Elder Isidore - Salt of the Earth

[Barbara]

OK. I just picked up the book about Elder Cleopas, the Romanian Elder.
I have had a copy FOREVER, just like Salt of the Earth, and not read it yet.

Sometimes they need to sit there quietly and then one picks them up when more beneficial
than maybe at the wrong time during one's life, before one could fully appreciate them.

Does anyone know about this book, if it's good [which I assume ] or EXTRA-good ?

[Revnitel]

Generally a good book. I found the references to witches in the Romanian forests very colorful.

[Barbara]

Ah - ! I will keep a careful eye out for that bit of 'local color' - !

Vampires did originate in Transylvania, so it's not surprising, I guess.

[Matthew]

OK. I just picked up the book about Elder Cleopas, the Romanian Elder. Does anyone know about this book, if it's good (which I assume) or EXTRA-good ?

I read it and found it a good read at the time, however, after I left the New Calendar Church and became True Orthodox, I learned some things about him that changed my mind radically about him. I would not bother reading anything by him now. There are so many other TRULY holy elders out there one can read about why would I read anything by a Judas Heretic?

Here are some quote from the evil pseudo-elder Cleopa:

Thank you for your insight on this matter. The reason I ask is because the more I read of his life and teachings, the more I am convinced that the Old Calendarists are in fact schismatics, who have violated the very canons they claim to uphold. Elder Cleopa was quite insistent upon the fact that the Old Calendarists are schismatics because of their refusal to obey the Patriarchate's decision. He claims that the calendar issue is not a dogmatic one; therefore it is not grounds for canonically ceasing commemoration. He asks rhetorically, "Do we say in the Creed, 'I believe in one calendar? Do we ever sing, 'O holy martyrs of the calendar pray to God for us'?" He goes on further to claim that the calendar was not changed, but corrected, and that it was undertaken with the fear of God. Not all at the council of Athens were ecumenists-- not even most. He asks rhetorically that if Athos, Jerusalem and Russia were on the side of the Old Calendarists, then why are they not in communion with them?

I think he brings up some valid points. You know, despite the 1583 condemnation of the papal calendar, there really is nothing that forbids the Church to actually change the calendar

-- see, http://orthodoxengland.org.uk/answers2.htm

Here in more detail is Cleopa's irreverent teaching against the Holy Church's condemnation of the Pope's calendar (of which NOT ONLY the paschalion was condemned, but the whole and every part of it was condemned):

http://www.oodegr.com/english/ekklisia/ ... endars.htm

Here is a quote from the True Bishops of the Church of Greece that totally contradicts this so-called "Elder" Cleopa:

In assuming the pastorship of the Orthodox Greek populace that follows the Orthodox festal calendar of our fathers, and being conscious of the oath of faith that we took that we would keep all that we have received from the seven Ecumenical Councils, we abjure every innovation and can not but proclaim as schismatic the State Church, which has accepted the papal festal calendar which has been described by Pan-Orthodox Councils as an innovation of the heretics and as an arbitrary trampling underfoot of the divine and sacred canons of the ecclesiastical traditions.

On account of this, we counsel all who follow the Orthodox festal calendar to have no spiritual communion with the schismatic Church and its schismatic ministers, from whom the grace of the All-holy Spirit has departed, since they have set at nought the resolutions of the Fathers of the Seven Ecumenical Councils and the Pan-Orthodox Councils that condemned the Gregorian festal calendar. The fact that the Schismatic Church does not have grace and the Holy Spirit is confirmed by Saint Basil the Great, who says: "Even though the schismatics have not erred in doctrines, yet because Christ is the Head of the Body of the Church, according to the divine Apostle, and from Him are all the members quickened and receive spiritual increase, the [schismatics] have been torn from the consonance of the members of the Body and no longer have the grace of the Holy Spirit abiding with them. And how, indeed, can they impart to others that which they have not?"
...

• Germanos of Demetrias
• Chrysostom of Florina
• Germanos of the Cyclades Islands

Code: Select all

   -- see, http://orthodoxflame.net/1935_Pastoral_Encyclical.php for the full document of the [u]Pastoral Encyclical to the Orthodox People

JUNE 21, 1935[/u].

[Barbara]

Oh thank you ! I knew there was some reason I kept putting reading the Elder Cleopas book off.
It sat and sat and sat...people had assured me that it was SUCH a "gem" -
but you can't believe any old people. Actually those were Old Calendarists who said this, but not
True Orthodox, come to think of it.

Some persons are not too demanding. Nor discerning, necessarily. They may have found a nice anecdote in it
but failed to catch this part which Icxypion unearthed.

I will look at that link because I am curious to see WHO wrote it. Was it Fr andrew philips replying to a parishioner, it seems ?

[Cyprian]

If this elder Isidore were still alive, would he even be observing the fast of the Holy Apostles this year? Since Pascha is late this year, there is no Apostles' fast for the new-calendarists. It will be eleven days for the Orthodox.

[Revnitel]

Elder Isidore was a member of the Russian church which was and is on the Old Calendar...