Moral theology. Division of the Science of Christian Morality

Submitting your good work to the knowledge base is easy. Use the form below

Students, graduate students, young scientists who use the knowledge base in their studies and work will be very grateful to you.

Posted on http://www.allbest.ru/

1. Subject and sources of Moral Theology

Moral theology is both specific and universal. It is based on the uniqueness of Divine Revelation, but also takes into account the value of philosophical knowledge. Moral theology contains a whole world of moral values ​​and deals with their theoretical justification and understanding. Moral theology derives its authority from Divine Revelation, that is, from the Divine will about man, and is therefore based on the highest and ultimate reality. Moral theology views Christian morality as the fulfillment and completion of natural morality, which is inherent in the experience of every person and requires its improvement and development.

The main source of Moral Theology is the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. The main principles of Christian morality are set out in chapters 5-7 of the Gospel of Matthew and in the Epistles of the Holy Apostle Paul. The Sermon on the Mount and other speeches of Christ, as well as the most important passages from the Apostolic Epistles, gave Christian teaching a deep ethical character and fiery enthusiasm. Of particular importance are the Gospel narrative of the Last Judgment, in which a person’s justification before God will depend on deeds of love for others, and those passages from the Epistles of the Holy Apostle Paul that indicate the incompatibility of sin with a person’s moral dignity and his Christian way of life.

Church tradition is the most extensive source. This includes the dogmatic teaching of the Church, the moral and exegetical works of the holy fathers and teachers of the Church, hagiography and hagiology, liturgical texts, homiletical heritage, canonical definitions and large moral and ascetic literature.

Moral theology comes from the basic doctrinal provisions of Dogmatic Theology, which studies the actions of God in relation to the world and man. Moral theology examines both the actions of God and the actions of man, showing man how to act in accordance with God's calling and how to respond specifically to the divine actions of the Incarnation and Atonement.

The importance of the moral and exegetical works of the holy fathers and teachers of the Church is determined by their direct relationship to the texts of Holy Scripture, that is, to the original source. The explanation of the moral meaning of the sacred text receives strength, depth and ecclesiastical authority in the works of the Church Fathers.

The value of monuments of hagiographic writing is determined by the moral examples they contain from the lives of saints who embodied the gospel moral ideal in their following of Christ.

The significance of liturgical texts as a source for Moral Theology is that they reflect the ideal forms of behavior and moral virtues revealed by the saints of the Orthodox Church.

The homiletical heritage of the Church contains abundant material, including practical pastoral experience in the religious and moral education of Church members.

Canon law is of undoubted value for Moral Theology, since this is the only area where the moral consciousness of the Church was expressed in an extremely concrete form in relation to ethical problems. However, Orthodox theology strives to engage the canon without excessive literalism. The changing conditions of life of the Church do not allow the literal application of patriotic instructions in relation to moral life without taking into account the nature of the new reality.

Moral and ascetic literature points to the path of active and contemplative deeds that lead a person to moral and spiritual perfection. Asceticism speaks a lot and in detail about the inclinations of man’s fallen nature, about the struggle against thoughts and sin, about the ways of man’s moral likeness to God, and this is the undoubted significance of asceticism as a source for Moral Theology.

From non-Revelation sources, reference should be made to various ethical disciplines that have important scientific and methodological significance. Among them, the greatest interest for Moral Theology is positive, normative, philosophical and practical ethics.

Positive ethics deals with the description of human behavior in connection with certain moral views in a particular historical era. Positive ethics provides insight into how people behaved in the past and how they act now. For example, one could write a history of morality in Ancient Rome or a history of a modern country, in which, decade by decade, the behavior of people and their attitude to prevailing moral norms and values ​​would be described.

Normative ethics has as its task the analysis and understanding of moral norms. Normative ethics develops moral precepts regarding human behavior and specifies what exactly a person should do and what he should not do in the name of observing moral standards.

Philosophical ethics deals with the discussion of metaphysical and metaethical questions of morality, for example, the question of the nature of ethical values. It is a moral philosophy built on a purely non-Revelation basis.

Practical ethics has the goal of improving human behavior. These are the moral instructions that a person receives in the family, at school and in society. The ancient Greeks called the ability to observe the norms of moral behavior an art, meaning a person’s ability to lead a decent, moral lifestyle.

Of these ethical disciplines, philosophical and practical ethics represent the ethics of theoretical understanding and execution, and positive and normative ethics represent the ethics of the functioning of morality in culture.

Other sources not related to Revelation, but of interest to Moral Theology, include philosophical and medical anthropology, biology, psychology and sociology.

2. History of Moral Theology

As a theological discipline, Moral Theology emerged in modern times. Nevertheless, we can talk about the history of Christian ethics, which arose together with the Christian moral gospel and has gone through a long path of historical development.

The history of Christian ethics is divided into three periods: patristic (I-VIII centuries), late Byzantine (IX-XVI centuries) and modern (XVII-XX centuries).

The beginning of Christian ethics dates back to the era when paganism, which had outlived its historical time, in the fight against the Christian religion, for its part, exposed the moral truths inherited over the centuries and contrasted them with the simplicity of the Christian faith. The criticism leveled against Christians by pagans reflected some important moral issues. The moral teaching of Christianity, as a living reflection in the life of Christians of the most holy ideal revealed in the person of the God-Man Lord Jesus Christ, revealed and confirmed the height and superiority of the Christian moral worldview.

The first attempt to present Christian moral teaching in a specific system dates back only to the end of the 4th century. We have in mind Saint Ambrose of Milan, who, in three books “On Duties” (De officiis), first set out Christian moral teaching in the system, contrasting his work with the work of Cicero, also called “On Duties” (De officiis).

Since the 4th century, we have seen an intensive growth of monuments on Christian ethics. These are moral instructions, sermons and ascetic words containing a lot of moral and theological material. Of the monuments of the patristic period, the most interesting are: “The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles” (“Didache”); the writings of the apostolic men - Saint Clement of Rome, Saint Ignatius the God-Bearer, Saint Polycarp of Smyrna, Hermas; the writings of Christian apologists - St. Justin the Philosopher and the author of the Epistle to Diognetus; the works of Saint Methodius of Patara and Clement of Alexandria; the writings of the great Cappadocian saints Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian and Gregory of Nyssa; the works of St. John Chrysostom, Blessed Augustine, Blessed Jerome and the works of the holy fathers - the authors of the Philokalia.

In general, the patriotic period is characterized by the fact that we constantly encounter in-depth consideration of ethical issues in the works of Christian apologists, early Church Fathers and great theologians of the “golden age” of Christian writing.

During the second period, from the 9th to the 16th centuries, we have little creative work. Analogies predominate, repeating the moral constructions of the fathers of the patristic period. Like ears of corn after the harvest, the works of the early fathers are collected and rewritten. Such holy fathers as Theodore the Studite, Gregory the Sinaite, Nikita Stifat and other authors, whose works were included in the Philokalia, contributed to the development of moral issues during this period. The most important and characteristic feature of this period is the continuation in theology of the mystical tradition begun in the patriotic period by saints Dionysius the Areopagite, Macarius the Great and Maximus the Confessor. Among the writings of late Byzantine mystics, the works of St. Simeon the New Theologian, St. Gregory Palamas and their followers are of value for Moral Theology. The ethics of the mystical theologians can be characterized as an ascetic ethics that flourished mainly in monastic life.

The third period in the history of Christian ethics covers the 17th-20th centuries. Here we must pay attention mainly to Russian and Greek authors. During this period, Christian ethics developed as an independent theological discipline, distinct from Dogmatic and Pastoral theology. At the beginning of this period, primacy in the development of Moral Theology belonged to Roman Catholic and Protestant theologians. In the 18th century in Russia, Archbishop Feofan Prokopovich created a course on Moral Theology, which was included in the program of the Kyiv and Moscow Academies and Trinity Seminary. Metropolitan Plato of Moscow, in the third part of his work “Abridged Theology” (1765), outlined a system of Christian moral teaching that had extreme success and was accepted as a guide in theological educational institutions. From Russian theologians XIX - early. XX centuries Moral Theology courses were developed by: Bishop of Penza and Saratov Innokenty (Smirnov) (1821), Archpriest Joakim Kochetov, teacher of the law at the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum (1824), Archimandrite Platon (Thebean), rector of the Vladimir Theological Seminary (1854), Archpriest Peter Solyarsky, Archpriest John Khalkolivanov (1872), Archimandrite Gabriel, Archpriest N. Kamensky (later Archbishop Nikanor), Professor Protopresbyter John Yanyshev (1887), I. Pyatnitsky (1890), A. Pokrovsky (1891), Professor M.A. Olesnitsky (1892), S. Nikitsky, professor M. Tareev (1908). A very special place belongs to the greatest Russian church writers of the 19th century - St. Theophan the Recluse (“Inscriptions of Christian Moral Teaching” and “The Path to Salvation”) and St. Ignatius of the Caucasus (“Ascetic Experiences”). Assessing the development of the pre-revolutionary school of Russian Orthodox Christian ethics, we must recognize the undoubted correspondence of the educational courses on Moral Theology created in Russia in the 18th-19th centuries to the demands, needs and character of their era.

In general, the third period in the history of Christian ethics is characterized by the Western Renaissance direction, which led to the formation of the concept of personality, which became key in modern European culture. In parallel with the influence of Western European enlightenment in Russia, there is a return to the holy fathers of the Church: the translation of the Philokalia undertaken by St. Paisius of Nyametsky and St. Theophan the Recluse, the flourishing of the Optina eldership and the extensive systematic activity of monasteries and Theological Academies in the translation and publication of the vast patristic heritage.

At the beginning of the 20th century, in the growing moral unrest, metaphysical motives were increasingly identified, and the question of the “ultimate meaning” became more and more prominent. The task is realized to build a new “doctrine of life” as its justification, to carry out a new moral-theological synthesis, to bring a solid metaphysical basis to the existing building of Moral Theology. This task, bequeathed by the pre-revolutionary era, requires responsible reflection and creative solutions in our time.

The current state of Moral Theology is determined by the search for a scientific approach to the creation of systems of Orthodox Christian ethics.

In the conditions of Russia gradually overcoming the consequences of spiritual and moral emptiness, it becomes especially obvious that a concept that does not affirm any eternal constants for a person deprives his existence of absolute moral meaning. Without the presence of a higher and sacred principle in life, human existence becomes humiliation and vulgarity. Overcoming the doom and meaninglessness of personal existence is achieved by a person by joining the grace-filled life of the Church, which embodies in its existence the universal meaning of the royal victory of Christ, who recreated man for eternal life in God in its ideal completeness. The theology of our time is called upon to declare and testify to this mission of the Church. It follows that the main categories of ethics to be studied must be considered as absolute coordinates of human existence, revealing the personality in its own inexhaustible depth, in the multifaceted perspective of its possibilities and manifestations.

In Greek theology, as noted by Professor S. Harakas, three main directions in the approach to ethics deserve attention: the Athenian, Constantinople and Thessalonian schools, each of which is characterized by its own specific method.

Representatives of the School of Athens emphasize that there is no vital difference between Christian and philosophical ethics, since ethics is based on the nature of the human mind. The Athenian school strives to give ethics a scientific and academic character and relies very little on the heritage of the holy fathers, preferring philosophical sources.

Representatives of the Constantinople school view Christian ethics as the doctrine of the conformity of the life of a redeemed person with the gospel moral ideal and pay great attention to a person’s personal relationship with Christ. The Constantinople school draws mainly on biblical and patriotic sources, especially on the Eastern and Western Church Fathers of the first four centuries.

The Thessalonian school draws its material from late Byzantine sources. Its representatives emphasize the existential and personal nature of ethics. They discuss issues of human existence and teach about the individual achieving salvation in the life of the Church.

The task of our modern domestic theology in the field of ethics, as already noted, should be the development of a universal, strictly defined and deeply ontologized ethical concept and the creation on this fundamental basis of an integral moral system.

3. Development and formation of personality

The problem of personality in Moral Theology

In its approach to the problem of personality, Moral Theology proceeds from dogmatic premises and data presented by the general science of man.

In the light of the dogmatic teaching of the Church, personality, as the image of God imprinted in man, is inaccessible to all-encompassing and exhaustive knowledge. A person cannot be an object of scientific study in the same completeness and volume as objects of the external world. It always remains incomprehensible in its ultimate, deep essence. In the inaccessibly hidden life and in its manifestation, the personality always remains an original, unique, inimitable and therefore the only spiritual structure in the whole world, not reducible to any other existential reality. The Holy Scriptures, pointing to the dignity of the human soul, implicitly emphasize precisely this aspect of the uniqueness of the individual. The unique value of the human personality, its high dignity and its exclusive ontological privilege, recognized as an incomparable gift of being, are determined by the fact of its creation by God as the Supreme and Absolute Person and the fact of its deification in Christ.

Personality cannot be explained from any extraneous extrapersonal elements. That which is personal is no longer composed of something else, which would be more primary than the personality, is not divided into anything, is not destroyed - neither in space nor in time. As the image of God, personality does not need any causal-genetic explanation. The only way to explain a person in the complete indivisibility and indestructibility of his existential structure is to recognize the dogmatic truth about what God created him out of nothing.

The second most important premise, which represents a fundamental point in the theological interpretation of personality, is the dogmatic teaching of the Church on the Incarnation of God. Moral theology proceeds from the fact that the Son of God in His Incarnation and Resurrection revealed the deepest and most fundamental basis of the essence of man, whom He recreated for eternal life and for participation in the ideal fullness of being.

The human personality does not exist on its own, not by virtue of its self-sufficiency, since it does not have a source of being in itself, but exists due to its ontological participation in Christ. Christ is the metaphysical foundation of each human personality in its real concreteness and in the infinity of the perspective of existence that opens up for it.

In the light of the data presented by the general science of man, its empirical aspect comes to the fore in the interpretation of personality. Here, primary attention is paid to how the personality manifests itself, reveals and realizes itself in the complex spiritual-physical nature of man. Human existence is a single and indivisible life of nature and personality. The God-given spiritual-physical nature of man is the area of ​​actualization (revealing) of personality. The soul and body of a person, under the influence of the individual, also become something individual, personal, they also reflect the innermost features of the image of God. In general, in all creation, in every person and the world as a whole, only the many-sided reflection in everything of the absolute wisdom and goodness of God is truly original and therefore valuable.

Moral theology deals with the description of Divine actions and, above all, God’s wisdom and goodness in their relation to man as a person, where morality is nothing more than the response of the human person to the benefits of God and its participation in the fate of one’s neighbor following the example of God’s goodness.

From the point of view of the empirical content of life, the existence of a person is formation, development and formation, taking place in the specific conditions of natural and historical reality, social and cultural situations. Within its biographical framework, each person finds himself immersed in the elements of the world, in the real flow of the cultural and historical process, and in it becomes the bearer of a certain moral worldview, manifested in lifestyle and moral behavior.

Therefore, in approaching the problem of personality, Moral Theology proceeds from the fact that one cannot separate a person’s individual life from the objective world of nature, social connections, historical and cultural conditions. On the other hand, based on the fact that personality is primarily a phenomenon of the spiritual world, it is necessary to refrain from exaggerating the role of various external determinants in the formation of personality. Moral theology recognizes the human personality as freedom and openness towards new values, towards man and society. Moral theology views the personality not as an unchanging and static image, but as a structure, although relatively stable, holistic, but at the same time an open structure, becoming, always in the dynamics of formation, in creative growth, on the way.

Moral principles in the development of personality

Starting from early childhood, a person’s life takes place simultaneously in three spheres of existence: in the sphere of natural existence, in the sphere of socio-cultural life and in the sphere of religious church life. The moral principle, as a universal reality of human life, is present in all these spheres of existence and performs the most important ontological function of forming the structure of existence. Formation is what opposes the law of decay, which leads to overcoming chaos and to the formation of life into a stable and integral structure. Specific factors for overcoming the principle of decay and the formation of life on solid ontological foundations are: in the sphere of natural existence - a person’s mastery of the processes of his own behavior, in the sphere of socio-cultural life - the implementation of the principles of ethical attitude towards man, in the sphere of religious church life - the achievement by a person of supernatural Divine grace .

In the sphere of natural existence, man defines himself in relation to the surrounding cosmos and in relation to his own nature. The formation of each individual human personality here should be understood in the context of the formation of the Earth's ethnosphere, which, according to L.N. Gumilev, is the key to understanding world history. Nature, climate, landscape and other geographical characteristics are factors in the formation of national moral character. For example, in the soul of the Russian people there is the same immensity, boundlessness, aspiration to infinity, as in the endless Russian plain. If a person expresses his attitude to the surrounding cosmos through the perception of the experience of his people and all of humanity in general, then he builds his attitude to his own natural existence on the acquired personal life experience. The moral principle underlying personal life experience is embodied in the principle of abstinence. The ethical meaning of abstinence is that a person is protected from immersion in the element of materiality and in the area of ​​sensual hobbies, where he ceases to exist as a spiritual person. The principle of abstinence presupposes a person’s reasonable and creative attitude towards the possession of the world. Called to a responsible awareness of his activities in the world, man must discover the abilities given to him and subordinate them to the fulfillment of God's intended purpose. It should not be thought that the final destination of man remains an absolutely transcendental goal. On the contrary, it is carried out in the conditions of earthly human reality, in the freedom of formation and is manifested in specific deeds and actions. Mastering the external world and mastering the processes of one’s own behavior is one of the main aspects of the formation of a person as an individual.

The socio-cultural environment is the second essential area of ​​personality formation. No matter how perfect man is, created in the image of God, revealed to us in the biblical Christian image of Adam, he cannot realize his formation outside of communication with the human environment. Human moral nature is focused on interhuman communication and cooperation. The man Adam can be considered complete only when Eve, like him, became his life partner. Consequently, not only the natural world, but also the socio-cultural environment in its diversity and universality is the area of ​​personality formation. Carrying out its formation in the conditions of a certain socio-cultural environment, a person strives to treat everyone ethically and to be perceived ethically by everyone. A specific aspect of personality formation in a socio-cultural environment is adherence to the moral principles of justice, duty, honesty and respect for human dignity.

In the field of church and religious life, the system of ethics rests on the foundation of a religious Christian worldview, which contains the immense mystery of the meaning of human existence, and therefore turns out to be valid and effective. The modern mind constantly struggles to understand the unthinkable; its empirical mission is to extinguish the mystery. Therefore modern thought has never actually been able to offer a morality. Even the highest ethics, built on the moral foundations of Christianity, but denying the Divine nature of Christianity and not recognizing the institutions of the Church, dooms itself to failure. Ethics can function with true authority and real success only in the system of a Christian worldview. The area of ​​religious church life is an environment for the formation of a highly moral personality. In the life of the Church, man is presented not only with the ideal of moral perfection, revealed in the Gospel image of the God-man, but also with supernatural grace, which leads man to deification and holiness and thereby contributes to the fulfillment of the task facing him of his formation and formation as a spiritual and transformed personality who has entered into a new life with Christ.

Stages of Personality Development

For a large number of people, “life crises” occur at approximately the same age. This provides the basis for dividing and describing the stages of development of a mature personality.

The stages of middle age precede the developmental stages of young adults. Young people in their twenties are faced with the choice of a spouse and profession, outline life goals and begin to implement them. Later, around the age of thirty, many of them come to reassess their previous choices and life goals. Finally, the first years after turning thirty are, as a rule, a time of coming to terms with new or newly confirmed elections.

The first stage of middle age begins around age thirty and continues into the early part of the next decade. Its main characteristic is the awareness of the discrepancy between a person’s dreams, hopes and life plans and the reality of his existence. Since dreams always have some unrealistic features, the assessment of their discrepancy with reality at this stage is colored, as a rule, in negative and emotionally painful tones. Time passes and makes a gap between dreams and suddenly revealed reality with frightening sharpness. People aged 35-40 years begin to disagree with statements such as: “You still have everything ahead of you,” “You still have enough time to achieve what you want.” Instead, they state: “It’s too late to change anything in my life.” At twenty and thirty years old they can say about a person that he “shows promise,” but after forty years no one will say that anymore. A person must accept the fact that he will never again become a scientist, an outstanding administrator, or even an insignificant writer. Liberation from illusions is not unusual for those aged thirty-five or forty, but it can be threatening to the individual. A person may feel confused and his self-confidence suddenly disappears. An analysis of the lives of people in creative professions reveals certain dramatic changes in their creativity somewhere around thirty-five years. Some of them began creative work at this time, others, on the contrary, lost their creative abilities to a large extent around the age of thirty-five. One of the reasons for the midlife crisis of people in creative professions is that the “impulsive brilliance” of youth requires the expenditure of great vitality. At thirty-five and forty years of age, a person leading a busy life (a manager or a professor) must change the intense pace of his life. In general, the problem of diminishing physical strength arises in the life of a person of any profession. Declining physical strength is one of the many problems that a person faces during the midlife crisis and beyond. For those who relied on their physical attributes when they were younger, middle age can be a period of severe depression. The decline of physical strength can surprise people from a wide range of professions with its unexpectedness. University professors recall with regret their ability to spend several days without sleep during their student years if important business required it. Many people simply complain that they start to get tired too often. They are increasingly attuned not to new creative work, but to the acquired wisdom and experience. This requires emotional flexibility, the ability to respond emotionally to new people and new activities. Mental rigidity must also be overcome so that rigid attitudes do not lead to mistakes and an inability to perceive creative problem solving.

Successful resolution of a midlife crisis usually involves a reformulation of life goals within the framework of a more realistic and restrained point of view and taking into account the limited time of every person's life. Spiritual matters, spouse, friends and children become increasingly important, while the self is increasingly deprived of its exclusive position. There is an increasing tendency to be content with what we have and to think less about things we will most likely never achieve. There is a tendency to feel one's position is quite decent. All these changes mark a new stage in personality development, a period of stabilization. The process of inner renewal ultimately leads to a calmer and even more fulfilling life. After fifty years of age, health problems become more pressing and there is a growing awareness that “time is running out.” In general, the fifties can be characterized by the continuation of those new forms of stability that were achieved during the previous decade.

The period after sixty years in rare cases can be a fourth or even a third of life. This period is characterized by the fact that a person leaves the work that he performed in adulthood. However, even during this period, some people retain their mental abilities and continue to engage in administrative or creative activities. In general, this period is the final one in relation to the life path traveled. Most people at this age live with memories of the past. For those people who in previous years led their lives according to the establishment of the Holy Church, this period is often marked by new spiritual achievements. Special clarity of mind, enlightenment of the entire external appearance, simple and spiritual complacency are visible gifts of Divine grace at this age. As physical strength fades, when there is nothing left that can keep a person in this world, he turns to God with all the strength of his soul. Believing and confessing that the Son of God revealed in His incarnation the deepest, eternal and essential basis of existence, and knowing that the path of earthly human life was really and gracefully traversed by Christ, man, at the last crucial moment of realizing himself in this world, strives to be pure with the mind, in freedom from everything earthly, to be rewarded with ascent to the upper world. He who does not believe in eternal life in Christ is not capable of ascension, for, having decided for himself that eternal life is impossible, he blocks his own path to the Divine light, remaining in the darkness of the terrifying “nothing” with its abyss. Man is not doomed to non-existence and destruction; he is called to overcome the elements of earthly existence and to eternal life, in which the entire life path he has passed acquires unconditional justification and meaning. Staying in faith in Christ, in humble hope in the infinite goodness of God, a person at the last decisive moment of life becomes open to eternity and achieves the experience of such inner greatness and peace, which sanctifies his entire past, consciously lived life.

4. Natural moral law

moral personality theology

The Reality of Natural Moral Law

The theology of the Orthodox Church accepts the position of the reality of natural moral law as a principle that has an unconditional and universal character and underlies all legal and ethical norms.

In recognizing the natural moral law, the Church proceeds from universal human moral experience, which among all peoples at all times has been sanctified by faith in the highest and eternal truth, in the world’s objective law, thanks to which every evil committed in the world is subject to just retribution. By accepting the natural moral law, the Church confirms its significance as a principle that protects the integrity of the structure of being from moral corruption and decay.

The reality of the natural moral law convinces us that the personal morality of individual people, embodied in the moral culture of both traditional and new societies, is not just a random cover thrown over the historical life of mankind, it is the fundamental, deep and mysterious basis of the world human system life. To be moral means to prefer and choose a worthy way of existence, that is, to implement a principle that guarantees order in one’s own soul and in the world around us, modeled on the order that we see in the structure and laws of the physical Universe.

Legal and ethical norms, characteristic of the structures of both patriarchal and new societies and performing the functions of regulating human relations at various levels of personal and public life, are nothing more than a visible manifestation and concrete discovery of natural moral law. The main sources of the Church's teaching on the natural moral law are Divine Revelation and patriotic writing, as well as monuments of church law.

Natural moral law in the teaching of the Holy Apostle Paul

Many New Testament scholars have asked the question: Does the passage in Romans (Rom. 2:14-15) actually indicate a doctrine of natural moral law? This very important passage needs to be quoted: “When the Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature what is lawful, then, not having the law, they are a law unto themselves: they show that the work of the law is written in their hearts.”

Some Protestant scholars have questioned the value of this text as a biblical basis for the doctrine of natural moral law. This is why it is necessary to examine the contents of this passage very carefully.

Here the question also arises about the influence of Stoic philosophy on the thought of the Apostle Paul. Did the apostle Paul use the Stoic teachings prevalent in his day to prove his point in this passage? Or is the doctrine of the natural moral law so essential to the gospel of the Apostle Paul that it would still have been taught even if no philosophical doctrine had existed about it?

So we should get closer to understanding this passage. The first thing to keep in mind is that the main theme of Romans is the absolute necessity of faith for man's justification before God.

The first important point that the Apostle Paul seeks to establish is that all people, regardless of their beliefs, have a need of justification through Jesus Christ. The Apostle Paul speaks about all people in general, about the wrath of God for the injustice committed by people, about the universal guilt of people before God, for no one can be justified by the fact that he did not know how to act in his life, and by the fact that he did not know about the future Divine reward and punishment for deeds committed, since God, through His creation, revealed His power and presence in the world. The wicked remain without justification because, despite the opportunity to know God and act in accordance with this knowledge, glorifying and thanking God, they turned away from the knowledge of God and, with a darkened mind, voluntarily plunged into the darkness of unbelief. The result of this rejection of the natural knowledge of God was that they were deprived of His Divine help and presence, became unable to fulfill their purpose in life, and suffered moral decline. Their guilt for rejecting God is aggravated by the fact that they know that God has determined the punishment for their iniquities and that sooner or later they will suffer due retribution for them.

Thus, in the teaching of the Apostle Paul about the natural moral law, the following main provisions can be distinguished. The natural moral law is given by God and is the common property of all people.

This is the law of reason that guides every person in choosing the good. Knowledge of the good is not just theoretical in nature, but also has an internally binding force.

All people are responsible for violating the requirements of the moral law and know that disobedience to the law entails future retribution.

The assumption that the idea of ​​a natural moral law came to the Apostle Paul from the philosophical culture of his time through the Stoic school cannot be accepted as completely undoubted and generally accepted. In any case, it should be pointed out that there is a significant difference in the teaching of the natural moral law in Stoic philosophy and in the gospel of the Apostle Paul. This difference is determined, first of all, by the huge discrepancy that exists between the pantheism of the Stoics, for whom God and the Divine law are inseparable from nature, and the monotheism of the Holy Apostle Paul, for whom God is the Creator and Lawgiver. Therefore, it can be argued that the teaching of the Apostle Paul about the natural moral law is a conclusion from his theological speculation, represents one of the aspects of his gospel and is essentially independent of Stoic philosophy.

Natural moral law in the teaching of the Church Fathers

The Orthodox East connected the doctrine of natural moral law with deep Christian experience. Here the goal of salvation and deification of man has always been in mind. Among Christian apologists, the testimony of Athenagoras deserves special attention, who writes that God created man from an immortal soul and body and gave him reason and internal law for preserving everything that was given to man by God as something necessary for his existence and life.

Saint Justin the Philosopher should be considered the father of the doctrine of natural moral law. Saint Justin teaches about Christ as the Eternal Logos. Human reason and moral wisdom have their origin in Christ. The main point of the teaching of Saint Justin is that God created man capable of choosing the truth and acting justly. Saint Justin the Philosopher most clearly sets out his view of the natural moral law in his “Conversation with Tryphon the Jew.” “God has established what is always and everywhere fair, and every nation knows that fornication, adultery, murder and the like are sins. And every person who commits such deeds cannot free himself from the thought that he is committing lawlessness, with the exception of people possessed by an unclean spirit or corrupted by bad upbringing and habits.”

Another representative of early patristics, Saint Irenaeus of Lyons, says that at creation God put in man the perception of the moral law: He gave him the knowledge of good and evil, and this knowledge consists of believing and obeying God and fulfilling His commandments.

Clement of Alexandria, following Saint Justin the Martyr, strives to enrich Christian thought with all the achievements of Greek philosophy. He notes that the knowledge of good and evil is achieved by man through the natural law given by God: “The law of nature and the law of Revelation are from God, which are one.”

Origen, considering man as the image of God, emphasizes man's ability to act correctly. According to Origen, this ability is inherent in man, thanks to the natural law established by God.

We find remarkable discussions about the natural moral law in Tertullian. He writes: “Before the Mosaic Law, then, written on the tablets of stone, I maintain, there was an unwritten law, which was generally understood naturally and observed by the ancestors.”

Tertullian says that the natural moral law is common to all mankind, and teaches that everything committed by man against nature must deserve condemnation among people as something shameful and terrible. When asked by the pagans what the law is, Tertullian replies: “You are asking about the law of God - it is common to all mankind and is carved on the tablets of our nature, to which the apostle points.”

Saint Methodius of Olympus, in his theodicy “On the Resurrection,” refers to the natural moral law that motivates our thoughts to good.

Thus, even in the ante-Nicene period we encounter recognition of the natural moral law by the fathers and church writers. It is necessary, however, to mention the fathers of a later period in order to conclude that the idea of ​​a natural moral law was clearly defined by patristic thought.

Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea teaches: “The Creator of all things gave every soul a natural moral law as an assistant and ally in the accomplishment of those things that need to be done.”

Saint Athanasius the Great speaks of the justification of the ancient righteous through natural law.

Saint Gregory the Theologian writes: “God gave us the prophets before any law, and even before them He gave the unwritten natural law that ensures that what should be done is done.”

Saint Basil the Great in his “Six Days” expresses the idea that universal order and harmony in the created world is a prototype of order in human life.

St. Cyril of Alexandria, Blessed Theodoret, and St. Maximus the Confessor speak about the natural moral law, but St. John Chrysostom spoke out most fully of all the Eastern fathers. For him, the law of nature is a true law and any other law that contradicts it should be considered false. The law of nature is universal and eternal, it is the moral guide of humanity: “God has placed in man an innate law that governs man, like the captain of a ship or like a rider of a horse.”

Thus, the patriotic tradition considers the natural moral law as the universal basis of the moral life of man and society.” It can be said that the fathers and Christian writers of the Eastern and Western Churches of the Patriotic period preached the morality of natural law. At the same time, the natural moral law was understood only in the light of the truth of Divine Revelation and was closely associated with all Christian experience.

We have already pointed to the indisputable evidence of patristic teaching that convinces us of the existence of a natural moral law. Nevertheless, it seems to be a very difficult task to determine the actual content of the natural moral law as a universal principle of universal morality. Recognizing the natural moral law as a universal fundamental ethical principle, we at the same time cannot help but notice the wide variety of moral codes characteristic of the moral cultures of various ancient and modern societies. It follows that determining the content of a natural moral law comes down to finding a common denominator that constitutes an integral element among the whole variety of moral norms. Thus, from the testimony of Saint Justin the Philosopher we have cited, it follows that the specific content of the natural moral law is reduced to the requirements that prohibit murder, adultery and other moral crimes and which are recognized as necessary moral prescriptions in the life of various peoples. It becomes quite obvious that there is one common source, in the light of which the rules and moral prescriptions are developed, constituting the ethical basis of personal and public life and expressing a pre-established correspondence between the absolute requirements of the moral law and the moral consciousness of man (Deut. 30:14). Therefore, in general, the patriotic tradition identifies the content of the natural moral law with the Ten Commandments of the Old Testament. By comparing the natural law with the law written on the tablets, the Church Fathers point to the internal connection that exists between them. In biblical and moral theology, the opinion that the revealed law reveals and specifies the content of the natural moral law can be considered firmly established. In an extremely generalized form, this thought is expressed by Clement of Alexandria: “The law of nature and the law of Revelation are from God, which constitute one thing.” The fact that the content of the natural moral law is identical to the moral precepts of the Old Testament is indicated by another important circumstance. The study of world religions convinces us that in terms of human relationships, no religion preaches anything that could contradict the Decalogue.

Thus, the content of the natural moral law coincides with the basic concepts inherent in the moral consciousness of every people. In the process of cultural and historical development, the natural moral law was clothed in those various concrete forms of expression in which its actual content was revealed.

Natural moral law and Orthodox ethics

No matter how highly we place the natural moral law, we must admit that it indicates only the most elementary level of morality and is something like ethics reduced to a common denominator. Christians do not need to resort to the natural moral law, having a higher and more perfect ethics in the gospel. From the point of view of evangelical ethics, we cannot call a person morally perfect based solely on the fact that he is not a murderer, not an adulterer, or a thief. All our ideas and statements about good and evil, about right and wrong, must be assessed in the light of Eastern Orthodox theology with its teaching about personal salvation and deification as the main goal of human destiny. Nevertheless, in the pursuit of moral perfection and deification, we cannot discard either the natural moral law or the Divinely Revealed Old Testament law, which is identical to it, since the tradition of the Church in its historical development, while affirming Gospel ethics, did not completely exclude the moral significance of the teaching of the Old Testament. The Lord Jesus Christ often reminds us of the law given in the Old Testament. The Apostle Paul states that “the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and righteous, and good” (Rom. 7:12). The Holy Fathers of the Church declare that anyone who wants to live according to the Gospel is obliged to keep all the commandments. St. Gregory Palamas, in a brief essay on the commandments of the Decalogue, says: “Thus, by observing them with all your strength and living by them, you will deposit in your soul the treasure of piety and you will be pleasing to God.”

Saint Simeon the New Theologian, speaking about how the soul unites with God, writes: “... The radiance of grace is established in us only after the commandments are kept and virtues are achieved.”

Thus, the requirements of the natural moral law and the commandments of the Old Testament should be understood as the expression of a style of life and behavior that leads a person to the fulfillment of his divine destiny. The moral demands placed on a person are constantly being improved and raised. It is noteworthy that the Apostle Paul not only points out the need to fulfill the moral law, but also gives Christian communities many new commandments and instructions. The Holy Fathers of the Church, guiding Christian life, continued this tradition, leaving us with spiritual and moral instructions as a legacy.

All the moral norms and principles that the Church has have never been considered as a desire to teach a person to adapt to external forms of behavior. They always included the goal of guidance to personal moral perfection, salvation and deification.

Posted on Allbest.ru

...

Similar documents

Freedom as an essential property of a person, its significance in society and the conditions for its formation. The relativity of this concept, its types: formal and moral, external and internal, negative and positive. Freedom in Pastoral Theology.

abstract, added 02/18/2015


A study of the provisions of the Orthodox teaching on personality and its significance for understanding Orthodox theology and salvation. The primacy of personality in relation to nature in the Trinity. Love as a manifestation of the absolute freedom of the Holy Trinity. Personality and the Church.

abstract, added 02/18/2015


The concept of “personality” in the theology of V.N. Lossky, its freedom and uniqueness. Karma, moksha and nirvana are the three pillars of Indian religiosity. Indivisible integrity and hypostasis. Self-identity of a person’s personality, its mental unity, self-determination.

abstract, added 12/05/2014


The essence of Islam as one of the world religions, the stages of its formation and development, its place in modern society, its influence on a person’s lifestyle and style of thinking. Sources of formation of Islamic ethics. Features of Muslim architecture, its forms.

test, added 02/05/2010


The beginning is the main subject of search for philosophers. The need for a Mediator between the inaccessible and inexpressible Absolute and the changeable earthly world in religious consciousness. Reflections on the sacrifice of Christ. Interpretation of kenosis in theology. The essence of man.

abstract, added 09.29.2010


Islam as one of the world religions, history and the main stages of its development, assessment of its role in modern society, justification for its wide spread. The personality of the Prophet Muhammad, his biography and activities. Women in Islam: equality and inequality.

test, added 03/10/2015


A study of the prophecies of the Old and New Testaments about Jesus Christ. Liturgical and moral theology. Study of the dogma about the primacy of the teachings of Jesus Christ in the Christian Church. Analysis of the validity of the teaching about Christ as the center of Christian life.

abstract, added 07/05/2015


Dividing divine properties into groups. General concept of apophatic theology. Originality, immutability, eternity, immeasurability and omnipresence. Cataphanic properties of God, light and holiness. All-bliss, goodness, love and mercy.

abstract, added 01/27/2014


The legacy of St. Augustine is a golden contribution that determined the diverse and controversial development of Western theology. Determination of the place of faith regarding the knowledge of things, reflection of this topic in his teaching. The relationship between faith and reason.

thesis, added 09/21/2015


Sacrament as a gracious action of God. Acquaintance with the history of the development of sacraments and rituals. Features of the foundation of monasticism in the Holy Scriptures. General characteristics of the foundations of dogmatic theology. Consideration of the most common liturgical books.

MORAL THEOLOGY
- Orthodox Christian teaching about morality, a theological discipline that examines the moral consciousness and behavior of a person in the light of the truths of Divine revelation - the dogmas of the Fall, incarnation, redemption, salvation, etc. Subject N.b. is largely determined by an understanding of the relationship between dogmatics and morality, the hierarchy of the relationship between dogmatic and moral truths. In theological literature it is customary to distinguish four perspectives. on the subject of N.b. and a method for systematizing moral and theological knowledge. Christian morality is considered and presented: 1) from the point of view. teachings about virtue and its opposite - sin; 2) with t.zr. ideas of the Kingdom of God; 3) with t.zr. doctrines of salvation; 4) with t.zr. the requirements of God's moral law and the moral duties arising from it.
N.b. examines the subject in the unity of two principles: the natural moral law, rooted in the rational nature of man, and the supernatural Divine will. This defines three types of moral norms that should guide a person in the performance of moral duties on the path to salvation: 1) norms that coincide with the natural law of reason (for example, norms about honoring parents, prohibitions on murder, theft, etc.); 2) norms that do not contradict the law of reason, but are not entirely reducible to it (for example, the commandment of love for enemies or non-resistance to evil through violence, which cannot be guided only on the basis of reason and common sense); 3) norms that are not comprehended by reason (for example, arising from the sacrament of God’s grace as a condition of salvation).
Origins of N.b. go back to the Holy Scriptures of the Old Testament and the New Testament and, first of all, to the Decalogue (ten Mosaic commandments) and the Sermon on the Mount of Christ, to the Epistles of the Apostle Paul, as well as the moral and exegetical works of the fathers and teachers of the church, hagiographical, homiletical and ascetic monuments of Christian thought, laying the foundation foundations of Christian ethics. The main topics of N.B. At the same time, they become the establishment of a person’s moral duties in relation to God and neighbor; phenomenology and analytics of passions, virtues and vices (sins); justification of the natural moral law and its normative functions in unity with supernatural Divine revelation.
In the Orthodox tradition, Christian moral teaching up to the 18th century. limited to ascetic and hagiographic materials borrowed from the writings of ascetics, fathers and teachers of the church and compiled into collections for moral and edifying reading. “Philokalia” is one of the first collections of this kind, approaching in method a systematic presentation of morality.
Becoming N.b. as an independent discipline dates back to the 18th century, when Feofan Prokopovich created the course “N.B.”, which was included in the program of the Kyiv and Moscow academies and Trinity Seminary. Design of the item N.b. occurs under the influence of Protestant ethics and Catholic moral theology. Thus, the seminar curriculum on N.B. under the Charter of 1867, it was drawn up in relation to the “system” of the Chronicle. Palmer and “Theological Ethics” by R. Rothe; at the Moscow Academy adhered to Sailer's Christian ethics.
This largely determined the main contradiction in the development of N.B. and theological science in general, especially clearly manifested towards the end. 19th century: the contradiction between moralism and spirituality, moral experience and spiritual contemplation as the source and basis of theology. Moralism was generally characterized by the reduction of Christian morality to “natural morality”, the secularization of asceticism, the elevation of dogmas to moral experience and, ultimately, the dissolution of all theology in N.B., “the conversion of all theology into moral monism” (Antony Khrapovitsky). The principle of spirituality, on the contrary, assumed the original value of spiritual contemplation in relation to moral experience: “metaphysical realism” prevailed here over “moral mysticism”, “spiritual sobriety” over “moralistic rapture”. This was especially clearly expressed in the experience of spiritual contemplation of Russian ascetics (Seraphim of Sarov, Ignatius Brianchaninov, Theophan the Recluse, the Optina elders, John of Kronstadt). The goal of Christian life was seen in the acquisition of the Holy Spirit; virtue acted as a means of such acquisition. N.b. At the same time, it was built as a justification for the path to salvation and a justification for the ascetic life leading to the acquisition of grace.
Features of the development of N.b. (unlike Catholic moral theology and Protestant ethics) - lack of relationship with philosophy. ethics, which led, in particular, to its sharp separation from Russian. religious and moral philosophy. This significantly affected the conceptuality and systematicity of the domestic scientific literature. After all, the systematization of the subject N.B. in many ways means a turn to philosophy. ethics. Thus, one of the most systematic courses N.B. - “Orthodox teaching on morality” I.L. Yanysheva gives a theoretical construction of a moral system through an in-depth analysis of the very idea of ​​morality and only from here approaches Christianity. It is no coincidence that this work is characterized as “a rational propaedeutic to Christian moral teaching proper” (N.N. Glubokovsky). The search for “philosophical-theological synthesis” in the field of systematization of moral knowledge in the spirit of Russian is relevant. religious-philosophical tradition of the 20th century, which attempted to create a philosophical Orthodox Christian ethics.

Philosophy: Encyclopedic Dictionary. - M.: Gardariki. Edited by A.A. Ivina. 2004 .

Moral theology aims to reveal the essence of morality, show the advantages of Christian morality over all other ethical systems and prove the universal significance of Christian morality in improving the conditions of human existence as a decisive condition for salvation. In other words, moral theology teaches how a Christian should act and act in earthly life, so that the latter becomes a means to achieve eternal bliss. That is why moral theology is also called active or practical theology.

By morality, theologians understand an innate internal need of a person, equivalent to instinct. It is based on a seemingly inaccessible root cause that determines the content of general rules and norms of behavior. A person’s awareness of these rules and norms is a reflection in his thinking of an objectively existing divinely revealed law or the voice of God himself.

The unity of faith and morality is derived by theologians from their divine origin. The Creator is also a legislator. Both natural necessity and moral freedom are subordinate to him. Man is free to make a choice between good and evil. But God at the same time limits the wicked and helps the good. By this, he ultimately affirms grace and grants the eternal possibility of moral renewal. Only through faith does a person gain moral strength and become able to overcome the inevitable moral decline.

Having made a conclusion about the supernatural essence of morality, theologians try from this position to derive a criterion for what is moral and immoral. The condition that motivates a person to good intentions and actions is, from their point of view, the moral law.

The moral law, according to religious ideas, is something given to man at the moment of creation. Being unchangeable in its essence, it appears in various forms in relation to individual consciousness. In the Old Testament, supposedly given by God to a people who were stubborn and cruel, prone to vices and errors, it is formulated in the form of certain prohibitions (don’t kill, don’t steal, don’t commit adultery, etc.) and restrictions (don’t do this, don’t do it this way). In the New Testament it is formulated not in a negative, but in a positive form: love God and your neighbor as yourself, etc.

Based on the recognition of the divine origin of morality in general and the moral law in particular, theologians draw a mystical conclusion about the universal human nature of all moral norms. This conclusion is due not only to the formalization of theological logic, but also to the practical interests of the church. The gist of it is this. Since God created all people the same, therefore, the rules of morality given to him are common to everyone. And if so, then believers are in better conditions than non-believers, for both are equally responsible for the fulfillment of the moral law. God will reward both of them with their due for the fulfillment and non-fulfillment of his will, and will fully exact it from the atheists. Therefore, it is in the interests of man to know the divine law and to conform his actions and actions in accordance with its requirements.

But how can we reconcile the real state of moral actions with ideas about omnipotence, omnipotence, omnirighteousness and other qualities of God? In fact, if morality is from God, then why does immorality exist? After all, this is contrary to his nature. If God only creates good, then why does evil exist?

To get out of the vicious circle of insoluble contradictions, theologians introduced the concept of free will. Its essence is as follows. God, as an absolutely free person, is capable of performing any actions, the motives of which are not amenable to any accounting or scientific analysis. The reality created by God cannot be considered as an adequate reflection of the divine essence. The creative principle is an intelligently free being, living and acting freely. This creature gives a person free will, which means the ability to choose between good and evil. If a person is guided in his actions by an innate moral sense, he does only good deeds. If he ignores the requirements of religion, he always commits evil.

This theological sophistry does not free theology from contradictions. In fact, there are people who strictly follow the requirements of Christian morality and are distinguished by their firm and deep faith in God. According to Christian ideas, this should give them health, longevity, prosperity, happiness, and peace. Conversely, failure to comply with the moral law can cause illness, premature death, disgrace and shame. In the real world, this is far from the case. Believers are not free from illness, suffering, grief, and torment. At the same time, vicious people are often distinguished by enviable health, have all the blessings of life, etc. To save the situation, theologians declare the suffering of believers the highest joy and feat, and the well-being of non-believers illusory.

If the presence of evil on earth is determined by human free will, then this conclusion is in no way consistent with the principles of divine predestination, according to which God is the cause of everything that exists, and an absolutely perfect cause. This cause must, naturally, cause perfect consequences, that is, give rise to good. But by what cause is evil predetermined? Theologians are trying to remove this contradiction by introducing the idea of ​​suffering as a good. Suffering is declared to be the main condition of salvation, the highest ideal of Christian life.

From the general idea of ​​morality as a divinely established law, theologians derive concepts about the meaning of life, happiness, duty, etc., which have nothing in common with genuine humanism.

In moral theology, Orthodox theologians pay special attention to evidence of the correspondence of Christian moral requirements to the interests of man in a socialist society. Modern theologians do not focus on the biblical preaching of obedience and humility, patience and non-resistance, forgiveness and obedience, but draw the attention of believers to such moments of biblical teachings, which contain a condemnation of wealth, a demand for equality, respect for the disadvantaged and oppressed, and condemnation of idleness and idleness. At the same time, the churchmen “do not notice” that the meaning of these teachings in the Bible is unequal. The decisive place in the biblical Moral requirements belongs to those that are alien to the interests of the working masses. In contrast to the collectivism of workers, biblical morality affirms the alien principle of “every man for himself, one God for all”; instead of active work to transform social life, it calls for “humble yourself before God and, in the work of fighting sin, be rewarded with the secret of spiritual life.”

This is the range of basic issues considered in Christian moral theology.

Exegesis

Exegesis is the branch of theology that deals with the interpretation of biblical texts, explaining the meaning of various symbolic stories contained in the Bible, as well as the so-called “difficult passages” in the Old and New Testaments that are in flagrant contradiction with modern scientific ideas. The main task of exegesis is to substantiate the divine origin of “holy scripture” and its absolute meaning for all times.

In the exegesis of various Christian churches there is a lot in common and specificity. What is common is that Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant theologians consider God the only author of the Bible who gave people “revelation” and formulated it in certain human terms, in relation to the conditions of their time and environment. By this they explain the presence in the Bible of anthropomorphic ideas, metaphorical language, repetitions of certain stories in different interpretations, etc. What is common is the interpretation of the basic biblical ideas about God, his properties and qualities, the infallibility of revelation, its absolute meaning in matters of faith and salvation.

At the same time, different theologians have different approaches to the interpretation of certain passages of the biblical narrative. Some of them show a greater tendency towards a symbolic understanding of the meaning of individual texts, others towards a literal one. For example, many Catholic and Protestant theologians have long held the view that the symbolic interpretation of “sacred scripture” is not only possible, but also necessary.

Orthodox theologians, as a rule, take a special position. They believe that the Bible should be understood in the literal sense of the word, since it is not so much the work of the prophets and apostles as the creation of the spirit of God speaking through their mouths.

Strictly speaking, neither of these two tendencies appears in its pure form in either Catholic, Protestant, or Orthodox exegesis. Both modernism and traditionalism contain elements of literal and symbolic interpretation of biblical myths.

Orthodox exegetes, defending the idea of ​​the historical reality of all biblical events without exception, widely practice symbolic interpretation of those Old Testament and New Testament stories that either themselves have an allegorical meaning, or have come into such contradiction with the modern concepts of believers that their content undermines trust in "sacred scripture". No theologian would now say that such biblical moral and social requirements as “let the wife fear her husband” or “slaves obey your masters” should be taken literally. They all say that the word “fear” should be understood not in its direct meaning, but as the reverence of spouses for each other, as a definition of the degree of love. They also propose to understand the word “slave” in the sense of “worker”, “voluntary servant”, etc.

Catholic and Protestant theologians, along with the recognition of the need for an allegorical interpretation of certain passages of the Bible that are not consistent with new scientific, moral and social views, understand the vast majority of biblical texts in their literal meaning. Moreover, they seek various evidence of the historical reality of biblical narratives, and carry out extensive work on the interpretation of historical documents and monuments in the direction they need.

Of course, all historical documents and monuments of material culture that theologians pay attention to do not at all testify to the reality of biblical events, but to the widespread borrowing and religious interpretation of historical events by the authors of the Bible. But the very method of theological argumentation speaks of the desire by any means to confirm the reliability and truth of the basic Christian ideas, most fully formulated in the “holy scripture.”

Liturgics

This is the name of the section of theology in which, on the basis of various historical and theological data, the necessity and obligatory nature of divine services is proved as the most important means of communication between man and God. At the same time, worship means a set of religious actions that help to instill in believers respect for God and maintain religiosity.

From the general concept of worship, theologians derive its main tasks. These tasks, according to them, are as follows: firstly, dogmatic-ecclesiastical, i.e., aimed at promoting the most important Christian ideas and concepts; secondly, moral, which boils down to evidence of the enduring significance of the main categories of Christian morality; and, thirdly, sacramental, that is, requiring strict observance of the sacraments and rituals directly related to them as a condition for receiving the grace-filled gifts of the holy spirit.

The central place in Christian worship is given to the liturgy, otherwise called mass in Orthodoxy, and the mass in Catholicism and Lutheranism. It is believed that it was established by Christ and the apostles, and was subsequently developed and improved by the “fathers and teachers of the church.” Especially popular in the Orthodox Church are the liturgies compiled by John Chrysostom and Basil the Great. These services are conducted by the clergy in a particularly pompous manner. Here believers are both listeners and participants in religious activities.

Liturgics sets itself the task of justifying the need for such components of worship as prayers, chants, reading the Bible, church teachings, and performing the sacraments.

Prayers are considered a particularly important part of the service. According to their content, they are divided into doxologies, thanksgivings and petitions. In doxologies, believers repeat all the attributes that characterize Christian ideas about the greatness and perfection of God, in thanksgivings they give praise to the Almighty as a benefactor, in petitions they beg for help and support. In the Orthodox and Catholic churches, all texts of prayers are canonized. In Protestantism their improvisation is allowed.

Theologians do not hide the fact that the word of prayer is the highest form of suggestion and self-hypnosis, contributing to the affirmation of religious beliefs. Their essentially witchcraft character helps to instill in a person a sense of helplessness and inferiority. In prayer, a person begins to see the magical power of words, capable of causing the supernatural and miraculous.

The glorification of God, gratitude to him and petitions constitute the main content of church hymns, which are another important moment of divine services. In this respect, they are practically no different from prayers. Therefore, the same prayers, such as “Our Father,” are read in one case and sung in another.

According to their content, chants are divided into psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. The main purpose of liturgical chants is to promote church dogmatic ideas. They glorify the resurrection of Christ, his suffering on the cross, the miracle of the divine, the Trinity. In addition, the merits of various martyrs for the faith, the exploits of saints and other church events are sung.

The Church pays great attention not only to the content of liturgical songs, but also to their emotional impact on believers. Various polyphonic chants have become widespread in Orthodox churches. The methods of performing various liturgical songs are different. Akathists are performed standing with the participation of all those present at the service, antiphons are performed alternately on both choirs, and to perform the final part of the canon, the so-called katavasia, the singers can go from the choir to the middle of the church.

Various liturgical songs, united by the commonality of their content in relation to a specific holiday, constitute a canon. The canon usually has nine songs. But there are canons consisting of four, three and two songs. The first verse of each song, the so-called irmos, is always sung, and the remaining verses following the irmos, the so-called troparia, are both sung and read.

Church services are accompanied by a number of ritual requirements for each believer. The latter is obliged to make the sign of the cross, kneel down, bare his head, etc. Moreover, the clergy instills in everyone that any of these ritual actions has a dogmatic or moral meaning. Thus, the connection of the thumb, index and middle fingers during the sign of the cross means, in their opinion, faith in the triune God, and the tilt of the ring finger and little finger towards the palm means the unity of the divine and human in Jesus Christ. Bowing and kneeling indicate the blessing and complete dependence of a person on God. Even the fact that a man in church is obliged to bare his head, and a woman, on the contrary, to wear a headdress, is interpreted in the sense that the former is the image and glory of God, and the latter emphasizes her modesty and chastity.

Worship is the main means of the church in the formation of religious ideas in the minds of believers. Therefore, clergy pay special attention to ritual practice. At the same time, taking into account the changed ideas of believers, they make adjustments to those aspects of liturgical practice that have come into conflict with the new conditions of their life and have become an obvious anachronism. A number of prayers and prayers, for example about sending rain, about getting rid of illnesses and illnesses, gradually disappeared from liturgical practice. The Church has abandoned staging of the consecration of new icons, their renewal, and does not consider the labor activity of people on religious holidays, etc., sinful. But these changes concerning the secondary aspects of the cult pursue the same goals: to preserve and strengthen religion.

Pastoral theology

This section of theology is devoted to substantiating the divine establishment of pastoral ministry and its necessity in the matter of salvation. Pastoral theology speaks of the basic qualities of clergy that they need to be an example of “firm faith and moral virtues” for believers. In addition, specific instructions are given to clergy on ways and techniques for improving divine services, on increasing the level of their emotional and psychological impact on believers, and they talk about the most effective methods of conducting preaching and so-called “trusteeship” activities. In other words, pastoral theology contains the entire complex of rules of conduct for clergy in the church and outside it and the basic requirements for a priest as a spiritual mentor of people.

An ideal priest, according to the teachings of the church, is obliged to devote his entire life to the highest interests of the church and, without fear of difficulties, persistently fulfill his main purpose of saving souls. The highest interests mean the preservation of faith, and the salvation of souls means the spread of religion among the masses.

To fulfill these main tasks, the priest, according to one of the Orthodox theologians, “must create a skill in approaching the human soul... deepen and expand this skill of communicating with people of different ages, gender, spiritual development.” Theologians persistently repeat that a child and an adult, a woman and a man, a person who has received an education or is illiterate, must be approached with different standards, and the peculiarities of his worldview must be taken into account. Moreover, each individual person must be addressed taking into account the peculiarities of his life, which leave a certain imprint on his individual consciousness. In this case, theologians say, a person can develop religiosity and spirituality, a stable habit of attending divine services, observing fasts, holidays, and performing rituals, i.e., mastering basic Christian ideas.

The personal example of a priest, according to church teaching, is one of the most important conditions for the education of believers in the spirit of a truly Christian life.

Pastoral theology also examines issues related to the conditions of appointment to the position of priest, ordination (ordination), and the main tasks of the activities of clergy in the parish.

Homiletics

By homiletics we mean a section of theology that examines issues of theory and practice of church Christian preaching activity. Homiletics includes the history of preaching, which is presented by theologians mainly as an illustration of the sermons of Christ, the apostles, fathers and teachers of the church. These sermons are promoted as examples for study and imitation.

Homiletics substantiates the mandatory need for the clergy to speak to believers with “words of piety.” But the main thing is to consider issues related to the form of church sermon, its content and especially the impact on listeners. “No matter how good the content of the sermon, no matter how well it was delivered,” theologians teach, “but if it did not produce an effect on the listeners, then it did not achieve its goal.”

In the proper sense of the word, preaching, according to Christian ideas, is the teaching of salvation, expressed in living speech before the people. This means that issues of Christian doctrine should come to the fore. A priest can talk about any facts of history or modernity, but he should never lose sight of the doctrinal side of the matter.

Connecting the religious content of sermons with various problems of today, especially such as the upbringing of adolescents and young people, issues of marriage, family, family relationships, the task of eradicating immoral phenomena in society, the clergy tries to convince believers of the ability of religion to lead a person out of the impasse in which he has found himself. due to loss of faith in God. These arguments are shared by a significant portion of believers, who are convinced that only through faith can they achieve happiness and prosperity.

Homiletics analyzes the main forms of preaching activity, methods of training qualified preachers, and a system for developing skills in promoting religious doctrine.

Patrology

Patrology is a branch of theology that deals with the presentation of the content of the main teachings of the fathers and teachers of the church, especially those of them who are called universal teachers. Patrology of the Orthodox Church seeks to substantiate the exceptional significance for Christianity of the writings of such ecumenical teachers as Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian, John Chrysostom, Athanasius of Alexandria. In Catholicism, the most popular works are the works of Jerome, Augustine, and Ambrose. Protestant churches and the vast majority of sectarian associations do not consider their creations to be an expression of divine revelation. They believe that the ecumenical teachers were ordinary religious writers who expressed in their works their own point of view on a number of dogmatic, apologetic, moral and other problems of the Christian faith.

Orthodox and Catholic theologians widely use the writings of ecumenical teachers to defend and substantiate all aspects of Christian doctrine. Along with quotations from the Bible and decrees of ecumenical councils, ecumenical teachers are widely quoted as infallible guardians and interpreters of divine truths. It is difficult to find a theological work that does not contain references to the authority of “fathers and teachers.”

However, when speaking about the absolute infallibility of ecumenical teachers, theologians cannot pass over in silence the fact that they all contain different, sometimes mutually exclusive, statements on the same Christian ideas. In addition, they all have a negative attitude towards science, education, and culture. That is why theologians believe that the indisputable authority of all fathers and teachers does not apply to each of them individually. A different judgment of any teacher in comparison with the judgment of other teachers on this issue should be considered his private opinion. As for the well-known hostility of fathers and teachers towards science, it is recommended to reconsider traditional patrolological ideas. Theologians propose not to consider ecumenical teachers as authorities in the case when they are speaking not about religious problems, but about the tasks of science. In this case, the holy fathers should no longer be considered as universal teachers, but as ordinary scientists capable of making mistakes, being mistaken, and defending incorrect conclusions. As for faith and morality, here the universal teachers are recognized as the guardians of divine revelation, and their authority is considered indisputable.

And human behavior in the light of the truths of Divine revelation - the dogmas of the Fall, incarnation, redemption, salvation, etc. Subject N.b. is largely determined by an understanding of the relationship between dogmatics and morality, the hierarchy of the relationship between dogmatic and moral truths. In theological literature it is customary to distinguish four perspectives. on N.B. and systematization of moral and theological knowledge. Christian is considered and presented: 1) from the point of view. teachings about virtue and its opposite - sin; 2) with t.zr. ideas of the Kingdom of God; 3) with t.zr. doctrines of salvation; 4) with t.zr. the requirements of God's moral law and the moral duties arising from it.
N.b. examines the subject in the unity of two principles: the natural moral law, rooted in the rational nature of man, and the supernatural Divine will. This defines three types of moral norms that should guide the performance of moral duties on the path to salvation: 1) norms that coincide with the natural law of reason (for example, norms about honoring parents, prohibitions on murder, theft, etc.); 2) norms that do not contradict the law of reason, but are not entirely reducible to it (for example, to enemies or non-resistance to evil by violence, which cannot be guided only on the basis of reason and common sense); 3) norms that are not comprehended by reason (for example, arising from the sacrament of God’s grace as salvation).
Origins of N.b. go back to the Holy Scriptures of the Old Testament and the New Testament and, first of all, to the Decalogue (ten Mosaic commandments) and the Sermon on the Mount of Christ, to the Epistles of the Apostle Paul, as well as the moral and exegetical works of the fathers and teachers of the church, hagiographical, homiletical and ascetic monuments of Christianity, laying the foundations Christian ethics. The main topics of N.B. At the same time, they become the establishment of a person’s moral duties in relation to God and neighbor; and analysis of passions, virtues and vices (sins); natural moral law and its normative functions in unity with supernatural Divine revelation.
In the Orthodox Christian moral teaching until the 18th century. limited to ascetic and hagiographic materials borrowed from the writings of ascetics, fathers and teachers of the church and compiled into collections for moral and edifying reading. “Philokalia” is one of the first collections of this kind, approaching in method a systematic presentation of morality.
Becoming N.b. as an independent discipline dates back to the 18th century, when Feofan Prokopovich created the course “N.B.”, which was included in the program of the Kyiv and Moscow academies and Trinity Seminary. Design of the item N.b. occurs under the influence of Protestant ethics and Catholic moral theology. Thus, the seminar curriculum on N.B. under the Charter of 1867, it was drawn up in relation to the “system” of the Chronicle. Palmer and “Theological Ethics” by R. Rothe; at the Moscow Academy adhered to Sailer's Christian ethics.
This largely determined the main thing in the development of N.B. and theological science in general, especially clearly manifested in. 19th century: between moralism and spirituality, moral experience and spiritual contemplation as the source and basis of theology. Moralism was characterized in general by the reduction of Christian morality to “natural morality”, the secularization of asceticism, the elevation of dogmas to moral experience and, ultimately, the dissolution of all theology into N.B., “all theology into morality” (Antony Khrapovitsky). The principle of spirituality, on the contrary, presupposed an initial spiritual contemplation in relation to moral experience: “realism” prevailed here over “moral mysticism”, “spiritual sobriety” over “moralistic rapture”. This was especially clearly expressed in the experience of spiritual contemplation of Russian ascetics (Seraphim of Sarov, Ignatius Brianchaninov, Theophan the Recluse, the Optina elders, John of Kronstadt). The goal of Christian life was seen in the acquisition of the Holy Spirit; acted as such acquisition. N.b. At the same time, it was built as a justification for the path to salvation and a justification for the ascetic life leading to the acquisition of grace.
Features of the development of N.b. (unlike Catholic moral theology and Protestant ethics) - lack of relationship with philosophy. ethics, which led, in particular, to its sharp separation from Russian. religious and moral philosophy. This significantly affected the conceptuality and systematicity of the domestic scientific literature. After all, the systematization of the subject N.B. in many ways means a turn to philosophy. ethics. Thus, one of the most systematic courses N.B. - “Orthodox teaching on morality” I.L. Yanysheva gives a theoretical construction of a moral system through an in-depth analysis of the very idea of ​​morality and only from here approaches Christianity. It is no coincidence that this is characterized as “rational to the actual Christian moral teaching” (N.N. Glubokovsky). The search for “philosophical-theological synthesis” in the field of systematization of moral knowledge in the spirit of Russian is relevant. religious-philosophical tradition of the 20th century, which attempted to create a philosophical Orthodox Christian ethics.

Philosophy: Encyclopedic Dictionary. - M.: Gardariki. Edited by A.A. Ivina. 2004 .

See what “MORAL THEOLOGY” is in other dictionaries:

- (moral theology) a theological discipline that expounds the doctrine of morality and moral norms. In Christianity, moral theology sets out and justifies the norms of Christianity ... Wikipedia

Moral theology- Christian teaching about morality, practical theology, systematically expounding the teaching of Christ, the apostles and fathers of the Church about morality. Possible human sins (vices) and ways to combat them are discussed here. Moral... ... Fundamentals of spiritual culture (teacher's encyclopedic dictionary)

- (Theologia moralis, otherwise Christian ethics, or ethics, practical theology) has as its subject a systematic presentation of the Christian teaching on morality. In the ancient Christian church, moral teachers were remarkable as theologians: Clement...

MORAL THEOLOGY- a theological discipline in Christianity, designed to substantiate the need for Christian morality as a condition for achieving salvation, to show its advantage over other ethical systems. According to the definition of theologians, N. b. is being developed in two... Ethics Dictionary

This article or section needs revision. Please improve the article in accordance with the rules for writing articles... Wikipedia

THEOLOGY- [Greek θεολογία]. The concept of Christ. "B." includes: 1) the practice of communion with God, which implies faith and prayerful aspiration to God as an object of faith, hope and love, and activity in accordance with faith. In this sense, B. can be understood... ... Orthodox Encyclopedia

Theology- the word Theology, borrowed by Christian writers from the ancient Greeks, is currently used in a very broad sense. For the ancient teachers of the church, Theology in etymological terms meant: the word about God, the word from God... Complete Orthodox Theological Encyclopedic Dictionary

THEOLOGY, THEOLOGY- (Greek God, doctrine, lit.: doctrine of God): a system of disclosure, justification and defense of religious teachings about God, his signs and properties, as well as a set of church disciplines setting out the various components of this system; complex... ... Eurasian wisdom from A to Z. Explanatory dictionary

- (Θεολογία, theologia) by etymological meaning is the doctrine of God and, according to current usage, denotes the entire composition of sciences that have the Christian religion as their subject. This word was not always in use and, having entered into... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary F.A. Brockhaus and I.A. Ephron

Theology- a word borrowed by Christian writers from the ancient Greeks, is currently used in a very broad sense. For the ancient teachers of the Church, “theology” in etymological terms meant “the word about God”, “the word from God”, and for others it meant... Orthodoxy. Dictionary-reference book

Orthodox Christian Moral Theology is a theological science that is a systematic Orthodox teaching about Christian morality.

The science of Christian morality also has other names. It is called Christian ethics, Christian morality, theological ethics or morality, practical or active theology, Christian moral teaching, etc. All these names have the right to exist, but the most correct name should be recognized as “Moral Theology” or more fully and more accurately “Orthodox Christian Moral Theology". The word “theology” shows the basic character of our teaching, which distinguishes it from the philosophical teaching about morality, the so-called moral philosophy. The word “Orthodox” emphasizes that our moral teaching is based on Orthodox principles and therefore differs not only from pagan and other non-Christian religions, but also from Catholic, Protestant and generally any heterodox dogma.

What is morality? Morality is the activity or behavior of a person, determined by his attitude to the idea of ​​the highest Good. Every activity has a specific purpose. The goal of moral activity is the achievement of the highest Good. Both theology and philosophy deal with questions about what is the true highest Good and the true highest Good for an individual and all humanity. Ethics is the philosophical science of morality (or so-called moral philosophy). “Moral Theology” is the theological (Christian) science of morality. Moral Theology and moral philosophy proceed from different principles and differ deeply from each other in the methods of their research. Moral philosophy seeks unknown standards of moral behavior. For moral philosophy, moral norms are the sought-after, the unknown. It poses the questions: can these norms be and should they be established? How to recognize them, establish them, prove them, justify them? What is good? What is good? What is the highest or absolute Good or Good? What is the purpose and meaning of life? Moral Theology considers all these questions to be completely insoluble by the human mind without help from Above, and therefore the Revelation of God given in St. Scripture and in St. Traditions, where all the unknown and sought-after concepts for moral philosophy are clearly and definitely revealed. Based on Revelation, Moral Theology only tries to understand, with the help of natural human reason, the Truths given in Revelation.

The sources of Moral Theology are: St. Scripture, St. Tradition, the teaching of the Church (the works of the Holy Fathers) and the moral examples of the Holy Fathers. ascetics. The highest moral example is the personality of the Divine Founder of Christianity, our Lord Jesus Christ.

The relation of Moral Theology to moral philosophy comes down to the general relation of theology to philosophy. Some researchers tend to merge theology and philosophy together, while others, on the contrary, tend to separate them completely. In reality, theology and philosophy, like religion and science, being different in methods, can be in complete agreement, if only their task is an honest search for truth.

Theology is based on faith in the infallible Divine authority of Revelation, and therefore theological truths are undoubted; philosophy is based on limited knowledge acquired by the forces of the human mind, on the basis of observations, experiments, reasoning and conclusions of various philosophers and scientists, and therefore these truths are only hypothetical and problematic in nature. From this it is clear that the Christian theological teaching about morality has an advantage over philosophical teaching. This advantage becomes indisputable when we remember that not a single philosopher has imagined or could have imagined a true moral ideal in his life. In theological teaching, the ever-living ideal of the God-Man-Christ is given, and in the diverse host of saints who lived according to the law of Christian morality, various examples of the implementation of holiness are given. Every tree is known by its fruit. The fruits of the “tree of life” - Christ’s revealed law on morality - ripened in the bosom of St. Churches - pragmatically justify the truth of the method of faith in Divine Revelation.

The significance of Moral Theology is enhanced by the fact that morality has the closest connection with all phenomena of public, social and political life. Family and school are only normal when they are based on Christian moral principles. The quality of state laws is also entirely determined by them.

The Christian teaching about morality, developed in Moral Theology into an integral system of religious and moral worldview, is especially useful and even urgently necessary for those people who have a leading role in life: bosses, judges, teachers, scientists, especially pastors who will have to give answer not only for themselves, but also for those led and flocked by them.

Faith and morality are inextricably linked. Neither religion without morality, nor morality without religion is unthinkable. “Without faith it is impossible to please God” (Heb. 11:6); “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). Without a correct concept of God, Creator, Savior and Redeemer, it is impossible to correctly understand Christian morality. Without feeling the impulse to do good deeds consistent with faith, and without doing them, one cannot have a living, fruitful faith. That is why - “And dogmas without works are unfavorable to God, and good deeds without pious dogmas are not accepted by God” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Teaching, Chapter IV, 2).

If religion embraces everything that relates to God, both in Himself and in His relations with creatures, then morality primarily characterizes man in his relationship to God and to the world. Pious meditation on God in His relation to the world and man constitutes the subject of Dogmatic Theology; pious reflection on man in his relation to God and the world constitutes the subject of Moral Theology. The purpose of Dogmatic Theology is the image of God so that man, having come to know Him, would love Him and strive for Him as his Holy prototype, Creator, Provider, Redeemer and Savior. And the purpose of Moral Theology is to depict the truths of moral life, leading man, through fulfilling the will of God, to eternal bliss and deification. Dogmatic Theology depicts the revealed call of Divine Love to man; Moral Theology speaks of the reciprocal grateful revelation of the human soul - to God.