Catechesis · Inquirer
How We Know
Catechesis · Inquirer
How We Know
God has not left us to find Him on our own. He has revealed Himself. The Orthodox Church receives this revelation in two inseparable forms: Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition. Thes…
Question
How has God made Himself known?
God has not left us to find Him on our own. He has revealed Himself. The Orthodox Church receives this revelation in two inseparable forms: Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition. These are not two competing sources — they are two expressions of one revelation.
Scripture is the written record of God's self-disclosure, preserved and interpreted within the community of the Church. Tradition is the living transmission of that same revelation — through the Liturgy, the councils, the Fathers, the sacraments, the icon.
The teaching
Scripture and Tradition — one revelation, two modes
Holy Scripture is the collection of writings — Old and New Testaments — which the Church recognises as divinely inspired. The Orthodox Church uses the Septuagint as its liturgical text, and includes the deuterocanonical books as part of the biblical canon.
Holy Tradition includes the Ecumenical Councils, the writings of the Fathers, the liturgical life of the Church, the holy canons, and the icons. It is the life of the Holy Spirit in the Church, by which the revelation of God in Christ is received, understood, and passed on.
The Church does not stand under Scripture; the Church stands in Scripture. She is the pillar and ground of truth, and from within that truth she has given us the Canon.
The Church did not receive the Bible from outside and then build herself around it. The Church wrote the New Testament, collected it, and recognised its canon. Scripture is the Church's book — not in the sense that the Church owns it, but in the sense that it was born within the Church's life and is rightly read within it.
Fr. Georges Florovsky
Bible, Church, Tradition · 1972
Holy Scripture
"But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will bear witness about Me."
John 15:26
"When the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all the truth."
John 16:13
Scripture and Tradition
Why the Church gave us the Bible, not the other way around
Many people assume the Bible came first and the Church formed around it. The historical reality is the reverse. The Church was preaching the gospel, baptising, celebrating the Eucharist, and transmitting the apostolic faith for decades before the New Testament was written. The writings were recognised as authoritative because they reflected what the Church already knew.