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CREATION AND CREATUREHOOD. THE NEO-PATRISTIC ALTERNATIVE WORLDVIEW TO THE «METAPHYSICS OF ALL-UNITY»? A BRIEF APPROACH OF G. FLOROVSKY'S THEOLOGY1
Георгий Флоровский - хорошо известный теолог русской диаспоры в ХХ веке. Будет предпринята попытка описать альтернативное предложение Георгия Флоровского как критику господствующего философского течения того времени в интерпретации данной проблемы, особо отмечая «Метафизику всеединства». В первой части будет кратко представлен подход к этим пересмотренным взглядам, чтобы понять контекст ответа Флоровского. После этого будет предприниматься попытка описать его предложение в основных аспектах, а затем оценить присущие его мысли проблемы и его ограниченное, в нашей интерпретации, отношение к «Метафизике всеединства».
Georges Florovsky is a well-known theologian of the Russian Diaspora in the 20th century. In this paper an attempt will be made to describe Georges Florovsky's alternative proposal, as a kind of criticism to the dominant philosophical stream of his time in interpreting this issue, focusing especially on the «metaphysics of All-unity». Hence, in the first part I will present a brief approach to this Russian revised worldview, in order to understand the context of Florovsky's answer. After this I will try to describe his proposal in its basic aspects, and then I will evaluate the innate problems of his thought and his narrow -in my estimation, relation to the «metaphysics of All-unity».
Ключевые слова: Соловьёв, «Метафизика всеединства», софиология, целостный взгляд, замкнутая онтология, Флоровский, синтез неопатристики, создание, свобода, диалектика.
Keywords: Solovyov, «metaphysics of all-unity», sophiology, holistic view, closed ontology, Florovsky, neo-patristic synthesis, creation, freedom, dialectic
The relationship between God and the world is diachronically a key-issue for the theological and philosophical thought. Especially the kind and the form, that this relationship can take, seems to be a crucial dimension for the very Christian and ecclesial character of the theological discourse, even in nowadays. It is well-known, the variety of the historical disputes on this problem from the origins of the classical philosophy and of the Christian patristic theology (e.g. Origen, Arius, Athanasius of Alexandria etc.).
УДК 1(091) ББК 87.3(2)51
NIKOLAOS ASPROULIS
Volos Academy for Theological Studies, journal «Theologia», Greece
The «metaphysics of All-unity» in European thought had existed «since Greek and Christian antiquity (cf. Plotinus, Pseudo-Dionysius) ....and it then travelled through all phases of Western tradition: Eriugena, Leibnitz.» etc. It seems that All-unity was the «leitmotif of all this worldview». The «orthodox sources of Russian philosophy and the ontological basis of the classical Western tradition found their meeting point»2 in the idea of All-unity. In this perspective the two basic philosophical concepts of the «All-unity» and «universality» attempt to describe, or in other words, to solve the above problem of the relationship between God and the world. If this task succeeded, it is outside of the purpose of this brief study.
I. The philosophical idea of «All unity» (translation of the Russian term
vseedinstvo) constitutes a key philosophical concept, which developed in the Russian
religious thought of the 19-20th centuries. It is a term of «mixed etymology», half
anglo-Saxon and half latin3, which very often assume many akin to each other meanings, such as «total-unity», «pan-unity», etc. Russian thinkers like Vl. Solovyov,
S. Bulgakov, P Florensky and others based their work primarily on this notion and developed the well-known metaphysics of «All-unity»4. Undoubtedly there are many differences in various aspects (e.g. different variants of «sophiology») among them, though their main task was to apply this important concept as a central element for describing the ultimate realities, finally the relation between God and the world.
In this context, «All-unity» as a concept, is closely related to many others central ideas of the same Russian tradition, such as «Sophia», «God-manhood», even with «sobornost»5. All these ideas constitute the necessary parts of a broader metaphysical model for the explanation of the whole reality. It is noteworthy that the origins of this «metaphysics of All-unity» can be traced already back in the classical philosophical thought, and again in a broader sense, in the modern times, anticipating a popular issue in the whole intellectual history and especially in the thought of many thinkers as Hegel, Schelling and others. (See e.g. the close relation between the notions of «All-unity», on the one hand and Schelling's «All-Einheit», «All-Einigkeit», on the other).
For this reason it is not accidental, that Vl. Solovyov (1853-1900)6, for example, the so-called "father of Russian Sophiology"7 was strongly influenced according to many scholars by Spinoza, Boehme's mysticism, Schelling's panentheism and others8 attempted to present a synthesis in which philosophy, theology and science would be reconciled.
Before diving into Florovsky's view, I would like to describe in brief the main points or aspects of this «All-unity metaphysics», in order to understand where is the point and the possible difference between the two perspectives.
Following two of the main representatives of the Russian sophiological tradition (Solovyov, Bulgakov) I have to pose a question which seems in my estimation at least to be a crucial one. What is the meaning of the All-unity and how does it functions as a hermeneutical-methodological key for the explanation of the relation between God and the world?
It has been argued that the central feature in Solovyov's system was that of «All-unity» or «unitotalite» (in its French version), by which he tried to explain the relation between the one and the many9. According to Solovyov, metaphysics in
general, aims at understanding the whole reality. In his understanding, reality is comprehended as «one»10, as a «unity which diversifies itself both internally, in the
divine life and externally in the sense of the creation of actual individuals»11. This
original unity was lost after the emergence of the variety of individuals. Solovyov tried to «grant some ...independence to the members of the All-unity... nevertheless they are as nothing outside their being within the whole»12. Hence the task is the restoration of this original or let's say of this protological status and unity of the reality. As Solovyov puts it, religion concerned with the «reunion of man and the world with the unconditional and all-one principle»13. In this perspective the ultimate purpose of the universe «is the synthesis of the temporal and the divine-universal reintegration in a living All-unity»14. Expressing, the same idea in different words:
«creation is a movement of recovery of the original unity that is manifested in the
God-man/ Christ»15.
What is the specific meaning of «All-unity» in Solovyov, metaphysics, it is not very clear, because, among other things, of the different phases of his career16. Daring
an insecure comment, it could be noted that it is «composed» by two Absolutes or by two poles in one Absolute; the first is the existence or super - existence (=God?) and the other the so-called «kosmos noetos» of Platon, an ideal world, that is characterized by a short of duality; a material and an ideal-divine aspect17. «All-unity» desires to
describe a broader reality than merely God, a reality that includes finally both the created and the uncreated into a holistic view. Quoting Solovyov himself «absolute unity is the first positive attribute of all that exists" and "true unity is a unity of multiplicity»18. In more theological terms it can be defined as the idea of «God in all
and all in God19».
It is necessary to note that the meaning of the «All-unity» could be better realized by using the relatives terms of «Sophia» and «God-manhood». In this context,
Solovyov «presents Sophia as the universal substance that unites the tree persons in the Trinity, and is also (as divine) likewise operative in God's ongoing act of creation
and in Church»20. In other words «Sophia explains the particular understanding of the relation of God and the world: God is Sophia, which means that God eternally relates to creation and creation itself-that is created Sophia-is a movement of reconciliation toward divine Sophia»21. Besides P. Florensky, continued Solovyov's metaphysics, developed farther his sophiology, attempted to place «the doctrine of Sophia in the orthodox liturgical tradition and patristic theology...as the fourth person»22 in God's being.
If this understanding of the «metaphysics of All-unity» (and the «Sophia», etc.) expresses more or less the spirit of Solovyov, and of the other Russian thinkers, one can hardly avoid the crucial question if exists some type of confusion at the relation between the world and God. I believe that this is the basic theological point concerning this study. This question involves the following observations:
a Even if many scholars attempt to overcome this ambiguity in the interpretation of the «All-unity»23, that is the somehow identification of the world with God; this evident holistic approach to the reality, is very difficult to avoid a pantheistic dimension. However in contradiction to this reading, Bulgakov states, trying to explain this issue that «if the world is capable of communion with God, then the world is already,
in some way, in God... (concluding that) this is not pantheism, but (a Christian) pan-en-theism»24.
b. Certainly, Solovyov (and the other sophiologists) has a very strong sense of the reality of God, which implies, in my view, that probably it exists a confusion at some level between his philosophical presuppositions (e.g. German idealism) and his theological and Christian perspective. In spite of the double methodology of his thought, he tries very hard to found his theories on the Christian principles25. In any case, the basic interest of this Russian philosophical school is to render the reality of God, a «God for us», to recall the famous phrase of C. LaCugna, a God for the world, which means a living God who relates himself to the world in order to redeem it. In this respect Bulgakov «affirms the core meaning of Solovyov's Sophiology=God is always God for me-creation»26.
c. To put it directly the issue at stake here is if it is possible to think «God's being as not in some way relating to creation»27. The real problem emerges when we are confronted with the question, if the creation is a constitutive element for God's being, or in other words if the life of God is necessarily depended on his creative revelation in the world. In theological terms the issue takes the classic form of the relation between Theology and Economy.
d. Despite the various and different aspects in the vision of the main Russian thinkers, I believe that the narrow connection between God and the world not only in intellectu (in metaphysics) but mainly in re (cf. the connection of the soul of the world with the divine Sophia, the view that reduces all the aspects of reality into a total-unity), is really problematic, and could lead into a holistic and closed view, into a perspective that confuses or better denies the ontological otherness between God and the world, between created and uncreated, between being and non being. In other words according to this philosophical worldview the world with the one or the other way presents itself as the necessary locus for God's revelation.
e. Otherwise, if we need to overcome this scheme, I think that we have only two alternative options; on the one hand we can approach God as an impassive being, like Zeus of the ancient Greeks, which was absolutely unrelated to the world, (something that it was the real fear for the Russian sophiology - cf. Bulgakov) or on the other hand we can conceive of a God that desires freely to create a new reality, the world and freely relates himself to this contingent reality, without limited his very being.
f. Besides it should be noted that the idea of creation is totally absent especially from Solovyov's system28, and even further there is a real lack of understanding the relation between the God and the world as a dialectical one, which presupposes the ex nihilo beginning of the created world. In this case the two realities, despite the opposite preoccupation of the Russian sophiology, («God's being is not dependent on creation, nor is exhausted in God' relation to creation» according to Bulgakov29) are inter-connected with a kind of an unbreakable ontological continuity and affinity at the level of being.
These brief remarks show us that for the «metaphysics of All-unity» God and the world constitutes finally a close circle, a sort of a closed ontology30, without ontological otherness, but also without ontological freedom for the different parts of
this monistic reality. Everything, the many, have to referred and subordinated to the One, the En, in order to achieve the desired All-unity of the reality. Perhaps it is preferable to describe this worldview as a large circle, which contains within itself the two narrowly interrelated Absolutes, (or better a kind of two homocentric circles).
II. In this case what is the possible alternative proposition for describing the relation between God and the world?
Georges Florovsky a well known orthodox theologian of the 20th century gives us the means to think due to a different point of view, concerning this crucial issue. If he succeeded to his task is, as we shall see, an open question. He is considered as the father of the famous «neo-patristic synthesis», which constitutes a kind of an alternative (or better an opposite to sophiology) methodological program, based on pure (?) theological principles. By this he tried to explain theologically the whole reality. This program can be presented as an effort to formulate a Christian theological methodology («Christian Hellenism»), as a full theological model, which according to him could diachronically function as a protection for the Christian theology against any kind of philosophical misunderstandings and confusions. Florovsky's neo-patristic
synthesis also implies that «the advancement of thought demands its return.......into
its origins...a living connection with these origins», that is the theological sources of Revelation.
Before dealing with his thought, two things have to be mentioned. Firstly, it should be noted that Florovsky attempts to criticize the idealistic influences, or better the introduction of the idealistic methodology in the field of the Christian thought, as a return to the pre-christian pagan world. Based mainly on the patristic theology, he desires to construct a theology of creation of the world which was according to him the most urgent task for the entire theological discourse. Because this theology of creation is close related to the vision we have about God ad intra, it is a point of great importance that Christian theology have to deal with it, in order to overcome the further problems and clarify the whole subject. As Florovsky puts it «the idea of Creation is one of the main distinctive marks of the Christian mind. It was much more than the answer to the problem of origins. In this answer the whole further development is already implied»31. Besides, it is noteworthy that, although Florovsky never struggles openly against the leaders of the Russian Sophiology of his time (e.g. Bulgakov), at the same time all his work and especially his essays on creation, seems to be a deep criticism to this sophiological view. Finally which are the basic elements of his «neo-patristic synthesis», relative to our issue?
a. The main effort of Florovsky, was the detachment of God from the world, in other words the break of the close holistic worldview of the classic thought, which keeps the whole reality in a close circle, without the sense of freedom, contingency and otherness. The philosophical term «cosmos» describes very well this tragic situation. In contradiction, Florovsky introduces the concept of creation, based mainly on the patristic theology of Athanasius of Alexandria. «The world is created» is a very sort phrase «which emphasizes the real contingency of the world». «A created world is a world which might not have existed at all.it is a derived and depended existence». Furthermore the world had been brought into existence by «the free act of God'»32 (his will), and not from God's essence. It is a «surplus»33 at the ontological level.
b. This new understanding about the status of the world's being that it was introduced by the Christian thought, opens a new perspective regarding the relation between God and the world. Firstly, the world does not constitute anymore a presupposed locus for God's self-revelation or better for the very being of the God. There exists a «hiatus»34 between God and the world. In addition not only the creatures (e.g. the «podvig»=ascetical achievement) but also God in his relation to the world (ad extra) engaged freedom (to create or not). Furthermore for the Russian theologian the beginning of the existence of the world is indentified with the beginning of time. Hence the historical time and history in general acquire now a positive meaning for the human life (because «the begun being is eo35 ipso a historical being»), in contradiction to the utopian trends of the German idealism, seeking for its eschatological, meta-historic accomplishment.
c. Since Florovsky had in mind the sophiological tradition, he tried to present a coherent theology of creation as an answer to this challenge. His antinomical (God#world) view offers to us the means to rethink on the relation between God and the world, or better between created and uncreated. Within a clear theological and not philosophical context, Florovsky attempted to overcome the close ontology and the monism of the Russian philosophical tradition, which evidently reflected according to his view the pre-christian Hellenism. Emphasizing the idea of the creation, which is a traditional biblical (Pauline) idea, he succeeded to present through his neo-patristic synthesis an alternative worldview, as an answer to the dominant in his time philosophical stream of Russian sophiology (especially against to Bulgakov).
d. After this brief discussion on Florovsky's thought, a question is still open if this program, the neo-patristic proposition, finally succeeded. In order to answer this question, we have to evaluate the basic difference between the two propositions (All-unity and neo-patristic synthesis). It is true, according to my reading at least, that Florovsky's program constitutes on the one hand a different and certainly corrective proposal to the sophiology of the Russian thinkers, but on the other hand not also such a radical and really new interpretation and development regarding the relation between God and the world. Let me explain what I mean.
III. a. Without exaggeration the key-idea of understanding Florovsky's program is the idea of creation on which he based all his neo-patristic theology. On the contrary, it is also true that this notion is totally absent in the «metaphysics of the All-unity». Additionally, while the Russian sophiology makes reference very often to a kind of even relative freedom for the creatures (c.f. the different between «epigenesist» and «evolution» used by Florovsky to define the two totally different perspectives in relation to freedom) there is an evident lack of any kind of freedom (obviously an absolute freedom) in the field of God's very being. Besides Florovsky, distinguishing between the essence and the will of God ad intra, attempts to safeguard God's being from cosmological motifs, that was a usual situation in the first Christian centuries, and that seems to be repeated by the narrow connection between God's being and the world.
b. However, in spite of his new direction, he does not finally succeed to overcome his deep philosophical roots, that is the same problematic holistic Russian tradition against which he struggles with passion. Although he desires to break the ontological
affinity and continuity between God and the world, and for this reason he applies the idea of creation, at the same time he prefers to utilize an «ontology of energy»36, which ties up permanently God and the word at the level of being. This is clear when he states that there is no exit «out or from the existence»37 for the created order. To put it in another way, while Florovsky attains to detach the world from God's being38, which means that he removes the world from its necessary connection or identification to the very being of God (cf. the above mentioned homocentric circles) he finally fails to fully disconnect God and the world at the level of being, provided that there is no any structural use of the ex nihilo concept as a radical and absolute concept concerning the beginning of the created world. The lack of a dialectical relation between God and the world relative to the nihilo as the absolute beginning of the world is of crucial importance for the acceptance of the full ontological transcendence and freedom of God both ad intra and ad extra to his relation to the creation39. Otherwise there is always the danger of some kind of confusion between the levels of Theology and Economy. Put it directly, we don't have anymore two homocentric circles, but two successive circles at the field of being.
References
1The paper is a revised version of a text read at the international conference on 'All-unity and Universality" organized by the St Andrew's Biblical-Theological Institute in Bose, on October 22-25, 2009. It is primarily based on my dissertation project (2008-till now) concerning a methodological comparison between G. Florovsky and Metropolitan John Zizioulas on the topic "Creation, History and Eschata"
2 S. HORUZHY "Neo-patristic Synthesis and Russian Philosophy" SVTQ 44:3 - 4 (2000) 315.
3 KLINE "Religious roots of S.L. Frank ethics" in J. KORNBLATT-R. GUSTAFSON, Russian Religious thought, (Wisconsin Press, 1996), p.228.
4 Routledge encyclopedia of Philosophy vol. 9 ed. Ed. Graig (1998), col. 31b - 32a
5 S. HORUZHY "Neo-patristic Synthesis and Russian Philosophy" SVTQ 44:3 - 4 (2000) 314.
6 Cf. F C. COPLESTON Philosophy in Russia: from Herzen to Lenin and Berdyaev (Notre Dame University Press, 1986) 206 - 212, B. ZENKOVSKY Histoire de la philosophie russe vol. 2, trans. Const. Andronikof, (Gallimard: Paris, 1954) 12-16.
7 J.HAERS-PD. MEY Theology and conversation: towards a relational theology (Leuven University Press, 2003) 324 (5).
8 FL.CROSS-E.A LIVINGSTONE (eds) The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (Oxford University Press, 31997) cl. 1517b. cf. the similarity between 'All-unity" and the "Great being" of Comte. Cf. also W BERCKEN-M. COURTEN-E DER ZWEERDE, Vl. Solov'ev: reconciler and polemicist, selected papers (2000) 193, M. CUNNINGHAM-EL. THEOKRITOFF, "Who are the Orthodox Christians?" in The Cambridge Companion to Orthodox Christian Theology (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 2008) 11.
9 Y. CONGAR, "Soloviev dans l' Eglise universelle" in (Colloque Vladimir Soloviev) Nouvelles Institut Catholique de Paris, n.1 (mars-1979) 115, B.DUPUY "Soloviev Vladimir (1853-1900)" in J-Y. Lacoste (dir) Dictionaire critique de Theologie, (PUF: Paris, 1998) 1100.
10 F C. COPLESTON Philosophy in Russia: from Herzen to Lenin and Berdyaev.op. cit. 222.
11 F C. COPLESTON Philosophy in Russia: from Herzen to Lenin and Berdyaev.op. cit. 214.
12 W BERCKEN-M. COURTEN-E DER ZWEERDE, Vl. Solov'ev: reconciler and polemicist, selected papers.. .op. cit. 194.
13 F C. COPLESTON Philosophy in Russia: from Herzen to Lenin and Berdyaev.op. cit. 214.
14 Routledge encyclopedia of Philosophy vol. 9 (ed) Ed. Graig (1998), col. 29b.
15 A PAPANIKOLAOU "Orthodox theology" in The encyclopedia of Christianity vol. 5 (Grand Rapids, Cambridge: Eerdmans Publishing-Brill, 2008) 415a
16 B. DUPUY "Soloviev..." op. cit. 1100.
17 B. ZENKOVSKY Histoire de la philosophie vol. 2, .op. cit. 36.
18 A> mentioned in IP GAIDENKO "Russian philosophy in the context of European thinking: The case of Vl. Solovyov" Diogenes 222-223 (2009), 24-36
19 F C. COPLESTON Philosophy in Russia: from Herzen to Lenin and Berdyaev... op. cit. 222.
20 J.HAERS-P.D. MEY Theology and conversation: towards a relational theology,...op. cit. 324.
21 A PAPANIKOLAOU "Orthodox theology" ... op. cit. 415a.
22 J.HAERS-P.D. MEY Theology and conversation: towards a relational theology,. op. cit. 325.
23 Cf. e.g. F C. COPLESTON Philosophy in Russia: from Herzen to Lenin and Berdyaev.op. cit. 236, A. PAPANIKOLAOU, "'Sophia Orthoi'! The Trinitarian theology of Sergei Bulgakov" (unpublished paper read at the conference of CTSA, in Romania, 2009).
24 A PAPANIKOLAOU, "Sophia Orthoi". op. cit. 11.
25 B. ZENKOVSKY Histoire de la philosophie russe vol. 2, ... op. cit. 72.
26 A PAPANIKOLAOU "Orthodox theology" in The encyclopedia of Christianity vol. 5. op. cit. 415b.
27 A PAPANIKOLAOU "Sophia Orthoi". op. cit. 12.
28 B. ZENKOVSKY Histoire de la philosophie vol. 2, .op. cit. 35.
29 A PAPANIKOLAOU "Orthodox theology" in The encyclopedia of Christianity vol. 5.op. cit. 415b.
30 Cf. in this respect the close ontological view of the classic philosophical thought of Plato and others.
31 G. FLOROVSKY, "The idea of creation in Christian Philosophy" in Eastern Churches Quartely -Supplementary issue: nature and grace - VIII (1949) 53.
32 G. FLOROVSKY, "The idea of creation in Christian Philosophy" op. cit. 54-55, "Creation and Creaturehood" in Collected Works, vol. 3 (Norland Publishing Company: Belmont, Massachusetts, 1976) 43-51.
33 Cf. for instance G. FLOROVSKY "Creation and Creaturehood". op. cit. 57, "The idea of creation in Christian Philosophy" op. cit. 55
34 Cf. for instance G. FLOROVSKY, "The idea of creation in Christian Philosophy" op. cit. 57
35 S. HORUZHY "Neo-patristic Synthesis and Russian Philosophy" SVTQ 44:3-4 (2000), 325.
36 S. HORUZHY "Neo-patristic Synthesis and Russian Philosophy" SVTQ 44:3-4 (2000), 326
37 Cf. for instance, G. FLOROVSKY, "The idea of creation in Christian Philosophy".op. cit. 76.
38 Cf. Florovsky's effort (Cf. for instance G. FLOROVSKY "Creation and Creaturehood". op. cit. 56) to distinguish in God's being between two shorts of eternity, relative to the divine plan of the creation of the world on the one hand and God's essence on the other. Besides in this context it must be mentioned the radical difference between the divine plan as such and the realization in space and time of this plan.
39 It must be mentioned that Florovsky's program appeared in the middle of a variety of theological trends. Beyond the dominant Russian philosophical theology, he also had to face the Barthian radically dialectic vision (at least his first period) concerning the relation between God and the world. In this respect Florovsky presents himself excessively hesitant to adopt such a radical understanding.
