Georges Florovsky on Reading the Life of St Seraphim--SobECR 27-1 Gallaher

7/28/2019 Georges Florovsky on Reading the Life of St Seraphim--SobECR 27-1 Gallaher

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Georges Florovsky on reading the life of StSeraphim

ANASTASSY BRANDON GALLAHER

The following letter was found in the archive of the Fellowship of StAlban and St Sergius, Oxford ('A.F. Dobbie BatemanPapers and

Booklist'). It is written by the Russian Orthodox theologian, historian,ecumenist and early member of the Fellowship, Protopresbyter

Georges Florovsky (1893-1979), who from 1956-64 was the professor

of eastern church history at Harvard Divinity School. The letter iswritten to his old friend, the retired civil servant and Anglican priest,

A.F. Dobbie Bateman (1897-1974), who was also an early leader of

the Fellowship.

Dobbie Bateman is a fascinating and little-known figure. In the

1930s, his knowledge of Russian made him one of the key linksbetween the Russian and Anglican members of the Fellowship, until

his resignation in 1945 after a disagreement with Nicolas Zernovconcerning the plan for a Fellowship centre in London, St Basil's

House.' His role as one of the only English interpreters of Russianthought in his era can be seen in a series of 'footnotes' published in

The Journal of the Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius and

Sobornost in the 1930s and 1940s, as well as many unpublished lettersand memoranda from the time of the controversy surrounding Sergii

Bulgakov's proposal, in June 1933, for limited intercommunion in the

Fellowship between Anglicans and Orthodox, and the Sophiologicalcontroversy which began in 1935.2 He was a critic and friend of both

Bulgakov (whose important essay, Ipostas' i Ipostasnost' he translatedfor a Fellowship study group in 1932)3 and Florovsky (an extensive

unpublished correspondence exists between them which is scattered

between archives at Princeton Universi ty, St Vladimir's OrthodoxTheological Seminary and the Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius

in Oxford).

Dobbie Bateman had a strong devotion to St Seraphim of Sarov.

Indeed, Nicolas Zernov, in his obituary,4 claimed that Dobbie Bateman


was responsible for introducing English Christians to Seraphim

through his 1936 work, St Seraphim of Sarov: Concerning the Aim of

Christian Life. This volume included one of the first English

translations of the now famous 'conversation' between Seraphim and

his disciple N.A. Motovilov, in which Seraphim describes the

Christian life as the 'acquisition of the Holy Spirit'.5 Later, following

his retirement from the civil service in 1952 where he was under-

secretary of the ministry of supply (being awarded a Companion of the

Bath in 1948)6 and his ordination to the priesthood on 5 June 1953 by

the bishop of Bath and Wells (after which he ministered at two

parishes around Frome, Somerset),8 he worked on another volume on

St Seraphim, which included a life of the saint and a revised

translation of the 'conversation' and was published in 1970 as The

Return of St Seraphim.''

In his letter to Dobbie Bateman, Florovsky, prompted by a

suggestion of the former in an earlier letter,10 corrects the

conversation's insistence on the role of the Spirit in Christian life (or,

more precisely, both corrects it and offers an alternative christologicalreading), insisting on the 'christoform shape' of everything we are

given as Christians by the Spirit who is the medium of ascetic and

pedagogical achievement as a feat of the creative witness to Christ.

Florovsky's christological reading of Seraphim influenced Dobbie

Bateman's The Return of St Seraphim. There he noted that the

conversation was 'deeply christological', marked as it is by

Seraphim's frequent refrain 'for Christ's sake',12 and he thanked

Florovsky in the work's preface for his assistance in showing him the

conversation's 'christological basis'.'3

The rest of Florovsky's letter discusses a wide variety of subjectsincluding an important section detailing his view of patristic

'authority'. It is not surprising that Florovsky would discuss St

Seraphim in the same breath as patristic authority since he believedthat the saints or fathers are fundamentally witnesses to Christ through

the Spirit and, furthermore, he understood tradition to be 'the witnessof the Spirit; the Spirit's unceasing revelation and preaching of good

tidings'.14 Patristic authority is coextensive with 'tradition', for

Florovsky, and by tradition he meant the charismatic, creative andecclesial power to teach the Word (potestas magisterii) primarily

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FLOROVSKY ON READING THE LIFE OF SERAPHIM

through the exegesis of scripture. This magisterial power is an

authoritative witness or testimony (martyria) by the Church, pre-

eminently embodied in the work of its hierarchy, to the truth of

salvation in Christ (adoption into God's eternal life). It accompanies

the church as it is challenged daily not to pursue authoritative answers

to settled problems before it has brought sharply into focus and

carefully identified its own new theological problems or ecclesial

challenges. The martyria of the saints reveals their creativity, courage

and wisdom and it comes from the inner evidence of catholicity given

to them through their common abiding in the one Spirit in whom they

were all baptised as one body having a concrete oneness of feeling and

thought (a common unity of life). The catholic consciousness or

'patristic mind',15 which we are describing, however, has a cruciform

structure because it is the living, eternal and faithful experience of

Christ being wholly in the midst of the his church in both head and

body. In figures like St Seraphim, we see saints (called 'doc tors and

fathers') who are unique in that they have attained a level of

catholicity, a completeness of the patristic mind, which allows thempersonally to witness for the whole Church 'from the completeness of

a life full of grace'.16 Thus the patristic authority to teach ('trad ition' )

is essentially a matter of the saints' creative spiritual vision of faith or

catholic witness to the Christian gospel of Christ crucified and risen

for us according to the scriptures, rather than a form of what might be

called 'patristicism' or 'Byzantinism'17 where the Greek patristic

corpus is understood, more or less, as inerrant and infallible with

theology as the careful repetition ofthe fathers' words.

The argument that tradition is the creative Christian witness in

the modern context to the truth of Christ or the global gospel vision of

the fathers as 'the constant abiding of the Spirit and not only thememory of words' is the essence of what Florovsky referred to as a

'neo-patristic synthesis'." Yet Florovsky's vision of theology,

understood in this fashion, is shared, in the broadest sense, by other

very different writers in the emigration, such as Vladimir Lossky and

even Bulgakov.20 Although it must be remembered that there were vast

theological differences, particularly between Bulgakov and his

younger colleagues Florovsky and Lossky,21 contemporary scholarship

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is now rightly emphasising that there exists an underlying

commonality of vision in Paris emigre theology.22

A previously unpublished letter of Georges Florovsky to

Dobbie Bateman23

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.

December 12, 1963

Dear Father,

Thank you so much for your letter and for the paper enclosed.24

The paper is excellent. Its first merit is in that it proceeds inductively,

from the concrete cases or episodes. Then the conclusion imposes. I

think you are right about Motovilov. In any case, the Conversation

should not be regarded as a closed unit. It does not say the whole truth.

The Spirit is the Spirit of Christ,25 and is sent by Christ from the

Father in order to remind the Disciples, those of Christ, or Christians,of Him. Pneumatic should not be played against Christological. I am

coming to see it with increasing clarity. The Spirit, and His gifts, the

charismata, can be 'acquired' only in the name of Christ. And, in the

order of Salvation, there is no higher Name. One addresses the Father

in the Name of Christ, the Incarnate Son. The Pentecost is the mystery

of the Crucified Lord, Who rose again to send the Paraclete. Thus,

Cross, Resurrection, Pentecost belong together as aspects of one

mystery, distinct in the dimension of time, but integrated in the one

Divine deed of Redemption. In the image of St. Seraphim all these

aspects are reflected both in their temporal distinction and in their

essential unity. Hardships, humility, joy and gentle charity, anddaring.26 I have discussed this paradoxical synthesis of humility in

daring in my short preface to Father Sophronius's book on Starets

Silouan.27 The Spirit brings joy, but He also bestows authority and

power. Your expression alter Christus is rather strong, but ultimately

correct.28 After all, in the phrase of St. Augustine, Christ is not only in

capite but also in corpore,29 and, according to St. Paul, all 'members'

together are 'One Christ'.30 Imitatio Christi is not just a figure of

speech, and it is not a Western phrase.31 St. Ignatius of Antioch

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regarded himself as a mimetes Christou, with the special emphasis on

the sharing of the Cross or the martyr's death.32 I do not see muchdifference between mimesis and akolouthia.

My remark on the preference for 'settled problems', in the article

on Old Russia, was not just a casual remark. This preference is still

the major predicament of modern man. It is so conspicuous in the

theological field. Just yesterday the question was put to me, in myPatristic seminar, by one of the participants: we enjoy immensely, he

said, the reading of the Fathers, but what is their 'authority'? Are we

supposed to accept from them even that in which they obviously were

'situation-conditioned' and probably inaccurate, inadequate, and even

wrong? My answer was obviously, No. Not only because, as it is

persistently urged, only the consensus patrum is bindingand, as to

myself, I do not like this phrase. The 'authority' of the Fathers is not a

dictatus papae. They are guides and witnesses, no more. Their vision

is 'of authority', not necessarily their words. By studying the Fathers

we are compelled to face the problems, and then we can follow them

but creatively, not in the mood of repetition. I mentioned this alreadyin the brief preface to my 'Eastern Fathers of the IV century',34 and

provoked a fiery indignation of the late Dom Clement Lialine.35 So

many in our time are still looking for authoritative answers, even

before they have encountered any problem. I am fortunate to have in

my seminars students who are studying Fathers because they are

interested in creative theology, and not just in history or archaeology.

I am very glad that you found M. Philaret simple and not unduly

rhetorical. On the other hand, his sermons were always thoroughly

prepared and probably written in advance. Not all of them are on the

same level, especially in his early years, when he was under theinfluence of'evangelical mysticism' of the time.36

I was glad to learn Father Salmon is still active. I remember him

very well. It is an excellent idea to produce a 'Western edition' of the

Damascene. It is a good sign that such a project could be initiated in

our time. What is needed is, of course, not a scientific edition, but a

kind of working book.37 You can do it, and it will be of great help in

the age of John Woolwich.38 By the way, in the recent catalogue of

James Thin, of Edinburgh, I found a new book of Oliver Clark, a reply

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to Robinson. Have you seen the book? Oliver does not seem to have

written much recently.39

You are the only man who can do what Chitty has asked you to

prepare for the projected Festschrift. And I shall be very grateful to

you. And I am grateful to Chitty for the idea to ask you to do it.

I have sent you a new article of mine on Tradition. Next to me

you will find also an article of Allchin, on the same subject. Themagazine is Lutheran, and the manager is a pupil of mine, a bright

scholarly minister.

With best greetings of ours to you both

Yours ever,

Georges Florovslcy

* I am indebted to the hospitality and generosity of the staff (the Revd StephenPlatt and Dr M.C. Steenberg) of the Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius inOxford, UK who gave me access to the archives of the Fellowship; the tirelesswork on my behalf of Margaret Rich, Archivist, the Department of Rare Booksand Special Collections, Princeton University Library (by whose gracious

permission I have published extracts of documents from the archive); ClareBrown and the staff of Lambeth Palace Library; Dr Cliff Davies, Keeper of theArchives, Wadham College, Oxon., Rt Revd Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia, RevdCanon Donald Allchin, Revd Prof Michael Plekon, Prof Andrew Blane, ProfPaul Valliere and Irina Kukota.

1 Dobbie Bateman felt that Zemov's plan to set up a Fellowship centre inLondon ('St Basil's House') was a financially unsound move (letter of A.F.Dobbie Bateman to Nicolas Zernov, 2 August 1943, archive ofthe Fellowship ofSt Alban and St Sergius f=FASOxon], in folder 'St Basil HouseOxford 1932-London 1943'). He believed Zemov's 'dream' departed from the original visionof the Fellowship and, furthermore, the Fellowship did not have the necessaryfinancial backing for investing in house property. The following year heresigned his membership (letter to N. Zernov, 16 April 1945, FASOxon, ibid.)postponing his decision to resign until contact had been resumed after the warbetween the London and Paris branches after the pleas of Zernov and PaulAnderson (see the letter ofN. Zernov to A.F. Dobbie Bateman, 24 April 1945;

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and the letter of Dobbie Bateman to Zernov, 17 June 1945, FASOxon, ibid.)

Neve rth ele ss, he reco nfirmed the follo wing year: am unwilling to be an

absentee member of a society with which I am out of sympathy [...]. ^

happiness of the past must be its own inspiration without the burden of

insincerity' (letter to N. Zernov, 6 January 1946, FASOxon, ibid.). However

Dobbie Bateman's lack of sympathy for the Fellowship did not last and he later

rejoined, although in a much diminished role due to his age, in February of I960(see his membership card, FASOxon).

See Gallaher, Anastassy, 'Bulgakov and intercommunion', Sobornost 24.2

(2002), pp. 9-28; Geffert, Bryn, 'Sergii Bulgakov, The Fellowship of St Alban

and St Sergius, Intercommunion and Sofiology', Revolutionary Russia 17.1

(2004), pp. 105-41; Klimoff, Alexis, 'Georges Florovsky and the Sophiological

Controversy', St Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 49.1-2 (2005), pp. 67-100;

and Nikolaev, Sergei V., 'Spritual Unity: The Role of Religious Authority in the

Disputes between Sergii Bulgakov and Georges Florovsky Concerning

Intercommunion', St Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 49.1-2 (2005), pp. 101-

23.

Dobbie Bateman translated the title of Bulgakov's famous essay (Bulgakov,

Sergii., 'Ipostas' i Ipostasnost' (Scholia k Svetu Nevechernemu)' in Sbornik

statei posviashchennykh Petru Berngardovichu Struve ko dniu tridtsatipiatiletiia

ego nauchno-publits isticheskoi deiatel'nosti, 1890-1925 (Prague 1925), pp. 353-

71) rather fancifully as ' Pers on and Person ality' (translati on done in London in

April 1932 for November 1932 Fellowship study group; in FASOxon folder

'Documents About Fellowship and Correspondence'). English translation:

'Protopresbyter Sergii Bulgakov: Hypostasis and Hypostaticity: Scholia to the

Unfading Light', revised trans., ed. and intro. of A. F. Dobbie Bateman by

Anastassy Brandon Gallaher and Irina Kukota, St Vladimir's Theological

Quarterly 49.1-2 (2005), pp. 5-46. See Bishop, Frank H., 'Editorial, News,

Comments, Correspondence etc.', Journal of the Fellowship of St Alban and St

Sergius 18 (1932), p. 3; and 'Editorial, News, Comments, etc.', Journal of the

Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius 19 (1933), p. 4).

Zernov, Nicolas, Obituary of The Reverend Arthur Fitzroy Dobbie Bateman',

Sobornost 7.1 (1975), pp. 47-9.

Dobbie Bateman, A.F., Conversation of St Seraphim of Sarov with

Nic holas Motovi lov Conc erni ng the Aim of the Chri sti an Li fe' , St Seraphim of i

Sarov: Concerning the Aim of Christian Life (London 1936), pp. 42-60. An )

earlier abridged translation of the conversation, which appears to be by the hand

of Oliver Fielding [Bernard] Clarke, was published a few years earlier:

Conversation of St Seraphim of Sarov with N. A. Motovilov concernin the Aim

of the Christian Life (1831)', The Journal of the Fellowship of St Alban and St

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Sergius 22 (1933), pp. 29-38. See Clarke's introduction to the conversation:

'Things New and Old', The Journal of the Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius

22 (1933), pp. 21-8.

6 'Acta Majorum', Wadham College Gazette no. 123 (1948), p. 9. Many thanks

to Dr Cliff Davies, keeper of the archives, Wa dham Coll ege, Oxford for

providing me with refer ences to Dob bie Bat eman in the archi ves of his old

college (BA, 1920 and MA, 1952).8 ibid., no. 133 (1953), p. 100.

9 Dobbie Bateman, A.F., The Return of St Seraphim: A Western Interpretation

(London 1970).

10 started with the view [in his paper sent to Florovsky, 'The Maturity of St

Seraphim'] (prompted by your critique of Lossky in 1054-1954 [Florovsky,

Georges, 'Christ and His Church: Suggestions and Comments' in 1054-1954:

L'Eglise et Les eglisesneuf siecles de doloureuse separation entre orient et

IOccident:Etudes et travaux sur Vunite Chretienne offerts a Dom Lambert

Beauduin, Vol. 2; Chevetogne 1954-55, pp. 168-70]) that Seraphim should be

interpreted christologically. This met the gap which I felt strongly but did not

sufficiently pr obe in my book of 1936. Also I have long felt that theconversation tells more about Motovilov than about Seraphim. It reads as if

Motovilov had written him up; and merely made him discursive. Not till I had

sorted all this into its proper time sequence did the post-resurrection theme

emerge. So the Pentecostal interpretation seems to lose its disturbing, almost

sectarian, vagueness. If this makes sense to you, then it gives an approach to

Seraphim's long years of recollection and preparation and a clearer meaning to

the attack of the robbers' (letter to Georges Florovsky, 27 November 1963,

George Florovsky Papers, box 26, folder 2).

" Blane, Andrew (ed.), Georges Florovsky: Russian Intellectual and Orthodox

Churchman (Crest wood 1993), p. 297.

12 Dobbie Bateman, The Return of St Seraphim, p. 30.

13 ibid., 'preface'.

14 Florovsky, Georges, 'Sobornost: The Catholicity of the Church' in The

Church of God: An Anglo-Russian Symposium By Members of the Fellowship of

St Alban and St Sergius, ed. E. L. Mascal l (London 1934), p. 64.

15 Florovsky, Georges, 'Patristics and Modern Theology', Diakonia 4.3 (1969

[1936]), p. 229.

16 ibid., p. 231.

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'' Florovsky, however, fell himself into a form of Byzantine romanticism which

can be seen in The Ways of Russian Theology (Paris 1937), his history of the

'western captivity' or 'pseudo-morphosis' of Russian theology from its true

Byzantine form. St Seraphim, who is favourably compared to the Byzantine

'visionary' St Symeon the New Theologian, is said to be outwardly Russian but

'inwardly belongs to the Byzantine tradition which once again fully came to life

in him' (Florovsky, Georges, Ways of Russian Theology, Part Two in TheCollected Works of Georges Florovsky, vol. 6, ed. Richard Haugh and tr. Robert

L. Nichols (Vaduz 1987), p. 165). Florovsky believed that the Christian message

could not be separated, without deforming it, from the Greek categories in which

it was formulated ('a new Christian Hellenism [...] Hellenism is a standing

category of Christian experience') and so the creativity of modern Orthodox

theology was dependent on a 'spiritual Hellenisation (or re-Hellenisation)': 'let

us be more Greek to be truly catholic, to be truly Ort hodox ' (Florovsky,

'Patristics and Modern Theology', p. 232, and see Blane, Georges Florovsky:

Russian Intellectual and Orthodox Churchman, p. 155). The complete

inadequacy of this position both theologically (Orthodox ethnicism and patristic

fundamentalism being encouraged) and scientifically (with its ignoring of the

witness of countless non-Hellenistic fathers such as Ephrem the Syrian,

Shenoute of Atripe, Mesrob, etc.) cannot be underestimated (See Maloney,

George A., 'The Ecclesiology of Father Georges Florovsky', Diakonia 4.1

(1969), pp. 23 ff; and bishop Hilarion Alfeev' s ' The patristi c heritage and

modernity' paper delivered at the 9th International Conference on Russian

monasticism and spirituality, Bose Monastery, 20 September 2001

, last accessed 27 June

2005).

18 Florovsky, Georges, 'Sobornost: The Catholicity of the Church', p. 65.

Blane, Georges Florovslcy: Russian Intellectual and Orthodox Churchman,

pp. 153-5 and see Florovsky, Georges, 'Sobornost: The Catholicity of the

Church', pp. 53-74, 'Patristics and Modern Theology', pp. 227-32 and 'Saint

Gregory Palamas and the Tradition of the Fathers', Sobornost 4.4 (1961), pp.165-76; for commentary on the meaning of this phrase see bishop Hilarion

Alfeev's 'The patristic heritage and modernity'.

Bulgakov, Sergii, 'Dogmat i dogmatica' in Zhivoie Priedanie: pravoslavie v

sovremennosti (Pravoslavnaia mysl' v.3) (Paris 1937), pp. 9-24, tr. as 'Dogma

and Dogmatic Theology', Peter Bouteneff in Tradition Alive: On the Church

and the Christian Life in Our TimeReadings from the Eastern Church, ed.

Michael Plekon (Lanham 2003), pp. 67-80; and Lossky, Vladimir, 'Tradition

and Traditions', tr. G.E.H. Palmer and E. Kadloubovsky in In the Image and

Likeness of God, eds. J. Erickson and T.E. Bird (Crestwood 1974), pp. 141-68.

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21 See Valliere, Paul, 'The "Paris School" of Theology: Unity or Multiplicity?',

unpublished conference paper, 'La Teologia ortodossa e l'Occidente nel xx

secolo: Storia di un incontro' (Seriate, October 2004). I am grateful to Prof

Valliere for sharing his paper with me (found at

, last accessed

27 June 2005).

22 See Arjakovsky, Antoine, 'Personne, Sagesse, Hypostase, une visionrenouvelee de la divino-humanite',

, last

accessed 27 June 2005. Also see Arjakovsky, Antoine, La generation des

penseurs religieux de Vemigration Russe: La Revue La Voie' (Put'), 1925-1940

(Kiev/Paris 2002), pp. 517-22.

23 Editorial note: We have retained herein the capitalisation and punctuation of

the original letter.24 This paper is 'The Maturity of St Seraphim' (George Florovsky papers, box

59, folder 2) and Dobbie Bateman had given it that year at the Fellowship

conference (Ryan, Edward and Ronald Smythe, 'Impressions of the Conference

II' Sobornost 4.10 (1964), p. 594). It would later serve, in a much revised form,

as chapter one ofThe Return of St Seraphim (1970).

25 Rom 8.9.26 In a much e arlier portrait from 1937 in The Ways of Russian Theology,

Florovsky writes that Seraphim 'testifies to the mysteries of the Spirit with an

unexpected daring. He was more of a witness than a teacher, but even more than

that, his being and his whole life are manifestations of the Spirit' (Florovsk y,

Georges, Ways of Russian Theology, p. 165).

2 Florovsky, Georges, 'Foreword' to Archim. Sophrony (Sakharov)'s The

Undistorted Image: Starets Silouan, 1866-1938 (London 1958), pp. 5-6;

Florovsky had come to know St Silouan personally on Mt Athos and his

photogra ph had hun g in his study (Blane, Georges Florovsky: Russian

Intellectual and Orthodox Churchman, p. 298).

28 'What the Holy Spirit revealed in Saint Seraphim was Christ in him. The life,

the piety and the glory of Saint Seraphim are fundamentally christocentric. He

who had withdrawn the Lord of his life from the imaginative exchange of vision

into the secret night of a reserved and recollected mind, has disclosed thereby

the operation of the Christ-life. He is alter Christus (Dobbie Bateman, 'The

Maturity of St Seraphim', George Florovsky papers, box 59, folder 2, p. 12).

Florovsky alludes to a passage of Augustine which is the locus classicus of the

phra se 'totu s Chr is tus ': In Iohannis evangelium tractatus CXXIV, 28.1 (PL 35.

c.1622). This notion is crucial for understanding Florovsky's theology. See

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http://orthodoxia.org/hilarion/articles/patrherit.htmhttp://orthodoxia.org/hilarion/articles/patrherit.htmhttp://www.livejournal.com/users/seraphimsigrist/2004/09/20/http://www.livejournal.com/users/seraphimsigrist/2004/09/20/http://www.ucu.edu.ua/fr/seminars/2004/personne.sagesse.hypostase/http://www.ucu.edu.ua/fr/seminars/2004/personne.sagesse.hypostase/http://www.ucu.edu.ua/fr/seminars/2004/personne.sagesse.hypostase/http://www.livejournal.com/users/seraphimsigrist/2004/09/20/http://orthodoxia.org/hilarion/articles/patrherit.htm


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commentary at Kiinkel, Christoph, Totus Christus. Die Theologie Georges V.

Florovskys (Gottingen 1991), pp. 14-15 and 185-7.

30 Rom 12.5 and 1 Cor 12.12.

The allusion is to Thomas a Kempis' (c. 1380-1471) Imitation of Christ.

'Allow me to be an imitator of the suffering of my God' (Ignatius of Antioch

Rom 6.3)

Florovsky, Georges, 'The Problem of Old Russian Culture. A discussion with

comments by Nikolai Andreev and James H. Billington', Slavic Review 21

(1962) , pp. 1-42.

'This book was compiled from academic lectures. In the series of studies or

chapters I strived to delineate and depict the images [obrazy] of the great

teachers and Fathers of the Church. To us they appear, first of all, as witnesses

of the catholic faith, as custodians of universal tradition. But the patristic corpus

of writings is not only an inviolable treasure-trove of tradition. For tradition is

life; and the traditions are really being preserved only in their living

reproduction and empathy [for them]. The Fathers give evidence concerning this

in their own works. They show how the truths of the faith revive and transfigure

the human spirit, how human thought is renewed and revitalized in the

experience of faith. They develop the truths of the faith into the integral and

creative Christian worldview. In this respect, the patristic works are for us the

source of creative inspiration, an example of Christian courage and wisdom.

This is a school of Christian thought, of Christian philosophy. And first of all in

my own lectures, I strived to enter into and to introduce [the reader/listener] into

that creative world, into that eternal world of unaging experience and

contemplation, in the world of unflickering light. I believe and I know that only

in it and from it is revealed the straight and true way towards a new Christian

synthesis, about which the contemporary age longs for and thirsts after. The time

has arrived to en-church our own mind and to resurrect for ourselves the holy

and blessed sources of ecclesial thought' (Florovsky, Georges, preface to

Vostochnye Ottsy IV-go Veka (Paris 1931)). Florovsky never completed hisprojected five-volume study of the father s, only two volumes of the full work

were ever completed (Blane, Georges Florovsky: Russian Intellectual and

Orthodox Churchman, p. 154).

Lialine criticized Florovsky's lectures as lacking a scientific erudition both in

their literary point of view and their lack of concern for scholarly precision

(Lialine, Clement, Review of' Vostocn ye Otcy IV veca', Irenikon 10.1 (1933), p.

84). His analysis and account of the sophiology controversy of 1935 is still a

major source for contemporary historians (Lialine, 'Le Debat Sophiologique',

Irenikon 13.2 (1936), pp. 168-205; 'Chronique Religieuse', Irenikon 13.3

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(1936), pp. 328-9; 'L'Affaire Sophiologique', Irenikon 13.6 (1936), pp. 704-5).

For his obituary see Rousseau, Dom Olivier, 'In Memoriam: Dom Clement

Lialine (1901-1958) ', Irenikon 31 (1958), pp. 165-82.

36 Metropolitan Philaret (Drozdov) of Moscow (1782-1867) was an eminent

19th-century Russian theologian and churchman (best known in the west for

1823's Christian Catechism of the Orthodox Catholic Eastern Greco-Catholic

Church and in Russia for his sermons, for which see Philaret, Slova i rechi, fivevolumes [Moscow 1873-85]).

37 Harold Bryant Salmon (1891-1965), then prebendary of Whittackington in

Wells Cathedral and formerly principal (1931-47) at Wells Theological College

(1840-1971), had suggested to Dobbie Bateman, in conjunction with a lecturer

of Arabic, the production of a 'Western edition' of St John of Damascus' De

Fide Orthodoxa. Dobbie Bateman felt that others more capable than him might

already have taken up the project and the preparation of a critical text was

outside his range and, therefore, asked Florovsky what he advised (letter to

Georges Florovsky, 27 November 1963, George Florovsky Pa pers, box 26,

folder 2).

38 John Robinson (1919-83) was Anglican Bishop of Woolich. He had just

publi shed his then contr overs ial book, Honest to God (London 1963), which

launched the 'God is dead' movement in theology.

39 Florovsky refers to Oliver Fielding Clarke's For Christ's Sake: a reply to the

Bishop of Woolich's Honest to God and a positive continuation of the discussion

(second ed., Wallington 1963).

40 Derwas J. Chitty (1901-71), Anglican rector for many years of the parish of

Upton in the diocese of Oxford, was a longstanding and formative early member

of the Fellowship, and a specialist in ancient Christian monasticism (cf. The

Desert a City: an introduction to the study of Egyptian and Palestinian

monasticism under the Christian Empire [repr. Crestwood, NY 1995]; Every,

Edward, 'Derwas James Chitty, 1901-1971' and Allchin, A. M. 'D. J. Chitty: A

Tribute', Sobornost 6.3 (1971), pp. 178-81; and Ware, Kallistos, 'Derwas JamesChitty (1901-1971)', Eastern Churches Review 6 (1974), pp. 1-21). He appears

to have started a project to collect a festschrift in honour of Florovsky, to which

he wanted Dobbie Bateman to contribute (cf. George Florovsky Papers, box 60,

folder 5). However, as happened many times in his life (e.g. his unfinished

English translation of John Climacus' Ladder of Divine Ascent: Ware, Kallistos

and Sebastian Brock., 'The Library of the House of St Gregory and St Macrina,

Oxford: The D.J. Chitty Papers', Sobornost 4.1 (1982): 57 [56-58]), this venture

was eventually put aside.

69


7/7


Cf. Florovsky, Georges, 'Scripture and tradition: an Orthodox point of view'Dialog2 (1963), pp. 288-93.

Canon A. M. Allchin was at that period a librarian of Pusey House, Oxford.See Allchin, A.M., 'Anglican view on Scripture and tradition', Dialog 2 (1963),

pp. 295-9.

The reference is to Charles S. Anderson, who was then managing editor ofDialogand taught at Luther Theological Seminary (St Paul, Minnesota).

*

70

Obituaries

SERGEI HACKEL (1931-2005)

One of my first vivid memories of Fr Sergei was in 1960. We were

together on the first pilgrimage from our diocese to the Soviet Union.It was a very mixed group: Nicholas Zernov, Shura Pickersgill and

myself from England, some others from Switzerland and Holland. Fr

Sergei, although far from the oldest, was chosen as leader since he was

the only ordained clergyman among us, he was a deacon. The trip was

not an easy one. The Church in Russia was undergoing the first stages

in Khruschev's campaign to eradicate religion. The purpose of our

visit was to reassure us as representatives of the Moscow Patriarchate

abroad that all was well, and to allay our fears regarding any

persecution. Our visits were carefully stage-managed and movements

were carefully controlled. The priest from the department of external

church relations assigned to escort us had to lie. We stayed in the

Ukraina hotel, were feasted on champagne and caviar, given presents

and a substantial gift in roubles. On our visits to various churches a

small number of clergy and some ordinary parishioners told us,

usually in a whisper, what was really happening. It was a very painful

experience, and I am sure that the trip played a very important part in

Fr Sergei's outlook and attitude to the Moscow Patriarchate.

Georges Florovsky on Reading the Life of St Seraphim--SobECR 27-1 Gallaher

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Transcript of Georges Florovsky on Reading the Life of St Seraphim--SobECR 27-1 Gallaher