Writer · Contemporary
Seraphim Rose
1934–1982 · Traditionalist Orthodoxy; patristic literalism
An American convert and hieromonk of the Russian Church Outside Russia, co-founder of the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood at Platina, California; a sharp critic of Rome and of the post-conciliar Church, never in dialogue with it, yet read by Catholic traditionalists.
Eugene Rose came to Orthodoxy from Methodism by way of Guénon, Alan Watts and Chinese philosophy, and his Nihilism: The Root of the Revolution of the Modern Age (written 1962, published 1994) traced liberalism, realism, vitalism and the “nihilism of destruction” as stages of one revolt against God and the old Christian order. Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future (1975) read ecumenism, the charismatic movement, Eastern religions and the post-conciliar changes in Rome as signs of a coming religious syncretism; The Soul After Death (1980) defended the patristic teaching on the aerial toll-houses; Genesis, Creation and Early Man (posthumous) argued that the Fathers read Genesis literally and that evolution is incompatible with Orthodoxy. He also defended Blessed Augustine against Orthodox “super-correctness” and warned against zealotry as much as against modernism, teaching the “royal path” of the Fathers.
Why he matters: He is the most widely read Orthodox writer among converts in the English-speaking world and the main source of the picture of Rome that many American Orthodox hold; a Catholic who wants to understand why a serious modern soul turns East rather than to Rome, and why the Council and the new liturgy look from outside like rupture, must read him. His diagnosis of nihilism runs parallel to that of Catholic thinkers from Del Noce to Benedict XVI.
Where to be careful
He denies the primacy defined at Vatican I, the Filioque defined at Florence and the grace of Catholic sacraments, holds the Second Vatican Council and the reformed liturgy to be a capitulation to the spirit of the age (against the hermeneutic of reform in continuity, Benedict XVI, 2005), and his reading of Genesis is more literal than Providentissimus Deus or Humani Generis require. His love of Augustine, his horror of nihilism, his ascetic seriousness and his warnings against sectarian pride are common ground.
Reading
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Nihilism: The Root of the Revolution of the Modern AgeSeraphim Rose · The four stages of nihilism and the old order they destroyed.
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Father Seraphim Rose: His Life and WorksHieromonk Damascene (Christensen) · The full biography, with long extracts from his letters and journals.
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Address to the Roman Curia offering them his Christmas greetings (22 December 2005)Benedict XVI · The hermeneutic of reform in continuity, the Catholic answer to his reading of the Council as rupture.
Documented positions
Where this thinker stands on each dispute the test covers.