Поездка в Виттенберг. Тезисы бедной веры на вратах Церкви Всех Святых
21 декабря я побывал в Виттенберге, который называется также Лютерштадтом, - в память о Мартине Лютере, который почти пятьсот лет назад начал здесь движение Реформации. 31 октября 1517 г. он прибил к вратам Церкви Всех Святых свои 95 тезисов, от которых и отсчитывается новая эпоха в истории христианства.
Это был мощный порыв к очищению веры от клерикализма и фарисейства. Дух Реформации жив и сегодня, в том числе в России, где, согласно опросу 2012 г., каждый четвертый верит в Бога, но не принадлежит какой-либо конфессии. В знак своей поддержки этого очистительного движения, которое вышло далеко за границы собственно лютеранской или реформистской церкви, я вывесил на воротах этой церкви свои 95 тезисов бедной веры (в переводе на английский). Доступ к вратам с внешней стороны сейчас закрыт, поскольку церковь стоит в лесах - готовится к празднованию юбилея Реформации. Поэтому я прикрепил Тезисы к тем же вратам, только с внутренней стороны, а также еще в нескольких лютеровских местах. Краткий рассказ о посещении Виттенберга - в фотографиях, а потом - сами Тезисы.
Одно общее соображение. В 2017 г. почти одновременно будут отмечаться два великих события: пятьсот лет европейской Реформации (31 октября) и столетие русской революции (7 ноября). Вот и повод поразмышлять, какое событие оказало более благотворное влияние на мировую историю: тезисы, прибитые к церковным вратам в Виттенберге, или вооруженное восстание и штурм Зимнего дворца в Петрограде?
С Рождеством!
Рождественская ярмарка в Виттенберге
Церковь Всех Святых готовится отпраздновать пять веков Реформации.
Церковные врата, к которым Лютер прикрепил свои тезисы.
Внутренний вид церкви
У надгробия Лютера
Мои Тезисы у входа в церковь
Тезисы с внутренней стороны главных церковных врат
Старинная гостиница-таверна прямо напротив Лютеровой церкви. Здесь останавливались на постой шведский король Карл ХII (21.2.1707) и русский царь Петр I (14.10.1712).
Дом-музей М. Лютера. Он и его жена Катарина фон Бора
Стол Лютера, тот самый, за которым проходили "Застольные беседы" , записанные и изданные его студентами.
Одно из изречений Лютера, близкое духу бедной веры: "Мы нищие, это правда".
Новогодняя елка в Доме-музее Лютера, с Тезисами бедной веры среди праздничных записок и пожеланий.
THESES ON POOR FAITH
Mikhail Epstein[1]
In 2005 the American priest and theologian Matthew Fox attached a list of 95 theses he had composed to the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany, theses proclaiming a renewal of Christianity in the 21st century. In doing this, he re-enacted what Martin Luther had done, pinning his theses to the very same church door in the year 1517 and, thereby, setting in motion the Reformation.
I resort to the form of theses for the very reason that they provide the most succinct means of setting out ideas which belong to a worldview still in the process of formation. These theses bring together much that I have already written on the subject of minimal religion since the beginning of the 1980s, at which time signs of its emergence became evident in the spiritual life of late-Soviet, post-atheist society. [2]
On 21 December 2014, I pinned these Theses to the internal side of the "door of theses" in the All-Saints Church in Wittenberg.
What is Poor Faith?
1. Poor faith is faith without religion, without any temples, dogma or rites. It is a direct orientation towards God, here and now, and one-to-one. This is a faith as integrally standing before God as God Himself is integral and undivided.
2. There is a need for faith which stirs inside human being who hears the voice of God within his soul. People search for faith, but encounter only a range of particular religions. Poor faith arises precisely in the space between faith and religions. Simply faith. Simply faith in God.
3. One ought to distinguish between faith and religion. When faith becomes surrounded by institutions, dogma and traditions, it becomes religion. Therefore ‘poor religion’ or ‘minimal religion’ is simply faith in God without any admixture of ‘confessional’ definitions.
4. Hence we get such a critical stance towards ‘religion’ as distinct from ‘faith’, even on the part of theologians such as Karl Barth: “Religion forgets that it has a right to exist only when it continually refutes itself. Instead of doing that, it rejoices at its own existence and regards itself as irreplaceable.” Such a complacent religion, seeking its own triumph within the world, is the very opposite of the essence of faith, which, by its very nature, is ‘not of this world.’
5. According to the results of the largest sociological survey of opinions involving 56,900 respondents and carried out by the ‘Sreda’ research centre in Russia, one in four people fall into the category of ‘poor religion’ - that is to say, a simple belief in God without any affiliation to a belief system or denomination. This proportion, 25%, comes second only to Orthodox Christian believers (41%) and exceeds Muslims (6.5%). [3]
6. The growth of supra-confessional awareness is a worldwide tendency. According to data from the Pew Research Center (USA, 2012), the ‘extra-confessional’ (religiously non-aligned) population of the world makes up 1.1 billion people (or 16% of the total world population.). In China that is 52% of its population, or 700 million, and in the USA 20%, or 46 million. These figures include atheists and agnostics. However, the proportion of believers among these ‘religious nones’ is very considerable: 7% in China, 30% in France, and 68% in the USA affirm that they do believe in God (and 10% of those pray every day). [4]
7. The concept of ‘poor faith’, or ‘minimal religion,’ first arose at the beginning of the 1980s in Moscow. It can be compared to the notion of ‘poor theatre’ developed by the Polish theatre director Jerzy Grotowski. His theatre was completely devoid of scenery, adornment and costumes.
8. In the religious context the word ‘poor’ has a strong positive connotation, as in ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit’. The adherents to ‘poor faith’ do not possess any symbolic ‘capital’ in the form of generally recognised and specific denominational traditions, church buildings, socially recognised prestige or ‘image’. Poverty is a Christian virtue, which one could use as a measure for judging Christianity itself and its dogmatic wealth.
9. Poor faith is rooted right in the world, in our need to link life with absolute meaning. Any person with poor faith converses directly with God within the depth of his or her own soul. It is impossible to root out such poor faith, for its temple exists in every home and in every soul.
10. When applied to the realm of faith, the word ‘poor’ has the following synonyms: free, direct,living, open, creative.
11. Poor faith corresponds to apophatic theology which denies the possibility of knowing God or conceiving of Him in positive forms, symbols or definitions.
This faith lives beyond the boundary of all faith systems.
..........
Полностью в "Снобе"