Augsburg and Constantinople: The Correspondence between the Tubingen Theologians and Patriarch Jeremiah II of Constantinople on the Augsburg Confession

by George Mastrantonis

Augsburg and Constantinople was the crowning achievement of the late Very Reverend Father George Mastrantonis, a distinguished Orthodox clergyman and prolific author. First published in 1982, this book remains a work of vital interest to scholars of all faiths. The correspondence between the Lutheran theologians of Tubingen and Orthodox Patriarch Jeremiah II may be seen as the first substantive ecumenical dialogue of the post-Reformation era. More than four hundred years later, these exchanges continue to have value well beyond the purely historical. In preparing this translation and commentary, Father Mastrantonis believed that these documents are "especially important today, when a movement toward better understanding among churches is taking place."

Genres: Religion, Nonfiction

372 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1982

Reviews

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Therefore, we request that from henceforth you do not cause us more grief, nor write to us on the same subject if you should wish to treat these luminaries and theologians of the Church in a different manner. You honor and exalt them in words, but you reject them in deeds. For you try to prove our weapons which are their holy and divine discourses as unsuitable. And it is with these documents that we would have to write and contradict you. Thus, as f or you, please release us from these cares. Therefore, going about your own ways, write no longer concerning dogmas; but if you do, write only for friendship's sake. Farewell."

[Micah Douglas · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book to understand the difference between original Lutheran theology (as a stand-in for general protestant theology) and Eastern Orthodox theology.

[Jon Whitmer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book allows the reader to track through the entire interchange between the Lutheran theologians that succeeded Martin Luther and the Patriarch of the Orthodox Church, Jeremiah II. This book gave done historical perspective to the issues I have had to work through in my journey into Orthodoxy, as the contrasts between Orthodoxy and Protestantism or pretty much the same blue as they were then. Also, I was stuck by the self-confident inability of the Tubingen theologians to appreciate the perspective of the Patriarch on points of disagreement between them and Orthodoxy and how that same dynamic persists today between Protestants and Orthodoxy. The responses of the Patriarch to the Lutheran theologians were noticably charitable yet uncompromising.

While this book may seem a bit of a cumbersome read to the casual reader, it is full of insights to those willing to devote the time required to track the arguments of both sides with the goal being to better understand the Orthodox perspective, which, of course, predates both Protestantism and Roman Catholicism.

[Scott]

Very revealing.