The Introduction by Fr. Seraphim Rose is in two parts. In the first part Fr. Seraphim speaks of himself in the third person. In the second part he explains how St. John's theology is from heaven and not from some earthly school of theological thought. –jh
online book
http://www.stmaryofegypt.org/files/library/st_john/on_veneration_of_the_theotokos.htm
http://rocorrefugeesreadmore.blogspot.com/2011/07/orthodox-veneration-of-mary-birthgiver.html
http://ortodoks.dk/ortodoks-tro-og-praksis/de-hellige/the-orthodox-veneration-of-mary-the-birthgiver-of-god
http://www.scribd.com/doc/38629709/The-Orthodox-Veneration-of-Mary-the-Birthgiver-of-God-by-Saint-John-of-Shanghai-San-Francisco
The Orthodox Veneration of Mary, The Birthgiver of God
by St. John Maximovitch
Translated, with an Introduction by Fr. Seraphim Rose
©1978
Fifth printing 1996
88 pages
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Table of Contents
Introduction: The Orthodox Theology of Archbishop John Maximovitch, by Fr. Seraphim Rose
I. The Veneration of the Mother of God during Her Earthly Life
II. The First Enemies of the Veneration of the Mother of God
III. Attempts of Jews and Heretics to Dishonor the Ever-Virginity of Mary
IV. The Nestorians Heresy and the Third Ecumenical Council
V. Attempts of Iconoclasts to Lessen the Glory of the Queen of Heaven: They are put to shame...
VI. "Zeal not According to Knowledge": The "Immaculate Conception"
VII. The Orthodox Veneration of the Mother of God
Akathist to the Most Holy Lady, the Mother of God
Index
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INTRODUCTION
by Fr. Seraphim
Not too many years ago [this was written 1978] the Abbess of a convent of the Russian Orthodox Church, a woman of righteous life, was delivering a sermon in the convent church on the feast of the Dormition of the Most Holy Mother of God. With tears she entreated her nuns and the pilgrims who had come for the feast to accept entirely and wholeheartedly what the Church hands down to us, taking such pains to preserve this tradition sacredly all these centuries -- and not to choose for oneself what is "important" and what is "dispensible"; for by thinking oneself wiser than the tradition, one may end up by losing the tradition. Thus, when the Church tells us in her hymns and icons that the Apostles were miraculously gathered together from the ends of the earth in order to be present at the repose and burial of the Mother of God, we as Orthodox Christians are not free to deny this or to reinterpret it, but must believe as the Church hands down to us, with simplicity of heart.
A young Western convert who learned Russian was present when this sermon was delivered. He himself had thought about this very subject, having seen icons in the traditional iconographic style depicting the Apostles being transported on clouds to behold the Dormition of the Theotokos; and he had asked himself the question: are we actually to understand this "literally," as a miraculous event, or is it only a "poetic" way of expressing the coming together of the Apostles for this event ... or perhaps even an imaginative or "ideal" depiction of an even that never occurred in fact? (Such, indeed, are some of the questions with which "Orthodox theologians" occupy themselves in our days.) The words of the righteous Abbess therefore struck him to the heart, and he understood that there was something deeper to the reception of Orthodoxy than what our own mind and feelings tell us. In that instant the tradition was being handed down to him, not from books but from a living vessel which contained it; and it had to be received, not with mind and feeling only, but above all with the heart, which in this way began to receive its deeper training in Orthodoxy.
Later this young convert encountered, in person or through reading, many people who were learned in Orthodox theology. They were the "theologians" of our day, those who had been to Orthodox schools and become theological "experts." They were usually quite eager to speak on what was Orthodox and what was non-Orthodox, what was important and what was secondary in Orthodoxy itself; and a number of them prided themselves on being "conservatives" or "traditionalists" in faith. But in none of them did he sense the simple authority of the simple Abbess who had spoken to his heart, unlearned as she was in such "theology."
And the heart of this convert, still taking his baby steps in Orthodoxy, longed to know how to believe, which means also whom to believe. He was too much a person of his times and his own upbringing to be able to simply deny his own reasoning power and believe blindly everything he was told; and it is very evident that Orthodoxy does not at all demand this of one -- the very writings of the Holy Fathers are a living memorial of the working of human reason enlightened by the grace of God. But it was also obvious that there was something very much lacking in the "theologians" of our day, who for all their knowledge of Patristic texts, did not convey the feeling or savor of Orthodoxy as well as a simple, theologically-uneducated Abbess.
Our convert found the end of his search --the search for contact with the true living tradition of Orthodoxy-- in Archbishop John Maximovitch. For here he found someone who was a learned theologian in the "old" school and at the same time was very aware of all the criticisms of that theology which have been made by the theological critics of our century, and was able to use his keen intelligence to find the truth where it might be disputed. But he also possessed something which none of the wise "theologians" of our time seem to possess: the same simplicity and authority which the pious Abbess had conveyed to the heart of the young God-seeker. His heart and mind were won: not because Archbishop John became for him an "infallible expert" -- for the Church of Christ does not know any such thing -- but because he saw in this holy archpastor a model of Orthodoxy, a true theologian whose theology proceeded from a holy life and from total rootedness in Orthodox tradition. When he spoke, his words could be trusted -- although he carefully distinguished between the Church's teaching, which is certain, and his own personal opinions, which might be mistaken, and he bound no one to the latter. And our young convert discovered that, for all of Archbishops John's intellectual keeness and critical ability, his words much more often agreed with those of the Abbess than with those of the learned theologians of our time.
THE THEOLOGICAL WRITINGS of Archbishop John belong to no distinctive "school," and they do not reveal the extraordinary influence of any theologians of the recent past. It is true that Archbishop John was inspired to theologize, as well as to become a monk and enter the Church's service, by his great teacher, Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky; and it is also true that the student made his own the teacher's emphasis on a "return to the Fathers" and to a theology closely bound to spiritual and moral life rather than academic. But Metropolitan Anthony's own theological writings are quite different in tone, intention and content: he was very much involved with the theological academic world and with the intelligentsia of his time, and much of his writing is devoted to arguments and apologies which will be understandable to these elements of the society he knew. The writings of Archbishop John, on the other hand, are quite devoid of this apologetic and disputatious aspect. He did not argue, he simply presented the Orthodox teaching; and when it was necessary to refute false doctrines, as especially in his two long articles on the Sophiology of Bulgakov, his words were convincing not by virtue of logical argumentation, but by the power of his presentation of the Patristic teaching in its original texts. He did not speak to the academic or the learned world, but to the uncorrupted Orthodox conscience; and he did not speak of a "return to the Fathers" because what he himself wrote was simply a handing down of Patristic tradition, with no attempt to apologize for it.
The sources of Archbishop John's theology are quite simply: Holy Scripture, the Holy Fathers (especially the great Fathers of the 4th and 5th centuries), and -- most distinctively -- the Divine services of the Orthodox Church. The latter source, rarely used to such an extent by the theologians of recent centuries, gives us a clue to the practical, un-academic approach of Archbishop John to theology. It is obvious he was thoroughly immersed in the Church's Divine services and that his theological inspiration came chiefly from this primary Patristic source which he imbibed, not in leisure hours set apart for theologizing, but in his daily practice f being present at every Divine service. He drank in theology as an integral part of daily life, and it ws doubtless the more than his formal theological studies that actually made him a theologian.
It is understandable, therefore, that one will not find in Archbishop John any theological "system." To be sure he did not protest against the great works of "systematic theology" which the 19th century produced in Russia, and he made free use in his missionary work of the systematic catechisms of this period (as, in general, the great hierarchs of the 19th and 20th centuries have done, both in Greece and Russia, seeing in these catechisms an excellent aid to the work of Orthodox enlightenment among the people); in this respect he was above the fashions and parties olf theologians and students, both past and present, who are a little too attached to the particular way in which Orthodox theology is presented. He showed equal respect for Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky with his "anti-Western" emphasis, and for Metropolitan Peter Mogila with his supposedly excessive "Western influence." When the defects of one or the other of these great hierarchs and defenders of Orthodoxy would be presented to him, he would make a deprecating gesture with his hand and say,"unimportant" -- because he always had in view first of all the great Patristic tradition which these theologians were successfully handing down in spite of their faults. In this respect he has much to teach the younger the theologians of our own day, who approach Orthodox theology in a spirit that is often both too theoretical and too polemical and partisan.
For Archbishop John the theological "categories" of even the wisest of theological scholars were also "unimportant" -- or rather, they were important only to the extent that they communicated a real meaning and did not become merely a matter of rote learning. One incident from his Shanghai years vividly reveals the freedom of his theological spirit: Once when he was attending the oral examinations of the senior class of his cathedral school, he interrupted the perfectly correct recitation by one pupil of the list of Minor Prophets of the Old Testament with the abrupt and categorical assertion: "There are no minor prophets!" The priest-teacher of this class was understandably offended at this seeming disparagement of his teaching authority, but probably to this day the students remember this strange disruption of the normal catechism "categories," and possibly a few of them understood the message which Archbishop John to convey: with God all prophets are "major," and this fact is more important than all the categories of our knowledge of them, however valid these are in themselves. In his theological writings and sermons also, Archbishop John often gives a surprising turn to his discourse which uncovers for us some unexpected aspect or deeper meaning of the subject he is discussing. It is obvious that for him theology is no mere human, earthly, discipline whose riches are exhausted by our rational interpretations, or at which we can become self-satisfied "experts," -- but rather something that points heavenward and should draw our minds to God and heavenly realities, which are not grasped by logical systems of thought.
One noted Russian Church historian, N. Talberg, has suggested (in the Chronicle of Bishop Savva, ch. 23) that Archbishop John is to be understood first of all as "a fool for Christ's sake who remained such even in episcopal rank," and in this respect he compares him to St. Gregory the Theologian, who also did not conform, in ways similar to Archbishop John, to the standard "image" of a bishop. It is this "foolishness" (by the world's standards) that gives a characteristic tone to the theological writings both of St. Gregory and of Archbishop John: a certain detachment from public opinion, what "everyone thinks" and thus belonging to no "party" or "school"; the approach to theological questions from an exalted, non-academic point of view and thus the healthy avoidance of petty disputes and the quarrelsome spirit; the fresh, unexpected turns of thought, which make their theological writings first of all a source of inspiration and of a truly deeper understanding of God's revelation.
Perhaps most of all one is impressed by the utter simplicity of Archbishop John's writings. It is obvious that he accepts the Orthodox tradition straightforwardly and entirely, with no "double" thoughts as to how one can believe the tradition and still be a "sophisticated" modern man. He was aware of modern "criticism," and if asked could give his sound reasons for not accepting it on most points. He studied thoroughly the question of "Western influence" in Orthodoxy in recent centuries and had a well-balanced view of it, carefully distinguishing between what is to be rejected outright as foreign to Orthodoxy, what is to be discouraged without "making an issue" over it, and what is to be accepted as conducive to true Orthodox life and piety (a point that is especially revealing of Archbishop John's lack of "preconceived opinions," and his testing of everything by sound Orthodoxy). But despite all his knowledge and exercise of critical judgment, he continued to believe the Orthodox tradition simply, just as the Church has handed it down to us. Most Orthodox theologians of our time, even if they may have escaped the worst effects of the Protestant-reformer mentality, still view Orthodox tradition through the spectacles of the academic environment in which they are at home; but Archbishop John was "at home" first and foremost in the church services at which he spent many hours every day, and thus the tinge of rationalism (not necessarily in a bad sense) of even the best of academic theologians was totally absent in his thought. In his writings there are no "problems"; his usually numerous footnotes are solely for the sake of informing where the teaching of the Church is to be found. In this respect he is absolutely at one with the "mind of the Fathers," and he appears in our midst as one of them, and not as a mere commentator on the theology of the past.
The theological writings of Archbishop John, printed in various Church periodicals over four decades have not yet been collected in one place. Those presently available to the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood would fill a volume of something more than 200 pages. His longer writings belong for the most part to his earlier years as a hieromonk in Yugoslavia, where he was already noted as outstanding among Orthodox theologians. Especially valuable are his two articles on the Sophiology of Bulgakov, one of them revealing convincingly , in a very objective manner, Bulgakov's total incompetence as a Patristic scholar, and the other being of even greater value as a classic exposition of the true Patristic doctrine of the Divine Wisdom. Among his later writings one should mention his article on Orthodox iconography (where, incidentally, he shows himself much more aware than his teacher, Metr. Anthony, of the question of "Western influence" in iconographic style); the series of sermons entitled "Three Evangelical Feasts," where he uncovers the deeper meaning of some of the "lesser" church feasts; and the article "The Church: the Body of Christ." His short articles and sermons are also deeply theological. One sermon begins with a "Hymn to God" of St. Gregory the Theologian and continues, in the same exalted, Patristic tone, as an inspired accusation against contemporary godlessness; another, spoken on Passion Friday, 1936, is a moving address to Christ lying in the tomb, in a tone worthy of the same Holy Father.
We begin this series of translations with Archbishop John's classic exposition of the Orthodox veneration of the Mother of God and of the chief errors which have attacked it. Its longest chapter is a clear and striking refutation of the Latin dogma of the "Immaculate Conception."
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