I think the two of you are showing one of the worst sides of Christianity: our tendency to use words for oneupsmanship. This started early in the Church, as Christianity moved from a Way to a narrowly defined set of beliefs, and believing the wrong thing became a crime. Jesus is a really odd master for such a religion, since he is notoriously hard to pin down with these kinds of precise formulations.

Jesus said lots of things involving both faith and works, although not always in those terms. I think his statements hang together, but I'm not so sure that they can be characterized by the kind of definitions you're arguing over. What did he say:

* When people asked him in one way or another how to be saved, he answered with faith, love, obedience and works, depending upon who he was talking to.

* He emphasized that it wasn't enough to believe; you had to do what he said.

* However he also emphasized the importance of motivation. His first principle is that if you love God and your neighbor, you'll do the right thing. Works had to follow from love for God or they are worthless.

So he demands both faith and works, but it must be faith that results in works and works that come from faith.

* While he set high ideals -- after all, he said we have to be perfect -- he also realized that in this life we wouldn't reach them. We can be forgiven of anything, as long as we are honest about ourselves (humble) and forgive others.

* His ideal for how we approach God was as a little child approaches their parents in trust and humility. We can never expect credit for anything we do. No matter how good it is, we're just slaves doing what our master has ordered us to do. He rejected any concept of humans being "holy" even when applied to himself.

The problem with trying to turn this into a single requirement like faith or works is that he opposed that kind of simplification. You can't say that we are justified by faith without action, when he was so clear on the status of people who call him Lord without doing
anything about it. But any requirements involving works have to be tempered by the reality of our imperfection, the need for repentance and forgiveness, and his emphasis on motivation. Works have to come from a heart that has been renewed.

This is why Christianity was originally a Way, and not a theological system.

I actually think that Maxentius and George are both within the bounds of acceptable Christianity and much of the discussion here is trying to show that only you have the right way of describing things. George says " You want a term and a definition, and I want an understanding of the reality we are addressing... Your terms and definitions will not help you in the age to come, but only the ontology of your soul regarding sin..." I agree with this completely, but the problem is that he's saying that while engaging in a vigorous game of trying to show that Maxentius is using unacceptable terms and definitions. EO negative theology would be a lot more convincing if it weren't so concerned about terms and definitions yourselves, and didn't demand that everyone adopt your exact way of saying things.

[I also find it odd that these debates are so often faith vs. works, when both Jesus and Paul would say that love is more important than either. In fact I think both of them would lump faith and love together as characterizing a heart that has been renewed by the Holy Spirit, Jesus' good tree that produces good fruit.]