d? ??? ?e???t??, ???' ??p??e?t??".
That the Holy Spirit "proceeds" from the Father and the Son in the sense of the Latin word procedere and the Greek p?????a? (as opposed to the Greek ??p??e?es?a?) was taught by the early fifth century by Saint Cyril of Alexandria in the East and even earlier by the fourth-century Western Fathers Ambrose, Augustine and Jerome, all of whom taught that the Spirit "proceeds" from the Father and the Son, though subordinate to neither. The Athanasian Creed, probably of the middle of the fifth century, and a dogmatic epistle of Pope Leo I. gives the same teaching,
Constantine Platis argues: "When the early Christian writers are not unanimous, it is best to remember the words of St. Vincent of Lerins, a Church Father who says that in the universal Church we should be very careful to teach only what 'has been believed everywhere, always, and by all' or at least by 'almost all' our holy ancestors and Fathers (Commonitory 2 [6]). The filioque was not taught 'always' (it was not taught before the 5th century); nor has it been taught 'everywhere' (it has been believed only in the Latin Church)"
On the other hand, the first record of denial of the teaching of Saint Cyril of Alexandria that the Holy Spirit "proceeds" (in the sense of the Greek p?????a? or the Latin procedere, not in the sense of p??e?es?a?) from the Father and the Son is of the start of the ninth century, when the first dispute about the matter arose: Easterners reacted against the use of the Latin form (with the verb procedere) by some Latin monks in Jerusalem who had visited the court of Charlemagne.
East-West controversy
As indicated above, the doctrine did not become a matter of controversy until Photius made it such in 864, affirming that it was contrary to the teaching of the Fathers and even suspecting that the relevant passages were interpolations. The opposition strengthened with the East-West Schism of 1054.
Two councils held to heal the break discussed the question.
The Second Council of Lyon (1274) accepted the profession of faith of Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos in the Holy Spirit, "proceeding from the Father and the Son" and the Greek participants, including Patriarch Joseph I of Constantinople sang the Creed three times with the Filioque addition. Though Emperor Michael had in 1261 succeeded in deposing the Roman Catholic Emperor Baldwin II of Constantinople established by force over the Orthodox, and winning back the city of Constantinople, which had been in the made into the Crusader state called the Latin Empire of the East, since the sack of Constantinople in 1204. Most Byzantine Christians feeling disgust and recovering from the Latin Crusaders' conquest and betrayal, refused to accept the agreement made at Lyon with the Latins. In 1282, Emperor Michael VIII died and Patriarch Joseph I's successor, John XI, who had become convinced that the teaching of the Greek Fathers was compatible with that of the Latins, was forced to resign, and was replaced by Gregory II, who was strongly of the opposite opinion.
Another attempt at reunion was made at the fifteenth-century Council of Florence, to which Emperor John VIII Palaiologos, Ecumenical Patriarch Joseph II of Constantinople, and other bishops from the East had gone in the hope of getting Western military aid against the looming Ottoman Empire. Thirteen public sessions held in Ferrara from 8 October to 13 December 1438 the Filioque question was debated without agreement. The Greeks held that any addition whatever, even if doctrinally correct, to the Creed had been forbidden by the Council of Ephesus, while the Latins claimed that this prohibition concerned meaning, not words.
In fact, what this third Ecumenical Council prohibited was:
The acts of the council of 431 contain the creed in its original 325 form, as adopted at Nicaea, without the additions made in 381 by the First Council of Constantinople, such as the clause "who proceeds from the Father", additions to the text established by the Holy Fathers in Nicaea, but accepted without question by both East and West.
When the Council moved to Florence in 1439, accord continued to be elusive, until the argument prevailed among the Greeks themselves that, though the Greek and the Latin saints expressed their faith differently, they were in agreement substantially, since saints cannot err in faith; and by 8 June the Greeks accepted the Latin statement of doctrine. On 10 June Patriarch Joseph II died. A statement on the Filioque question was included in the Laetentur Caeli decree of union, which was signed on 5 July 1439 and promulgated the next day, with Mark of Ephesus being the only bishop to refuse his signature.
The Eastern Church refused to consider the agreement reached at Florence binding, since the death of Joseph II had for the moment left it without a Patriarch of Constantinople. There was strong opposition to the agreement in the East, and when in 1453, 14 years after the agreement, the promised military aid from the West still had not arrived and Constantinople fell to the Turks, neither Eastern Christians nor their new rulers wished union between them and the West.
Differences in views
In the late sixth century, the Latin-speaking churches of Western Europe added the words "and the Son" (Filioque) to the description of the procession of the Holy Spirit, in what Easterners have argued is a violation of of the Third Ecumenical Council, since the words were not included in the text by either the Council of Nicaea or that of Constantinople.
If these words are associated with the Greek verb ??p??e?es?a? of the text adopted by the Council of Constantinople, it is held that they would be heretical, but not if associated with the Latin verb procedere, which corresponds instead to the Greek verb p?????a?, with which some of the Greek Fathers also associated the same words. In English and other languages that lack the Greek distinction between ??p??e?es?a? and p?????a?, both of which can be translated by "proceed", "and the Son" is often included in reciting the Creed. Due to this and as part of the North American Orthodox-Catholic Theological Consultation. Both Orthodox and Roman Catholics agreed that the Catholic Church, as a consequence of the normative and irrevocable dogmatic value of the Creed of 381, use the original Greek text alone in making translations of the Creed for catechetical and liturgical use. Doing so would mean the Creed would be without the filioque. As can be seen in the Greek Orthodox churches which do not when translating or reciting the Creed in their liturgy to English (for example) use any form or reference to the Christ in the section devoted to the Holy Spirit's procession within that section of the Creed.
"And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, and Giver of Life, Who proceeds from the Father,"
It has been noted that a good bit of the disagreement comes from the Greek ??p??e?es?a? (ekporeuesthai) and p?????a? (proienai/coming-forth). The distinction here is about the cause of the Holy Spirit. As is what is the Spirit's origin or cause. Which the East content is confused by the filioque
by using and translating both terms as Proceeds.
Patriarch of Constaninople Photius, in the East and the Patriarch of Rome John VIII (872-882) in the West, rejected the filioque both restoring communion to each others respective communities, but still disagreeing on this matter. Rome refused to capitulate to the Filioque under pressure from Charlemagne in the ninth century, when Pope Leo III of Rome (795-816), though it was he who crowned Charlemagne as Emperor, and though he affirmed the orthodoxy of the doctrine expressed by Filioque, opposed its adoption (not only in Rome, where the Creed was, in any case, said at Mass), in part because of his loyalty to the received tradition. He also knew that the Greeks resented the new Roman Empire in the West and Charlemagne in particular; the Pope wanted to preserve Church unity. Leo had the traditional text of the Creed, without the Filioque, displayed publicly, engraved on two silver tablets, at the tomb of St. Peter
Eastern theologians have objected to the teaching that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, saying that it conflicts with biblical and accepted doctrine: speaks only of a proceeding from the Father, and no ecumenical approval had been granted to the teaching. On the Western side, it is claimed that absence of a declaration by an Ecumenical Council is not denial of this teaching that safeguards, against Arianism, the doctrine of the First Council of Nicaea that the Son is consubstantial with the Father; that, since the Son as well as the Father sends the Spirit in , we are justified, by analogy with this relationship to us, in inferring that the Spirit proceeds from both Father and Son in the relationship within the Trinity; and that to deny this teaching is to divorce the Spirit from the Son in contradiction of the passages that speak of him as the Spirit of Christ, as and .
Eastern theologians have said that, the Latin church was at the Council of Nicaea 325, (and also the First Council of Constantinople 381 and the Council of Ephesus 431). That the East and West both agreed on the original wording of Creed, against the Arians then. Eastern theologians content that the Latin Church then later acted unilaterally, without council or consent with the East and added the filioque. Which is an alteration of the faith in such a way as to show that the Eastern Churches are not equal with the West but are rather subordinate to the Western Church. Subordinate to whatever alterations to the faith the Western Churches arrive upon and see as beneficial to it's own opinion.
Eastern theologians state for the Holy Spirit to proceed from the Father and the Son in the Creed, there would have to be two sources in the deity (double procession), whereas in the one God there can only be one source of divinity. Which in the case of the East, is the Father hypostasis of the Trinity, not God's essence per se. This very behaviour of groups defining doctrine and acting unilaterally within Christianity as a whole was supposed to addressed, resolved and condemned by calling of councils to begin with.
In the acts of the Council of Ephesus of 431 it is the original text of the Creed as established at Nicaea in 325 that appears, without the alterations made at the First Council of Constantinople of 381: the Creed used by the Council of Ephesus thus ends, as that of Nicaea, but not that of Constantinople, with "And in the Holy Ghost", and is followed, again as in the Creed of Nicaea, but not in that of Constantinople, by an anathema against "those that say, There was a time when he was not, and, before he was begotten he was not..." The Council of Ephesus declared that "it is unlawful for any man to bring forward, or to write, or to compose a different (?t??a?) Faith as a rival to that established by the holy Fathers assembled with the Holy Ghost in Nicæa". The differences between the original Nicene Creed, approved at Ephesus, and the now familiar Niceno-Constantinopolitan form (mostly additions, but with some omissions) include the addition of "who proceeds from the Father", and the omission of "God from God", which was preserved in the Latin text of the Creed ("Deum de Deo").
The original text of the Creed as established at Nicaea 325. It was then altered to a final agreed upon form at the Council of Ephesus 431, The Council of Ephesus then declared that "it is unlawful for any man to bring forward, or to write, or to compose a different (?t??a?) Faith as a rival to that established by the holy Fathers assembled with the Holy Ghost in Nicæa". The text of the Creed as now used in both East and West differs from that of Nicaea but the final agree text by both East and West from the Council of Ephesus is still used in the East. The East and West both accepted the changes of the Council of Ephesus(mostly additions, but with some omissions) made at the First Council of Constantinople 381, including the addition of "who proceeds from the Father". As East and West both where then at the Council of Constantinople and had agreed again as they had in the Council of Nicaea on the creed, where as no ecumenical council was held to make the addition of the filioque. This also implies that the Council of Ephesus 431 in making its statement was invalid as well in that the Creed as a declaration was at that point a resolved issue for East and West.
Eastern theologians have said that, for the Holy Spirit to proceed from the Father and the Son, there would have to be two sources in the deity, whereas in the one God there can only be one source of divinity. Western theologians counter by saying that, since both Greeks and Latins agree in attributing everything as common to the Father and the Son except the relation of Fatherhood and Sonship, the Spiration (breathing forth) of the Holy Spirit, which does not involve this relation, must also be common to both Father and Son.
The Roman Catholic Church has expressed this by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and Son as from a single principle or beginning: "We declare that the Holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son, not as from two beginnings, but from one beginning, not from two breathings but from one breathing."
The Western tradition does not see itself as merging and confusing the persons of the Father and the Son, as it has been accused of doing: it has always held that the Holy Spirit proceeds, in a principal, proper and immediate manner, from the Father, not the Son. Saint Augustine of Hippo admits that the Holy Spirit takes his origin from the Father "principaliter" (as principle).
The East contends that this understanding can not said to be seen in the reciting of the creed with filioque, as is done in Latin and therefore this clarification is made outside and after the use of the Creed. Where as the Nicene Creed as the proclaimation of faith is suppose to be the clarification of faith by and in itself.
The West further contends from their perspective, even if Filioque has been accused of making both Father and Son, but not the Holy Spirit, sources of deity, thus diminishing the Holy Spirit, it "must not lead to a subordination of the Holy Spirit in the Trinity. Even if the Catholic doctrine affirms that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son in the communication of their consubstantial communion, it nonetheless recognizes the reality of the original relationship of the Holy Spirit as person with the Father, a relationship that the Greek Fathers express by the term ??p??e?s??." Though in the East such a "diminishing" of the Holy Spirit was addressed as the heresy of the Macedonians, who denied the divinity of the Holy Spirit.
The West however does so outside of the Creed and appears then, in the eyes of Eastern theologians, as wrong in it's clarification of the procession of the Holy Spirit. In the Western teaching that the life or origin of the Holy Spirit is derived from both the Father and Son. Since the wording or portion of the Creed in question is dealing with the origin of the Holy Spirit
or how the Holy Spirit has His existence not with what the Holy Spirit manifests as in the material world.
Although the Western teaching speaks of the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Persons of the Father and the Son, it has been accused of making the divine essence itself the source of deity in God, thereby suggesting a form of Semi-Sabellian that the Holy Spirit proceeds from himself, since he is certainly not separate from the divine essence. The Western response is that the origin of the Holy Spirit is similar to that of the Son, whom the original text of the Nicene Creed as established in the First Council of Nicaea declares to be "begotten from the Father, only-begotten, that is, from the essence of the Father" (?e??????ta ?? t?? pat??? µ????e??, t??t?st?? ?? t?? ??s?a? t?? pat???), without thereby implying that the Son is self-begotten.
In the East however the filioque has never been accepted or used. This also includes Eastern Christian churches that did not remain in communion with the Greeks or Rome, including the Oriental Orthodox and the Assyrian Church of the East, which broke from communion with the Byzantine and Roman Churches after the fourth and third ecumenical councils respectively. The Armenian Apostolic Church, which is part of Oriental Orthodoxy and not the Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox communion, uses a version of the Nicene Creed that makes no mention of the procession of the Holy Spirit, either from the Father or from the Father and the Son. The use and defense of the filioque has been condemned by Eastern Orthodox theologians.
The heart of the conflict from the Eastern perspective is that the Eastern Orthodox detect modalism, specifically the Sabellian heresy of modalism (see Photius) in the West's over all approach and teaching of the Trinitarian God. This by first, the use of the word person by the Latin West in its translation of the Greek work hypostasis which is sometimes translated as existence or reality.. Then the Latin East unilaterally inserting the filioque into the Universal declaration of faith or Nicene Creed. Both causing open conflict when the Latin Church attacked the East's rejection of this as heretical and in its continued treatment of the issue, after being confronted for adding to the Nicene Creed the "filioque", which appears to the Eastern Orthodox as further solidifying a modalistic teaching of the Trinitarian God.
Saint Maximus the Confessor wrote in defense of the Roman use of the Filioque, maintaining that it was a legitimate variation of the doctrine that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son. Orthodox theologians insist that Maximus' use and definition are different than what was established by the West. What Maximus wrote was as follows:
From Maximus and John Damascene the East draws the conclusion that the Holy Spirit derives it's existence and being from God the Father alone as it feels was originally expressed in the Final version of the Creed accepted by East and West. However if the Roman Catholic church changed it's addition to say "through the Son" rather then "from the Son" then such a compromise by the West would then clarify inside the Creed the true nature and sovereignty of each hypostases of God.
Recent discussion
In 1995 the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity published in various languages a study on The Greek and the Latin Traditions regarding the Procession of the Holy Spirit.
It pointed out, in particular, that the Latin verb procedere (to proceed), used in the Latin version of the Nicene Creed, has a broader meaning than the verb ??p??e?es?a?, which is used in the Greek text. It quoted Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, who used the Greek word to distinguish the Spirit's form of coming from the Father from that of the Son from the Father, for both forms of which he used the Greek verb p?????a?, ??????a? was the word used by Greek Fathers of Alexandria when saying, as Saint Cyril of Alexandria did: "Since the Holy Spirit makes us like God when he has come to be in us, and since he also proceeds (p??e?s?) from the Father and the Son, it is clear that he is of the divine substance, proceeding (p?????) substantially (??s??d??) in it and from it"
Latin does not have two words, one of which corresponds to the precise meaning of ??p??e?s?a? and the other to the broader meaning of p?????a?. Procedere is used for both these Greek verbs.
In this view, to say that the Holy Spirit proceeds (in the sense of the Greek word "??p??e??µe???") from the Father and the Son can be considered heretical; but to say the same, giving to the word "proceeds" the meaning of the Latin word "procedere" (or of the Greek "p?????a?"), is not heretical.
The difficulty or near impossibility of finding in another language words that will reproduce with complete accuracy certain words of another language was remarked on by Saint Maximus the Confessor in the seventh century precisely with regard to the Filioque expression. Of the Latins he wrote: "It is true, of course, that they cannot reproduce their idea in a language and in words that are foreign to them as they can in their mother-tongue, just as we too cannot do."
Metropolitan John Zizioulas of Pergamon concluded his examination of the Pontifical Council's study by saying: "The Vatican document on the procession of the Holy Spirit constitutes an encouraging attempt to clarify the basic aspects of the Filioque problem and show that a rapprochement between West and East on this matter is eventually possible. An examination of this problem in depth within the framework of a constructive theological dialogue can be greatly helped by this document."
Even before the publication of the Pontifical Council's study, several Orthodox theologians had considered the Filioque anew, with a view to reconciliation of East and West. Theodore Stylianopoulos provided in 1986 an extensive, scholarly overview of the contemporary discussion. Twenty years after writing the first (1975) edition of his book, The Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia said that he had changed his mind and had concluded that "the problem is more in the area of semantics and different emphases than in any basic doctrinal differences": "the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father alone" and "the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son" may both have orthodox meanings if the words translated "proceeds" actually have different meanings. For some Orthodox, then, the Filioque, while still a matter of conflict, would not impede full communion of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches if other issues were resolved. But many Orthodox consider that the Filioque is in flagrant contravention of the words of Christ in the Gospel,. has been specifically condemned by the Orthodox Church, and remains a fundamental heretical teaching which divides East and West.
Eastern Christians also object that, even if the teaching of the Filioque can be defended, its interpolation into the Creed is anti-canonical.. The Roman Catholic Church, which like the Eastern Orthodox Church considers the teaching of the Ecumenical Councils to be infallible, "acknowledges the conciliar, ecumenical, normative and irrevocable value, as expression of the one common faith of the Church and of all Christians, of the Symbol professed in Greek at Constantinople in 381 by the Second Ecumenical Council. No profession of faith peculiar to a particular liturgical tradition can contradict this expression of the faith taught and professed by the undivided Church", but considers permissible additions that elucidate the teaching without in any way contradicting it, and that do not claim to have, on the basis of their insertion, the same authority that belongs to the original. It allows liturgical use of the Apostles' Creed as well of the Nicene Creed, and sees no essential difference between the recitation in the liturgy of a creed with orthodox additions and a profession of faith outside the liturgy such that of the Patriarch of Constantinople Saint Tarasius, who developed the Nicene Creed as follows: "the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father through the Son".
The Roman Catholic view that the Greek and the Latin expressions of faith in this regard are not contradictory but complementary has been expressed as follows:
- At the outset the Eastern tradition expresses the Father's character as first origin of the Spirit. By confessing the Spirit as he "who proceeds from the Father", it affirms that he comes from the Father through the Son. The Western tradition expresses first the consubstantial communion between Father and Son, by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (Filioque). … This legitimate complementarity, provided it does not become rigid, does not affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed.
For this reason, the Roman Catholic Church has refused the addition of ?a? t?? ???? to the formula ?? t?? ?at??? ??p??e??µe??? of the Nicene Creed in the Churches, even of Latin rite, which use it in Greek.
Where as the Orthodox have pointed out that even though the Roman Catholic church has down played the use of the Filioque when the Creed is recited in Greek. The Roman Catholic church has insisted none the less that the Eastern Catholic churches accept the Filioque as correct and dogmatic. According to Roman Catholic canons the Filioque has to be accepted by the Eastern Catholic churches. Even though the Eastern Catholic churches may not recite the creed in Greek and use the Filioque they do have to accept the Filioque as correct. As such they maybe called to recite the Creed and include the Filioque in order to show their fidelity with the West.
Joint statement in the United States in 2003
The Filioque was the main subject discussed at the 62nd meeting of the North American Orthodox-Catholic Theological Consultation, in June 2002. In October 2003, the Consultation issued an agreed statement, The Filioque: A Church-Dividing Issue?, which provides an extensive review of Scripture, history, and theology. The recommendations include:
- That all involved in such dialogue expressly recognize the limitations of our ability to make definitive assertions about the inner life of God.
- That, in the future, because of the progress in mutual understanding that has come about in recent decades, Orthodox and Catholics refrain from labeling as heretical the traditions of the other side on the subject of the procession of the Holy Spirit.
- That Orthodox and Catholic theologians distinguish more clearly between the divinity and hypostatic identity of the Holy Spirit (which is a received dogma of our Churches) and the manner of the Spirit's origin, which still awaits full and final ecumenical resolution.
- That those engaged in dialogue on this issue distinguish, as far as possible, the theological issues of the origin of the Holy Spirit from the ecclesiological issues of primacy and doctrinal authority in the Church, even as we pursue both questions seriously, together.
- That the theological dialogue between our Churches also give careful consideration to the status of later councils held in both our Churches after those seven generally received as ecumenical.
- That the Catholic Church, as a consequence of the normative and irrevocable dogmatic value of the Creed of 381, use the original Greek text alone in making translations of that Creed for catechetical and liturgical use.
- That the Catholic Church, following a growing theological consensus, and in particular the statements made by Pope Paul VI, declare that the condemnation made at the Second Council of Lyons (1274) of those "who presume to deny that the Holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son" is no longer applicable.
In the judgment of the consultation, the question of the Filioque is no longer a "Church-dividing" issue, one which would impede full reconciliation and full communion. It is for the bishops of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches to review this work and to make whatever decisions would be appropriate.
Summary
The Filioque was originally proposed to stress more clearly the connection between the Son and the Spirit, amid a heresy in which the Son was taken as less than the Father because he does not serve as a source of the Holy Spirit. When the Filioque came into use in Spain and Gaul in the West, the local churches were not aware that their language of procession would not translate well back into the Greek. Conversely, from Photius to the Council of Florence, the Greek Fathers were also not acquainted with the linguistic issues.
The origins of the Filioque in the West are found in the writings of certain Church Fathers in the West and especially in the anti-Arian situation of seventh-century Spain. In this context, the Filioque was a means to affirm the full divinity of both the Spirit and the Son. It is not just a question of establishing a connection with the Father and his divinity; it is a question of reinforcing the profession of Catholic faith in the fact that both the Son and Spirit share the fullness of God's nature.
Ironically, a similar anti-Arian emphasis also strongly influenced the development of the liturgy in the East, for example, in promoting prayer to "Christ Our God", an expression which also came to find a place in the West. In this case, a common adversary, namely, Arianism, had profound, far-reaching effects, in the orthodox reaction in both East and West.
Church politics, authority conflicts, ethnic hostility, linguistic misunderstanding, personal rivalry, and secular motives all combined in various ways to divide East and West.
As regards the doctrine expressed by the phrase in Latin (in which the word "procedit" that is linked with "Filioque" does not have exactly the same meaning and overtones as the word used in Greek), any declaration by the West that it is heretical (something that not all Orthodox now insist on) would conflict with the Western doctrine of the infallibility of the Church, since it has been upheld by Councils recognized by the Roman Catholic Church as ecumenical and by even those Popes who, like Leo III, opposed insertion of the word into the Creed.
Bibliography
Much has been written on the Filioque; what follows is selective. As time goes on, this list will inevitably have to be updated.
- "Filioque", article in the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church Oxford University Press, 2005, p. 614.
- David Bradshaw. Aristotle East and West: Metaphysics and the Division of Christendom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 214–220.
- Joseph P. Farrell. . Bound edition 1997. Electronic edition 2008.
- John St. H. Gibaut, "The
Cursus Honorum and the Western Case Against Photius", Logos 37 (1996), 35–73.Elizabeth Teresa Groppe. Yves Congar's Theology of the Holy Spirit. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. See esp. pp. 75–79, for a summary of Congar's work on the Filioque. Congar is widely considered the most important Roman Catholic ecclesiologist of the twentieth century. He was influential in the composition of several Vatican II documents. Most important of all, he was instrumental in the association in the West of pneumatology and ecclesiology, a new development.Richard Haugh. Photius and the Carolingians: The Trinitarian Controversy. Belmont, MA: Nordland Publishing Company, 1975.Joseph Jungmann, S.J. Pastoral Liturgy. London: Challoner, 1962. See "Christ our God", pp. 38–48.James Likoudis. Ending the Byzantine Greek Schism. New Rochelle, New York: 1992. An apologetic response to polemical attacks. A useful book for its inclusion of important texts and documents; see especially citations and works by Thomas Aquinas, O.P., Demetrios Kydones, Nikos A. Nissiotis, and Alexis Stawrowsky. The select bibliography is excellent. The author demonstrates that the Filioque dispute is only understood as part of a dispute over papal primacy and cannot be dealt with apart from ecclesiology.Bruce D. Marshall, "'Ex Occidente Lux?' Aquinas and Eastern Orthodox Theology", Modern Theology 20:1 (January, 2004), 23–50. Reconsideration of the views of Aquinas, especially on deification and grace, as well as his Orthodox critics. The author suggests that Aquinas may have a more accurate perspective than his critics, on the systematic questions of theology that relate to the Filioque dispute.John Meyendorff. Byzantine Theology. New York: Fordham University Press, 1979, pp. 91-94.Aristeides Papadakis. Crisis in Byzantium: The Filioque Controversy in the Patriarchate of Gregory II of Cyprus (1283–1289). New York: Fordham University Press, 1983.Aristeides Papadakis. The Christian East and the Rise of the Papacy. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1994, pp. 232-238 and 379-408.Duncan Reid. Energies of the Spirit: Trinitarian Models in Eastern Orthodox and Western Theology. Atlanta, Georgia: Scholars Press, 1997.A. Edward Siecienski. The Use of Maximus the Confessor's Writing on the Filioque at the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1438–1439). Ann Arbor, Michigan: UMI Dissertation Services, 2005.Malon H. Smith, III. And Taking Bread: Cerularius and the Azyme Controversy of 1054. Paris: Beauschesne, 1978. This work is still valuable for understanding cultural and theological estrangement of East and West by the turn of the millennium. Now, it is evident that neither side understood the other; both Greek and Latin antagonists assumed their own practices were normative and authentic.Timothy Kallistos Ware. The Orthodox Church. New edition. London: Penguin, 1993, pp. 52–61.Timothy [Kallistos] Ware. The Orthodox Way. Revised edition. Crestwood, New York: 1995, pp. 89–104.[World Council of Churches] /Conseil Oecuménique des Eglises. La théologie du Saint-Esprit dans le dialogue œcuménique Document # 103 [Faith and Order]/Foi et Constitution. Paris: Centurion, 1981.
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