Man and the God-Man

by Justin Popović

"Father Justin Popovich, pan-orthodox witness to the God-revealed and Christ-given Eternal Truth, whose testimony can be even seen within this collection of his articles - that "the mystery of Truth is not in material things, not in ideas, not in symbols, but in Personhood, namely the Theanthropic Person of the Lord Christ, Who said: I am the Truth (John 14:6), Truth perfect, never diminished, always one and the same in its complete fullness - yesterday, today, and forever (Heb.13:8)."

The treasure to be found in this anthology of neopatristic syntheses consists of: "Perfect God and perfect man" - Nativity Epistle, where Fr Justin boldly exclaim that "man is only a true man when he is completely united with God, only and solely in God is man a man, true man, perfect man, a man in whom all the fullness of Godhead lives."; "The God-man" - The foundation of the Truth of Orthodoxy - Ava Justinian language of love in Christ-centered reflections of Truth; "The Supreme Value and Infallible Criterion"- contemporary philosophical reflections on visible and invisible realities; "Sentenced to Immortality" - a homily on the Resurrection or Our Lord Jesus Christ; "Humanistic and Theanthropic Culture"-criticism of European anti-Christian culture; "Humanistic and Theanthropic Education" - indicative pondering of consequences of education without God.. ; "The Theory of Knowledge of Saint Isaac the Syrian" - Faith, prayer, love, humility, grace and freedom, the purification of the intellect, mystery of knowledge; "A Deer in a Lost Paradise" - Ava's renowned poetic essay, a confession, and deepest longing for all-sweetest Jesus...

Genres: Theology, Christianity

125 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

Saint Justin (Serbian Cyrillic: Jустин Поповић) was an Eastern Orthodox theologian, archimandrite of the Ćelije Monastery, Dostoyevsky scholar, anti-communist, a writer, and a critic of the pragmatic church (ecclesiastical) life. On the April 29, 2010, Fr. Justin was canonized as a saint by the Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church.

Reviews

[Joshua Finch]

This work is a compilation of essays written by St Justin Popovich at various times. I heard he is sometimes called a philosopher. One can tell that he was acquainted with various philosophic schools. He references them in these essays. But this is not a philosophic work in that sense. This isn't academic or scientific or logic-based philosophy. There are no demonstrations or refutations or arguments of that kind. In this work at least, St Justin's philosophy is a doxology, his love of Wisdom is expressed in why and how he praises Wisdom.

We see some hard words about Western Christianity: "All these facts lead to the conclusion: humanistic Christianity [he is speaking of Western Christianity in total] is in fact the sharpest protest against the God-man and His axiology and criteriology" said in 'The Supreme Value and Infallible Criterion.' There are some dark omens about Europe. We see the assertion that man's knowledge depends on man's moral character, some hard words about this, and the splendor of higher knowledge is described, in the essay titled 'The Theory of Knowledge of St Isaac the Syrian.' In the last section there is an answer to the version of the problem of evil that many atheists raise, the problem of animal suffering. He says animals will have their immortality and compensation and humans will be brought to account.

[w gall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Devotional and informative in a theological sense

I used the book as a devotional, not to obtain information. St. Justinn exudes devotion to God throughout this work, but also informs us of the theandric nature of the incarnate Christ and of godmanhood, through which Christ as the Theanthropos saves us. The repetition of these terms became a bit tiresome, though of course each chapter was drawn from St. Justin's essays in various journals, which explains this repetitive quality somewhat. The last chapter, which is poetic, is a jewel. I could have rated it with 5 stars, but the chapters preceding the last two were, for me, tiresome because of the repetitive terms. But all in all the book contributed to my sense of how wondrous Christ Ism

[Невен Паштар · Rating 4 out of 5]

4+

[Fr Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Must read!