Aziz Matta

Two sentences stopped me in the speech which the Premier of Turkey, Rajab Tayyeb Erdogan, addressed the Foreign Ministers of the Arab World in Cairo with; the first is “Turkey and the Arabs share the same faith, culture and values.” The Creed referred to here is undisputedly Islam. His words indicate that the Premier does not recognize the presence, in this part of the world, of, at least, twelve million Arab Christians who do not expect to have their national identity be affirmed by a foreigner (Erdogan). In regard to culture, the language that has had a significant impact on the Anatolian language is Farsi. After Mehmet the Conqueror, Constantinople became a pole of attraction for poets of the Arabs and the Persians until the entrenchment of modern Turkish. But in general, and around the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, there was no Arab impact left that has not been affected by the Persian influence.

With the emergence of organizations in the Nineteenth Century, Turkey swayed towards the West. And then the Turks became more closed and fanatic with the War of Independence and the Declaration of the Turkish Republic in 1923 until the revolutionary Nazim Hikmet (1902-1963) came to power. After that, the horizons were widened with the translations and the trend towards communal and political thought. What survives now in Turkish literature has no connection to Arabism. But in regard to the values that Mr. Erdogan refers to as “in common” between us and them, some are ancient and some are modern. There is no doubt that what is ancient does not put pressure on us not to make us eager for modernity (which we are) and moreover, we have tasted much of Europe, while the Turks are strongly attached to what is ancient and Europe is for them a hope for political fusion thus complementing the NATO which brings both Turkey and Europe together making Turkey the stronger one in the regions of the Arabs in the hope of an Ottoman-like situation in which the Arabs are only a “small” ally.

But what is more frightful than what he previously said is his statement: “There came in the history of Turkey a young man who put an end to a “black” culture and inaugurated an modern-ancient culture when he conquered Constantinople; and that man is Mohammad (Mehmet)  the Conqueror. I do not argue the greatness of the Turkish culture and its ancience, but I have a question for Mr. Erdogan which is not supposed to shock him. Has he read the Byzantine culture which he calls “black”? The Turks are a strong military people who, with the help of the Western fleets that conspired along with them, were able to overcome the greatest civilization in the year 1453. Yet how is it that Mr. Erdogan wants to convince us that the civilization which is whole and integrated in all its elements, the civilization that is creative, the civilization the spirituality of which reaches the heavens, was BLACK. How can he not see that the Renaissance of Europe emerged only when the brain drain to the West (from Byzantium to western Europe) took place? Such brain drain from which Greek thought was adopted in developing modern thought.

What is most prominent in Byzantine civilization is culture. We have witnessed Greek and Latin calligraphy in the works of Historians, in articles on agriculture and military art, in medicine and veterinary practice, in dream interpretation; and all that constitutes a huge library part of which was that of the Ecumenical Patriarchate which used to contain the works of the Ecumenical Councils and the Fathers of the Church. Besides that there were private libraries which also contained Liturgical books. The rarity of books springs from them being expensive. Only rich families can afford buying books. The elementary school, in which a young child learns arithmetic, reading and writing, used to be overseen by the Bishop. The main book used for learning was the Book of Psalms. Learning how to make sentences took place at school as did also the singing of hymns.

All the children used to go to middle school. People learned what there was in ancient cultures: Homer, architecture, rhetoric and mathematics. The study of philosophy included theology, mathematics, music, astronomy and natural science. Translation of books to Farsi, Arabic and Latin took place in the Thirteenth Century. People adopted the vocabulary of the study of administration from Latin, and from Arabic they adopted the terms used in the art of weaving. The Church used to cling to ancient language. There were several universities in Constantinople and the Patriarchate itself used to offer university education.

Higher knowledge and learning had to include the interpretation of the Scriptures. Also the theological terms used emerged when the creed was defined. Asceticism and Mysticism had their impact on education and the study of the creed focused on the books of John of Damascus. The great mystics of the time were Symeon the New Theologian, Gregory Palamas and Nicholas Cabasilas.; and so here come the lives of the Saints and the liturgical books that were written in the Fourth and Fifth Centuries’; the Orthodox consider those as their daily bread. Also, knowing how to use the Liturgical and prayer books for the different seasons and feasts is a basic aspect of Byzantine culture.

Besides the abovementioned concerning Byzantine culture, we have the written works accomplished by men of knowledge and scientists; and these works deal with History, Geography, Military Art, Rhetoric, Novel Writing, Philosophy, Linguistics and Grammar.

History starts with creation and ends with the time-period of the writer. Moreover there is Greek Philosophy from which Christian thought borrowed terminology that can be used complimentarily with the Revelation which is immutable in essence and several methods were used in building the theological structure. Also there were few main philosophers but there were many of those knowledgeable of ancient Greek literature, many language experts and tragedians and writers for the theatre.

Perhaps some of the most beautiful written works were the religious poems like the Kontakions and others used in the prayers of the Church. Moreover there was in Byzantium popular poets and story writers in both the vernacular and formal dialect.

The Byzantines also knew applied Zoology and Botany and the use of medicinal plants. They also adopted the study of Chemistry to be used in the industry of metals, medicines, dyes and glass.

In the medical realm and health organization, many hospitals were established and the doctors received systematic education and fixed earnings. They were famous for their ophthalmic practice; Paul of Aegina knew much in surgery and gynecology and had an influence on the medical practice of the Arabs. Another has put a dictionary of diseases. They wrote specific books on dentistry and were well known for their knowledge in veterinary medicine and animal nutrition. The study of Pharmacy was a part of the medical curriculum and they had adopted some things from the Arabs and Persians in that.

As for Rhetoric, it was used as a means in political and religious campaigns. St. John Chrysostom was famous for his eloquence in the fourth and fifth centuries in Antioch and Constantinople and we have his sermons in Greek but they were translated to most of the European languages and some to Arabic.

In Graphic Art, icon painting on wood or as murals was popular in the Empire and it was used to teach those who cannot read. As of the Fourth Century, Mosaic art spread in the land; and one of the oldest mosaics (those of St. George and the Theotokou) are now in Thessaloniki. A few were kept in the Aegia Sophia and many icons were discovered during the days of Ataturk. There are also some in Cyprus and still more in Ravenna in Italy. And due to the high cost of making mosaics, murals were painted instead; and this became popular in the Arab world and is now widely spread in Syria and Lebanon. Moreover, books and scripts were adorned with drawings especially the Book of the Gospels. The same was true in textile embroidery and goldsmith industry.

The Church was aware of the importance of the Icon and in the Seventh Ecumenical Council, the Church defined the doctrine governing the veneration of icons. Devotion through icons spread in the year 787 A.D. and homes were full of them. It was St. John of Damascus who first explained its position and function in the Church. He lived in Palestine as a monk; the Church adopted his thought concerning the icon namely that the Divine Incarnation of the Logos leads us into the theology of the icon. The faith of the Orthodox people was kept partly because of the spirituality resulting from venerating of the icons and finding inspiration in them.

All the Byzantines, as historians affirm, were believers; when they meet a monk on their way, they would ask for his blessing. And such a way of life can tell you about their concern and care for the sick and the needy.

Among the emperors of Byzantium were those who were in darkness; but among them also were those who left the throne and joined the monastic life in monasteries. That society, amidst its sinfulness, wanted to inaugurate, in purity of life and orthodoxy of doctrine, the Kingdom of God here on earth; its stamp is the shedding of tears for sins (repentance), kindness, forgiveness, peace, compassion, ungreediness and asceticism. All the aforementioned is wrapped up in one word which is “love for the Lord”.

All what there is in the matter is that one would pay more attention to the internal aspects of one’s person than the external ones. In that sense the belief of the people of that culture was mystical in nature whereby one would dwell in God’s “mysteries” in a dispassionate manner invoking unceasingly in your heart the name of the Lord Jesus until your heart becomes itself the prayer.

Those who know Byzantine worship find in it richness that is above every richness. All the prayers of Matins and Vespers and the Midnight carry in them the certitude which we express on the Sunday of the Resurrection saying:” Christ has risen from the dead”. In the Liturgy, you receive hope from God to have you in the fullness of the Kingdom of God free from judgment on the last day. All those intense, profound and pure prayers as you stand or as you bow down with your body, while your soul is pure springing from the Divine Book so that, with the rest of the community, it (the Divine Book) becomes its verse.

When Mr. Erdogan reads the above, can he say that the great splendor that we described is a “black civilization”? You (Mr. Erdogan) are not excused when you read us and understand us wrongly. You are not excused when you see the light as darkness. The city which your ancestors invaded was known then as the sole bearer of civilization and culture in the world. Render justice to what was glorious before you came and read it well because the responsibility falls on you.

Translated by Riad Moufarrij

Original Text: “السيد اردوغان هل يقرأ؟” –An Nahar- 24.09.2011

There are three ranks [orders] of human existence: the rank of bodies, the rank of minds and the ultimate rank of love, as the great Pascal has said. Before my death, I face all the three ranks distinctively and in their interconnectedness, so that one may conquer the other and God seizes hold of me as God pleases.

The rank of bodies is about the human body, with its beauty and weaknesses, with the complications that it hides, with that which transcends in it and that which falls, with that which brings joy and that which causes pain, until it is buried with the hope of resurrection, if we were believers. The body is a stanchion, just a stanchion, for a mind that either glows or is absent. Through the word ‘body’ Pascal points to all that he owns in this world and its abodes, to all its vanities and delights and whatever is in one’s hands of dissolution and the love of dissolution, which might seem to be existing, while it is not. However, there is in it comfort and enjoyment. Enjoyment is about things through which we stretch out, yet, they make us heedless and they veil from us that which is greater, since the greater is more difficultly accessible, and requires from us great effort to drive away the specter of death. This reminds me with what Paul has said, “The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” [1Cor. 15: 26]

Thus, we must enjoy. The tragedy is, however, when we stand by these enjoyments and we perceive ourselves in a horrible emptiness, similar to ‘nothingness’, until we reach at the rank of the mind, which encompasses the universe. For us, the universe is about knowledge. It is regretting that you do not know everything. Certainly, you do not know much in life, that of which you might take advantage in your [own] life, especially what concerns your health. There have been, in the past, those who knew everything, like Al- Ghazālī and Leonardo Da Vinci; however, at our times, the encyclopedic knowledge has seized to exist. Thus, the educated is partially educated, while lack of education is widely spread in many countries and continents. This is our reality, the mind is a source of power for practical life, yet it does not lead you to the thought which gives you joy. How is it possible not to be moved, with the whole of your being, when you know that a Maronite priest had memorized one-hundred thousand of verses? How do you not desire all the feelings which endowed this man with life, whenever you are able to memorize only ten verses of poetry? Then, our poets who wrote here since Imru’ Al-Qays are not alive in your thought.

Is not my intellect curtailed, I, the writer of these lines, from whom all the mathematical and natural sciences have remained absent and who is ignorant completely of all electronic education, and thus belong to a civilization which no more exists. The content of my intellect is then little.

Hence, the mind is just an ability and not a core. In addition to this, you do not have enough time to know everything. The human being is a combination of voids put together.

In one of our monasteries, we had with us a Rumanian monk, who mastered several contemporary languages beside old languages, such as the Sanskrit, and he knew all the modern sciences and could cite poetries in their original languages and the New Testament in Greek. I used to sit at his feet for hours during the day, in order that I might learn what I want. I have never known anyone in his intelligence in the whole Orthodox world. This is the mind.

The Middle Ages have known the dilemma concerning the relationship between faith and reason, or between transmission and the mind, as it was displayed in Islam, Catholicism (with Thomas Aquinas) and Judaism. Whoever has read the religious texts of those three religions would realize that the dilemma is one and it is the reconciliation between revelation and reason. In the religious dimension of all these beliefs Aristotle was, indisputably, the first master.

The Eastern Byzantine Church has not experienced this dilemma, maybe because Aristotle had not dominated it. On the other hand, Basil the Great had known that through reason one can know the nature and through revelation one can grow in faith. As if Basil had confirmed two sources for knowledge, and thus he had not perceived the problem concerning the relationship between reason and revelation.

Further, the Orthodox Church views the human mind, similar to all human constituents, as damaged, upon what we call the parental sin (i.e. the sin of the first parents, Adam and Eve). Thus, the mind was not aborted but rather it was damaged. Furthermore, the Church views a relationship between the mind and the heart. Thus, we say that the mind descends to the heart and then it ascends purified. The mind is then the means to know this world.

The importance of reason is not downplayed in the Christian East, however there is [a kind of] inebriation in its regard and the elimination of it would lead to an uncontrolled emotivity, while God is known through faith that is the outcome of the meeting through divine grace between the mind and the heart.

Since his childhood Pascal had started his intellectual life and then he went through technology and he was a great Christian writer, particularly in relation to his book ‘Thoughts’, before he passed away in the age of thirty-nine. ‘Thoughts’ is concentrated on his knowledge of Christ and it was inevitable for him to consider love as the highest rank [order] of human existence. One of our Fathers said that when John the Evangelist in his First Epistle had said, “God is love” he did not refer by it to an attribute of the divine attributes, rather God in Godself.

It might be useful here to recount a conversation between me and the departed Mufti [a Muslim scholar] Nadīm al-Jisr at a funeral. He initiated the conversation saying, ‘you are monotheists’, so I thanked him and then he added, ‘however, you are philosophers’. When I noticed that he is referring to our faith in the Holy Trinity, I answered him: ‘No, we are not philosophers. We are lovers of God.’ Then I explained that there is unity that brings the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit together and that unity is love.

We do not distinguish between love [agápe], that is God, and that which descends upon us or indwells in us. I think this is what Pascal had meant when he said that the highest order in existence is love. [Love] might entail death for the sake of the Other, and it does not come neither from the rank of bodies nor of minds. In it you remain yourself, however you become poured to the extent of the death of the solitary I. You become one with the ‘Other’ without dissolving [in the Other].

Love is given to us since eternity and it remains forever as God takes us to Godself or into Godself. Thus we become it and it becomes us and nothing other than it [love] alone endures in the Kingdom.

However, it does not descend upon us unless after great purification and austerity. Then, in us and in all the people of heaven, it takes the image of a fulfilled unity. Love does not replace the mind; rather it elevates it to itself. [Love] does not abort the mind in what it has of particularity, but it transcends and purifies it so that it might give up all distortion and instability, and might become an instrument for discerning God.

Only through this vision, the mind controls the things of the world as they control it. In the last day when all people unite in love, God will be ‘all in all’. God will be revealed as love both in God’s nature and works, i.e. nothing remains in them other than God. Hence, they recognize God as their savior and there would be no trait [of the world] in them but God’s integral descent on it [the mind]. God will make them, like Christ; sit on the throne on his right hand. Love would not become a crown for us unless after it becomes our core.

Translated by Sylvie Avakian-Maamarbashi

Original Text: “المحبة كإكليل وفحوى” –An Nahar- 03-09-2011

In Christian terminology, it is the Feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God, and “dormition” is the eastern term for death. In the language of worship, the dead are called those asleep, in order to indicate Christ’s victory over death. Their death is because they are embraced by God before the Resurrection on the last day. The origins of the feast are eastern. It was established in the sixth century in Jerusalem where her church stood in Gethsemane. The Emperor Maurice made the feast general throughout the empire. Pope Sergius I, who died at the beginning of the seventh century adopted the feast, and Pope Pius XII announced that the transport of the Virgin to heaven in body and soul is a dogma.

The Orthodox Church has not defined the transport of Mary into heaven as a dogma. Orthodox theologians are divided between those who believe in the assumption of her body and those who do not, since where there is not a synodally-defined dogma, the matter is left to freedom of interpretation. However, the services for the feast are clear in stating that she was transported (“You were transported to life, being the Mother of Life”, that is of Christ). Also in the prayer for the feast we say “You arose after your death to be with your Son eternally” and even more clearly “God… preserved your body in the tomb and your glory is with Him in your divine transport”.

The question that poses itself to eastern Christians is ‘are the texts of the feast binding as dogma?’ The general, basic answer is that worship services reveal a dogmatic position in general, but this does not mean that we are able to extrapolate a binding dogmatic position from the worship services, and so we remain with critical freedom as long as a clear definition is not issued at an ecumenical council made up of all the Orthodox churches.

Taking stock of both the Orthodox and the Catholic positions, we can say that Mary anticipated the Resurrection, that she will not be subject to trial or judgment, and that she abides in glory, that is the state in which we will be after the final resurrection. This is what Saint John of Damascus realized in the eighth century when he addressed her in one of the two sermons he wrote about the Dormition. He said, “I will not call your holy departure death, but rather a dormition or a journey but the best way to call it is an abiding. In leaving the realm of the body, you entered a more excellent realm”.

I said that she abides in the divine glory and that she is not like us, subject to divine judgment on the last day. This is why we greatly magnify her. She is our ambassador to heaven.

She is full of grace, as the angel Gabriel told her at the moment of the Annunciation. That is, that she was free from all sin, submitting to God alone and prepared to accept every word from Him. This is what the angel meant when he said, “The Lord is with you, blessed among women.” These words were the beginning of her path to glory. The beginning of the path is that from her and from the Holy Spirit the Word of God, who existed in the beginning, became incarnate. The angel’s greeting makes it clear to Mary: “The Holy Spirit will rest upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” There is no doubt that the angel Gabriel’s use of the word “overshadow” points to the cloud that accompanied the People of God of old and which later became the temple in Jerusalem. The idea, then, is that Mary is the new temple of God or the first church for Christ and there is no church unless she dwells within it. In the first church, which gathered in the upper room in Jerusalem, where the disciples gathered “continuing with one accord in prayers and Mary the mother of Jesus was with them” (Acts 1: 14). So when the Holy Spirit rested upon them, it also rested upon Mary, just as it had rested upon her at the Annunciation in order for the Word to be made flesh. This Spirit accompanied her until the end of her life on earth. This is the life in glory before her being transported to the heavenly abodes.

There is no further talk about Mary after this in the Gospel, since it goes on to talk about the Holy Spirit’s formation of the Church. The Virgin is an inherent part of the Church since she said, “From this moment all generations shall call me blessed” (Luke 1:48). Thus the words of the Gospel show that the humanity that relies on the Gospel as its scripture turns to the Virgin, through whom the Mighty One worked wonders (Luke 1: 49). Those who know of the place of Mary in glory address her, seeking her intercession.

The author of the Book of Revelation looked at her as an image of the Church. He said, “There appeared a great sign in heaven: a woman robed in the sun and the moon is under her feet and upon her head is a crown of twelve stars” (Revelation 1: 12). Byzantine art has a pattern by which she is drawn with the Child. She relies on Him for all her splendor. She has no power on her own. She is given what we receive from the Lord. If you love the Lord and go for all His splendors, then He is great in His saints and among them she is the first. Knowledge of Mary is a part of knowledge of Christ.

Perhaps this feast is an occasion for me to say that what is called the intercession or the entreaties or the meditations of the saints are words that do not cancel the single mediation of Christ. Salvation was achieved a single time in the person of the Savior. No one can add anything to that, since there is no power outside this salvation.

We Orthodox do not accept the view of Mary as a partner is salvation. No human can save humans. However, we believe that those in heaven pray, just like the people on earth, because Christ’s Resurrection is active from this moment and by it Christ has trampled down the death of those who have tasted it. Those who have been transported to glory stand in prayer and are not mere bones and ashes. They are alive with their Lord, that is they speak to Him and we speak to them. We accompany them and they accompany us in the vale of tears in which we live. The Church in heaven and the Church on earth is one. Heaven is chanting after divine kindness in the saints. Is it right for you to say that those in heaven are silent and that Mary is absent from the glory of her Son and of her brothers and sisters in righteousness?! She is a word, after the Word dwelt within her and after He gave those invited to the wedding at Cana wine to enjoy. What does it mean when some say “Can God not respond to us directly?” If you entrust grace with Mary, supplicate her, and receive an outpouring from her, is the Savior not working within you directly? In the Kingdom of Love above, what is direct and what is indirect? Are we not, with those great ones who preceded us in arriving at God’s mercy, the single body of Christ, living together in

Translated from Arabic

Original Text: “عيد رقاد السيدة” –Nahar- 13.08.2011