Epicurus on the fear of death /Ο Επίκουρος για τον φόβο του θανάτου

συνέθιζε δὲ ἐν τῷ νομίζειν μηδὲν πρὸς ἡμᾶς εἶναι τὸν θάνατον ἐπεὶ πᾶν ἀγαθὸν καὶ κακὸν ἐν αἰσθήσει· στέρησις δέ ἐστιν αἰσθήσεως ὁ θάνατος. ὅθεν γνῶσις ὀρθὴ τοῦ μηθὲν εἶναι πρὸς ἡμᾶς τὸν θάνατον ἀπολαυστὸν ποιεῖ τὸ τῆς ζωῆς θνητόν, οὐκ ἄπειρον προστιθεῖσα χρόνον, ἀλλὰ τὸν τῆς ἀθανασίας ἀφελομένη πόθον. [...] ὥστε μάταιος ὁ λέγων δεδιέναι τὸν θάνατον οὐχ ὅτι λυπήσει παρών, ἀλλ’ ὅτι λυπεῖ μέλλων. ὅ γὰρ παρὸν οὐκ ἐνοχλεῖ, προσδοκώμενον κενῶς λυπεῖ. τὸ φρικωδέστατον οὖν τῶν κακῶν ὁ θάνατος οὐθὲν πρὸς ἡμᾶς, ἐπειδήπερ ὅταν μὲν ἡμεῖς ὦμεν, ὁ θάνατος οὐ πάρεστιν, ὅταν δὲ ὁ θάνατος παρῇ, τόθ’ ἡμεῖς οὐκ ἐσμέν. οὔτε οὖν πρὸς τοὺς ζῶντάς ἐστιν οὔτε πρὸς τοὺς τετελευτηκότας, ἐπειδήπερ περὶ οὓς μὲν οὐκ ἔστιν, οἳ δ’ οὐκέτι εἰσίν. [...] μνημονευτέον δὲ ὡς τὸ μέλλον οὔτε πάντως ἡμέτερον οὔτε πάντως οὐχ ἡμέτερον, ἵνα μήτε πάντως προσμένωμεν ὡς ἐσόμενον μήτε ἀπελπίζωμεν ὡς πάντως οὐκ ἐσόμενον.

Να συνηθίσεις την ιδέα ότι ο θάνατος δεν είναι τίποτε για μας· διότι κάθε καλό και κάθε κακό βρίσκεται στην αίσθηση, ενώ ο θάνατος είναι ακριβώς η στέρηση της αίσθησης. Γι' αυτό η γνώση του γεγονότος ότι ο θάνατος δεν είναι τίποτε για μας μας κάνει ικανούς να απολαμβάνουμε την πρόσκαιρη ζωή μας, όχι γιατί προσθέτει άπειρο χρόνο σ' αυτήν, αλλά γιατί απομακρύνει τον πόθο της αθανασίας. [...] Επομένως, είναι ανόητος όποιος λέει ότι φοβάται τον θάνατο όχι επειδή θα υποφέρει όταν έρθει ο θάνατος, αλλά επειδή υποφέρει στη σκέψη ότι θα έρθει. Εκείνο που δεν φέρνει ταραχή όταν είναι παρόν, άδικα προξενεί πόνο όταν αναμένεται. Το πιο φοβερό από τα κακά, ο θάνατος, δεν είναι τίποτε για μας- στον βαθμό που όσο υπάρχουμε, δεν είναι παρών· κι όταν πάλι είναι παρών εκείνος, τότε δεν υπάρχουμε εμείς. Άρα, ο θάνατος δεν υπάρχει ούτε για μας τους ζωντανούς ούτε για τους πεθαμένους—εφόσον για τους πρώτους δεν υπάρχει ενώ οι άλλοι δεν υπάρχουν πια. [...] Πρέπει, επίσης, να θυμόμαστε ότι το μέλλον δεν είναι ούτε εντελώς δικό μας ούτε κι εντελώς ξένο μας, ώστε ούτε να περιμένουμε με βεβαιότητα ότι θα έρθει ούτε να απελπιζόμαστε ότι σίγουρα δεν θα έρθει.

Become accustomed to the belief that death is nothing to us. For all good and evil consists in sensation, but death is deprivation of sensation. And therefore a right understanding that death is nothing to us makes the mortality of life enjoyable, not because it adds to it an infinite span of time, but because it takes away the craving for immortality. [...] So that the man speaks but idly who says that he fears death not because it will be painful when it comes, but because it is painful in anticipation. For that which gives no trouble when it comes, is but an empty pain in anticipation. So death, the most terrifying of ills, is nothing to us, since so long as we exist, death is not with us; but when death comes, then we do not exist. It does not then concern either the living or the dead, since for the former it is not, and the latter are no more. [...] We must then bear in mind that the future is neither ours, nor yet wholly not ours, so that we may not altogether expect it as sure to come, nor abandon hope of it, as if it will certainly not come.

Επίκουρος, «Επιστολή προς Μενοικέα»,
Επίκουρος. Ηθική: Η Θεραπεία της Ψυχής,
μετάφρ. Γιώργος Ζωγραφίδης, Αθήνα: Ζήτρος, 2009, σσ. 253-255.

Epicurus, “Letter to Menoeceus,” transl. Cyril Bailey (1926).

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New Revised Standard Version:The reasons that the Orthodox Church in America rejected it in 1990 /Οι λόγοι που την απέρριψε η Ορθόδοξη Εκκλησία της Αμερικής το 1990

Bishop's Pastoral Letter
on the New Revised Standard Version

I. Synodal Decision: At the 1990 Fall Session of the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America convened at the OCA Chancery, Oyster Bay Cove, New York, October 15-18, 1990, His Grace, Bishop Dmitri, presented an oral report on the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible (NRSV). Based on this report, the Holy Synod decided not to permit the use of the NRSV in liturgical services and in bible study. I'm now communicating this decision to you all in the expectation that you will carry it out, of course, but I also wish to provide you a little "background", as I understand it, of the decision.

II. Background: The "NRSV' was produced under the auspices of the NCC. One of the participants in its production was a Greek Orthodox scholar, Father Dimitrios Constantelos. Nevertheless, the members of the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in America, upon being acquainted with certain of its key passages and phraseologies, found it to be so divergent from the Holy Scriptures traditionally read aloud in the sacred services of the Church as to render it impossible of acceptance as Holy Scriptures. Here are a few examples of quotations from the NRSV:

(Genesis I: 1-2) In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. (Psalm I) Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked.
(Psalm XXII:16) My hands and feet have shriveled.
(Psalm LI:5) Indeed I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me.
(Romans V:12) Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned.
(John I:3-4) All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.
(I Timothy II:5-6) For there is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human, who gave himself a ransom for all-- this was attested at the right time.
(I Timothy III: 1-2) The saying is sure: whoever aspires to the office of bishop desires a noble task. Now a bishop must be above reproach, married only once, temperate, sensible, respectable, hospitable, an apt teacher.

III. Comment: I'm sure that none of the venerable clergy of the Diocese of the West need be reminded that the word "Orthodox" itself implies a certain care about correct syntactics, semantics and pragmatics, the correct use of language, and therefore any member of the clergy might be justified in questioning the necessity of Synodal action in an area where all clergy would come to the same conclusion as have the right revered bishops. Here, frankly, the media come into the picture, as it were; to wit, the "New York Times," which carried an article on the "dedication" of the NRSV in Manhattan. This article made it very easy to infer, from its text alone, that the NRSV had been accepted by the Orthodox in general and the OCA in particular, an inference made even more probable by the accompanying photo of one of our Protodeacons carrying the NRSV aloft in solemn procession at the dedication. I do not myself subscribe to or regularly read that paper, but the article was brought to my attention by some phone calls from around the area of the Diocese of the West. Moreover, I believe the OCA Chancery received a very large number of calls from persons who expressed surprise at our "adoption" of a patently questionable version of a Bible. However, the New York Times article did occasion the bringing to the attention of the Holy Synod of already existing criticism of the NRSV by Orthodox scholars. You may recall that I also mentioned the problems of the NRSV during a plenary session of our Diocesan Assembly.

The prohibition of the use of the NRSV for bible study refers to Orthodox bible study, an activity where the Holy Truths of our Faith as they are revealed in the Holy Scriptures are studied by the Faithful with the guidance of a teacher ordained to the task. So-called critical studies, where various bibles may be subjected to objective examination and scholarly evaluations are, of course, not included in the Synod's prohibition. Indeed, I will be studying this NRSV myself, and comparing it with our Orthodox Septuagint and our Orthodox Gospel Books in Greek and Slavonic and our Orthodox Books of Apostolic Readings ("Apostols") in Greek and Slavonic.

This matter in general heightens my sense of urgency about our lack of Orthodox Holy Scriptures in English. Scripture used and quoted by the Apostles was the Greek Septuagint, and it was from the Greek Septuagint that the Old Testamental texts used in the other Holy Orthodox Churches have been translated. The Old Testament texts in all the English Bibles in use today, including the venerable King James version, are based primarily on Hebrew texts which are frequently less ancient than existing Greek texts. The New Testament, i.e. the Gospel Scriptures and the Scriptures of Apostolic origin read aloud in our Churches, were written in Greek. I ask you all to pray that our Department of Worship, of which I am Moderator, will be able to take productive steps toward providing canonical texts in English for all the readings in the sacred services of our Church. In the meantime, I encourage the use of the King James Version and the New King James Version, acknowledging that neither of these versions is fully accurate and free of mistakes, hence, completely acceptable. I am fully aware that the RSV, which will now be going out of print, is widely used, especially among those trained as clergy after its appearance. When we were trained we learned how to approach the RSV's divergences from our Tradition. Now it seems that that version was only the first step down a road which has, now, stopped at the NRSV, but which may continue in the direction of producing versions which do not reproduce so much the original texts as they reproduce the current theological opinings of their sponsors and publishers. I would like to assure the very many qualified scholars, biblical and otherwise, of our Diocese of the West that I make no pretensions at all to being a critical scholar or to having scholarly credentials in the area of biblical criticism, but I am speaking as I am sure are all my brother bishops, as one charged preeminently with responsibility before God both for Orthodox bible study in the first sense, above, and for insuring the purity of the Gospel proclaimed in our Churches.

I ask for your continued prayers and support (which I feel almost physically, at times) in all our common work. I assure you of my own appreciation of all your work, of my constancy in prayer for you all individually, and I send you as much of a fatherly blessing as I am capable of as a bishop.

In Christ,

Bishop Tikhon

[His Grace Bishop Tikhon is the ruling hierarch of the Diocese of the West of the Orthodox Church in America. This article was originally published in The Orthodox West, Winter 1990 issue.]

* Source: www.holy-trinity.org