This Overview of the Canon Law of the Orthodox Catholic Church is a prcis of the lessons on Canon Law taught to undergraduate students of the Theological School of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki from 1968; and, after the division of the School into two Departments in 1982, to the undergraduates of the Department of Pastoral and Social Theology. With the passage of time, the content of the lessons underwent adaptations and improvements because of what had in the meantime become His Eminence Panteleimon's established ecclesiological and canonical views on certain matters of Canon Law. These changes were small but nonetheless of the essence. The present edition does not constitute a complete system of Canon Law, but, as its title declares, is an overview thereof.
Can we know God? What is the relation of creation to the Creator? How did man fall, and how is he saved? Lossky demonstrates the close relationship between the Orthodox doctrine of the Trinity and the Orthodox understanding of man.
The Holy Canons of the Orthodox Church contain the texts of the Orthodox-Christian ecclesiastical rules according to the holy apostles and the Councils of the Church.A collection of this basic canonical account of the Eastern Orthodox Church can serve as a helpful tool to both research and ecclesiastical canonists. Since resources concerning different translations of the Canons in English cannot always be easily found, by publishing these texts we hope to give better access to them for English speaking Orthodox clergy as well as the faithful.
An insider’s account of the Eastern Orthodox Church, from its beginning in the era of Jesus and the Apostles to the modern age In this short, accessible account of the Eastern Orthodox Church, John McGuckin begins by tackling the question “What is the Church?” His answer is a clear, historically and theologically rooted portrait of what the Church is for Orthodox Christianity and how it differs from Western Christians’ expectations. McGuckin explores the lived faith of generations, including sketches of some of the most important theological themes and individual personalities of the ancient and modern Church. He interweaves a personal approach throughout, offering to readers the experience of what it is like to enter an Orthodox church and witness its liturgy. In this astute and insightful book, he grapples with the reasons why many Western historians and societies have overlooked Orthodox Christianity and provides an important introduction to the Orthodox Church and the Eastern Christian World.
Western European Christendom finds it difficult to comprehend the Eastern Orthodox Church because it knows little about the practice and doctrines of Orthodoxy. Even what is known is overlaid by many strata of prejudices and misunderstandings, partly political in nature. One of the obstacles has been the natural tendency to confound the ideas and customs of the Orthodox Church with familiar parallels in Roman Catholicism. To escape this tradition pitfall, Ernst Benz focuses on icon painting as a logical place to begin his examination of the Orthodox Church. Beginning with a brilliant discussion of the importance of icons in the Eastern Church--and the far-reaching effects of icons on doctrine as well as art--Benz counteracts the confusion, explaining simply and clearly the liturgy and sacraments, dogma, constitution and law of Eastern Orthodoxy. In brief history, he describes the rise of Orthodox national churches, schismatic churches, and churches in exile; the role of monasticism and its striking differences from Roman Catholic monasticism; the missionary work of the Orthodox Church; and the influence of Orthodoxy on politics and culture. The role of the church can be defined in terms of the image. Benz writes that the church exists so that "members may be incorporated into the image of Jesus Christ in that individual believers are changed into his likeness'" as Paul writes in the second letter to the Corinthians. Thus, Orthodox theology holds up the icon as the true key to the understanding of Orthodox dogma. The Eastern Orthodox Church will be valuable to anyone interested in learning more about the church, its thought, its life, and its ideals. Ernst Benz (1907-1978) was one of the most distinguished contemporary German theologians and perhaps the leading Western authority on Eastern Orthodoxy. He studied classical philology and archeology at Tbingen, Berlin and Rome, and turned to the study of Protestant theology. He became professor of ecclesiastical and dogmatic history at the Philipp University at Marburg on the Lahn. He is the author of Buddhism or Communism and Theology of Electricity: On the Encounter and Explanation of Theology and Science in the 17th and 18th Centuries.
