Догматы

1. Your brother writes to you that “very few dogmas belong to the evangelists.” There are only two main dogmas of the Orthodox Church: the dogma of the Holy Trinity and the dogma of the incarnation of the Son of God. The entire Gospel speaks about these dogmas... 2. Your brother writes: “Doctrines are clearly formulated provisions. The dogmas were developed by the Ecumenical Councils.” Dogma is not a clearly formulated human position, but the Divine truth about God, a truth that people themselves could not comprehend in any way if it were not revealed by God Himself. Truth can be explored, truth can be known, truth can be affirmed. But the truth cannot be assumed. 3. Your brother asserts: “From dogmas to the Christian spirit, it is as far from a celestial star.” Not true. When the incarnate Son of God revealed to His disciples the dogma of the Holy Trinity, saying: Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19), then immediately with this dogma he inseparably united the doctrine of the Christian spirit, saying: Teaching them to observe everything that I have commanded you (Matthew 28:20 ). Everyone who thinks sensibly knows that the Christian spirit and together the Spirit of Christ lies in keeping the commandments of Christ. But your brother invented some other Christian spirit. How can this be a Christian spirit without Christ and without observing the teachings of Christ? This is some kind of self-invented and, so to speak, self-made spirit and is in no way worthy to be called by the Christian name, because it thinks it loves everyone indifferently, both Christians and Turks and pagans alike. Christ the Lord in His teaching made a distinction in this, saying in the Gospel: If anyone does not listen to the church, then let him be to you as a pagan and a publican (Matthew 18:17). And the All-Good Lord Himself loves the righteous, but only has mercy on sinners. And true Christians, imitating the Lord, do the same: showing mercy and condescension to everyone indifferently, they show complete love only to true believers. 4. Your brother says: “Heresy is deviation from the opinion of the majority.” Not true. Heresy is a deviation from the Divine truth, and not from the opinion of the majority. The Lord did not entrust the majority with the truth, saying: Fear not, little flock! for your Father has been pleased to give you the Kingdom (Luke 12:32). The Roman Church is several times larger in number than the Orthodox Church, but having deviated from the truth, it has deviated into heresy... The True Church accepts all Scripture, both Old and New, in all its volume and completeness. For example, in one place in the Holy Gospel the Lord says: When the Comforter comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me (John 15:26). And in another place in the Gospel it is said that the Lord, giving the holy apostles the power to forgive sins, blew and said to them: receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive, they will be forgiven; on whomever you leave it, it will remain on him (John 20:22–23). The Orthodox Church, accepting both of these passages, confesses that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and is taught to the faithful through the Son. The Roman Church, leaving in vain the first place of the Gospel and the words of the Lord Himself and basing itself only on the second place, asserts that the Holy Spirit also proceeds from the Son, and through this introduces two principles in the dogma of the Holy Trinity. What incongruity is exposed through the likeness of the sun. Light is born from the sun and rays emanate. No one claims that the rays also come from the light of the sun, but only without the light of the sun the rays do not shine. Arius also produced an evil heresy from two passages in the Gospels, leaving the main thing in vain. In the Evangelist John, the Lord, speaking about His equality with the Father in Divinity, said: I and the Father are one (John 10:30). In another place, saying that He is less than the Father in humanity, He said: My Father is greater than Me (John 14:28). Arius, choosing the second place to establish his opinion and rejecting the first, produced a harmful heresy. This is what all heretics did, confirming their false doctrine with places of Holy Scripture of their choice: the true doctrine is affirmed by the fullness of all Holy Scripture. 5. Your brother attributes hatred and enmity to the true shepherds of the Church who met at the Ecumenical Councils. It's not fair. If there was hatred and enmity at the same time, it was only from the opposite side of the heretics. True shepherds gathered at Councils out of love for their neighbors and to pacify true Christians, worried by unrest and the false teaching of heretics; secondly, to study and establish the truth according to the commandment of the Lord Himself: Search the Scriptures, for through them you think to have eternal life; and they testify of Me (John 5:39). Thirdly, the shepherds of the Church gathered from time to time at Councils to defend the truth and according to their duties, since the Lord calls mercenaries those shepherds who, seeing heretics like wolves tormenting the flock of Christ, do not drive them away, but shirk the strong defense of their flock. 6. Your brother says: “I consider it absolutely possible for a person to resolutely recognize all the dogmas of faith and at the same time be very far from the spirit of Christianity.” It is true that sometimes, unfortunately, this happens. Only such people, if they want to improve their lives, very conveniently find the path of salvation. Anyone who has incorrect, confused and false concepts about Christian faith and truth finds it inconvenient to find salvation whenever he wants. How much more impossible is it for him to have a Christian spirit and the Spirit of Christ. From all your brother’s words it is clear that he has fallen into the sect of indifferentists who teach: believe as you want, but only have love for your neighbor. Indifferentists think to base their opinion on the teachings of John the Theologian. But in his Epistles it is said that in addition to the Spirit of Christ there is a flattering spirit and the spirit of Antichrist. That is why Saint John warns not to believe every spirit, but to test the spirits to see whether they are from God (1 John 4:1). 7. You write that your brother completed a course at St. Petersburg University. If someone began to assure your brother that you do not need to study at a gymnasium or at a university, but only have love for your neighbor and you will get a good position in the district court or even in the judicial chamber, would your brother believe it? In a similar way, we must reason about the fact that it is impossible for someone who does not have correct and true knowledge of the dogmas of the Christian faith to have the Spirit of Christ... ...If your brother is a sincere and conscientious person, as you write, then let him pray with faith to our Lord Jesus Christ to enlighten him in the truth, and then let him also read with faith the “Orthodox Confession” of Peter (Mogila) (2, part 1, pp. 77-80). You might be interested in: