In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, One God. Amen.
My beloved, it is a blessing for me to be with you here today. If you are joining in, it is because you know that this is going to be the very first lecture in a new series of lectures where we will begin to investigate together and deep dive into the mystery of the Eucharist.
Now for this first lecture, what we are hoping to do is, as we deep dive into the Eucharist, and more specifically as we deep dive into the Eucharist and its theology as understood through the mindset and the teachings of St. Cyril of Alexandria, we are going to be discussing a variety of different things. So let's take a look at some of the things that we will hopefully be discussing together throughout this lecture series.
So first thing first: we're going to be discussing the fallen human condition and the necessities for reconciliation of this fallen human being. We are then going to be speaking specifically towards the Eucharist and how the Eucharist, in the mindset of St. Cyril of Alexandria, is a source of what brings us from a state of corruption to a state of incorruption. We will then be speaking of how St. Cyril clearly explains in teachings that the Eucharist is the very body of our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ. And because He is the author of life, because He is life itself, then He also takes us from a state of death into a state of life and he heals that which we inherited in this fallen human condition. And then we will finally discuss, in a series of lectures, how the Eucharist is our source of our union with God, how it heals the brokenness of our relationship with the Lord, how we went from being alienated and separated from God to now the Eucharist allows us to be reunited and reconciled to our Lord Jesus Christ.
So, today specifically, here is what we are hoping to achieve in the first lecture and its breakdown. So today we want to discuss the fallen human condition and the necessities for reconciliation. What this looks like is that we are first going to investigate the primordial human being. What this really means is that we're going to be taking a look at how the early Church and some of the early Church Fathers and we're going to try to focus a lot on St. Cyril of Alexandria, but also those who influenced St. Cyril. So we'll be speaking about St. Athanasius quite a bit; we'll also be speaking about St. Basil the Great; speaking of those who lived a little bit before him.
So we're gonna be speaking about how it is that the early Church understood the human being before he fell, created in God's image and likeness. And here this is where we're going to be discussing how God created the human being, so that we can live in a state of incorruption and while being incorrupt, that God's intention for us is that we were created for
life, for immortality, for eternity, and we'll be seeing how it is that the early Church taught this. And then finally, we'll be speaking quite a bit about how it is that the Lord created us so that we can be in union with him. God created us so that we can know him, so that we can be in relationship with him. And this will be the scope of our first lecture.
Now hopefully, after we discuss this, we'll then be able to discuss, in another lecture, what it means to understand the effects of the fall; how, when death and sin entered into the world, that the human being lost his place and how God had created him to bear properly his image and likeness.
So let us go ahead and begin. Now obviously, when we begin our conversation of what it means to be created, for... to be in union with God, to have life, to live in eternity so that we can live in relationship and union with Him in a state of incorruption, all of this begins with one of the most important passages in all of Scripture. And no matter what you discuss in the Orthodox faith, we always go back to this very specific passage. So we'll be reading together Genesis, chapter 1, verses 26 to 28. This is where we discover that the human being was created in God's image and likeness. Let's take a look at what the passage says.
'' 26 [And] then God said, “Let Us make [humankind] in Our image, according to Our likeness; [and] let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, [and] over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, [and] over all the [wild animals of the] earth and over every creeping thing that creeps [upon] the earth.'' (Genesis 1:26)
Now I want you to notice how it is that in this very specific passage, Moses, who is the author of the Book of Genesis, is emphasizing that God created us in His image and the Greek word here for image is εικόνα (ikóna). He created us as an icon of Christ, an icon of God. We become a manifestation of who God is. And He didn't just create us in His image, but He created us in His likeness.
Now some of the early Church Fathers, they believe that image and likeness are interchangeable, that they pretty much mean the same thing. There are other Fathers who describe how the image of God is like the toolbox that was given to us. It's the attributes of being rational, of being created to have free will, of being created with a certain level of creativity, of the fact that we have the faculty of being able to be compassionate and loving and all of those things of what it means to be truly human. Those are the gifts that God has given us when He created us in His image; that He created us almost as blueprints of His own Son, our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ, who St. Paul, later on in the Book of Colossians, calls Him as the icon of the living God. So we are images of the image, if you wish. And he creates us in His image and also His likeness.
Now the likeness here, some of the understandings of the Fathers of the early Church, people like St. Clement of Alexandria who came as an early Church Father before St. Athanasius and before St. Cyril obviously, he taught that the likeness was given to us as a
task. So here I want you to imagine that the image of God was given to us freely, but the likeness was a responsibility, something that we had to work for. So while the image was given to us freely, the likeness is something that we had to work for. We had to be able to wilfully choose to become like God. And so here it says in verse 27:
'' 27 So God created [humankind] in His...image; in the image of God He created [them]; male and female He created them.'' (Genesis 1:27)
And then in verse 28, it says:
'' 28 [And] then God blessed them,...'' (Genesis 1:28)
Now I want us to tie the word bless them here with that other word that's highlighted in verse 26 where it says let them have dominion. When God creates the human being, he identifies the human being as truly something that is unique, something that is very different, and I want you to notice how it is that when God creates everything else in creation, he doesn't stop and say let us create and according to our image and our likeness... There's no conversation that happens; he simply commands it into being. He says let there be light and there was light; let there be a firmament, let there be waters, let there be the ground, let there be the animals, let the waters fill with life and with creatures and let the air fill with flying creatures and he just commands everything into being through His word, through His Logos. But when it comes to the human being, He stops, He deliberates. There's something unique that is happening here. And then he tells the human being: I want you to have dominion; I want you to be the pinnacle of creation; I want you to rule over the rest of creation. Later on and we're going to read it here in verse 28, he says:
'' 28 ...God blessed them and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it;...'' (Genesis 1:28)
Subdue it here, tied into this other word in verse 26, which is dominion, literally means that God has granted to humanity the capacity, after being created in God's image and likeness, to be the pinnacle of creation, to be kings and queens of creation. We were called to have dominion. God created everything and then gives it to humanity and says: you be priest, you be prophet, you be king, you be everything that creation needs and he blessed us in order to play that role. This is truly what the human being before the fall was intended to be. The human being was called to be priest, prophet and king over all of creation; the human being was called to be almost like God for the rest of this creation that He gave to us.
My beloved, let's take a look at what it means a little bit further, because when we study chapter 2, in this narrative of how He creates the human being, it says in verses 7 of chapter 2:
'' 7 And [then] the Lord God formed man [from] the dust of the ground, and [He] breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and [the] man became a living being.'' (Genesis 2:7)
Now, some people interpret this passage specifically as God formed man out of clay, out of dust, and then He gave him life; He started his heartbeat; He breathed into him what he needed to be able to begin to function biologically. But St. Cyril of Alexandria actually interprets this passage very differently and remember that we're going to be really focusing on the teachings of St. Cyril of Alexandria throughout this lecture series.
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