The Hesychasts

Elliot's got a very interesting and challenging post up about St. Gregory of Palamas here. I've numbered my points according to the segmenting of his original post.

1. I used to think that Orthodoxy hasn't had an Councils with ecumenical force since the Schism, but other Orthodox disagree. I'm pretty sure I read that in one of the essays in Eastern Orthodox Theology, a very good collection of essays on several aspects of the Faith.

I won't come down on either side of the issue yet; I want to see if I can find the cite and re-examine the argument. I just wanted to through that out, regardless.

2. I disagree, if I correctly understand what Elliot means. I think the idea of divine simplicity is actually very important. It informs the Catholic understanding of the Holy Trinity, for instance, which seems to make the hypostases posterior to the simple essence.

Turning to the point about necessity, I suppose this arises from how we choose to think about God's Essence (to the extent we can think about God's Essence). I'm far from an expert in apophaticism and other modes of Trinitarian thinking, which seeks to go beyond the economic Trinity and attempt to approach the Trinity in itself. However, some Fathers have a good point in arguing that the names "Father," "Son," and "Holy Spirit" are more accurate than the name "God." "God" is a name that assumes the relationship between the Lord and man, while the names of the Trinity contemplate the relationship the Lord has to Himself in Himself. When we introduce concepts like love and justice into the Lord's essence, we're talking about "God." This introduces necessity into the Lord's essence. If love is part of the Lord's essence then necessity is introduced into creation, a necessary expression of that love.

I'm not sure if these are the objections Elliot had in mind. I'm working somewhat from memory of past reading, but mainly thinking as I type.

3. I think this point relates to my notes in #2. Energies are only a part of "God" and not of the "Father" or the "Son" or the "Holy Spirit." At least that's what I think; I haven't read as much of St. Gregory of Palamas as I'd like to, especially for one so interested in hesychasm.

4. This is my favorite of Elliot's 4 points, a very challenging one.

I'm not sure that a Palamist would say that God's Essence would swallow up a man. I don't think one would even entertain the possibility of a man ever experiencing God's essence. And one couldn't maintain that proposition without becoming a Monophysite, and a Palamist probably wouldn't like that.

With the Incarnation, the unknowable suddenly became knowable. God became man, that man might become God. Christ, along with several saints (like the Ever Virgin Mary the Mother of God, and the Propher Elijah), bodily rose up into Heaven. Those fortunate enough to enter Heaven will have their bodies, as prefigured by the Transfiguration and those bodily assumptions. Heaven will be like Paradise, I suppose, and I don't think there's anything to indicate that Adam and Eve had any experience of the Lord's Essence.

Beyond that, just because Christ could experience the Lord's Essence doesn't necessarily mean that we will as well. Christ exercised a Lordship that will never, and can never, be totally ours. He was God from before all time, and became man. We are men from the time we're born, and will hopefully become gods and reign with Christ at the End. But we can achieve no more. We can become like Christ, but we can never become Christ. I don't think we will necessarily have access to His experiences, either.

I hope his was clear. Maybe I'll have to return to this in the future. I think I may have reached one of those moments where thought stands still for a second, as my jaw hangs agape and moves with the breeze. Thinking about the Trinity, the Lord's Essence, and the meaning of the Incarnation tends to do that to mean.

Very difficult and interesting stuff to think about. In the end, though, faith cannot seek understanding. Understanding must seek faith. Lord, help me to know what is True, even if I can't make sense of it.

EDITED TO ADD: I just noticed that I wrote "St. Gregory of Palamas" instead of "St. Gregory Palamas." Wow, I'm a dullard. And sorry about that, St. Gregory.