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[German Version] I. New Testament – II. Dogma and the History of Dogma – III. Art History I. New Testament Christ's descent into hell, i.e. his descent to the underworld, the realm of the dead, is, as Descensus ad inferos, one of the christological statements of the early and medieval church's confession of faith (Apostles' Creed, Athanasian Creed; Confession (of faith): III). Nonetheless, the NT does not offer a single certain text for this notion; at most, 1 Pet 4:6 may be interpreted as preaching by Jesus to the dead, before his resurrection (cf. Ign. Magn. 9.2; Gos. Pe…

[German Version] I. Terminology – II. Technique and Material – III. Theological Basis – IV. History I. Terminology The word icon, from Gk εἰκών/ eikṓn (“image, likeness”), is usually ass…

[German Version] I. Phenomenology – II. History – III. Dogmatics – IV. Practical Theology – V. Ethics – VI. Orthodox Church – VII. Judaism – VIII. Art History – IX. Asia, Africa, Latin America I. Phenomenology The term liturgy has been used for Christian worship since the end of the 16th century; by the end of the 18th century, it had gained general acceptance. In secular usage, Gk λειτουργία/ leitourgía means work done in public service (from λαός/ laós, “people” [Laity] and ἔργον/ érgon, “work”); the LXX used it for the temple cult. It appears only 15 times in the N…

[German Version] (Mar 11, 1856, Gouvernement Astrachan' – Aug 10, 1929, Leningrad) was the most important representative of Russian critical study of the liturgy. After training and teaching in the Kazan' Spiritual Academy, he was professor of liturgics …

[German Version] The word panichida is based on the Greek παννυχίς/ pannychís (“all night [ sc. service]”); in the Russo-Slavic church, it refers to what the Greek church calls a parastas (from παράστασις/ parastasis), a memorial service. It is modeled on the structure of Matins (Orthros: Worship: II, 7). Very popular with Orthodox churchgoers, today it is a comparatively short (and often further abbreviated) memorial service for the liturgi…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies and History of Philosophy The dogmatic definition of the Holy Spirit as a person within the one divine substance (Trinity/Doctrine of the Trinity) presupposes not only a particular philosophical context but also a religio-historical horizon. A formative influence on the conceptualization of the Holy Spirit was exercised by the various anthropomorphic interpretations of elemental anthropological or normative qualities …

[German Version] I. General Preaching (from Lat. praedicare, “proclaim publicly”) is spiritual or religious speech, in contrast, for example, to forensic speech, political speech, or celebratory speech. Its setting is the worship of the community (Ministerial offices), church activities such as evangelism, devotions (Devotion [Attitude]), and ordinations (Consecration/Ordination/Dedication), and – in various forms – the media (see IV below). ¶ Communication in preaching, reduced to its basic elements, can be represented as a triangle of the preacher, the text, and the audience (see IV and V below). Theologically, preaching stands between the poles of the Word of God and human speech (K. Barth), between a rhetorical exercise and a divine event. Preaching essentially presents itself as an exposition of a biblical pericope (II) or words addressed to the gathered congregation (homily). In expounding texts of the Hebrew Bible, the church i…

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[German Version] I. Catholic Theology – II. Orthodox Theology – III. Protestant Theology I. Catholic Theology The semantic field of mysterium in Catholic theology exhibits two characteristic poles; though they cannot be separated, there is some tension in their relationship. One pole is the dialectic of God's revelation and hiddenness in his action of revelation and salvation. This semantic pole has its roots in the biblical use of the term (esp. in the Pauline, deutero-Pauline, and trito-Pauline ¶ material), but it is still dominant in formal scholastic usage in the 19th and 20th centuries. The second semantic pole refers to the (lasting) incomprehensibility of the mysterium even when it is revealed, even in its escha

[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Church History – III. Survey of the Christian Confessions – IV. Systematic Theology I. Religious Studies For an overview of Christianity at the end of the second millennium of its development, it is reasonable to give a comparative presentation against the background …

[German Version] is known as the author of a commentary on the liturgy that was probably written by Nicholas, his predecessor as bishop of Andida, prior to 1067 and merely revised by Theodore in the early 12th century. It was the first commentary to interpret the Divine Liturgy (Worship: II, 7) consistently as a representation of Jesus’ life, from his birth to his ascension.…

[German Version] I. Church History – II. The Branches of Orthodoxy – III. Orthodoxy throughout the World – IV. History of Orthodox Theology I. Church History 1. Terminology. The term orthodox (cf. also Orthodoxy: I) goes back to Hellenistic Judaism. Flavius Josephus, for example, commends τὴν ὀρϑὴν δόξαν περὶ Θεοῦ/ tḗn orthḗn dóxan perí Theoú instead of Greek myths and reports that the Essenes viewed other Jews as ἑτερόδοξοι/ heteródoxoi ( Apion. II 256; Bell. II 129). ¶ This idiom passed into Christian usage in the 2nd century. The critical moment for its ecclesiastical sense was the establishment of the Feast of Orthodoxy in 843 to mark the conclusion of the Ico…

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[German Version] (Sep 16, 1754, Michailov – Apr 2, 1829, Rjazan'), Russian lay theologian, teacher of Hebrew and Greek, and, finally, lecturer with the rank of collegiate assessor. His most important work is the first Russian commentary on the divine liturgy (VI) on a …

[German Version] (Boris Dorofeevich Jarushevich; Dec 31, 1891, Kovno – Dec 13, 1961, Moscow), Russian metropolitan. In 1922 Nikolai became bishop of Peterhof; in 1940, archbishop of Wolhynien and Luck; in 1941, metropolitan of Kiev; in 1944, metropolitan of Kruticy; in 1946, head of the church foreign office. Nikolai gave full support to Stalin’s foreign policy but …

[German Version] I. General Russia (Russ. Rossiya) has been known by that name only since the early 18th century (Peter the Great). Previously the name Rus’ had been in common use; the earliest documents used it to designate both the land and its people. The origin of the term Rus’, a feminine singular noun, is disputed; etymologically it most likely derives from Finnish Ruotsi (“Sweden”). The historical and geographical heartland of Russia can be defined as the territory of the upper Dvina, the upper Volga, and the upper and middle Dnieper. The southern step…

[German Version] (Dec 1, 1861, Svyatoe Ozero, Ryazan’ Oblast – Nov 26, 1941, Irpen’), archpriest, professor of apologetics at the University of Kiev (not at a seminary). As one of the most creative theologians of the period of awakening prior to 1917 and the first among strictly academic theologians to oppose the ideas of A. Ritschl, he argued for discarding a onesidedly juridical doctrine of redemption; in later years, he sought to protect the doctrine from the opposite extreme of a purely subjec…

[German Version] I. Catholic The city church of Rome took over a pre-Christian field procession held on Apr 25 in honor of Rubigo, the feared…

[German Version] I. Dogmatics In general, the term synergy denotes theological conceptions that consider spiritual or ethical cooperation of the human will with divine grace a causal factor in human salvation (Pelagius/Pelagians/Semi-Pelagians). The Reformers followed Augustine of Hippo in rejecting synergism, seeing justification based solely on God’s free grace ( sola gratia) as the only foundation of salvation. Despite the 1999 Joint Declarationon the Doctrine of Justification by the Vatican and the Lutheran World Federation, it remains debatable whether an…