The History Of Sacraments, Ordinances, And Sacred Actions
Christian history can be divided into two main epochs: premodern and modern. In premodern culture, ritual, symbol and metaphor were employed to express realities that could not be fully expressed in words. For premodern cultures, symbols were not merely notions; symbols were powerful mediators of divine activity. Patristic Christian writers used words to discuss Christian sacred actions but they did so in a multilayered, metaphorical, evocative manner, frequently employing the symbolic language of Scripture. Patristic influence continued until the rise of university, scholastic theology in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries in Western Europe. Because Eastern Orthodox churches did not experience this scholasticism, Orthodox practices often more directly reflect the symbolic and metaphoric patristic usage. Between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries, scholastic theologians applied Aristotelian logic to theology and systematized all aspects of the church's life: canon law, doctrinal …
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Chapters & Articles in The History Of Sacraments, Ordinances, And Sacred Actions (9)
Sacred actions, however they may be named, have been significant in every worship tradition. This article examines …
Understanding the sacred actions of the early church requires a short language lesson. Two words, the Greek word my…
The Middle Ages witnessed some far-reaching developments in the theology and practice of the sacraments. This artic…
This article traces the development of a Catholic view of the sacraments since the medieval period. This developmen…
The Eastern Orthodox churches did not develop scholastic, logic-based systematic theologies like those of late medi…
Many of the differences between Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Christians in sacramental practice stem from ch…
Protestant emphasis on the Word of God affected the role played by sacraments in Christian life. The more extreme P…
The emphasis on words and the Word of God in Reformation theologies and the adoption of a fundamentally scholastic …
Ever ready to adopt new methods, Protestants have been affected by new means of communication and contemporary cult…