Ilaria Ramelli: Justinian & anathematisms - Is UR orthodox?

[Alex_Smith]

In a recent discussion someone attacked the orthodoxy of Christian Universalism:

it is too strong a positive claim to suggest that the position is orthodox given that a previous important
synod [Justinian’s 543AD] does condemn it and the Pope later signed off on the synod’s Canons, including
number 9 that anathematizes the concept that demons and impious men will have temporary punishments
and will be completely restored eventually

I’ve been told Justinian honored Gregory of Nyssa at the Fifth Ecumenical Council so that makes it even more confusing.

Does your new book “The Christian Doctrine of Apokatastasis” look at these issues? If not, what are your thoughts
on this?

I do treat Justinian and the anathematisms in my monograph. Justinian, who was neither a philosopher nor a theologian but a politician, hated Origen because he was a philosopher, but knew nothing of his writings (just a distorted compilation put together by the Sabaites) and knew little of Gregory Nyssen too — like Germanus, he thought Gregory did not support universal salvation!

NB: mine is a scholarly monograph in historical theology, so I am not concerned with upholding the orthodoxy of apokatastasis there; I rather argue that Origen, Gregory Nyssen, Diodore, Rufinus, initially even Augustine, and others supported apokatastasis in order to defend orthodoxy: Origen against Gnosticism, Greg against neo-Arianism, Diodore, Rufinus and Augustine against Manichaeism, etc.

[Origen]

How do we define “orthodox”? What is believed by the majority of bishops, by a single infallible human leader, what the Scriptures teach, or most Christians say? Can what is “orthodox” change over time?

A similar forum topic here is: "Universalism is the new Christian orthodoxy"

Also related is this fascinating historical opinion:

“The Salvation Conspiracy: How Hell Became Eternal”, Ken R. Vincent, Ed.D:

https://christianuniversalist.org/resources/articles/salvation-conspiracy/

[anon12438761]

Can what is “orthodox” change over time?

It’s just a word, like ‘evangelical’ - does no more than mark out a territory that an individual or a group uses to mark out who the ‘others’ are, ‘outsiders’ - and the others are therefore deficient in some manner, by definition, not by reality.
Councils, creeds, catechisms - killers of the spirit

(I decided to post an excerpt on Creeds in another thread today)