Tradition – To be Creatively Developed

                Tevye sang about Tradition in the Fiddler on the Roof, which provided balance and a sense of identity. Tradition provides continuity amid a world that is constantly changing. With Tradition, you know who you are and where you belong. The problem is that we can hold so tightly to tradition we get stuck in the past. We call that nostalgia. There’s nothing wrong with a little nostalgia (I enjoy reminiscing about the “good old days” of my earlier years while watching old TV shows), but if we get stuck there, we have problems. I wrote a bit about Tradition as opposed to nostalgia in my book Called to Bless: Finding Hope by Reclaiming Our Spiritual Roots (see chapter 2: “Continuity: Tradition as the Interpretation of Founding Visions”), and as a church historian/historical theologian I have a special interest in the past. However, there is the present and perhaps even more importantly the future to be concerned about.

                I have recently taken a keen interest in Eastern Orthodox theology. One need not convert to find valuable resources there, especially among early to mid-20^th century Russian expatriates like Vladimir Lossky, Alexander Schmemann, and Sergius Bulgakov. It appears that some parts of contemporary Orthodoxy in the United States have gotten caught in the trap of a stagnant deposit of doctrine and practice that theologians such as Bulgakov warned against. Most of those who have embraced this view are converts from conservative Protestantism who have concluded that Orthodoxy provides a safe haven from modern theology (and practices like ordaining women and welcoming LGBTQ folk). But is this being true to Orthodoxy? Might Tradition be seen not as a fixed point of doctrine that must be defended at all costs, but as a deposit of the faith that needs to be developed creatively as we move through time?

                Sergius Bulgakov spoke to the importance of the creative development of Tradition as an expression of an apocalyptic dimension of theology. While Bulgakov died in 1944, his voice remains an important one. I’ve been reading him recently, seeking to better understand his vision for theology. What I had forgotten until yesterday was that I had encountered Bulgakov several years ago when I read and reviewed his book The Comforter back in 2006 for the Stone Campbell Journal (I realized this when I received a copy of the book through interlibrary loan that I had originally donated to a local university library—I recognized my marginal notes).

This idea of creative development of Tradition is present in an essay present in an anthology of Bulgakov’s work published originally back in the 1970s and then reprinted a decade back. One of the pieces in the section titled “Autobiographical Notes” concerns the Episcopate (Bulgakov isn’t anti-episcopate, but has concerns with how it exists in practice). My concern here is not with the episcopate (I’m not part of an episcopal tradition), Orthodox or otherwise, but the word he shares concerning the relationship between eschatology and Tradition is intriguing.

In this essay, Bulgakov shares his concern that Orthodoxy (and remember this is the early 20^th century) had lost contact with the eschatological “longing for the coming of Christ.” It had lost this not in terms of dogma, but because of the “overwhelming burden of its historical heritage.” He suggests that this is, even more, a problem in Roman Catholicism—though this would have been pre-Vatican II (Sergius Bulgakov, p. 19). Thus, Tradition has lost its vitality.

Here is the key piece that I want to share:

Tradition has ceased to be ‘vital’ and has become the depository of the faith to be preserved but not developed creatively. Orthodoxy demands not the mere possession of the inherited wealth of faith and life, but prophecy and apocalypse—a call and a promise. In this sense apocalypse implies a concern for the history of the present and the future as well as that of the past. The Church has no continuing city on earth, but seeks one to come. Orthodoxy implies inspiration, the eros of the Church, her yearning for the Bridegroom, the feeling proper to the Bride. It is creativeness directed towards the final goal, the expectation of the End. It is not cowardly fear of life and flight from it, but the overcoming of all givenness, the longing for a new heaven and a new earth, for a new meeting and life with Christ. All this is ineffable and sounds like music in the soul; it is like a symphony of colours, like art and poetry. It is eager expectation of the promise. [Sergius Bulgakov, (Wipf & Stock, 2012, pp. 19-20].

  What struck me was the premise that Tradition is not just inherited wealth to be preserved, but a resource to build upon. Thus, we have this opportunity to creatively envision the future, with our roots in the Tradition passed on to us through time. That should be good news.

                We are blessed with a wonderful deposit of resources passed on through time. As a historian, I love spending time with this deposit. There is so much to discover that not only speaks to what was believed and done in the past but as Bulgakov suggests a deposit upon which to build as we traverse into the future. Regarding Orthodoxy, I have found that there are trajectories, paths not taken in the west, that were taken (or not taken) in the East, which might prove promising, including the way we understand the Trinity or salvation or even the eschaton. Let’s spend time with the past but not get stuck in it!