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Leo and the Council of Chalcedon
Hi
Last week I was doing a project for youth meeting about the defenders of the orthodox faith and i was speaking with my best friend who is serbian orthodox and he mentioned the obvious ones like st athanasius and st cyril etc. and he also mentioned st leo. When i went to the coptic synaxarium to look up all the saints we thought up together i found them all but was confusing is when i did a word search on leo of rome i came across this:
On The Seventh Day of the Blessed Month of Tute
I. The Departure of St. Dioscorus, 25th Pope of Alexandria.
It says "When he saw that Leo, Archbishop of Rome, was teaching that Christ has two natures and two
wills after the Union, he took the charge to refute this new belief."
im confused? who is leo and why is he not a saint. I thought we believe Jesus has two natures so i dont understand why it says leo is bad for saying two natures, and why is he not a saint?
for my project i had to list all the false beliefs and the saints who dealed with them. my friend said the belief that jesus has only one divine nature is false and leo attacked this. so who from our church attacked it if we do not think leo is a saint. was there any saint who did?
sorry for my many questions i am justy confused.
James
Last week I was doing a project for youth meeting about the defenders of the orthodox faith and i was speaking with my best friend who is serbian orthodox and he mentioned the obvious ones like st athanasius and st cyril etc. and he also mentioned st leo. When i went to the coptic synaxarium to look up all the saints we thought up together i found them all but was confusing is when i did a word search on leo of rome i came across this:
On The Seventh Day of the Blessed Month of Tute
I. The Departure of St. Dioscorus, 25th Pope of Alexandria.
It says "When he saw that Leo, Archbishop of Rome, was teaching that Christ has two natures and two
wills after the Union, he took the charge to refute this new belief."
im confused? who is leo and why is he not a saint. I thought we believe Jesus has two natures so i dont understand why it says leo is bad for saying two natures, and why is he not a saint?
for my project i had to list all the false beliefs and the saints who dealed with them. my friend said the belief that jesus has only one divine nature is false and leo attacked this. so who from our church attacked it if we do not think leo is a saint. was there any saint who did?
sorry for my many questions i am justy confused.
James
Comments
Leo of Rome is certainly not a saint of our Church; he is in fact the enemy, a key figure who is central to the historical injustice and intolerance that lead to the fifth century schism and consequent persecution of the Coptic Church.
Whether he is a heretic or not, I cannot conclude with any level of certainty. Our fathers certainly interpreted him as such, and they were not being unreasonable in doing so. His infamous tome does not negate Nestorianism, and it employs expressions which certainly imply Nestorianism. In the context of his affiliation with a Nestorian, and the council which vindicated his document in the first place (which itself employed other expressions that imply Nestorianism e.g. “IN two natures”), there seems to be little support for his case as an Orthodox figure, let alone an Orthodox Saint.
The synaxarium which you quote is written under the assumption that Leo was indeed a heretic, so that’s why it reads that way. Eutychism is clearly refuted by Leo, but whether this was done by regressing into some form of crypto-nestorianism is something we have no conclusive evidence of in my opinion. The hypothetical doctrine of Christ possessing a sole divine nature – a heresy which was the creation of the Chalcedonians imaginations (since no one seriously adopted such a doctrine at the time; we cannot even draw anything conclusive with regards to Eutyches himself) – is a doctrine that I believe was clearly refuted by St Cyril, before Chalcedon. It is also one clearly refuted by St Dioscorus, St Timothy, and many of our other patriarchs, including the blessed St Severus of Antioch.
Peace.
( 2 natures vs. 1 nature):
"2. The second Alexandrine Council
This second Alexandrine council again resolved to try convincing Nestorius of his error. A decision was taken to write to him another letter the first part of which was to be an exposition of the Nicene Creed, and the second part an affirmation of the true faith, followed by twelve anathema. It read thus like this:
"Conforming to the faith of the fathers, we declare that the unique Logos of God has taken flesh of the Virgin. Has made this flesh His own, submitting Himself to human birth, passed out of the Virgin's womb as a child without ceasing to be what He is and remaining in the body as He is, namely Very God by nature.
The flesh was not changed into the nature of the divine, just as the divine Logos was not changed into the nature of
the flesh for It was not submitted to any change. Being yet a child, and even while in the tomb of His Mother, the Logos filled the entire world, He governed it conjointly with His Father and the Holy Spirit, for divinity knows no limit. The Logos is united to the flesh hypostatically.
We therefore believe in one single Son and Lord, Jesus Christ; separate not the man from the God; we do not believe that He is simply united under the semblance of dignity and power; these are new words alien to the faith.
If we, too, say, as did St. Paul in Colossians 2:9 that in Christ dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, we see that God dwells not in Him as He dwells in His saints. But that the divine and the human were united in our Lord Jesus Christ in the fashion that the soul is united to the body in a human being. There is, therefore, one Christ, one Son, one Lord." If he were really ‘Orthodox’ as he had claimed, Nestorius was asked to
prove it by signing both the letter and the anathema. Thus he would vindicate himself and clarify his attitude before all believers.”
The messengers who bore this letter bore simultaneously two other Kyrillian letters: one to the priests, the deacons and the people of Constantinople, and the other to the monks
of that same city.
Nestorius not only refused his signature, but also exerted every effort to antagonize the Emperor against Kyrillos. His efforts succeeded, at least temporarily, so that Theodosius wrote to the Alexandrine Prelate asking him to relent in his attitude to
Nestorius so as to avoid the consequences of his wrath."
if u need more information check this link
http://www.suscopts.org/servantsprep/pdf/2004/HIS102_councils.pdf
but i dont understand why he is wrong or the council of chalcedon is wrong for saying two natures. this is confusing because in my studying i learned that it is wrong to say two persons and this is nestorius saying, so what is wrong with two natures? We believe in the divinity and humanity of Jesus, so that is two natures.
Help?
James
To put it simply for you, it is not the concept of two natures per se that our Church denies or has a problem with; it is the manner and context in which a two-nature Christology was expressed at Chalcedon to convey the Orthodox concept of Christ subsisting according to a divine and human nature united without mingling, without confusion and without alteration.
For example, the definition in Chalcedon asserts that one must declare Christ “to exist IN” or “to be IN” two natures. Not only is such an expression rooted in Nestorianism, but its logical implications are indeed Nestorian, for to exist IN two natures may be understood in a sense that Christ exists IN 1) His human nature AND exists IN 2) His divine nature i.e. His humanity and divinity are depicted as two grounds of being, which is the sense in which Nestorius employed the expression himself.
Considering the very sensitive atmosphere in which the Council of Chalcedon was held (Nestorianism strongly expanding and gaining much influence to the extent that the Persian empire had later accepted it and proclaimed it as the official confession of faith), as well as the efforts and lengths that our father St Cyril went through in order to emphasize the unity of Christ, our Church could not in all good consciousness and faithfulness to the Orthodox Alexandrine Christological tradition vindicated at Ephesus 431, compromise all this by accepting such weak expressions/formulas which allow the enemy to make a comeback under the banner of Orthodoxy.
Furthermore, though I doubt that any Chalcedonian would be likely to admit this, the expression “IN two natures” is implicitly condemned by the ninth canon of Constantinople II which reads:
“If anyone says that Christ is to be worshipped in two natures……let him be anathema”
I know my post has focused on one expression alone, but this should give you an idea of where we are coming from. The Orthodox manner in which we express Christ's two natures is by declaring Him to be "of two natures", such that He exists according to a union "of" (i.e. in a sense of composition as opposed to a sense of chronology) a divine and human nature, both of which are perfect in essence, distinct in reality, and One with regards to their inseparable union according to which Christ subsists.
Peace.
H.H. said in this matter :
The importance of the “ One Nature “ for the propitiation and redemption:
The belief in the One Nature of the Incarnate Logos is essential and fundamental for redemption. Redemption requires unlimited propitiation sufficient for the forgiveness of the unlimited sins of all the people through all ages. There was no solution other than the incarnation of God the Logos to offer this through His Divine Power.
Thus if we mention two natures and say that the human nature alone performed the act of redemption, it would have been entirely impossible to achieve unlimited propitiation for man’s salvation. Hence comes the danger of speaking of two natures, each having its own specific tasks
In such case the death of the human nature alone is insufficient.
Accordingly St. Paul says:
“ For had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory. “ (1 Cor. 2:8).
He did not say; they would not have crucified the man Jesus Christ. The term “ Lord of Glory “ here affirms the One Nature and its necessity for redemption, propitiation and salvation; this because the one who was crucified is the Lord of Glory. Obviously He was crucified in the body, but the body was united with the Divinity in One Nature, this is the essential basis for salvation.
From the Book " The Nature Of Christ "
With regards to the Oriental Orthodox Church, we declare One Nature in the sense of b), referring to the One state of existence proceeding the union, and as such we affirm the reality of the hypostatic union which involves the en-hypostasization of the non-selfsubsistent hypostasis of Christ's humanity by the self-subsistent hypostasis of The Word.
Peace.
iqbal, im trying to understand u but u are confusing me sorry, too many big words. But what are u saying here: Iqbal says: "
are u saying they contradicted themselves deliberetly???????????
James
I typed this part from the book of H.H., I have this book , I know it must be on the internet, I will try to look for it,
And for any member of this website, if you know the website for the book of H.H. Pope Shenoud III title “ The Nature of Christ “ please kindly write the address to all who interested.
Thanks a lot.
http://www.copticchurch.net/topics/theology/index.html
You are the one to call when we need any thing!!!!
God blees
If, according to the Chalcedonians, Christ is IN two natures, then how else is He to be worshipped if not IN two natures? The section of that ninth canon which I have dotted out clarifies the Chalcedonians intention with regards to what is being condemned exactly; it reads in full:
"If anyone says that Christ is to be worshipped in two natures, and that by this two adorations are introduced, a separate one for God the Logos and a separate one for the nab...let him be anathema."
...The fact of the matter is, by condemning Christ's being worshipped IN two natures, and then going on to clarify the nature of the heresy theyre condemning, is in itself a self-admission that the very expression "IN two natures" is heretical, such that whoever indeed confesses Christ to be IN two natures, is according to the above aforementioned anathema, essentially confessing that each nature has its own independent existence and they thus fall under the very above aforementioned anathema.
As I said earlier, this is indeed the traditional understanding of "IN two natures", since the expression itself is rooted in Nestorianism and was used to convey the very heresy that the ninth canon of Constantinople II anathemized its usage for!
Professor Frances Young states in his book From Nicea to Chalcedon:
“The ‘prosopic union’…becomes Nestorius’ attempt to provide a metaphysical account of Christ’s unity of person which did not involve the difficiulties of a ‘natural’ or ‘substantial’ union, and Nestorius meant to convey a ‘real union’. The One Christ has ‘two grounds of being’, he exists ‘in two natures’, as Chalcedon was later to confirm.” (page 237)
Peace.