What are distinctive features of Eastern Orthodox spirituality?

Question

I'm seeking insights into the distinctive features of Eastern Orthodox spirituality. For those familiar with this tradition, could you provide information on specific aspects that characterize the spiritual experience within Eastern Orthodoxy? This might include elements of communal worship, personal devotional practices, mystical traditions, iconography, or any other aspects that contribute to the unique spiritual identity of Eastern Orthodoxy. Please share knowledge and references to authoritative sources that discuss practices and teachings within the Eastern Orthodox tradition.

Answer 1

What are distinctive features of Eastern Orthodox spirituality?

Thinking about this question, one would think it is quite broad, but if we think about it in terms as being distinctive that seems like this is a much narrower perspective request that is being asked for.

For example, let us take the subject matter of icons. True that this is an ancient tradition of the Eastern Orthodox spirituality, but it is not distinctively or uniquely an Orthodox Church form of spirituality. Catholics and other Christian denominations also practice this tradition in their spirituality.

An icon is a religious work of art, most commonly a painting, in the cultures of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Catholic churches. They are not simply artworks; "an icon is a sacred image used in religious devotion". The most common subjects include Christ, Mary, saints and angels. Although especially associated with portrait-style images concentrating on one or two main figures, the term also covers most of the religious images in a variety of artistic media produced by Eastern Christianity, including narrative scenes, usually from the Bible or the lives of saints.

Icons are most commonly painted on wood panels with egg tempera, but they may also be cast in metal or carved in stone or embroidered on cloth or done in mosaic or fresco work or printed on paper or metal, etc. Comparable images from Western Christianity may be classified as "icons", although "iconic" may also be used to describe the static style of a devotional image. In the Greek language, the term for icon painting uses the same word as for "writing", and Orthodox sources often translate it into English as icon writing.

Eastern Orthodox tradition holds that the production of Christian images dates back to the very early days of Christianity, and that it has been a continuous tradition since then. Modern academic art history considers that, while images may have existed earlier, the tradition can be traced back only as far as the 3rd century, and that the images which survive from Early Christian art often differ greatly from later ones. The icons of later centuries can be linked, often closely, to images from the 5th century onwards, though very few of these survive. Widespread destruction of images occurred during the Byzantine Iconoclasm of 726–842, although this did settle permanently the question of the appropriateness of images. Since then, icons have had a great continuity of style and subject, far greater than in the icons of the Western church. At the same time there have been change and development. - Icons

A more distinctive feature of the Eastern Orthodox Church’s spirituality could be seen other traditions.

Take for example, the Jesus Prayer. Although, Wikipedia says it is also a Roman Catholic tradition, I would say that very few Roman Catholics actually practice this tradition and that it is almost exclusively an Eastern Orthodox form of spirituality. After all Catholics have their rosary! Eastern Rite Catholics would practice this form of spirituality because they of from the same historical spirituality of the Eastern Orthodox Churches.

• The Jesus Prayer

The Jesus Prayer, also known as The Prayer, is a short formulaic prayer, esteemed and advocated especially in Eastern Christianity and Roman Catholicism:

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

It is often repeated continually as a part of personal ascetic practice, its use being an integral part of the eremitic tradition of prayer known as hesychasm. The prayer is particularly esteemed by the spiritual fathers of this tradition as a method of cleaning and opening up the mind and after this the heart (kardia), brought about first by the Prayer of the Mind, or more precisely the Noetic Prayer (Νοερά Προσευχή), and after this the Prayer of the Heart (Καρδιακή Προσευχή). The Prayer of the Heart is considered to be the Unceasing Prayer that the Apostle Paul advocates in the New Testament. Theophan the Recluse regarded the Jesus Prayer stronger than all other prayers by virtue of the power of the Holy Name of Jesus.

Though identified more closely with Eastern Christianity, the prayer is found in Western Christianity in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. It also is used in conjunction with the recent innovation of Anglican prayer beads. The prayer has been widely taught and discussed throughout the history of the Eastern Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Church. The ancient and original form did not include the words "a sinner", which were added later. The Eastern Orthodox theology of the Jesus Prayer as enunciated in the 14th century by Gregory Palamas was generally rejected by Latin Church theologians until the 20th century. Pope John Paul II called Gregory Palamas a saint, a great writer, and an authority on theology. He also spoke with appreciation of hesychasm as "that deep union of grace which Eastern theology likes to describe with the particularly powerful term "theosis", 'divinization'", and likened the meditative quality of the Jesus Prayer to that of the Catholic Rosary. - Jesus Prayer

• Feast of Orthodoxy is a unique Eastern Orthodox Feast in honour to celebrate the final defeat of iconoclasm, but later expanded to commemorate opposition to all heterodoxy.

The Feast of Orthodoxy (or Sunday of Orthodoxy or Triumph of Orthodoxy) is celebrated on the first Sunday of Great Lent in the Eastern Orthodox Church and other churches using the Byzantine Rite to commemorate, originally, only the final defeat of iconoclasm on the first Sunday of Lent in 843, and later also opposition to all heterodoxy. The feast originally celebrated the final defeat of iconoclasm, but later expanded to commemorate opposition to all heterodoxy.

Despite the teaching about icons defined at the Seventh Ecumenical Council in 787, the iconoclasts began to trouble the Church again. After the death of the last iconoclast emperor, Theophilos, his young son Michael III, with his mother the regent Theodora, and Patriarch Methodios, summoned the Synod of Constantinople in 843 to bring peace to the Church. At the end of the first session, all made a triumphal procession from the Church of Blachernae to Hagia Sophia, restoring the icons to the church. This occurred on 11 March, 843 (which that year was the first Sunday of Lent). The Synod decreed that a perpetual feast on the anniversary of that day should be observed each year on the First Sunday of Great Lent, and named the day, "the Sunday of Orthodoxy" (ἡ Κυριακὴ τῆς Ὀρθοδοξίας). - Feast of Orthodoxy

• Children (Infants) are baptized and confirmed at the same time.

• Orthodox clergy may be married before becoming deacons or priests, but once widowed may not remarry.

• The Eastern Orthodox Churches have several unique historical and liturgical celebrations that they celebrate, such as The Dormition of the Most-Holy Theotokos (Aug. 15). Catholic tradition for the most part holds that Mary died before being assumed into heaven, while the Eastern Orthodox Church holds that Mary fell asleep. For Catholics, this remains an open question.

• Fasting remains a very integral part of of their spirituality and as such I hold this tradition in high esteem. It is almost non-existent in the Roman Catholic Church save for a few occasions per year. Not only have the Orthodox Churches preserved this ancient tradition, some of their fasts are uniquely within the Eastern Orthodox Church communities. Their rules are also more strict than what permitted to eat than in the West. Hats off and keep it up!

In the Byzantine Rite, the fast traditionally entails fasting from red meat, poultry, meat products, eggs, dairy products, fish, oil, and wine. Fish, wine and oil are allowed on Saturdays and Sundays as well as most Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, and oil and wine are generally allowed on Tuesdays and Thursdays, except in the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church.

The fasting rules also permit fish, wine and oil on certain feast days that occur during the course of the fast: Evangelist Matthew (November 16), Apostle Andrew (November 30), Great-martyr Barbara (December 4), St. Nicholas (December 6), St. Spiridon and St. Herman (December 12), St. Ignatius (December 20), etc. The Nativity Fast is not as severe as Great Lent or the Dormition Fast.

As is always the case with Byzantine fasting rules, persons who are ill, the very young or elderly, and nursing mothers are exempt from fasting. Each individual is expected to confer with their confessor regarding any exemptions from the fasting rules, but should never place themselves in physical danger.

There has been some ambiguity about the restriction of fish, whether it means the allowance of invertebrate fish or all fish. Often, even on days when fish is not allowed, shellfish may be consumed. More detailed guidelines vary by jurisdiction, but the rules strictly state that from the December 20 to December 24 (inclusively), no fish may be eaten.

The Eve of Nativity (December 24) is a strict fast day, called Paramony (lit. 'preparation'), on which no solid food should be eaten until Sirius is seen in the evening sky (or at the very least, until after the Vesperal Divine Liturgy that day). If Paramony falls on a Saturday or Sunday, the day is not observed as a strict fast, but a meal with wine and oil is allowed after the Divine Liturgy, which would be celebrated in the morning. - Fasting Rules