by a feast.[1] Moreover, there are Eastern Fathers who imply the Immaculate Conception plainly enough, joining our Lord and his Mother together as the only two who were all stainless. So St. Ephrem († c. 379) addresses our Lord: "You indeed and your Mother are the only ones who are beautiful in every way; for in you, O Lord, there is no spot, in your Mother no stain."[2] The Acts of St. Andrew say: "As the first man was formed from immaculate earth (that is, from the earth before it was cursed by God, Gen. iii. 17), who by the sin of the tree brought death into the world, it was necessary that the perfect man, the Son of God, should be born of an Immaculate Virgin."[3] The development of this dogma, then, went on in parallel lines in both Churches before the schism. It is to be noticed that it did so equally after the schism; the Eastern theologians, never behindhand in giving honour to the all- holy Theotokos, taught her Immaculate Conception more and more plainly, till the influence of Protestants produced an opposing school, and at last the fact that the Pope defined the doctrine was a sufficient reason for altogether denying it (p. 391).
The question of Grace and Predestination is interesting as showing the different attitude of mind in the two Churches. Although Pelagius was condemned at Ephesus side by side with Nestorius,[4] this question never took hold of Eastern minds as it did those of the Latins. Their theological discussions were all Christological, ours Soteriological. St. Augustine, whose influence in the West has always been so great, remained almost unknown in the East, and their schools never produced any one like St. Augustine. Harnack thinks that the Greek Church is
- ↑ St. Augustine's sermon on St. Cyprian: "We should not keep his birthday even if we knew the date, because on that day he contracted original sin" (Sermon 310, n. 1). The Church only keeps three birthdays—of our Lord, our Lady, and St. John the Baptist, because he, too, was sanctified before his birth.
- ↑ Carm. Nisibena, ed. Bickell, p. 122.
- ↑ M.P.G. xi. 1226. The point of the comparison is that Adam was made from the earth as yet unstained by the curse of original sin—so also Christ. For this question see Hurter: Theol. dogm. comp. iii. pp. 464–479. Pesch: Præl. dogm. iii. pp. 160–172.
- ↑ Can. i. 4.
