Supersession and Continuance: The Orthodox Church's Perspective on Supersessionism

Over last few decades as Western scholars have developed term they have used it with increasing frequency to portray traditional Christian views on relationship between Old and Testaments, between ancient Judaism and Christianity. Yet, it is almost never mentioned in Orthodox Church, whose traditions focus on first several centuries of Christianity. The perspective of Orthodox Christians is important for ecumenical relations, since they number 200-300,000,000 worldwide, (1) and it is especially relevant to Holy Land, where it is largest Church among Palestinians and Israelis. This raises fundamental question of whether Orthodoxy is, in fact, This essay will show that Orthodox Church is in that Testament concepts take precedence over Old Testament ones, and Christ's coming transforms Israel's spiritual community into Church. Yet, not give full range of Orthodox thought, since biblical Israel and Old Testament continue in important ways. One must begin by reviewing meanings of which vary from inclusive to exclusive. Supersede itself has a scale of meanings, from full replacement to incorporation without abolition. There are other important considerations: How do Orthodox theologians view topic? Does Orthodox thinking differ enough from that of Western Christianity that supersessionism is inconceivable? Are there ways in which supersession both occurs and not occur? What it mean that Church is New and that mean that nation Israel is simply rejected? I. Defining Supersessionism Dr. Michael Vlach, a leading Evangelical scholar on has defined it broadly as the view that NT Church is new and/or true Israel that has superseded nation Israel as people of (2) He explained that supersessionism may encompass Church, either replacing or fulfilling nation Israel's role in God's plan. (3) One difficulty is that connotations of replace and range from one thing's cancellation of another (replacement) to creation of fullness or success (fulfillment). Like Vlach, whose work opposes Orthodox Christians do not see Church as cancelling nation Israel forever from any role in God's plan, because they expect its whole return, (4) but they do see Church as accomplishing Israel's task of bringing humanity to God. The 2011 study document of Presbyterian Church in Canada, One Covenant of Grace, focusing on this idea of fulfillment, portrayed supersessionism sympathetically, stating: As Presbyterians, we want to affirm Jesus' work and fulfillment of covenant on our behalf, [so] what [Rabbi] David Novak calls a 'soft supersessionism' may be in view. (5) Believing that in early Church Testament was considered either a replacement or an addition, Novak called latter idea soft supersessionism, which, he wrote, does not assert that God terminated covenant of Exodus-Sinai with Jewish people. Rather, it asserts that Jesus came to fulfill promise of old (6) He added that it seems to me that Christianity must be generically supersessionist. In fact, I question Christian orthodoxy of any Christian who claims he or she is not a supersessionist at all. The reason for my suspicion is as follows: If Christianity did not come into world to bring something better.... then why shouldn't anyone ... remain within normative Judaism? (7) In other words, Novak viewed supersessionism in general to mean that Christianity brought something better and that it need only mean a fulfillment, rather than a termination, of old covenant. Catholic theologian Fr. Brian W. Harrison did see supersessionism as implying end of Mosaic covenant, calling it traditional Christian belief that covenant between God and People of Israel, established through mediation of Moses at Mount Sinai, has been replaced or superseded by 'New Covenant' of Jesus Christ. …

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