07 — The Wider Theology

Bulgakov wrote far more than sophiology, and much of what he wrote is not obviously sophiological at all. This section covers the rest: the kenotic Christology that the second Moscow ukaz singled out; the mariology of The Burning Bush and its polemic against the Immaculate Conception; the ecclesiology of The Orthodox Church and The Bride of the Lamb; the theology of the Eucharist and of icons; and the eschatology — including the doctrine of universal restoration — that closes his last book.

Tradition: Russian Orthodox (emigration) — expounding a modern theologian’s own positions, not the dogma of the Church

What This Section Covers

Three cautions govern the section.

First, the dogmatic line. Where the Church has defined — Chalcedon on the two natures and the one hypostasis; the Third Ecumenical Council on the Theotokos; the Fifth Council and the 553 condemnations on Origenism; the councils of the fourteenth century on the uncreated energies — the dogma is confessed here as the Church’s, and Bulgakov’s proposals are attributed to him and measured against it. He is expounded sympathetically; he is not baptized as the standard.

Second, the §4.2 line. Where his positions are contested among Orthodox and the Church has not settled the matter, both sides are named and neither is adjudicated. This applies especially to his kenoticism and to his eschatology.

Third, the §3.5 line. Bulgakov’s own accounts of his religious experience — the 1926 illness, the 1939 operation, the essay “The Sophiology of Death” — are reported as his testimony, pinned to the texts in which he gives them, never asserted as documented fact.

Files in This Section

File Description
Kenosis, Christology, and Mariology The self-emptying of the Son in The Lamb of God, the criticism it drew, and the mariology of The Burning Bush
Ecclesiology, Eschatology, and Universal Salvation The Church as realized Godmanhood, the Eucharist and icons, and the eschatology of The Bride of the Lamb including his universalist leanings

See Also