Patristic theology, and traditional teachings of Orthodoxy from the Church fathers of apostolic times to the present. All forum Rules apply. No polemics. No heated discussions. No name-calling.
The following is taken from the website of the Assyrian Church of the East:
The same God the Word, begotten of his Father before all worlds without beginning according to his divinity, was begotten of a mother without a father in the last times according to his humanity, in a body of flesh, with a rational, intelligent, and immortal soul which he took from the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary and united to himself, making it his very own at the moment of conception. The humanity which he took for his own was assumed by God the Word, who was, thenceforth and for ever, the personal subject of the divine and human natures. His divine and human natures retain their own properties, faculties, and operations unconfusedly, immutably, undividedly, and inseparably.
Therefore, because the divinity and humanity are united in the Person of the same and only Son of God and Lord Jesus Christ, the Church of the East rejects any teaching which suggests that Christ is an "ordinary man" whom God the Word inhabited, like the righteous men and the prophets of old. The Church of the East further rejects any teaching that explicitly or implicitly suggests that there are two Sons, or two Lords, or two Christs in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, but we confess one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever. http://www.cired.org/aceov.html
If this represents an honest confession of faith, what would prevent a reconciliation of the Assyrian Church of the East with other Orthodox churches?
It could be that they only deny Mary the title of Theotokos and avoid the usage of icons because this is what they've done from the very beginning of their church.
It could be that they only deny Mary the title of Theotokos and avoid the usage of icons because this is what they've done from the very beginning of their church.
So what? What an inane thing to say! Just because an heresy is old doesn't make it Orthodox doctrine; it just makes it an old heresy.
"As long as it depends on Monothelitism, then Miaphysitism is nothing but a variant of Monophysitism."
How could it be heresy if these Christians have been doing the same thing since the first century, before the term "Theotokos" was even created?
All they'd be doing then is following tradition.
Because when a disagreement errupted an Œcumenical Council was called and the Nestorian wanted to call the Panagia the "Christotokos" and refused to call her the "Theotokos", calling that a heresy. The Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, in one of the CHurch's Seven Ecuemenical Councils ruled that her proper title was Theotokos and that Christotokos was insufficient and improper. Rather than agree with the truth that the Church had always taught, they thought her only a Christotokos and not the Theotokos and separated themselves from the Church to stand fast in their heresy.
The Assyrian Christians, after Ephesus, were referred to as "Nestorian," not because they followed Nestorias, but because they had long been believing the same position which Nestorias had chosen to follow.
If we are to accept Ephesus' condemnation of Assyrian Christians as divinely inspired, then we must also accept St. Cyril's Miaphysite Christology as divinely inspired.
