‘You are not your own, you were bought at a price’; were slaves of sin, decay, death, and after baptism, voluntarily, became the property, slaves of Love, Freedom, Resurrection, the Kingdom of God – Happiness, Triune God. – V.A.). Theology – seeking, selecting words worthy of God, to give flesh to the Word of Truth. Every word of the Church, which conducts internal and external mission, has its addressee: external – proclaimed and unproclaimed; and internal – members of the Body of Christ. Therefore, the Church through the mouths of apostles, prophets, teachers in the language of the proclaimed (with each level of proclamation – in a special way – V.A.), in the language of the culture in which the proclaimed live, in the time and space in which it (the Church –V.A.) carries out its mission – the Work of Christ, the Salvation of the World. Every word has an addressee and is commensurate with his perception.
‘Being free from all,’ says one apostle, evangelist, ‘I made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them: to the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews; to those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law; to those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being without law toward God, but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law; to the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some.’ The apostle says that he descends to the level of the interlocutor (philosopher, sage, lawyer, atheist, godless, faint-hearted, communicates with each, the addressee’s language, concepts understandable to the proclaimed: to the philosopher he evangelizes in the language and concepts used by the philosopher: God – Absolute, Supreme Mind; Kingdom of God – Good; Jesus Christ – Logos, Truth, etc.; to the aesthete: God – Beauty, Harmony… V.A.), to rise together with him from the pit of ignorance in which the proclaimed resides, to the light of knowledge of God. With each, the Church coos in his baby language, to save all, to win for the Kingdom of God (and, if only one, who is the most valuable and only one in the eyes of Personality; one, by Divine arithmetic, more valuable than ninety-nine – V.A.).
Every Word of the Church points to Jesus Christ (the Lord preaches Himself ‘I am’, ‘I – Truth, Way, Life’, ‘Who does not eat Me, does not have Life in Me’, not teaching; the apostles preach Christ Risen, not teaching; that is, the Church preaches Jesus Christ, and offers Him to the world, not teaching – V.A.), but to read this indication, this vector, this map, you need to know: who said, wrote? to whom was this historically incarnate word addressed (Hellenist- philosopher, lawyer, atheist, godless… – V.A.)? when (cultural context: politics, economy, customs, traditions, rituals, religious beliefs, language, semantics of words of this language,… that is, the holistic, spatio-temporal context – V.A.)? what reason? purpose? etc. Entire sciences – biblical studies (studies the Bible), patrology (studies the creations of the Holy Fathers) with subdivisions: textology, isagogics, exegesis, hermeneutics, archaeology, etc., dealing with these questions, help us to read clearly, distinctly hear in one Word or another testimony about Jesus Christ and definitely hear the call to communion with Christ in the Eucharist of the Church. But all this scientific labor of biblical studies, patrology, everyone who reads, must work through or use the fruits of someone else’s labor, to awaken in us the desire (eros – V.A.) to unite with God, to be deified, to be saved, to be healed, which is possible only in the Church in the Eucharistic life, preceded by Baptism and Chrismation. And whoever in the Eucharist, the Mystery of the Church, partook of the Eternal Imperishable Life, already reads Scripture for the purpose of verifying their experience of knowledge of God, knowing God with the experience of those who believed before him. Therefore, Christians read Scripture to verify their experience, lest they have strayed from the path (the apostle Paul went to Jerusalem to verify his labors, whether he was doing well – V.A.), and to rejoice in shared faith… (There are Christians who have lost their memory. For such, through Scripture, the Church reminds them of who they are in Christ and calls them to repent and return to the Church (to the House of God), to Life in the Eucharist– V.A.).
Elder Silouan of Mount Athos used to say that if all the Scriptures were somehow lost (absolutely all!), the Church would write a new Bible, a new testimony: “about the Life that was in the Father and was given to us by the Son through the Holy Spirit.”
“Behold, I am with you,” says the Lord, “all the days, to the end of the age.” Christ is with us; He Himself, as a Gift, has been left to us by the Lord (not Scriptures, not typikons, not commandments, not rituals and acts that only point to Him – V.A.), therefore, in Orthodoxy, there is no panic over this as seen in Catholics, Protestants, pseudo-Orthodox legalists-quote collectors. Thus, the Church would write, and will write if necessary, the Gospel, not a new one, but the same, simply in different words (this does not suit Catholics, Protestants, for they would then have to relearn and create new combinations of quotes to confirm their heresies – V.A.), because the essence is not in the words. Saint Seraphim of Sarov, a spirit-bearing elder, seer, wonderworker, theophanist, read the Gospel all his life – it’s hard on the road without a map, in war one is not a warrior alone, in trouble without like-minded people it’s dangerous…