1 / 40

Basics of Orthodoxy: Holy Tradition & Holy Scripture

Basics of Orthodoxy: Holy Tradition & Holy Scripture. Holy Tradition Monastery of St. Katherine. What is “Holy Tradition?”. The word Tradition / Paradosis means transmission, to hand down, to pass along.

hatmaker
Download Presentation

Basics of Orthodoxy: Holy Tradition & Holy Scripture

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Basics of Orthodoxy:Holy Tradition & Holy Scripture

  2. Holy Tradition Monastery of St. Katherine

  3. What is “Holy Tradition?” The word Tradition/Paradosis means transmission, to hand down, to pass along. There are two kinds of tradition spoken of in the Bible. One type we are warned about, the other we are admonished to hold on to.

  4. The Tradition of Men “You abandon the commandments of God and you hold thetradition of men . . . rejecting the word of God by your tradition” (Mk. 7: 8, 13). In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus says, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition . . . thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you: “‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules’” (Mt. 15) “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ” (Col. 2:8).

  5. Holy Tradition “Therefore, brethren, stand fast and hold the traditions which you were taught, whether by word or our epistle” (2 Thess. 2:15). “But we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw from every brother who walks disorderly and not according to the tradition which he received from us” (2 Thess. 3:6). “Now I praise you, brethren, that you remember me in all things and keep the traditions just as I delivered them to you” (I Cor. 11:2).

  6. Holy Tradition cont. One definition of Holy Tradition is that it is the deposit of faith given by Jesus Christ to the Apostles and passed on in the Church from one generation to the next without addition, alteration or subtraction.

  7. Holy Tradition cont. In addition to being the deposit of the faith, Holy Tradition has also given birth to: Holy Scripture, the Holy Canons, Worship, Architecture, Iconography, Music, Vestments, the Lives of the Saints, and the Writings of the Fathers. For example, in the book of Acts we read . . .

  8. Examples of Holy Tradition The Divine Liturgy “They were regular in attending the apostles’ teaching and the communion and the breaking of the bread and the prayers” (Acts 2:42).

  9. Visual Examples of Holy Tradition Vestments, Hymnography, Architecture, The Cross

  10. Examples of Holy Tradition Events surrounding the Dormition of the Theotokos

  11. Examples of Holy Tradition Byzantine Iconography vs. Western paintings

  12. Examples of Holy Tradition Councils of Bishops The first seven Ecumenical Councils were held during the 4th - 8th centuries to decide issues of faith and protect the Church from heresy. Even now, Orthodox hierarchs meet and pray together regarding matters of the Church.

  13. Examples of Holy Tradition Lives of the Saints We trust the accounts of the lives of the saints that have been passed down and recorded for our benefit.

  14. Examples of Holy Tradition Lives of the Saints, cont. The goal of the Christian life is to become Christ-like: “This is the will of God, your holiness” (I Thess. 4:3). The primary aim & concern of Holy Tradition is holiness. The Saints are living examples for the faithful of every generation. All that is passed on through Holy Tradition is to assist us in achieving this goal.

  15. Examples of Holy Tradition Writings of the Holy Fathers, Holy Elders Holy Hierarchs and Fathers, inspired by the Holy Spirit, wrote letters pastoral in nature, dogmatic in content and apologetic in defense of the Christian faith. Even in the 20th & 21st centuries the lives and teachings of many holy elders have been inspired by the Holy Spirit.

  16. Holy Tradition: Past or Present? Holy Tradition is not a deposit of doctrine learned by heart, but a way of life, the way of holiness. It is not the sum of past experience, but a living experience of God’s action today . . . a total dependence on the Holy Spirit” (Moore, pg. 11).

  17. Holy Scripture What is the place of Holy Scripture within Orthodoxy? Sola Scriptura – a brief analysis

  18. Scripture itself is a part of Holy Tradition. It is the written word of God, written by the Holy Apostles who were inspired by the Third Person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. Scripture

  19. The Canon of Scripture “At a council in Laodicea in Asia Minor, held in AD 363, the Old Testament and New Testament canonical books to be used in the Church were listed and the enumeration of books in the Bible was established. This was followed by the earliest listing of all 27 N.T. books, done in AD 367 by St. Athanasius. Then the 3rd Council of Carthage took place in AD 397 when the full Old & New Testament canonical book list of Scripture was finalized” (Anthony, pg. 16).

  20. Scripture cont. “The primary purpose in the Church establishing an authoritative list of books which were to be received as sacred Scripture was to protect the Church from spurious books which claimed apostolic authorship” (Whiteford, p. 11).

  21. Scripture cont. “By the time the Church settled the canon of Holy Scripture she was already, in her faith and worship, indistinguishable from the Church of later periods. The bishops gathered together in various councils and in time, through the guidance of the Holy Spirit . . .

  22. Scripture cont. . . . settled the question of the canon, selecting what books would be included and which ones would not. What does this mean? It simply means that the Church as we know it was in place long before the Bible as we know it was in place” (ibid. p.12). The Church gave birth to the Bible.

  23. Sufficiency of Scripture alone Sola Scriptura – is the doctrine that the Bible contains all knowledge necessary for salvation and holiness. Primary text – “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Tim. 3:16-17).

  24. “In this passage of St. Paul to Timothy, the scripture that Timothy has known since he was a child does not refer to the N.T. since it had not yet been written, but rather to the O.T.

  25. “In establishing an authoritative list of sacred books that were received by all as being divinely inspired and of genuine O.T. or apostolic origin, the Church did not intend to imply that all of the Christian Faith and all information necessary for worship and good order in the Church was contained in these writings” (ibid, p. 12).

  26. Before the codification of Scripture in the 4th century, the Church was already over three hundred years old and had been worshiping as the Body of Christ. The Christians were meeting regularly in prayer and fasting. They were being taught through stories and letters. They were remembering the martyrs, those who were giving their lives

  27. in the name of Jesus Christ. They were breaking bread, partaking of the Eucharistic meal together (cf. Acts 2:42). In the 4th century when Emperor Constantine made Christianity the religion of his Empire the Church was then able to flourish and express itself liturgically musically, architecturally, and in imagery (iconography).

  28. It was also during this time when strong heresies arose. Strange doctrines were being introduced and it was necessary that the Church meet in council, just as it had first done in Jerusalem as we read in Acts 11. The Councils, composed of lay people, deacons, priests, bishops, and monastics, met to discuss matters of faith and doctrine. From such councils

  29. came the Christian statement of belief known as the Nicean Creed (325 – 381 A.D.) as well as the canon of Holy Scripture, all of which were decided upon through the guidance of the Holy Spirit whom Jesus Christ promised to send and guide the Church for all ages.

  30. The Creed, Holy Scripture, the Worship, the Sacraments, the Ascetical Life within the Church, are all a part of man “working out his salvation”. The Apostolic Church never saw Scripture alone as sufficient for salvation. This is not found anywhere in Patristic sources.

  31. Sola Scriptura –the doctrine that the Bible contains all knowledge necessary for salvation and holiness. Orthodoxy views knowledge as important, but it is participation within the Mysteries of the Church that brings salvation, not knowledge.

  32. Holy Baptism Baptism: “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter the Kingdom of God” (Jn. 3:5).

  33. HolyCommunion Eucharist: “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourself. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For My flesh is true food and My blood true drink” (Jn. 6:53-56).

  34. Holy Confession To the Apostles Jesus Said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, their sins are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained” (Jn. 20:22,23). “Many of those also who had believed kept coming, confessing and disclosing their practices” (to Paul) (Acts 19:18).

  35. SUMMARY What the Orthodox Church refers to when it speaks of Holy (Apostolic) Tradition is ‘the faith once delivered unto the saints’ (Jude 3). Its source is Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit delivered to the Apostles, who in turn delivered these teachings and practices to the faithful believers who make up the Body of Christ on earth, the Church.

  36. And the Church, being the repository of this treasure (including Scripture) thus became ‘the pillar and foundation of the Truth’ (I Tim 3:15) for the salvation of the world.

  37. “How can we know the Church has preserved the Apostolic Tradition in its purity? The short answer is that God has preserved it in the Church through the Holy Spirit because He promised to do so. Jesus said that He would build His Church and the gates of hell would not prevail against it (cf. Mt. 16:18).

  38. Christ Himself is the Head of the Church (Eph. 4:15,16), the Church is His Body (Eph. 1:22,23), and He has promised to be with the Church ‘even unto the end of the world’ (Mt. 28:20) . . .

  39. Were the Church to have lost the purity of Apostolic Teaching or Apostolic Tradition, then the Truth would have been compromised, and the promise would have been broken.

  40. Holy Tradition and Holy Scripture together have been the safeguard of the Truth found in the Church guided by the Holy Spirit from the time of Pentecost until the end of time . . .

More Related