λóγος

Word, Reason, Moral Order —

God’s unifying principle of all creation and the rational order of the universe

Gospel of St. John, Prologue (1:1 – 18) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. A man named John was sent from God. He came for testimony, to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world came to be through him, but the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, but his own people did not accept him. But to those who did accept him he gave power to become children of God, to those who believe in his name, who were born not by natural generation nor by human choice nor by a man’s decision but of God. And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth. John testified to him and cried out, saying, “This was he of whom I said, ‘The one who is coming after me ranks ahead of me because he existed before me.’” From his fullness we have all received, grace in place of grace, because while the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father’s side, has revealed him.

Wisdom (18:14 – 16) For while gentle silence enveloped all things, and night in its swift course was now half gone, thy all-powerful word leaped from heaven, from the royal throne, into the midst of the land that was doomed, a stern warrior carrying the sharp sword of thy authentic command, and stood and filled all things with death, and touched heaven while standing on the earth.

The incarnate Logos reveals God. One knows God in knowing finite things through openness to and dependence upon the Logos within all things, and also on account of the indissoluble, nuptial unity of consciousness and being. Everything that exists receives existence from God and subsists mysteriously in God. God is Being itself, not a category of being. There is metaphysical bond between God and Nature. Earthly objects receive reality from God’s own Being; they do not possess their own being. A created order is not independent of God, who is Being and Logos. Yet nominalism denies there is an intrinsic essence in anything, instead assuming that matter has meaning through acts of motion or will. Yet a being is part of God’s nature because He is united in creation. To remove God further is to place man’s relationship to Nature as one of want and will instead of discovery bound by natural laws.

Human life has teleology; the self is not willed but created with purpose. The self should seek transformative communion – theosis – with its originator – Logos – by an understanding of the telos of life. The telos of life is theosis with the Logos through ascesis. The Logos, the Un-Manifest, the Being-Intellect, the Absolute, is the source of all including matter-nature. There is no division between the natural and the supernatural, as nature is theophany and its fulfillment a revealed Being, self-sacrificed. Logos, for humans, involves not only logic, reason, and order but communion. Reason involves transforming encounters with the living, loving God. All things feature divine logoi within them, rays of the supreme Logos. He who discovers these ascends toward knowledge of God. The Logos is universal and ever-present, as God moving in the world. The Apostolic faith worships Logos most fully, because Logos chose to relate to creation in a Sacramental manner, with His power given to the Apostles. Logos is Incarnate, personal, and highly active. By the power of the Reason and Order of all creation, best is to be homines liturgi, men of the liturgy. Salus animarum prima lex, the salvation of souls is the highest law. Eternal blessedness in the Logos is the telos of the human life: to transform existence into a testimony concerning it.

In principio erat Verbum et Verbum erat apud Deum et Deus erat Verbum. Hoc erat in principio apud Deum. Omnia per Ipsum facta sunt, et sine Ipso factum est nihil quod factum est. In Ipso vita erat, et vita erat Lux hominum. Et Lux in tenebris lucet et tenebrae eam non comprehenderunt. Fuit homo missus a Deo cui nomen erat Iohannes. Hic venit in testimonium ut testimonium perhiberet de lumine ut omnes crederent per Illum. Non erat ille lux, sed ut testimonium perhiberet de lumine. Erat lux vera quae illuminat omnem hominem venientem in mundum. In mundo erat, et mundus per ipsum factus est, et mundus eum non cognovit. In propria venit et sui eum non receperunt. Quotquot autem receperunt eum dedit eis potestatem filios Dei, fieri his qui credunt in nomine Eius. Qui non ex sanguinibus, neque ex voluntate carnis, neque ex voluntate viri, sed ex Deo nati sunt.