Ellopos Blog

Schmemann, The first Christianization of the Slavs

Ellopos Blog — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 17:45:34 +0000

Alexander Schmemann, A History of the Orthodox Church – At the end of the seventh century came a new invasion from a Turkic people, the Bulgars, who asserted their authority in provinces settled by Slavs and began a struggle against the empire that lasted many years. As occurred later with the Varangian conquerors of the [...]

Schmemann, Orthodoxy is the Church of Byzantium

Ellopos Blog — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 21:24:02 +0000

From Alexander Schmemann, A History of the Orthodox Church Byzantium can in no way be considered merely a completed and outlived chapter of Church history. Not only does it continue to live in the Orthodox Church, but in a sense still defines Orthodoxy itself, constituting its historical form. Just as modern Catholicism crystallized in the [...]

Schmemann, Life of the early Church

Ellopos Blog — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 23:54:44 +0000

From Alexander Schmemann, A History of the Orthodox Church For the early Church, unity in love was the ultimate value; it was the supreme purpose of life that Christ Himself had revealed to men. … This unity was demonstrated above all in the active love through which each Christian was conscious that he belonged to [...]

Manolis Vlachos, Greek Painters after the War of Independence

Ellopos Blog — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 18:59:27 +0000

Excerpts from the Origins of Modern Greek Painting – Modern Greek painting, whether evolved from late Byzantine or Italian art, is rich in religious and secular works, in which one can discern influences from the late Renaissance as well as from artists from the Greek islands, particularly Crete and the Ionian Islands. From the outset, [...]

The Cracow Symposium about Mimesis in Byzantine Art

Ellopos Blog — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 08:50:11 +0000

The second Cracow Symposium on Byzantine Art and Archaeology, September 5-7, 2012, calls for papers. Here I copy excerpts from the invitation: The problem of the connections between the prototype and the image was a key point of theological dispute during iconoclastic controversies and mimesis, as an esthetic category, appears in numerous written sources: chronicles, [...]

Totalitarianism generates total sterility

Ellopos Blog — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 21:12:18 +0000

In their early revolutionary stages of development, to be sure, and whenever and wherever they meet opposition, totalitarian movements employ tyrannical measures of force and violence, but their nature differs from that of tyrannies precisely in the enormity of their threat of world destruction. That threat has often been thought possible and explained as the [...]

Paul Tillich, Courage and Participation

Ellopos Blog — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 22:09:36 +0000

Being, Individualization, and Participation This is not the place to develop a doctrine of the basic ontological structure and its constituent elements. Something of it has been done in my Systematic Theology, Vol. i, Part I. The present discussion must refer to the assertions of those chapters without repeating their arguments. Ontological principles have a [...]

Paul Tillich, The idea of courage from Plato to Nietzsche

Ellopos Blog — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 09:51:54 +0000

Courage and Fortitude: From Plato to Thomas Aquinas Courage and Wisdom: The Stoics Courage and Self-affirmation: Spinoza Courage and life: Nietzsche – Courage and Fortitude: From Plato to Thomas Aquinas In Plato’s Republic courage is related to that element of the soul which is called thymos (the spirited, courageous element), and both are related to [...]