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Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 4th, 2009, 12:18 pm
by Bluegoat

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 4th, 2009, 1:19 pm
by rusmeister

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 4th, 2009, 3:34 pm
by postodave
If I understand the position Rus is espousing it is something like this. The authority of the Church is something a person comes to accept as a result of argument (I am not sure if Rus is saying this is or ought always to be the case of it just happened to be so in his case) once he has accepted this authority he must in some matters submit his reasoning to it.

Now it seems that the argument by means of which a person reaches the conclusion that the Church is authoritative is not simply that the Church is authoritative because it says so which would be viciously circular. It follows then that at this point of deciding whether the Church is authoritative the argument must have greater authority than the Church; Rus confirms this when he says people do not accept the authority of the Church because their reasoning is flawed. He rejects the idea that Orthodoxy just feels true to him so we know that he feels reason has greater authority for him than feeling and that would presumably include any feelings generated by religious experiences and in so far as they are felt by him the religious experiences themselves. Now if this argument is a purely deductive one it must have premises, so the next question will be where these premises come from. Are they the product of a prior argument and if so where do the premises of this prior argument come from? We know that they cannot come from a person's own experience as Rus has rejected the self as a source of authority and we know they cannot come from the Church as it is the authority of the Church that is being judged. If on the other hand the argument is a hypothetical one then there is the problem that the truth of a hypothesis can never be conclusively proved and so someone will have to make the judgement as to whether the argument is compelling; this cannot be the self because Rus rejects the self as a source of authority.

Now either I have misunderstood Rus completely or there is no way anyone could ever come to accept the authority of the Church in the way Rus claims they do. What I am saying is that there seem to be huge gaps in Rus's epistemology and I'd invite him to fill them in.

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 4th, 2009, 9:11 pm
by Bluegoat

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 5th, 2009, 9:59 am
by rusmeister

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 10th, 2009, 11:15 pm
by hammurabi2000

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 11th, 2009, 1:04 am
by rusmeister

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 11th, 2009, 2:47 pm
by Bluegoat

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 13th, 2009, 12:30 am
by hammurabi2000

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 13th, 2009, 10:14 am
by Xara

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 13th, 2009, 10:23 am
by Xara

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 14th, 2009, 6:04 pm
by Bluegoat

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 14th, 2009, 10:35 pm
by Xara

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 14th, 2009, 10:54 pm
by Bluegoat

Re: Orthodox church and authority

PostPosted: April 16th, 2009, 10:59 pm
by postodave
Hi bluegoat
I would recommend the monachos site. It's well regulated though rather formal. You have to make it clear you are a non-orthodox visitor but you are made to feel welcome. It tends to the philosophical/theological side but I think that would suit you. The guy who runs it is very knowledgeable on the fathers which is where it tends to focus a lot of the time - so it can sometimes but more like a question and answer session than a debate but I quite like that. Just google monachos. You do the occasional oddball but it's all very civil.
I was reading a book of Anglican, Catholic and Orthodox dialogue written back in 1963 - it was all more civilised then somehow. I actually wonder if Orthodoxy is now picking up people who would have joined groups like the Plymouth Brethren at one time. I've no evidence for that though just a suspicion.