ABSTRACT
The term 'Neo-Orthodoxy', although in use earlier to designate an influential theological current in Protestantism, 1 has been widely used in Greece since the 1980s. To my knowledge, it was the leftist journal Scholiastis (Commentator), which no longer appears, which coined this term in 1983 as a negative characterization of the religious quest of some Left intellectuals, men of letters and artists (for example, Stelios Ramfos, Kostas Zouraris, Kostis Moskof, Dionysis Savvopoulos and Nikos Gabriel Pentzikis). These men had shown even before the 1980s, each one in his own way, an unusual degree of interest in the Orthodox tradition and indeed in the spiritual legacy of Athonite monasticism.2 This was unusual among the traditional Left intelligentsia, which considered Orthodoxy and generally religion as a reactionary element that was bound to disappear in the long run. In this way, the term N eo-Orthodox has become very common, in journalistic and scholarly circles alike. 3 Yet those generally considered to be part of this Neo-Orthodox current never accepted the label, or rather term of opprobrium, and considered that it gave a misleading notion of their purposes and ideals.4 For the theologian and philosopher Christos Giannaras, for example, the Neo-Orthodox label was similar to the smear-word 'Slavophile' in nineteenth-century Russia. In his view, this 'new wave' in Greece had nothing to
dowithadiscoveryofanewOrthodoxy,butwasarediscoveryofaforgotten butauthenticOrthodoxtradition.Itdidnot,then,representamerereligious revival,butarealacquaintancewiththespirituallegacyofGreekOrthodox civilization,acivilizationclearlydifferentiatedfromthatoftheWest.5For others,itwasmoreanexpressionofageneralpro-Orthodoxcurrent,which hadbeenpresentearlier.6Themainproblemis,however,thatNeo-Orthodoxy wasinitsessenceanunofficialandunsystematicendeavour;asaconsequence,nocleardefinitionordescriptionofthisentirecurrenthasyetbeen provided.Neo-OrthodoxycannotbereducedtosomesortofanOrthodox revivalalone,forthelatterisamuchwiderphenomenonrepresentedby suchthinkersasJohnRomanides,PanagiotisChristou,NikosNisiotis,Savvas Agourides,JohnZizioulas,NikosMatsoukasandseveralothers,whohave madeadecisivecontributiontotheregenerationofOrthodoxtheology.7No doubtthereexistsomecommonfeaturesinthisrevival-aboveall,an OrthodoxcritiqueoftheWest.Butthisinnowisemeansthatthiscritiqueis undifferentiatedandunified,northatitspromoterssharethesamepresuppositions.
