Preface to the 1913 edition

"We must understand the Western confessions and evaluate them from the point of view of true Christian teaching. By saying that it is necessary to understand them, we partly determine the method of investigation itself. If we only point out the partial deviations of these confessions from the truth, we will be on the basis of the Holy Scriptures. If we refute the Scriptures and Traditions every point after point of their doctrine, we shall not understand the Western confessions, and if we do not understand them, we shall not convince anyone of their falsity: there will always be the possibility of assuming in our proofs an imperceptible stratagem, and in the failure of the opponent only a temporary oversight or inexperience. It is necessary to discover the very root of the disease, it is necessary to understand the Western religions in their basic world view, to clarify their conception of life, which produces all these unhealthy symptoms: then the particular points will probably not require refutation. Life is a subject that can be judged by anyone who has reason and conscience, is an unperverted moral consciousness. Dogmatic reasoning may not be understood by anyone, historical evidence may not be known, but the understanding of life is before everyone's eyes: one has only to compare it with Christ's teaching, and the falsity of heterodoxy is proved, as well as the origin of all its particular deviations."

In prefacing this issue with the above-quoted words of Archbishop Sergius from his article "The Attitude of an Orthodox Person to His Church and to Non-Orthodoxy," we at the same time draw the reader's attention to the preface to the 31st issue, which explains the main task of a whole series of issues beginning with the 31st, with which the 32nd is organically connected.

Introduction

The essential difference between Western confessions and Orthodoxy is not in individual dogmas, but in a common view of Christian life

Whoever wants to know the true essence of Catholicism, Protestantism, or Orthodoxy must turn not to their theoretical teaching, but to their conception of life, to their teaching, namely, of personal salvation, in which this concept is clearly expressed, he must inquire into each of the faiths in what it posits the meaning of man's life, his highest good. The dogma of the filioque undoubtedly touches upon the cornerstone of our faith, but has it expressed the whole of Catholicism, and can it be thought that with its removal Western Christianity will be reconciled with us? Only one of the many points of disagreement will be removed, only one of the many points of contention will be less, and the division will not be weakened in the least. After all, Catholicism is not from the filioque, but vice versa. The dogma of the papacy, of course, constitutes the mainspring, so to speak, of the soul of Catholicism, but, again, it was not from the papacy that the perverted Catholic conception of life originated, but from the latter the papacy. Otherwise, it is impossible to explain why and how the Pope has found and still finds in the Western world so many obedient, fanatically devoted servants and so many voiceless followers. In the same way, it was not as a result of the rejection of the sacraments and church tradition, and not as a result of an exaggerated concept of the fallen nature of man, that the Protestants arrived at their illusory, fictitious salvation, but, on the contrary, having distorted the very concept of life, they had to consistently distort the entire church structure and teaching. Suppose that all the errors in doctrine and structure are corrected -- a distorted conception of life will prove that these corrections are only in words -- after a while the Protestants will have to create new distortions, new errors in place of those which have been eliminated.

In the same way, Orthodoxy is not recognized from his theoretical teaching. Abstract propositions and formulas, by their very abstraction, are equally incomprehensible, incomprehensible to man, whether they are Catholic or Orthodox. Can direct logical absurdity reveal the inconsistency of the heterodox system? As an expression of objectively given truth, Orthodoxy is most and most profoundly known where it is most directly in contact with this objective truth, with the realm of real being: in its description of man's real life, in its definition of the purpose of life, and in the teaching of personal salvation based on this last one. Only by finally assimilating the Orthodox teaching on life can one be fully (not only logically) convinced of the immutable, unconditional truth of Orthodoxy – it is possible to understand, to visually comprehend this truth. After that, all those theoretical propositions, all those dogmas which previously seemed only indifferent metaphysical subtleties, will receive their deep, full-life meaning. All this will be one and the same doctrine of true life, united in spirit and idea, only this time life is considered not for man, but in its objective givenness, in itself.

I had to be convinced of these elementary truths in practice when writing my work. At first I approached the question of personal salvation with a purely theoretical interest. I wanted to clarify this question for myself, simply as a dark, confusing point of doctrine, difficult to define. How can we more accurately express our doctrine of salvation? It is known that an Orthodox cannot speak as the Catholics say; That he can speak even less as the Protestants say, this is also beyond all doubt, but how should he speak?

The Significance of the Patristic Writings for the Clarification of the Orthodox Teaching on Salvation

In order to give myself an account of this, I began to read the works of Sts. Fathers of the Church. I read them not only because I accepted them, so to speak, canonical authority, not only as an obligatory church tradition for every Christian. My thought was somewhat different: I searched in the works of Sts. The Fathers describe and explain the life according to Christ, or the true, proper life. We know that Jesus Christ brought us first and foremost a new life and taught it to the Apostles, and that the work of Church tradition is not only to transmit teaching, but to transmit from generation to generation precisely this life conceived with Christ, to transmit precisely that which is not transmitted by any word, by any writing, but only by direct communion of persons. Theoretical teaching only generalizes and systematizes this doctrine of life. That is why the Apostles chose as their successors and substitutes people who were the most successful, who most consciously and firmly assimilated to themselves the life of Christ proclaimed to them. For this reason, the Fathers of the Church are not those of the Church writers who were the most learned and the most well-read in Church literature, but the holy writers, i.e. those who embodied in themselves that life of Christ, which the Church received as its inheritance to preserve and spread, are recognized as Fathers of the Church. If so, then it is possible to form a correct understanding of Orthodoxy not by analyzing its fundamentally positive, abstract teaching, but by observing this real life according to Christ, which is preserved in the Orthodox Church. And since the recognized bearers, the embodiments of this life, this life tradition were Sts. The Fathers, who in their writings interpret this life in detail, then it is natural to turn to them for observation. I did so.

The Opposition of the Christian Patristic Worldview to the Juridical, Western Worldview

The more I read Sts. It became clearer and clearer to me that I was moving in a very special world, in a circle of concepts that was far from resembling ours. I began to understand that the difference between Orthodoxy and non-Orthodoxy lies not in some partial omissions and inaccuracies, but right at the very root, in principle, that Orthodoxy and non-Orthodoxy are opposite to each other, just as self-love, life according to the elements of the world, the old man - and self-sacrificing love, life according to Christ, a renewed person are opposite. I was confronted with two completely different worldviews, irreducible to one another: legal and moral, Christian. I called the first legal because the best expression of this worldview is the Western legal system, in which the individual and his moral dignity disappear and only separate legal units and relations between them remain. God is understood mainly as the First Cause and Lord of the world, closed in His absoluteness - His relationship to man is similar to the relationship of a king to a subordinate and does not at all resemble a moral union. In the same way, man is represented in his separateness: he lives for himself and only by the external side of his being comes into contact with the life of the general, only he uses this general; even God from the point of view of man is only a means to achieve well-being. The beginning of life, therefore, is self-love, and the general sign of existence is the mutual alienation of all living things. Meanwhile, according to the thought of Sts. Being and life in the proper sense belong only to God, Who bears the name "This" – all the rest, all created things exist and live exclusively by their participation in this true life of God, this longed-for Beauty, in the words of St. Basil the Great. God, therefore, is not connected with His creation by an absolute "let there be," God literally serves as the center of life, without which creation is as inconceivable in its present existence as it is inexplicable in its origin. Translating this metaphysical proposition into the language of moral life, we get the rule: no one can and should not live for himself - the meaning of life of each particular being is in God, which practically means: in the fulfillment of His will. "I have not come to do my will, but the will of the Father that sent me." Thus, the basic principle of everyone's life is no longer selfishness, but "the love of truth" (2 Thessalonians 2:10). Faithful to this law, man in his relations to God, the world, and to people is no longer guided by a selfish thirst for existence (the conclusion from this would be the struggle for existence), but by an unselfish hunger and thirst for truth, as the supreme law, to which he sacrifices his being. In the legal understanding of life they sought happiness, here they look for truth. There, moral goodness – holiness – was considered a means to attain blessedness, here true existence is ascribed only to the moral good incarnated in God – and the blessedness of man, therefore, is considered identical with holiness.

I. Legal Understanding of Life in Catholicism and Protestantism