Page 291 - Orthodoxy Zizioulas

T H E F I L I O Q U E A N D T H E Q U E S T I O N O F C AU S E
from the Father alone; the second may denote the Spirit’s rela-
tion to the Son. On this basis, one might say that there is a
kind of Filioque on the level of ousia, but not of hypostasis.
Latin theology did not make this distinction, using procedere
for both realities. Saint Maximus considered this decisive: the
Filioque was not heretical if its intention was to denote not the
Spirit’s ἐκπόρευσις from the Father alone, but His manifesta-
tion through the Son.
The Filioque presents no difficulty at the level of the Econ-
omy. The Orthodox have no objection when the Spirit is spo-
ken of as the Spirit of the Son in the history of salvation. The
difficulty arises when what belongs to the Economy is pro-
jected into the Immanent Trinity. The Filioque in no way can
be projected from the Economy into the eternal being of God.
Biblical texts referring to the sending of the Spirit in salvation
history cannot simply be transferred into the eternal inner life
of the Trinity.
The issue, therefore, is not simply verbal. It concerns the
preservation of the monarchia of the Father. The Father is the
one source, the one cause, the one principle in God’s Trinitar-
ian being. If this is safeguarded, and if the Son is understood
in no way as constituting a second cause, then a rapproche-
ment becomes possible. The single cause principle remains the
indispensable foundation for any true understanding of the
procession of the Holy Spirit.
Yet despite these difficulties, important common ground
remains. The idea that the Spirit brings us into the filial rela-
tionship of the Father and the Son, making us sons of the
Father by grace through the “spirit of sonship,” and that the
constant invocation of the Spirit is necessary for the realiza-
tion of the work of Christ in us, shows that the East and the
West can reach a common ground in many areas of Pneuma-
291