Chapter 13
Eastern Christianity splits from the
West
Questions to be addressed in this
chapter
1.
2.
3.
4.
What was the relation of Rome to the Eastern Church?
What was the filioque clause and its importance?
What was the Iconoclastic Controversy?
How did Eastern spirituality contribute to the separation of
East and West?
Rome claims primacy
• When it became apparent that the Christian Church would be
around for a while—neither being exterminated by persecution
nor gathered up into the skies at the Second Coming of Christ—it
institutionalized.
• In the West, this meant taking on the form of the Roman Empire,
with one head or monarch: the Bishop of Rome (who came to be
called “Pope”).
• The West’s justification for why the Bishop of Rome was preeminent rested on two claims:
1. Jesus said that his Church would be built on Peter, and he
gave Peter ultimate authority.
2. Peter’s authority is passed on through the office he founded
in Rome.
Filioque
• Filioque is a Latin word which translates as “and the son.”
• This seemingly insignificant phrase became the source of a
significant theological difference between East and West
when taken in the context of the part of the Nicene Creed
which states, “The Holy Spirit, the Lord and the Life-giver, that
proceedeth from the Father [and the son].”
• Besides the political drama that attended the filioque
controversy, there was a deep theological issue at stake.
Central to this was how the relationships between members
of the Trinity were to be conceived and explained.
Iconoclastic Controversy
• Another debate which was ultimately grounded in Christology
was the Iconoclastic Controversy.
• This was particularly important in the East because of their
tradition of the use of icons in worship, but also because of
the ramifications the dispute had for the developing
relationship between Church and State.
• The controversy began when Emperor Leo III of the Eastern
(or Byzantine) Empire, had an image of Jesus removed from
the Imperial Palace in Constantinople in 726.
Eastern spirituality
• The debate over icons in the East carried more than just
academic or intellectual gravitas; the reverence and use of
icons was an important way of life for people in the East.
• John of Damascus had called them “books for the illiterate”—
ways in which people could be visually drawn into the
mysteries of the faith.
• The Hesychasts, a term which translates as “stillness”,
maintained with the earlier apophatic theologians of the East
that God cannot be known in his essence or nature. But they
argued that he can be known through the energies which
emanate from him.
The Jesus Prayer
“Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
Summary of main points
1. The primacy of Rome was justified by the claims that Jesus
gave authority to Peter, and Peter passed his authority on
through the office he founded at Rome.
2. The disagreement over the filioque clause of the Nicene
Creed cut to the heart of diffferent theological approaches
between East and West.
3. The Iconoclastic Controversy forced further reflection of
Christology and was another source of tension between East
and West.
4. Eastern spirituality continued in the mystical tradition of
earlier Christian ascetics and gradually had less and less
interaction with Roman Catholicism.