Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ (Changing Paradigms in Historical and Systematic Theology) 9780198845294, 0198845294

Table of contents :
Cover
Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ
Copyright
Dedication
Preface
Acknowledgements
Contents
Chapter 1: Human perfection in Orthodox theological anthropology: Retrieving the Christological imperative
1. Method
A defence of ‘neo-patristic synthesis’
Approaching Theological Anthropology: Christ as Cornerstone
2. The roots and contours of modern Orthodox theological anthropology
Orthodox theology of the person/hypostasis
Personalism and Orthodox Theology
Forging the rudiments of an Orthodox theological personalism
John Zizioulas and the debate over hypostasis
Deification as a Christocentric doctrine
The God-man versus Godmanhood: delineating Orthodox approaches to deification
Chapter 2: Perpetual progress or eternal rest?: Contemplating the eschaton in St Maximus the Confessor
1. Perpetual progress and its discontents
Epektasis as normative
Problems with epektasis
Perpetual progress in early Byzantine theology: the evidence
2. The eschatology of Maximus the Confessor
Some preliminaries
Christocentric deification and the suspicion of change
The blessed Sabbath
Born(e) into the age to come
From ever-moving rest to undivided union
Inheritors of his holy name
The stature of the fullness in the mystery of love
Chapter 3: Perfection before our eyes: St Theodore the Studite on the humanity of Christ
Theodore the Studite
1. The one human nature of Christ, of Mary, and of us
Introduction
Christ’s human nature
The humanity of Mary
2. From the humanity of Christ to the humanity of the saints
Our corrupted nature raised above the heavens
The healing of my nature
The earthiness of the holy: seeing perfection in the coenobium
Chapter 4: I am called by two names, human and divine: Dogma and deification in St Symeon the New Theologian
Symeon the New Theologian
1. Mediocrity routed
The threat of a mediocre ideal
Mediocrity as heresy
The meaning of experience
2. Christocentric perfection
Unto angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come’ (Heb. 2:5)
The meeting of God and the image of God
Perfect man in a Chalecdonian key
Mary, Mother of God and of all the saints
Symeon the ‘individualist’?
Conclusion
Chapter 5: The energy of deification and the person of Jesus Christ in St Gregory Palamas
1. The Hesychast Controversy and the anti-Palamite challenge to divine energies
The Hesychast Controversy
The anti-Palamite challenge to deification by divine energies
2. Gregory Palamas on epistemology and deification in Christ
Knowledge of the world and knowledge of God in Palamas: finding the impetus for the theology of divine energy
The human ideal in Palamas: deification through the radiance of the body of Christ
Conclusion: Christ as ‘Father’
Conclusion
A Byzantine Christological synthesis: summary of findings through a twelfth-century lens
Theological anthropology in contemporary Orthodoxy: the case of Fr John Behr
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Anonymous (Isaac Argyros?)
Barlaam of Calabria
Gregory Akindynos
Gregory of Nyssa
Gregory Palamas
Irenaeus of Lyons
John of Damascus
Maximus the Confessor
Nikephoros Gregoras
Niketas Stethatos
Origen of Alexandria
Prochoros Kydones
Symeon the New Theologian
The Synodikon of Orthodoxy
Theodore the Studite
Secondary Sources
Scriptural Index
Index of Names and Subjects

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CHANGING PARADIGMS IN HISTORICAL A N D S Y S T E M A T I C TH E O L O G Y General Editors Sarah Coakley Richard Cross This series sets out to reconsider the modern distinction between ‘historical’ and ‘systematic’ theology. The scholarship represented in the series is marked by attention to the way in which historiographic and theological presumptions (‘paradigms’) necessarily inform the work of historians of Christian thought, and thus affect their application to contemporary concerns. At certain key junctures such paradigms are recast, causing a reconsideration of the methods, hermeneutics, geographical boundaries, or chronological caesuras which have previously guided the theological narrative. The beginning of the twenty-first century marks a period of such notable reassessment of the Christian doctrinal heritage, and involves a questioning of the paradigms that have sustained the classic ‘history-of-ideas’ textbook accounts of the modern era. Each of the volumes in this series brings such contemporary methodological and historiographical concerns to conscious consideration. Each tackles a period or key figure whose significance is ripe for reconsideration, and each analyses the implicit historiography that has sustained existing scholarship on the topic. A variety of fresh methodological concerns are considered, without reducing the theological to other categories. The emphasis is on an awareness of the history of ‘reception’: the possibilities for contemporary theology are bound up with a careful rewriting of the historical narrative. In this sense, ‘historical’ and ‘systematic’ theology are necessarily conjoined, yet also closely connected to a discerning interdisciplinary engagement. This monograph series accompanies the project of The Oxford Handbook of the Reception of Christian Theology (Oxford University Press, in progress), also edited by Sarah Coakley and Richard Cross.

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CHANGING PARADIGMS IN HISTORICAL AND SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY General Editors: Sarah Coakley (Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity, University of Cambridge) and Richard Cross (John A. O’Brien Professor of Philosophy, University of Notre Dame) RECENT SERIES TITLES

Georges Florovsky and the Russian Religious Renaissance Paul L. Gavrilyuk Balthasar on the Spiritual Senses Perceiving Splendour Mark McInroy Knowledge, Love, and Ecstasy in the Theology of Thomas Gallus Boyd Taylor Coolman Prayer after Augustine A Study in the Development of the Latin Tradition Jonathan D. Teubner God Visible Patristic Christology Reconsidered Brian E. Daley, SJ Gregory Palamas and the Making of Palamism in the Modern Age Norman Russell Communicatio Idiomatum Reformation Christological Debates Richard Cross

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Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology Attaining the Fullness of Christ

ALEXIS TORRANCE

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Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Alexis Torrance 2020 The moral rights of the author have been asserted First Edition published in 2020 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937511 ISBN 978–0–19–884529–4 Printed and bound in Great Britain by Clays Ltd, Elcograf S.p.A.

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For my parents

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Preface Till we all come . . . unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Ephesians 4:13

Orthodox Christianity is impossible to understand without reference to its vast Byzantine theological heritage. This volume is an exercise in coming to terms with this heritage as it relates to the questions of human sanctity and perfection. As such, this book can be considered a contribution to theological anthropology. It is bookended by discussions of certain aspects and figures in modern Orthodox theology, but the core chapters are devoted to the thought of seminal Byzantine theologians on the matter of human perfection. The first chapter includes ample discussion of the scope and methodology of the work, thus a separate introduction was deemed unnecessary. When combining systematic and historical theology, there is always the danger of falling between two stools. I am of the opinion, however, that we separate systematic and historical theology at our peril, not least in the case of Orthodox Christian theology; the two must be treated together. The main thesis proposed herein emerges from this combined look at Orthodox systematics and the Byzantine theological tradition, namely that for Orthodox theological anthropology to develop positively and in keeping with its theological inheritance, it must keep its focus unwaveringly on the person of Christ as the source and touchstone of all human perfection. In particular, I argue that the doctrine of the humanity of Christ is sometimes overlooked, underplayed, or misunderstood in modern Orthodox theology, whereas its central presence and importance in the Byzantine theological tradition is unmistakable. Discussing the thought of those still living is a happy task when we reserve ourselves to praise alone: it becomes more delicate when we feel critique is necessary. Judging from reactions given by colleagues to drafts of the following chapters, the reader may well find the critical discussion of certain living theologians either too weak, too harsh, or simply unfounded. I look forward to any scholarly debate and disagreement generated by my tentative arguments. The point of this work, however, is not to engage in academic skirmishes with fellow travellers on the path of Orthodox theology, but to proceed positively and constructively by proposing an overarching vision for the study of theological anthropology, grounded and settled on the person of Christ. Alexis Torrance Feast of St Porphyrios of Athens 2 December 2019

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Acknowledgements That I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving. Psalm 26:7 Thanksgiving intercedes for our weaknesses. St Barsanuphius of Gaza, Letter 77

The initial idea for this monograph came all the way back in 2010: it has been a long journey and, as such, the tremendous debt of gratitude I owe to a multitude of companions on this journey can only be incompletely expressed here. I can begin, however, with thanks for the generous institutional support I have received for this project over the years: first from the Notre Dame Institute for Advanced Study, and followed by the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies, the Ministry of Development and Investments (ΕΣΠΑ) of the Hellenic Republic (for a postdoctoral fellowship at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki), as well as, most recently, the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. Institutions are nothing without their personnel, so from these halcyon days of life as a research fellow I would like to single out the directors of each programme whose tireless efforts and guidance greatly facilitated my work: Vittorio Hösle, Dimitri Gondicas, Symeon Paschalidis, and Jan Ziolkowski. The research and writing of this book would not have been possible without the support of these fellowships, and still less without the support and encouragement of my home institution, the University of Notre Dame, particularly the Department of Theology and the Medieval Institute there. My colleagues and students have been a constant source of inspiration. In particular I would like to mention two department chairs from Theology, Matt Ashley and Tim Matovina, as well as Tom Burman (Director of the Medieval Institute), and my dear colleagues John Betz and Fr Khaled Anatolios for their frequent encouragement and insight. Among the students, all the members of my Hesychast Controversy doctoral seminar from 2015 and 2018 are especially to be thanked for helping me think through not only the material that forms the heart of Chapter 5, but the larger questions of the monograph as well. Librarians are always in the background of any operation such as this: I would especially like to thank Alan Krieger from Notre Dame and Joshua Robinson (also a dear friend) from Dumbarton Oaks for all their much needed and swift help. The anonymous reviewers of the manuscript were incredibly gracious and insightful: without the first set of reviews, in particular, I may never

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have plucked up the courage to engage modern Orthodox theology with the same boldness as I have done in Chapters 1 and 6. My good friend Fr Evgenios Iverites (previously Nick Marinides) kindly read through my whole manuscript, saving me from a multitude of infelicities and omissions: I am most grateful. Other close friends and colleagues read through parts of the work and offered invaluable feedback: Fr Demetrios Harper, Vitaly Permiakov, John Betz, and a member of the Monastery of St John the Baptist in Essex. Earlier versions of several of the chapters were delivered in seminar or conference settings, whose organizers and participants I would like to thank. In particular, an earlier version of Chapter 2 was presented at the Boston College Historical Theology Colloquium in 2016. I am most grateful to Boyd Coolman for extending that invitation, and to the participants for their helpful feedback (in particular, my respondent and friend Matthew Briel). Similarly, I am especially grateful to Christophe Erismann for inviting me to deliver an earlier version of Chapter 3 at the University of Vienna. I am much indebted to him and to the other conference participants for their valuable comments. The tremendous input from so many notwithstanding, all mistakes herein are solely my own. The individual thanks I owe to other colleagues, friends, and family cannot all be enumerated. I am grateful for the support, friendship, and advice of His Eminence Elder Metropolitan John of Pergamon (Zizioulas), His Eminence Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia (Ware), His Eminence Metropolitan Maximos of Selyvria (Vgenopoulos), Fr Andrew Louth, Marcus and Mariamni Plested, Paul Gavrilyuk, Fr John Behr, Fr Brian Daley, Fr Damaskinos Xenophontos, Symeon Paschalidis, Dcn Brandon Gallaher, Charles Yost, Fr George and Presbytera Elaine Konstantopoulos, Jerry (Athanasios) DiPietro, Chris Kirgios, Dcn Evan and Matushka Robin Freeman, George Sarraf, and many, many others. I express gratitude to my siblings, Isabelle (who will forever be my ‘aspirational peer’ in the academic world!) and Marc. I pause in gratitude to and remembrance of a dear friend, the late Fr Matthew Baker, whose untimely passing in 2015 was a terrible loss to so many. At his death he was already an Orthodox theologian of first rank and importance, and his influence continues to be felt in the theological academy. The shape and direction of this work is greatly indebted to him. I offer thanks to the series editors Sarah Coakley and Richard Cross, not least for accepting this volume to be included in the auspicious Changing Paradigms series, and to the personnel at OUP for their patience and counsel, especially Karen Raith, John Smallman, Samantha Downes, Sumintra Gaur, and Henry MacKeith (whose deft and swift copy-editing skills I greatly appreciated). The Community of St John the Baptist in Tolleshunt Knights, Essex has served as a longstanding wellspring of inspiration for all who come into contact with it. I wish to express my sincerest gratitude to the Community,

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particularly for granting me permission to reproduce the icon ‘Christ Almighty’ by the Community’s founder, Archimandrite Sophrony (Sakharov), for the cover. This study engages with, and is indebted to, the theology of Archimandrite Sophrony. It brings me special joy that during the final phase of the manuscript’s preparation the Ecumenical Patriarchate inscribed Archimandrite Sophrony into the calendar of saints of the Orthodox Church. The time is evidently ripe for his theology to be further studied and discussed. If my gratitude were to be offered whole and undivided, then it would belong wholly and undividedly to my greatly beloved and ever patient wife Eugenia. She read every version of every chapter with a keen yet kind eye. Her long-suffering clearly knows no bounds. I reserve the final note of thanks, however, for my parents, Andrew and Marie-Christiane. Without them, I daresay I would not know what Byzantine or Orthodox Christianity even is, let alone be studying it for a living. But more importantly, I would also not know what it looks like from within. Only when theology is sketched out in the living colours of human lives can it acquire real meaning. My parents, righteous and just, have given me such a portrait of living theology. Though I fail to live up to it, their example has remained from my youth as a constant guide and comfort to me. Thus, with much love, unfading gratitude, and deep reverence, I dedicate this work to them.

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Contents 1. Human perfection in Orthodox theological anthropology: Retrieving the Christological imperative

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2. Perpetual progress or eternal rest? Contemplating the eschaton in St Maximus the Confessor

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3. Perfection before our eyes: St Theodore the Studite on the humanity of Christ

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4. I am called by two names, human and divine: Dogma and deification in St Symeon the New Theologian

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5. The energy of deification and the person of Jesus Christ in St Gregory Palamas

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Conclusion Bibliography Scriptural Index Index of Names and Subjects

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1 Human perfection in Orthodox theological anthropology Retrieving the Christological imperative

By one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified. Hebrews 10:14 I should have been considering not so much the words used as their meaning. St Gregory the Theologian, Oration 31:24

Theological anthropology is a gift of Christology. While the hope of theological anthropology is divinely inscribed, via the image of God, in the heart of every human being, it is only truly revealed, known, and given in Christ. This is the guiding premise of the present volume, that from the perspective of Orthodox theology, to understand and expound the doctrine of the human being as fundamentally conditioned by the doctrine of God, one must do so in the first instance through careful attention to the doctrine of Christ as God Incarnate. It is only in and through the humanity of the Son of God that human beings both behold and partake, by the Holy Spirit, of their high calling to be perfect even as the Father is perfect. At root, theological anthropology is concerned with the question of the human ideal, an ideal uniquely to be found in and through the person of Jesus Christ. It is the contention of this study that several tendencies in modern Orthodox theology have risked unmooring their claims about anthropology from this primary Christological imperative, thereby leaving open the possibility of theological shipwreck. It is in the service of warding off this possibility that the present study has been written. As such, it is a call for a paradigm shift in the manner in which key areas of Orthodox theological anthropology are approached and examined on the scholarly plane. These interrelated areas are the following: (1) the concepts of personhood and communion; (2) the doctrine of deification (including its frequent

Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ. Alexis Torrance, Oxford University Press (2020). © Alexis Torrance. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198845294.001.0001

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association with the notion of epektasis or ‘perpetual progress’); and (3) the doctrine of divine energies. Each of these areas (alone or in combination) has become virtually definitive of contemporary Orthodox theological anthropology, encompassing the concerns of Vladimir Lossky, John Zizioulas, and Christos Yannaras, to name only a few pioneering figures. These themes are inescapable in modern Orthodox theology, which is widely known and celebrated for its richly Trinitarian focus on God as persons in communion; its vision of Christ as not only restoring humanity to its pre-fallen state, but raising it up beyond Eden to the heights of deification, a reality to which all are called by the uncreated power and energy of the Holy Spirit; and as well as this, its emphasis on the apophatic, the continuing mystery and ineffability of God who remains always transcendently ‘beyond’ and ‘above’ us in his essence, even when sharing with us his life. The themes of personhood and communion, deification, and the distinction between the essence and energy of God are not only to be found in modern Orthodox theology, having likewise each received broader systematic as well as historical treatment. Work in these areas has yielded exciting but sometimes conflicting results. Thus, in debates surrounding personhood, an impasse of sorts has been reached between the historian who simply does not see anything like a developed theological personalism in the sources (whereby the doctrine of the Trinity as persons in communion serves as a straightforward ‘model’ for anthropology and human relationships), and the systematician who insists it is there. Similarly, while the doctrine of human deification (or theosis) is upheld by all as a sine qua non of Orthodox theology, its precise meaning is diffusely and sometimes confusingly expressed, especially when it is tightly combined, with little discussion, with concepts of continual growth and development for all eternity. One cannot fault the casual or even seasoned observer from wondering how theosis is really ever reached if, in fact, it is inherently unattainable as such: in what way, from this perspective, is deification a ‘doctrine’ regarding human destiny? Should the doctrine, in order to be truer to its content, be re-named one of ‘perpetually deferred deification’? This is not to say that Orthodox theology must necessarily do away with one or the other (that is, theosis or epektasis), but it must at least treat the connection between the two as less than obvious and in need of far more careful attention than it has hitherto received. Finally, the doctrine of the distinction between God’s unknowable essence or nature and his knowable energy/energies (which includes within itself the ‘apophatic turn’ also characteristic of much modern Orthodox theology) is repeatedly and understandably championed as the Orthodox solution to the problems of human knowledge of and communion with God. But this is often done either in an unhelpfully acerbic anti-Western key and/or in a way that potentially

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reflects more a species of pantheism than any clearly Christian theological perspective.¹ These three areas are not, of course, the only concerns of modern Orthodox theology (one could add, for instance, the significance of Eucharistic ecclesiology), but they are nonetheless representative, and importantly they provide a summons to engage with the first principles and fundamental tenets of theological anthropology writ large. Thanks in particular to work in these areas, Orthodox theology has proved rich and influential in the Western theological academy over the course of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first, and this influence will doubtless continue. As alluded to, however, various levels of historical and theological debate and even confusion surrounding these areas have arisen, a state of affairs that calls for scholarly treatment and, it is argued, a fresh Christocentric paradigm.

1. METHOD

A defence of ‘neo-patristic synthesis’ The methodology most often associated with Orthodox theology is ‘neopatristic synthesis’, a term coined by a true titan of the modern Orthodox intellectual tradition, Georges Florovsky (1893–1979).² To Florovsky, the term implied a certain balance between the duty of paying close attention to the historical sources of the tradition combined with that of relating these sources creatively and afresh to the problems and concerns of each generation. He summarizes his understanding of this method in his ‘theological will’ as follows: I was led quite early to the idea of what I am calling now ‘the Neo-Patristic Synthesis’. It should be more than just a collection of Patristic sayings or statements. It must be a synthesis, a creative reassessment of those insights which were granted to the Holy Men of old. It must be Patristic, faithful to the spirit and vision of the Fathers, ad mentem Patrum. Yet, it must also be NeoPatristic, since it is to be addressed to the new age, with its own problems and queries.³

¹ Several theologians and scholars have spoken out about such dangers: see Zizioulas (2006), pp. 27–32 (on the danger of pantheistic interpretations of essence–energies theology), Plested (2012) (a work aimed precisely at combatting entrenched East–West dichotomies, including that surrounding the essence–energies distinction), and Ciraulo (2016). This issue is discussed in greater detail in Chapter 5. ² For an overview of the life and thought of Florovsky, see especially Blane (ed.) (1993) and Gavrilyuk (2014). ³ Blane (ed.) (1993), p. 154 (emphasis in original).

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In proposing the methodological paradigm of neo-patristic synthesis, Florovsky was mainly attempting to counter two perceived threats to Orthodox theology (and theology more broadly). The first was the risk of mere patristic ‘archaeology’, a mechanical parroting and repetition of the sources without sensitivity or care for the current context. The second threat was from a hypercontextualized theology that felt free to divest itself of (or at least modify) the dogmatic norms of Scripture and tradition in its conversation with the world, setting aside a sense of reverence for the testimony of the forbears of the Orthodox tradition, and questioning in this way any real sense of the inner, unbroken, and ‘organic’ continuity of the faith down the ages (often described by Florovksy in terms of the ‘mind’ or phronema of the Fathers). It is not without irony that despite Florovsky’s attempt at a delicate balance between the historical and the systematic concerns of theology, neo-patristic synthesis has become virtually synonymous for many contemporary Orthodox theologians with a form of patristic ‘excavation’ that uncovers or repeats the sources without genuinely informing or edifying the modern context. As Gallaher puts it: ‘a re-envisioning of neo-patristic synthesis is [ . . . ] certainly needed. As it stands, it is a blind alley from which there is no escape from a theology of repetition or, worse, the degeneration of Orthodox theology into patristic archaeology. Neo-patristic theology has become a theology of repetition’.⁴ Similarly, although Florovsky envisioned this ‘synthesis’ as showing a path forward in the ecumenical arena towards the substantial theological ‘reintegration’ of diverse Christian culture, it is commonly branded a fiercely and intrinsically anti-Western approach.⁵ A growing dissatisfaction with such alleged shortcomings in Florovsky’s programme and its heirs, combined with a strong revival of theological interest in Florovsky’s theological adversary Sergius Bulgakov (and other representatives of the Russian Religious Renaissance), has led several Orthodox theologians to push for new models and paradigms by which to conduct theological work, whether John Behr’s proposal of ‘symphony’ and patristic text as ‘icon’ or Aristotle Papanikolaou’s advocating of ‘the logic of divine–human communion’ to address contextual issues (such as political theology).⁶ There is clearly a desire among a growing ⁴ Gallaher (2011), p. 680. See also Valliere (2000), pp. 299–300 where the claim is made that Florovsky placed ‘tradition-based patristic Orthodoxy’ and ‘philosophical Orthodoxy’ in opposition, which would amount to a false dichotomy in Florovsky’s thought. ⁵ This is tied up with Florovsky’s appeal to ‘Christian Hellenism’ as an indispensable category for doing Christian theology. For more, see for instance Gallaher (2011) and Behr (2014). The issue of the alleged anti-Western thrust of neo-patristic synthesis (and of Florovsky’s thought in general) is impressively laid to rest by Baker (2013). ⁶ See Behr (2016) and Papanikolaou (2012). The metaphor of the symphony, harmony, or ‘polyphony’ of the fathers (with the possibility of melodic ‘counterpoints’) has become rather popular: together with Behr, see also Russell (2019), p. 17. As will become clearer in the following paragraphs, there is little reason why this metaphor needs to be pitted against the method of neopatristic synthesis. The latter, as articulated by Florovsky, is far from implying the quest for a

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contingent of Orthodox theologians to retire ‘neo-patristic synthesis’ as a method and move beyond it to something else.⁷ However, as Mathew Baker has argued, this desire often regrettably stems from a caricatured understanding of Florovsky’s approach rather than a deep or sustained engagement with its premises: ‘to speak now of passing beyond the neo-patristic synthesis misses the tragedy of this situation: the fact that Florovsky’s own very openended formulation of this hermeneutic has hardly yet come to be understood or appropriated’.⁸ Significant work on the intellectual context in which Florovsky formulated his concept of neo-patristic synthesis, and thus on the rich philosophical background to his thought, has recently been carried out by Paul Gavrilyuk.⁹ Whereas the popular narrative pits Florovsky against Russian religious philosophy (represented notably by Bulgakov, Pavel Florensky, Nicholas Berdyaev, and others), Gavrilyuk deftly shows that ‘Florovsky’s program [needs] to be understood as a theological option within the Renaissance, not merely as a theological alternative to the Renaissance’.¹⁰ Though this issue is seldom examined, Florovsky himself did recognize and openly discuss many of his intellectual influences (Eastern as well as Western), yet his self-presentation and legacy as a whole have nonetheless coalesced around a portrait of someone who was an ‘outsider’, a maverick battling the theological errors of Orthodox and non-Orthodox peers with the sword of patristic testimony. Gavrilyuk has done a great service in providing much needed nuance and qualification to this picture, amply demonstrating that as a thinker, Florovsky monolithic and univocal ‘homophony’ of the fathers. It strikes this author as more of a terminological than a substantive distinction, though both the terminology of seeking ‘synthesis’ as well as conceiving Church tradition as a polyphonic ‘musical score’ can certainly be pushed in awkward directions, whether through the Hegelian overtones of ‘synthesis’ language or through the possibility of overemphasizing ‘dissonance’, ‘counterpoint’, and stand-alone ‘movement’ language when discussing tradition as ‘symphony’. ⁷ Among the more well-known examples of this movement in Orthodox circles was a large international conference held in Volos, Greece in 2010 with the provocative title: ‘Neo-Patristic Synthesis or Post-Patristic Theology: Can Orthodox Theology be Contextual?’ The organizer’s aims are summarized in Kalaitzidis (2010). ⁸ Baker (2010), pp. 114–15. In his discussion of neo-patristic synthesis in Florovsky, Louth appears to conflate the broader theological method Florovsky envisages with the latter’s more specific understanding of how to approach Patrology or patristics as a scholarly discipline, an approach that combines the straightforward history of ancient Christian literature with the more philosophical history of doctrine (Dogmengeschichte). Florovsky would certainly understand such an approach to patristics as potentially contributing to neo-patristic synthesis, but not as defining the overall theological method itself. See Louth (2015), pp. 84–5. Elsewhere in Louth’s work, the broader concept of neo-patristic synthesis just outlined is tacitly recognized, as when he consciously associates the theological work of both Fr Dumitru Staniloae and St Justin Popović with the neo-patristic method: Louth (2015), pp. 132, 154, 158. The best analysis of Florovsky’s methodological paradigm of neo-patristic synthesis remains Williams’s contribution in Blane (ed.) (1993), pp. 287–329, but see also the discussion of the epistemological contours of neopatristic theology in Gavrilyuk (2017). ⁹ Gavrilyuk (2014). ¹⁰ Gavrilyuk (2014), p. 271.

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was not radically ‘above’, ‘beyond’, or ‘apart from’ his wider context. On the question of methodology, however, several points for consideration remain. When the relative flexibility and suppleness of Florovsky’s programme is borne in mind, the recent opposition to it by a number of Orthodox theologians becomes harder to explain. Florovsky himself could even hold up Soloviev, Bulgakov, Florensky, and Berdiaev as examples of his approach, not because of the results of their thought, but precisely due to their overall methodology and ‘aim’, which was ‘to show and to prove that a modern man can and must persist in his loyalty to the traditional faith and to the Church of the Fathers without compromising his freedom of thought and without betraying the needs or requests of the contemporary world’.¹¹ What his ‘neo-patristic synthesis’ attempts to capture in broad terms is the engagement with historical theology for the sake of, or at least with an eye to, systematic concerns: history in the service of life. True, the specificity of Florovsky’s own out-working of this method (especially via the category of Christian Hellenism) has been by turns critiqued and championed, but it ought to be possible to distinguish his method from his results, as Florovsky himself does in the case of his own ideological adversaries. It should be pointed out, moreover, that the many scholars who have inherited this method from Florovsky, whether directly or indirectly, cannot themselves be placed in one easy category in terms of their works’ results. Taking only some of Florovsky’s own students, who openly acknowledged their debt to him in this respect, we are faced with a range from Jaroslav Pelikan’s more historically focused (but theologically pertinent) enterprises,¹² to John Meyendorff ’s historical emphasis with its stronger systematic streak,¹³ to John Zizioulas’s more clearly ‘synthetic’ systematic theology,¹⁴ to John Romanides’ somewhat fundamentalist and hard-line stress on a monolithic (and anti-Western) patristic heritage.¹⁵ We have a spectrum, in other words, that takes in a large diversity of work, each of it written by a conscious heir of the neo-patristic method. Regardless of how the various (and sometimes conflicting) results of such work are assessed in each case, on the question of methodology this author would plead for restraint from those who assume it is a desirable or necessary task to ‘move on’ to something else. If by ‘move on’ is meant to adjust one’s terms for the neo-patristic method, such as shifting to ‘symphony’ rather than ‘synthesis’, then the disagreement could well prove terminological rather than ¹¹ Florovsky (1948), pp. 69–70. ¹² As, for instance, Pelikan (1995). Pelikan discusses his debt to Florovsky at length in Pelikan (1999). ¹³ See, for example, Meyendorff (1964). ¹⁴ See especially Zizioulas (1985, 2006). Zizioulas (1985), p. 26 is one example of many in which Zizioulas acknowledges his dependence on Florovsky. ¹⁵ Typified in his study of ‘ancestral sin’: Romanides (2002).

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substantial. But if what is meant is a jettisoning of the very need for a careful balance between close engagement with both the sources of the tradition and living systematic concerns in the service of the Church and the world, then it is difficult to see how any such new methodology could make a convincing case for being recognizably ‘Orthodox’. In the end, a basic respect for the quickening and guiding presence of the Holy Spirit in Scripture, in the experience of the saints, and in the living Body of Christ through history are not simply the ‘inventions’ of modern Orthodox fundamentalism; by extension, the appeal to these categories is not necessarily a frightened coping mechanism that betrays an inability to engage or embrace the contemporary context, even if in some cases it takes this form. The denial or substantial modification of these categories for the creation of Orthodox theology would be bound to prove the more perilous choice, whether this took place ‘from the right hand or the left’, signifying here a range of options from an outright fundamentalist ‘theology of repetition’ to wholesale alignment of Orthodox theology with the results of the historical-critical method applied to patristic texts, or through an easy setting aside of the Church’s vast and complex historical and theological witness in favour of timely statements à la mode that might well directly contradict almost all that has come before (and doubtless what will soon come after). The methodological approach of this study, then, strives for a measure of continuity with Florovsky’s paradigm of neo-patristic synthesis. In so doing, far from ignoring the recent critiques of this method, it has been argued that many of these critiques are more properly directed towards particular instantiations or results of the method’s application, and do not necessarily comprise substantive challenges to the underlying concerns Florovsky had in mind (namely, of relating the historical experience of the Church to the contemporary world through a creative act of engagement). I write primarily as a historical theologian, and thus if any aspect of Florovsky’s method is given priority, it is inevitably in the attempt to attend closely to the historical sources, without however losing sight of the larger issues at stake. It is an attempt, in other words, to abide patiently with each of the pivotal figures of the Byzantine theological tradition under discussion, giving them sufficient space and ‘room to breathe’. This entails neither chasing their use of one specific term (be it hypostasis, theosis, epektasis, energeia, and so on) nor rushing them into the service of a preconceived ‘synthesis’, but recognizing their fundamental relevance for the further realization of such a synthesis, one described by St Paul in terms of attaining ‘the unity of the faith’ (Eph 4:13). From a certain perspective, through these debates over methodology in Orthodox theology one can observe the broader and continuing tug-of-war between the disciplines of historical and systematic theology. Later in this chapter, the way this conflict has played out over the application of the concept of personhood to theological anthropology will be examined. This

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debate serves as a prime example of the opportunities as well as difficulties faced by Orthodox theology in terms of method and content. It likewise opens out onto the central question of this book: the understanding of human perfection in Byzantine theology. But before turning to this, now that methodology has been discussed a word is called for on the volume’s more specific approach to the question at hand, an approach centred on the Incarnate Christ.

Approaching Theological Anthropology: Christ as Cornerstone To ‘fitly frame’ (cf. Eph 2:1) and build up a viable Orthodox theological anthropology means to begin with, and never lose sight of, the living Cornerstone himself. This not only reflects the approach of the New Testament and the broader historical tradition, but it likewise has potential to serve as a measuring rod by which to gauge the successes, shortcomings, or failures of other less obviously Christocentric and/or more exploratory attempts to present a convincing theological anthropology. The three interrelated areas singled out at the opening of this chapter are of most concern to this study: the concepts of personhood and communion; of deification or theosis (often combined with ‘perpetual progress’ or epektasis); and the doctrine of divine energies. Each of these has proved vital for modern Orthodox theological anthropology and its attempts to articulate a certain vision of the human ideal and human perfection, yet each deserves more clarificatory work on the Christological underpinnings that, in the end, must form the basis and goal for any truly Christian approach to human vocation and destiny. This is especially so given that, as the following chapters will demonstrate, the major theological sources of the Byzantine tradition themselves see no other way to get at such themes apart from through Christ. To begin with Christ is not a novelty for Orthodox theology, but it is an approach that is nevertheless markedly set aside in a number of highly influential and even programmatic discussions of Orthodox thought, not least Lossky’s The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church and Zizioulas’s Being as Communion.¹⁶ This is not to say that a strong Christocentric element is missing from their work, but simply to highlight that the entry point in both cases is not explicitly Christ. In the case of Lossky, this disturbed his contemporary Florovsky, who generally praised the Mystical Theology as an excellent example of neo-patristic synthesis in action. In a review of the work, he writes: If one wants, as Lossky obviously does, to develop a system of ‘Christian philosophy’, which is identical with Christian Dogmatics, should he not begin with

¹⁶ Lossky (1957) and Zizioulas (1985).

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Christ? Strangely enough, it is not seldom contended that a ‘christological’ approach to theology is alien to the Eastern Orthodox mind. Historically speaking, it is simply untrue. Indeed, what warrant may a Christian theologian have to speak of God, except the fact that ‘the Only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father’ has declared the unfathomable mystery of the Divine Life? Would it not be proper, therefore, to begin with an opening chapter on the Incarnation and the Person of the Incarnate, instead of following a rather ‘philosophical’ order of thought: God, Creation, Created Being, and Imago Dei, etc., so as to arrive at Christology only in the middle of the road?¹⁷

A similar reticence about placing Christ at the beginning of systematic theological discussion can be found in Zizioulas, who begins Being as Communion with a meditation on the deeper questions of human existence, whose solutions are connected with the Trinitarian doctrine of God. A legitimate key concern for Zizioulas is to counter the scholastic tendency to treat of ‘God’ first and only then treat of the ‘Trinity’, as if the Trinity were an awkward appendage to the doctrine of God and not constitutive of that doctrine. This results in a daring Trinitarian focus for his theological anthropology that boldly justifies the need to relate the doctrine of God as Trinity (three persons in one nature) to anthropology (the human person called to perfect communion with God and neighbour). In a strident defence of his method, Zizioulas explicitly singles out the danger of ‘Christo-monism’ in theological endeavour that renders the Trinity ‘irrelevant’, lamenting ‘a tendency toward mysticism among many Christians that would [ . . . ] direct the soul toward a personal relationship with Jesus and especially His humanity, a kind of Christomonistic piety’.¹⁸ A similar charge is repeated in Communion and Otherness, where it is argued that ‘Christology [ . . . ] does not offer Christ to anthropology as a model for imitation, as an imitatio Christi, for this would be perhaps of an ethical but certainly not of an ontological significance to anthropology’.¹⁹ These misgivings about the imitation of Christ or imitatio Christi interestingly also echo Lossky’s sentiments, who saw a like danger, and similarly hoisted up the issue as another barrier between East and West.²⁰ While acknowledging the possibility of an extreme ‘Christo-monism’ that could reify the ‘human Jesus’ to Nestorian proportions and undermine the relevance of Trinitarian doctrine to anthropology, as well as the danger of positing Jesus Christ as mere moral exemplar without ontological import, one must also recognize the difficulty involved in denying the relevance to theological anthropology of a crucial concern (viz. to be imitators of Christ and his disciples) that is shot right through the New Testament itself. This suggestion that theological anthropology calls first and foremost for a Christ-oriented stance is not new. Among the most impressive recent studies ¹⁷ Florovsky (1958), p. 208. ¹⁹ Zizioulas (2006), p. 244.

¹⁸ Zizioulas (2010), p. 6. ²⁰ Lossky (1957), p. 215.

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of Orthodox anthropology are George Mantzaridis’s The Deification of Man, and Panayiotis Nellas’s Deification in Christ, both of which have a clear Christocentric focus.²¹ More directly, John Behr has repeatedly criticized modern Orthodox systematics as engaging in metaphysical speculation at the expense of the Christ of the Scriptures.²² He likewise sets out his own anthropological vision, to which we shall return in the concluding chapter. Unlike Behr, the present author is not disturbed by the spectre of metaphysics in the same way: while to begin Christian theology with metaphysics is certainly hazardous, the outright denial of metaphysical categories for the articulation of theology seems to be an affront to both early creedal Christianity and significant portions of the New Testament, not least the Gospel of John. To derive one’s theological anthropology from the ‘metaphysical’ doctrine of the Trinity is difficult to dismiss as fundamentally incorrect, and it has clearly yielded much fruit. That said, when the Trinity is deployed as a starting point for anthropology, bypassing or deferring Christology, such an enterprise is faced with two significant obstacles: first, the lack of direct, clear, and deeply developed precedents for this approach in the Scriptural, patristic, or Byzantine sources; and second, absent a thorough Christological orientation to anchor itself, such thinking is at risk of disintegrating into a sentimental application or projection of worldly and hazy concepts of personality and ‘community’ to both the Godhead and the people of God. We can certainly arrive at a robust and ontologically significant Trinitarian understanding of theological anthropology, but only via the revelation of Christ, the ‘knowledge of the Son of God’.²³

²¹ See Mantzaridis (1984) and Nellas (1987): the original Greek title of Nellas’ work is Ζώον θεούμενον (‘deified animal’), echoing a line from Gregory of Nazianzus’s Oration 38.11 (PG 36:324B). These works are discussed in Russell (2004), pp. 316–20; Christos Yannaras considers the former work by Mantzaridis, as Russell explains, a ‘turning point’ in twentieth-century Greek theology. See also Steenberg (2009) on ‘theology as anthropology’ in the early development of Christian theological discourse. ²² See Behr (2006), pp. 16, 173–4. ²³ This is not to say, then, that the results of the theology of Zizioulas (who on many counts has a robust Christocentric perspective) or others need be dismissed out of hand. It is rather to warn that if the innovative approach of deriving theological anthropology from Trinitarian doctrine is not engaged in cautiously and with an eye to the deeply Christocentric approach to these questions that characterizes the patristic and Byzantine tradition, the Trinitarian focus in theological anthropology can easily become a springboard to something rather foreign to the sources, being detached from its Christological bearings. Florovsky expressed similar sentiments in his correspondence with St Sophrony Sakharov in 1958, when he wrote: Personally, I believe that one should begin theology not from the mystery of the Holy Trinity, but from the mystery of the incarnation of God, which has a direct effect on the activity of the Church in the new life of the Christian. We only know of the mystery of the Trinity because ‘One of the Holy Trinity’ became man. Otherwise, we fall into metaphysics, and we will never reach theology at all. Sakharov (2020), Response 1, p. 49.

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The potential risk of losing sight of Christ via inventive Trinitarian anthropologies applies also to the other areas of concern to this study; deification (together with epektasis) and the doctrine of divine energies. We shall explore how this might be the case later in this chapter. The purpose here is to underscore the need for theological anthropology to be methodologically grounded in Christology: human perfection and human destiny are only revealed, known, and bequeathed in the person of Jesus Christ, the Godman. In particular, this study calls for a fuller and more sustained retrieval of the significance of the humanity of Christ as the ‘place of meeting’, as the only context in which theological anthropology from an Orthodox Christian perspective is even conceivable.

2. THE ROOTS AND CONTOURS OF MODERN ORTHODOX THEOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY Before embarking on a series of close readings of foundational figures of the Byzantine theological tradition on the matter of human perfection, a sketch should be made of how certain themes (personhood and deification in particular) have come to dominate modern Orthodox thinking on the question. There is, of course, the long view that sees the roots purely in the sources themselves, and this view should not be summarily dismissed out of hand. It is a view that does not, however, directly concern us here. In this section, what is of direct concern is the more immediate background and context for the emergence of and emphasis on these themes in modern Orthodox thought. This in turn will help to frame this study’s overall discussion and contribution to the question of theological anthropology. We begin with the question of personhood and personalism.

Orthodox theology of the person/hypostasis The articulation of a rich theology of personhood should rightly be considered among the crowning achievements of modern Orthodox systematic theology. It is not, certainly, an achievement attained in isolation from broader theological and philosophical currents, nor is its reception without controversy. Nevertheless, the ability of Orthodox personalist theology to capture critical theological and anthropological principles as enunciated in the biblical and patristic sources, conveying them in turn in an engaging and contemporary key, has proved resilient and widely popular as well as emblematic of what Orthodox theology stands for. This theology likewise has developed roots, as

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we shall see, with many of its core premises and themes firmly established through the interwar years of the 1920s and 1930s, with earlier precedents in the nineteenth century. For readers who may be less familiar with contemporary Orthodox personalist theology, before examining its background it would be worth fleshing out its core premises and themes, especially as they relate to the concept of human personhood and perfection. It should be borne in mind that this overall summary is not intended as a complete or exhaustive presentation, nor will it dwell on the distinguishing features of the various representatives of this kind of thinking (for example Lossky’s controlling sense of apophaticism and Zizioulas’s wariness of the ‘necessity’ of nature).²⁴ The torchbearers of this developed way of thinking in Orthodox theology are undoubtedly Lossky and especially Zizioulas,²⁵ although what follows also integrates elements from other representatives, such as St Sophrony Sakharov and Christos Yannaras.²⁶ What prompts much Orthodox personalist theology is the desire to relate dogma to life, doctrine to existence. In particular, the doctrine of the Holy Trinity as the Personal (that is, Tripersonal) Absolute, and the doctrine of Jesus Christ as the personal and saving God-man, are brought to bear on the meaning of human life and existence, as well as the meaning of ontology (the theory of being) as a whole. At its deepest level, to encounter the meaning of personhood is to confront the mystery of divine life itself and, by extension, of human life as created in God’s image and summoned to his likeness. God, in other words, is not ‘beyond’ the personal: personal existence could even be said to constitute the way God is; an existence or way of being that in turn is summed up by the revelation that ‘God is love’. At the same time, God is not circumscribed by the often impoverished understandings of ‘person’ (or, by extension, ‘love’) that obtain in the world. The tendency to conflate ‘person’ and ‘individual’, for instance, and ‘love’ with ‘self-love’, is fervently resisted in modern Orthodox personalist theology: as Triune, Three-in-One and One-inThree, God as Trinity reveals that primordial being is not personally isolated or ‘individualized’, but communal: divine being itself is understood ‘as communion’ (to paraphrase the title of Zizioulas’s famous work), a communion whose content is uncreated love. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit do not indicate ‘different beings’: the oneness of divine being (God’s consubstantiality) is rather constituted by the three persons or hypostases. One in nature or essence, the three persons or hypostases are distinguished through no category other than their relation one to the other (an insight of the Cappadocian

²⁴ For an in-depth study of the theology of Lossky and Zizioulas, including close attention to their differences, see Papanikolaou (2006). ²⁵ For Lossky’s most developed discussion of the concept of the person see Lossky (1974), and for Zizioulas see especially Zizioulas (1985, 2006). ²⁶ See for instance Sophrony (2004), pp. 190–220 and Yannaras (2007b, 2011).

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Fathers): the Father is pre-eternal ‘begetter’ or ‘cause’ (and is thereby the sole personal ‘source’ in the Godhead),²⁷ the Son is begotten of the Father, and the Spirit proceeds from the Father. In nature, essence, life, being, will, and every natural attribute, the Trinity is One, but that oneness coincides with tripersonal ‘otherness’. The otherness or irreducibility of each divine person is expressed not through diverse natural attributes or characteristics—the divine essence being one and undifferentiated—but through the category of relation just mentioned. Divine personhood, then, as somehow ‘containing’ the divine nature yet irreducible to it thus becomes a supreme ontological category for theological reflection. This mystery of the Trinitarian divine being as three and yet one cannot be fathomed with the mind and is to be reverenced, according to Lossky, as ‘primordial fact’²⁸ revealed through the Incarnation of the Son of God by the good pleasure of the Father and the descent of the Holy Spirit. But the mystical and ‘antinomic’ character of this revelation of the Triune God does not thereby definitively serve to cordon off God from the human being; it offers rather an ultimate revelation regarding the meaning and mystery of human life and human destiny, called to be ‘one, even as we are one’ (John 17:22). From this overall sketch that can be taken as a summary of the Orthodox personalist framework, several principles for pursuing theological anthropology ensue or are deduced by its representatives. These are emphasized to varying degrees depending on the theologian in question, and space forbids a detailed appraisal of each theologian in turn. For our purposes, what is of prime interest is the transposition of Trinitarian theological discussion into anthropological principles, since this is a procedure that has provoked much criticism. Once again, in an effort to introduce less familiar readers to the rudiments of Orthodox personalist theology under discussion in this section, allow me to summarize several of these anthropological principles gleaned from Trinitarian theology, which include but are not limited to: 1. Freedom must be considered a corollary of personhood. In order to be truly in loving communion with another, the person must be free. Love that is coercive, forced, or ‘necessitated’ is not true love, but a form of tyranny.²⁹ The person, then, is one who loves in freedom. This can ultimately only take place, however, through the divine freedom bestowed by Christ and in obedience to him, through ‘continuing in his word’ which brings about ‘knowledge of the truth’ and in turn ‘makes you free’ (cf. John 8:31–32). ²⁷ This is especially important in the theology of Zizioulas under the rubric of the monarchia of the Father: see Zizioulas (2006), pp. 113–54. ²⁸ For the term ‘primordial fact’, see Lossky (1957), p. 64. ²⁹ The freedom and necessity dialectic in modern Trinitarian Theology is richly explored in Gallaher (2016).

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Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology 2. The human ‘individual’ can be considered the enemy of the human ‘person’. Fulfilling the vocation to personhood patterned after the Tripersonal God involves the shedding of the ‘individual’ with its egotistical perspective in favour of the new birth into personal and relational existence afforded by and in the person of Christ. In humanity’s fallen state, a toxic individuality fundamentally conditions the human being: the healing of this state is given in baptism, chrismation, and the Eucharist, which introduce the selfenclosed human being into communion with the divine life, ‘enlarging’ the person to relate in love to God and neighbour. 3. Personhood is constituted through relation, a point connected to considering the concept of the ‘individual’ as the adversary of personhood. The person is inescapably relational, and ontology itself can be considered as inherently relational (a theory developed especially by Yannaras). This means that a personal I implies a personal Thou and a personal Us. This is a truth revealed in the doctrine of the Holy Trinity and applicable to the human being, but properly speaking only through the relationship of love with God and neighbour. Other forms of relationship still constitute the person or hypostasis, but negatively. To relate without love is a negation of personhood. 4. The person or hypostasis is irreducible to nature, which implies that natural attributes (including those normally associated with the ‘person’, such as rationality and even will) do not somehow combine to form a person. A person likewise does not ‘emerge’ from the combination of such natural properties. Again, the cue is taken from Trinitarian doctrine, in which the divine persons are irreducible to the divine nature: no divine natural attribute defines or distinguishes one person from another (there is one divine will, being, intellect, life), only their mutual hypostatic relations. This line of thinking is variously expressed, but it is sometimes applied to the human person or hypostasis in terms of ‘possessing’ his or her nature. It can be linked to the concept of universal human dignity, wherein the lack of one or other natural human property (including, for instance, a diminished rational faculty) cannot translate into a denial of that human being’s personhood, since the human person, while always connected to human nature and forever expressed through that nature, nonetheless remains intrinsically irreducible to human nature (with its properties or capacities) as someone inviolably and infinitely precious. While this approach need not be anti-substantialist in orientation (i.e. pitting person against nature), it is often critiqued for erring in that direction.³⁰

³⁰ For some further comments on this issue, see Torrance (2011); Larchet (2011), pp. 207–396; Zizioulas (2013).

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5. As irreducible to nature, human personhood is also often apophatically inflected as a mystery that cannot be compassed or comprehended merely with the tools of reason. It can only be truly known through communion with its Trinitarian personal source—that is, through deification. As an expression of the ‘image of God’, human personhood is an incomprehensible depth, sometimes even understood as God ‘repeating himself ’ with the gift of his own ineffable mode of life. However, to know and experience this ineffable mode of life willed by God for every human being concretely means to participate in its free distribution through the Church, the Body of Christ, as a disciple and follower of the God-man. Without Christ, in whom humanity is permanently united to divinity, that for which our personhood yearns—our innate thirst for authentic and eternal life—remains unfulfilled and unachievable. This is not an exhaustive list, but is presented merely to give a sense to readers of the general framework and approach of much contemporary Orthodox personalist thought represented by Lossky, Zizioulas, Sakharov, Yannaras, and others. As can be seen, there is a strong desire to connect Trinitarian and Christological dogma to human life, destiny, and perfection, something developed through emphasis on the image of God in humanity, the efficacy of the sacraments, and the keeping of Christ’s commandments. There is a presupposition that to fulfil one’s vocation as a human person or hypostasis is to be a deified human being: personhood and deification go hand in hand. Taken together, points (2), (3), and (4) regarding individuality, relation, and irreducibility to nature form an implicit or sometimes explicit critique of the Boethian formulation of the person as ‘an individual substance of a rational nature’, a definition that was to have a tremendous impact on Western thought. In that sense, Orthodox personalist theology can legitimately be understood as resistant to ‘substantialist’ (often viewed as ‘impersonalist’) readings of the human being: the category of personhood enjoys a measure of logical primacy vis-à-vis nature in a way not readily seen in the Boethian definition. The reader accustomed to a wider range of theological and philosophical sources of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries will doubtless recognize several terms and concerns that are present beyond the bounds of Orthodox theology. Moreover, the relationship between this personalist theology and the patristic and Byzantine sources of the Orthodox tradition is still a hotly contested topic, and will be touched on below in the section on John Zizioulas. First, however, some of the intellectual roots of the personalist concerns and ideas conveyed above need to be discussed.

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Personalism and Orthodox Theology The broad philosophical (and theological) movement in the West known as ‘personalism’ is difficult to pin down with any degree of real coherence as a thoroughgoing school of thought. As the name suggests, the concept of the person is generally given primacy among personalist thinkers as that which is of ultimate ontological value. The precise meaning of ‘person’, ‘personality’, or ‘personhood’, however, differs substantially among personalists, and only on occasion (even in the case of Christian personalists) do their definitions of the person coincide in a strong and recognizable manner with Orthodox thought. Although personalism is usually associated with either the so-called Boston school with Borden Parker Bowne (1847–1910) at its head, or the French School connected primarily with the names of Emmanuel Mounier (1905–50) and Jacques Maritain (1882–1973), its conceptual beginnings, on the philosophical level, reach back further. Recent work by Jan Olof Bengtsson has demonstrated that many of the chief themes and terminology that characterize twentieth-century personalism have their roots in earlier intellectual debates in continental Europe.³¹ In particular, the figures of F. H. Jacobi (1743–1819) and Friedrich Schelling (1775–1854) as well as the movement known as Speculative Theism (represented, for instance, by J. G. Fichte and H. Lotze), are upheld as the true architects of modern personalism. Needless to say, the Enlightenment ‘turn to the subject’ is seen as the larger canvas for these developments, as are the insights and debates surrounding Kantian and Hegelian philosophy. Immanuel Kant’s philosophy, in particular his ethical theory (tied to his ‘categorical imperative’) that called for each human being to be treated as an end in itself and never merely as a means (outlined in his Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals), helped introduce the concept of the intrinsic dignity of the human person in a new and highly influential way. On a theological level, however, the strong impetus for some form of ‘personalism’ arose from the pantheism controversy (1785–89), initiated by Jacobi in response to the thought of the seventeenth-century philosopher Baruch Spinoza, whose monistic theory of God and matter he saw as leading, in the final analysis, not simply to pantheism, but to pure materialism, atheism, and ‘nihilism’ (a term popularized by Jacobi). To this Jacobi opposed a theism that bore a number of ‘personalist’ marks. Several of these are worth highlighting. First, Jacobi summarizes his overall approach in terms that are strikingly similar to what we find in modern Orthodox theology: ‘My philosophy asks who is God, not what he is. All what belongs to nature’.³² The ³¹ Much of this section is indebted to Bengtsson’s work: see Bengtsson (2006). ³² Jacobi (1819), p. xxiv, cited in Bengtsson (2006), p. 140 (emphasis in original) (modified) (meaning here and henceforth that, having compared the translation and the original, I have slightly modified the translation).

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strong distinction between who and what (and the priority of who) is a leitmotif in the theology of, for example, Zizioulas and Sophrony Sakharov. Similarly, he narrows in on the Mosaic revelation of God as ‘I am that I am’ as key to affirming God as personal, and connects this to the human being, writing that ‘the I-ness of finite beings is only lent to them, taken from another; a broken ray of the transcendental light, which alone is the living one’.³³ Finally, Jacobi also introduces the I–Thou dialectic whereby the two become mutually co-dependent: ‘without Thou, the I is impossible’.³⁴ What Jacobi means by ‘Thou’ in this and other contexts is not necessarily, however, a personal ‘Thou’ and appears to apply to external things and objects as much as persons; one would have to wait until the 1920s for Martin Buber’s more developed theory of relational personalism, where I–Thou relationships are juxtaposed with the category of I–It. In Schelling, the elements of note coalesce around the positions of his later philosophy. His emphasis on the concept of freedom and the apophatic ‘dark foundation’ of personality³⁵ can be seen as a foreshadowing, to some extent, of themes in Orthodox personalism, and one must keep in mind that several key figures in the history of modern Orthodox thought (Solovyev, Florensky, and Bulgakov in particular) engaged deeply with the philosophy of Schelling.³⁶ The later Schelling’s resistance to any notion of the person dissolving or being swallowed up in God (a Hegelian threat) mirrors an important theme for the Orthodox personalists. However, although Schelling can speak of a form of deification (whereby ‘God must become man in order that man might be brought back to God’³⁷), his theology does not escape the notion of an unfolding development or process in God, which puts him at odds with the Orthodox personalism sketched above. As Bengtsson summarizes it, Schelling’s thought regarding divine personhood was clearly not the personalist understanding which agreed with traditional, orthodox theism in insisting on original transcendent completeness. It was a version of the emergent God of the esoteric tradition who—or rather, which— develops from an implicit Alpha to an explicit Omega: ‘as Alpha he is not what he is as Omega’.³⁸

The esoteric elements of Schelling and other proponents of German Idealism broadly construed were to have more than a passing impact on the thought of

³³ Jacobi (1825), p. 436, cited in Bengtsson (2006), p. 140. ³⁴ This issue of I–Thou in Jacobi is discussed at some length in Bengtsson (2006), pp. 205–12 (this citation of Jacobi at p. 205). See also the helpful discussion of Feuerbach’s use of the I–Thou dialectic in Patterson (2016), pp. 49–51 (emphasis in original). ³⁵ On which, see Bengtsson (2006), pp. 89–93. ³⁶ For a helpful discussion of the connections between German Idealism and the Russian Religious Renaissance, see Martin (2015). ³⁷ Cited in Bengtsson (2006), p. 145. ³⁸ Bengtsson (2006), p. 146, citing Schelling.

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Solovyev, as well as (though in a more ‘churched’ form), that of Bulgakov and Florensky. But on the whole, they are rejected by Orthodox personalist thought. At this point in the narrative, two figures ought to be inserted for their consonance with the ‘existentialist’ elements of Orthodox personalist thought, namely Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55) and Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821–81). The consonance of Kierkegaard’s thought with Orthodoxy is debatable, though it cannot be examined here in detail: his titular role as the first ‘existentialist philosopher’ places him, however, in a quasi-personalist lineage.³⁹ It would be difficult, though, to underestimate the role of Dostoevsky in the development of modern Orthodox theology as a whole. On the one hand is his unflinching literary presentation of the problems of evil, faith and doubt, human existence, and freedom exemplified by characters such as Kirillov in Demons (amply discussed by Zizioulas) and Ivan in Brothers Karamazov. On the other is Dostoevsky’s ‘solution’ to these problems in the figure of Father Zosima in the Brothers Karamazov, a preacher of the interconnectedness of all reality and the ‘power of humble love’ in imitation of the God-man Christ. On both fronts Dostoevsky was able to capture a large gamut of the concerns that were to drive Orthodox anthropology in the twentieth century. It is rare (perhaps impossible) to find a major Orthodox theologian of the twentieth century who does not directly engage with, or explicitly acknowledge a debt to, Dostoevsky. It must be remembered that Dostoevsky was, beyond his fictional works, engaged in the defence and popularization of Slavophile thought, which was itself another catalyst of personalist themes in Orthodoxy. Together with a strong nationalist and Romanticizing impulse that glorified the ancient and ‘simple’ ways of the Russian people and their village life (reminiscent, incidentally, of certain themes in Yannaras), Slavophiles such as Alexei Khomiakov (1804–60) and Ivan Kireevsky (1806–56) developed important theological and ecclesiological insights on the basis of their adherence to Orthodoxy. As Louth explains, while conversant in the Idealist philosophy of the day, and particularly the problem of the ‘one and the many’ that the later Schelling had worked on, the Slavophiles insisted that, contrary to the dominant currents of Idealism, ‘the reconciliation of the one and the many was rooted in God the Holy Trinity, in which unity and the manifold are already united’.⁴⁰ There is a tangible devotion in the Slavophiles (including Dostoevsky) to the patristic and Byzantine theological tradition as normative that helps set them apart as among the clearest forerunners of modern Orthodox thought. As Louth argues, a key stimulus to this state of affairs in the nineteenth century was the publication and dissemination of the Philokalia (first published in 1782), a ³⁹ For the relationship between Kierkegaard and Orthodox Christian thought, see the dissertation by Magnusson (2016). ⁴⁰ Louth (2015), p. 7.

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collection of mostly ascetic works of the patristic and Byzantine tradition whose Slavonic edition (begun long before the Greek edition’s publication) appeared in 1793. This work helped to orient Orthodox thought in a manner at least cognizant of, if not attuned to, a vital part of its theological heritage. Louth can thus justly speak of the Philokalia as a ‘watershed’ moment and ‘turning point’ for subsequent Orthodox theology.⁴¹ One of its great effects was to help ground Orthodoxy in its own tradition of lived theological reflection. While the effect of the Philokalia was significant and widely felt, it was not necessarily read or appropriated in an intellectual vacuum. The questions that dominated European culture were bound to play a role in its reception. Furthermore, when looking at the development of Orthodox personalist thought, the texts of the Philokalia may certainly provide a basic map for an Orthodox personalist understanding of the human being called to communion with the Triune God (with a strongly ascetic inflection), but on the level of philosophical terminology and structure, the influence of other currents of thought is evident. If, as we have seen, the various philosophical concerns and debates in the wake of Kant and Hegel helped set the scene for personalist thought, it is worth briefly turning to personalism proper as it took shape in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, drawing out some of the key commonalities and differences between it and modern Orthodox thought. The Boston school of personalism, best known for its influence on the thought of Martin Luther King Jr,⁴² grew most directly out of the German Speculative Theist movement represented by Hermann Lotze (1817–81). Lotze served as the doctoral advisor to Borden Parker Bowne (1847–1910), who in turn self-consciously headed the American philosophical school of personalism, with its base at Boston University. This form of personalism is fascinating but ultimately of only relative value for our purposes. Although it contained a serious theological element (many of its representatives were practising Methodists), it lacked any strong attachment to received doctrine, tracking as it did in a liberal direction. By ‘person’ was primarily meant the self-conscious individual, with God as the Supreme Personality (strictly in the singular). Although Albert Knudson (1873–1953), a key disciple of Bowne, could describe personalism as ‘par excellence the Christian philosophy of our day’, he clearly has in mind a form of Christianity that is radically altered from its doctrinal roots. Thus he admits that the doctrines of the Trinity, Incarnation, and Atonement ‘do not easily fit in the framework of our current personal idealism’, but while some might take this as a signal that such a personalism could be problematic, instead for Knudson ‘this may point to the need of reformulation of these doctrines rather than to any want of harmony

⁴¹ See Louth (2015), pp. 1–12.

⁴² On which see Burrow (2006), esp. pp. 69–87.

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between the personalistic philosophy and the essentials of the Christian faith’.⁴³ Such a reformulation involves positing a ‘modified modalism’ for the Trinity (i.e. God is not three persons, but only one),⁴⁴ and when it comes to Jesus Christ, we are presented with an unorthodox Christology thoroughly indebted to Friedrich Schleiermacher, in which ‘we are to think of Christ as a man in whom God was present in a unique manner and to a unique degree’ and ‘there emerged in Christ a unique and potent Godconsciousness in which God was both causally and consciously present and which expressed itself in qualities of mind and heart that have made him in the faith of the church the ideal man and perfect organ of divine revelation.’⁴⁵ In other words, while Jesus is thoroughly ‘inspired’ by God, so much so that he is ‘the ideal man’ and a/the locus of divine revelation, he is not himself strictly speaking God: Christ is not fundamentally or ‘personally’ divine according to the theology of the Boston school of personalism. When it comes to the importance of the category of relation between persons, Knudson can acknowledge the significance of ‘co-dependency’, but with an accent always falling on the ‘metaphysical separateness’ of persons.⁴⁶ In fact, the conception of personhood in the Boston school is so different from what one might expect, that when considering the doctrine of the Trinity, Knudson can speak of his personalist understanding of ‘threeness’ in God as much closer to a ‘psychological’ analogy than a ‘social’ one, where the oneness of God’s personality takes precedence over any threeness we might attribute to him.⁴⁷ This position is perhaps unsurprising given his modalist leanings, but Knudson’s explicit reserve regarding ‘social’ analogies applied to the Godhead is notable. From the perspective of Orthodox personalist thought, the Boston school comes across as more a brand of individualism than of personalism proper.⁴⁸

⁴³ Knudson (1927), p. 80. ⁴⁴ Schilling (1986), p. 91 uses the term ‘modified modalism’ to describe Knudson’s Trinitarian view. ⁴⁵ Knudson (1950), p. 148. ⁴⁶ Knudson (1927), pp. 331–2. ⁴⁷ Knudson (1927), p. 333. ⁴⁸ For a summary of the common tenets and rather loose dogmatic nature of this movement’s thought, consider the following ‘personalistic creed’ offered in an early issue of The Personalist, a philosophical journal begun by a member of the Boston school (Ralph Tyler Flewelling) at the University of Southern California (the journal became the Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, which is still in print). It was written by John A. W. Haas and won the journal’s ‘Personalistic Creed Contest’: I believe that the energy of the universe demands will as its solution. I believe that the order of the universe calls for intellect and purpose. I believe that the beauty of the universe implies supreme feeling. I believe that the moral implications of life indicate ultimate goodness. I believe that the progress of history points to final righteousness. I believe that a sound theory of education must posit universal human freedom. I believe that the best philosophy of religion ends in the axiom of God as Spirit and Love. I believe that all these claims are best united in a doctrine of personality, divine and human, individual and social. Haas (1922).

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There is likewise a British strand of personalism that developed somewhat independently (though from common German ancestry) and which bears many similarities to the Boston school. It is associated with the philosopher Andrew Seth Pringle-Pattison (1856–1931), whose Hegelianism and Personality from 1887 was highly influential in British philosophical circles. Special mention should be made of the Gifford Lectures on Natural Theology inaugurated in Scotland in 1888, of which Pringle-Pattison gave three sets in 1911–13 and 1921–3. Many of the early Gifford Lecturers might easily be classed as personalist or strongly influenced by personalist themes, despite the wide disparity among their respective views (among them, between 1898 and 1954: Josiah Royce, William James, Henri Bergson, Clement Charles Julian Webb, Gabriel Marcel, Michael Polanyi, and John Macmurray). In the case of Pringle-Pattison, who is representative of the early British strand of personalism, we are faced in theological terms with something rather similar to the views of Bowne and Knudson. Thus he can declare that the generation of the Son by the Father ‘is plainly a figure of speech’, and the Trinity itself is not ‘a suprarational mystery’ but ‘the most intelligible attempt to express the indwelling of God in man’.⁴⁹ Two exceptions to the rule of a dogmatic ‘flattening’ among the American and British personalists are J. R. Illingworth (1848–1915) and C. C. J. Webb (1865–1954), who both insisted on conforming their personalist vision to received ecclesiastical doctrine (Illingworth was an Anglican clergyman associated with the Oxford movement). In particular, this opened onto a more clearly relational concept of the person as someone ‘essentially and constitutionally social’ who ‘can only grow and develop through relationship to other persons, to whom he is bound by the mutual interchange of sympathy and service’.⁵⁰ Interestingly, together with Illingworth’s emphasis on the expected themes of freedom, the Personal Absolute, and the person as ‘mystery’,⁵¹ he goes further than many of his contemporaries in explicitly seeing the personal conception of the human being as at fundamental odds with Vedantic spirituality (something likewise strongly held among the Orthodox by Sakharov). Illingworth writes: The Christian conception of the divine immanence in man is the extreme opposite of the Vedantic identification of the inmost self with God. Man at the centre of his being is not God, but is capable of receiving God (capax deitatis), while, as the result of that reception, his own individuality, his own ‘peculiar difference’ is not pantheistically obliterated, but divinely intensified.⁵² ⁴⁹ Pringle-Pattison (1920), pp. 313, 410. His views are discussed further in Bengtsson (2006), pp. 178–91. ⁵⁰ Illingworth (1915), p. 191. ⁵¹ Illingworth’s best known work on the issue of personhood, Personality: Human and Divine, is the published version of his University of Oxford Bampton Lectures for 1894: Illingworth (1902). ⁵² Illingworth (1911), pp. 17–18.

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Of all the personalists or proto-personalists we have thus far encountered from outside the Orthodox sphere, Illingworth is perhaps the closest in sensibility to Orthodox personalist thought. The personalist thinkers, however, who were to have a more direct impact on Orthodoxy were those that emerged on the European continent. The French philosopher Charles Renouvier (1815–1903) proposed a personalist system in his Le Personnalissme (1903) that emphasized in a new way the constituent role of the category of relation for the concept of the person and the role of freedom. Georges Florovsky engaged directly with the thought of Renouvier, though he disagreed with his non-Christian theism which Florovsky saw as ultimately impersonal rather than personal.⁵³ Florovsky’s interest in Renouvier (and the same can be said of his interest in the quasi-personalist thinker Henri Bergson) was primarily tied not to his ‘personalism’ per se, but to his insistence on the free and non-deterministic nature of human history, which is nevertheless a corollary to the notion of the human person as a free agent. After Renouvier, as we come to the years following the Russian Revolution and the expulsion of many Russian intellectuals during the interwar years, we are faced with figures who not only influenced Orthodox thought, but were themselves in varying degrees of dialogue with Russian émigrés thinkers. Thus Martin Buber (1878–1965), famous for his personalist work I and Thou first published in 1923, knew and interacted with the Russian émigré Lev Shestov (1866–1938) (who, although not Orthodox himself, had married an Orthodox, was conversant in Orthodox theology, and was intimately connected with the Orthodox intelligentsia in Paris). There were likewise Russian émigrés connections with the philosopher Max Scheler (1874–1928), whose thought proved influential on the personalism of Karol Wojtyła (later Pope John Paul II).⁵⁴ Shestov himself was the proponent of a form of existentialist personalism, as were many of the Russian émigrés thinkers. Another earlier Russian personalist of note is Lev Karsavin (1882–1952), a teacher of Vladimir Lossky (and friend of his father the philosopher Nikolai Lossky). Karsavin’s On Personhood appeared in 1928, and though his personalism is somewhat sui generis, its proposals of ‘symphonic personhood’ and its frequent appeal to Orthodox dogmatic theology for support and insight are significant.⁵⁵ Best known of this group of Russian personalists, however, is Nikolai Berdyaev (1874–1948), whose thoroughgoing philosophical personalism was at once engaged with the Western intellectual ⁵³ In 1928, Florovsky devoted a review article to the thought of Renouvier in the pages of the Russian interwar journal Put (The Way), discussed in Williams (1993), pp. 291–2. ⁵⁴ On the interaction of Shestov and other émigrés personalist thinkers such as S. L. Frank and N. Berdyaev with Buber, Scheler, and others, see Arjakovsky (2015), pp. 60–1, 335–6, etc. For a discussion of the personalism of Wojtyła/John Paul II, especially as expressed in his work Person and Act, see Acosta and Reimers (2016). ⁵⁵ For a detailed study of the life and thought of Karsavin, see Rubin (2013).

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context, inspired by themes in Orthodox theology, and highly influential in Western circles in its own right.⁵⁶ The relationship between Berdyaev’s personalism and Orthodox theology is rather complex, and cannot be given the attention it deserves here. Like the personalism of the French Roman Catholic Emmanuel Mounier (1905–50), with whom Berdyaev collaborated, the emphasis tended toward a certain political vision of ‘personalist socialism’ that was at odds with the perceived maladies of both bourgeois consumerist capitalism (which led to individualism) and totalitarian regimes such as national socialism or Soviet communism (which subjugated the intrinsic dignity of human person to the larger social ‘collective’).⁵⁷ The political theories emerging from personalism are important. Broadly speaking they constituted a ‘third way’ between the extremes of capitalism and communism which prioritized the person as irreducible to political superstructures yet only fulfilled in positive relation to other persons in a societal setting. Needless to say, such theories still have much relevance and potential for contemporary political theory. Our focus here, however, is the more strictly theological rather than the political. In terms of his theology, Berdyaev is consciously in tension with his received Orthodox tradition. This is clear, for instance, in his developed and positive appropriation of the theosophical ideas of Jakob Böhme (1575–1624) whom Berdyaev may have initially encountered through the work of Schelling. In one of his direct studies of Böhme, as well as in his work The Meaning of the Creative Act, Berdyaev elaborates a unique anthropology under the rubric of the ‘Christology of man’ according to which the human being, through his creative (especially cultural and religious) activity, is called to realize ‘another sphere of living’, which will constitute a future ‘anthropological revelation, an unveiling of the Christology of man’.⁵⁸ This new age is a ‘third revelation’ in Berdyaev and one with little to no room for the Church, which as ‘institution’ already comes under the ban of Berdyaev’s system. For a theological personalism that is more recognizably Orthodox, one must turn to other figures active in the interwar years and beyond.

Forging the rudiments of an Orthodox theological personalism What has been outlined in the previous section in sketch form is a series of intellectual currents from the late eighteenth to the early twentieth century ⁵⁶ For a helpful overview of the life and thought of Berdyaev, see Louth (2015), pp. 60–76. ⁵⁷ See, for instance, Berdyaev (1955) and the discussion in Arjakovsky (2015), pp. 402–6. Another important figure for the question of political personalism is Alexandre Marc (1904–2000), a proponent of personalist federalism (a key idea in the political development of post-1945 Europe): see Hellman (2002). ⁵⁸ Berdyaev (1955), pp. 103, 107; note that this work was originally published in 1914.

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that coalesce around themes and concerns that can broadly be understood as ‘personalist’, even if, as should be clear, none can straightforwardly be seen as the direct source of modern Orthodox personalist theology. The Slavophiles (including their association with the ‘Philokalic’ movement) and especially Dostoevsky have perhaps the strongest ‘ancestral claim’ on modern Orthodox personalism, but even this should not be overstated. In this section, those who more properly instigate the developed concept of the human person as microtheos in the image and likeness of the Tripersonal God will be looked at, beginning with the controversial theologian Sergius Bulgakov (1871–1944). Interest in the person and work of Bulgakov has experienced a resurgence of late.⁵⁹ A powerful and creative theologian, he courted much controversy during his lifetime. Regardless of where one stands on the particularities of his thought, the themes that preoccupied him and the manner in which he approached them had a profound impact on the shape of subsequent Orthodox theology, among both his defenders and detractors. An important theme in Bulgakov’s thought is that of personhood and hypostasis, already a matter of significant reflection in his 1917 work The Unfading Light. In 1925 he published the text Hypostasis and Hypostaticity that emphasizes among others the themes of tri-personal or tri-hypostatic communion and mutual, selfgiving love as constitutive of divine life: ‘Unihypostatic Absolute, possessing itself and everything unconditionally, would be not only a contradiction in adiecto, but also an expression of metaphysical egoism, absolute limitedness, Satanism’.⁶⁰ We have here the stark contrast perceived by Bulgakov between theological individualism and true personalism. It is a contrast that carries over directly into his conception of the human being made in the image of God and summoned to deification. The emphasis on the concepts of ‘hypostasis’ and ‘deification’ as indicative (if not explanatory) terms for an Orthodox approach to human perfection is a phenomenon that really begins in earnest, in the modern period, with Bulgakov’s theology. It must be said, however, that despite the richness of his personalist thought, one cannot disentangle Bulgakov’s own understanding of these terms from his overarching and much debated system of sophiology. This sophiology, or theory of Wisdom, is an all-encompassing theory for Bulgakov. One of its purposes is to work out a pre-existing ground for communion between God and the world, a foundational and unbroken link between the earthly and the heavenly in which all things cohere. Even his Christology is conditioned by this theory of Wisdom as a principle (distinct from the person of the Son) that

⁵⁹ For two recent and helpful overviews of Bulgakov’s life and thought, see Louth (2015), pp. 42–59 and Slesinski (2017). One could also add Pavel Florensky (and many others) to this discussion, but our space is limited. Vladimir Solovyev, who has yet to be discussed, will briefly emerge in the section on deification below. ⁶⁰ Bulgakov (2005), p. 19.

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somehow precedes and gives the original potential, possibility, and even meaning to the Incarnation. As he writes, ‘Wisdom, divine and created, is the principle which unites God with the world. It is also that particular principle in Godmanhood, which in itself postulates the Incarnation, not only as a means of Redemption, but also of the deification of the creature’.⁶¹ We shall return briefly to this line of thought in the section ‘Deification as a Christocentric doctrine’ below, but suffice to say here that despite its admirers, Bulgakov’s sophiological framework yields insurmountable difficulties for the main patristic and Byzantine understandings of Christ and the God–world relationship. As Lev Gillet (known also under the pseudonym ‘a monk of the Eastern Church’) maintained already in 1936, Bulgakov seems to have displaced the centre of gravity in Christian theology (including Christian anthropology) from Christ to Sophia.⁶² It could be added that, ironically, Bulgakov’s ‘Christian personalism’ tends to prioritize the principle of personhood (which is ultimately Sophia) over the person itself (including the person of Christ). As stated, Bulgakov’s influence is hard to underestimate. Lossky was among his fiercest and most vocal theological critics, writing in 1936 that his theology ‘confuses nature and person’.⁶³ Yet Lossky’s own interest in developing a theology of the person, with its emphasis on ‘antinomy’ and the apophatic, is difficult to detach entirely from Bulgakov’s project. In the thought of St Sophrony Sakharov (1896–1993), who had Bulgakov as a teacher and confessor before departing for the monastic life on Mount Athos in 1925, we find an array of terminological and conceptual similarities with Bulgakov, even if divested of the larger sophiological framework and given a strongly ascetic inflection.⁶⁴ Florovsky too, although eventually a leader of sorts in the resistance to Bulgakov’s sophiology, nevertheless was highly conditioned by the questions and concerns driving Bulgakov: when the two professors were teaching at the St Sergius Institute in Paris at the same time, Florovsky (without naming Bulgakov) would consciously teach his students ‘the other side’ of the same topics, based on close reading of the patristic sources.⁶⁵ The personalism of Florovsky is not highly developed, but is nevertheless unmistakably present.⁶⁶ It is Florovsky who is the first Orthodox to insist clearly (in the vein of his student Zizioulas) that ‘the classical world did not know the mystery of personal being’, something that only the Christian

⁶¹ Bulgakov (2005), p. 44. ⁶² Gillet (1936), briefly discussed in Arjakovsky (2015), p. 400. ⁶³ Cited in Arjakovsky (2015), p. 387. ⁶⁴ The consonances and dissonances between Sakharov and Bulgakov are discussed throughout the important study by N. Sakharov (2002). ⁶⁵ See, for instance, Florovsky’s reminiscences of the debate over Sophiology and his time with Bulgakov in Blane (ed.) (1993), p. 66. ⁶⁶ On which, see Gavrilyuk (2014), pp. 80–4.

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revelation could disclose.⁶⁷ In an article on St Gregory Palamas, he likewise states in conclusion that ‘if there is any room for Christian metaphysics at all, it must be a metaphysics of persons’, as opposed to a ‘Greek impersonalist metaphysics’, in tacit tension with the potentially misleading category, as he sees it, of ‘existentialist theology’ that John Meyendorff was already applying to Palamas’s thought.⁶⁸ He is likewise an important bridging figure, having directly known, corresponded, and/or collaborated closely not only with Lossky, Sakharov, Meyendorff, Zizioulas, and many other leading Orthodox theologians, but also with those of other confessions, including Karl Barth and the Thomist personalist Jacques Maritain.⁶⁹ Before turning to some of the contemporary debate regarding Orthodox personalist thought, the Serbian St Justin Popović (1894–1979) should be mentioned. A disciple of St Nikolai Velimirović (1881–1956), Popović is known mainly, if at all, for his unflinching stance against ecumenism and his vocal critiques of Western forms of Christianity.⁷⁰ But his thought likewise contains a sustained interest in personhood, visible already in his doctoral thesis completed in Athens in 1925/6 entitled Person and Knowledge according to St Macarius of Egypt. In his conclusion, Popović sums up his findings as follows: ‘the ascetical and psychological analysis that St Macarius makes of the human person causes him to show that the God-man, Christ, is the indispensable Person for man’.⁷¹ Popović is insistent on this Christ-centred perspective: ‘the human person is fundamentally theocentric and Christocentric, and can only find its meaning and fullness through union with our Saviour, the God-man, Christ’.⁷² This early work finds strong resonances throughout Popović’s oeuvre, in which the God-man serves as the methodological and hermeneutical core for his approach. In a paper delivered at his installation as Chair of Dogmatics in Belgrade in 1934, Popović expounds on Christ the God-man as ‘the supreme value and ultimate criterion’. He clearly stood by this text, since he included it as the final piece in the last volume of his Dogmatics published shortly before

⁶⁷ Florovsky (1987–9), vol. 7 (Eastern Fathers of the Fourth Century), p. 32 (emphasis in original). ⁶⁸ Florovsky (1959), p. 176. ⁶⁹ On Florovsky and Barth, see Baker (2015); on the connection with Maritain, see Blane (ed.) (1993), pp. 54–6. ⁷⁰ For more on the life and thought of Popović, see Louth (2015), pp. 143–58 and especially Le Caro (2018). In the case of Velimirović, we find an explicit endorsement of ‘personalism’ as a way of approaching Orthodox theology (specifically its doctrine of causality). He writes: ‘our religious mysticism is nothing misty, nothing nebulous, nothing obscure or mystified. It is our clear and perennial doctrine of causality. If we have to call this doctrine by an ism, we may call it personalism’: Velimirović (1953), p. 396. ⁷¹ Popovitch [sic] (1998), p. 107. ⁷² Popovitch (1998), p. 107.

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his death.⁷³ Notably, the only contemporary Orthodox theologian he cites in this paper is Florovsky, whose article ‘The Father’s House’ (1925) he had already translated into Serbian by 1926. In it, Popović defends a strong view of man in the image of God as containing both ‘an ontological and a teleological significance’, an innate potential in humanity for divine likeness together with its fulfilment in and through Christ. Thus ‘nothing is more human than Jesus Christ’, who reveals absolute divine and human perfection in his theanthropic person.⁷⁴ Abiding in Christ, specifically in his Ecclesial Body, is thus the key to becoming truly human, to becoming ‘divino-humanized’. In this process, while the human being is ‘expanded, engulfed in the divine infinitude, he does not, however, lose his human identity, his personality, nor his character, but remains man: a perfect man, human and divine’, human by nature, divine by grace.⁷⁵ As he puts it, ‘in a word, the member of the Church becomes divinely human in the fullness of his human personality’ because he is joined to the ‘theanthropic personality’ of Christ.⁷⁶ To insist on a thoroughgoing Christocentric approach to the question of the human person and human perfection in Orthodox systematic theology, then, is not a novelty of this author’s invention, but was already being articulated with depth and insight in the early decades of the twentieth century.

John Zizioulas and the debate over hypostasis We have seen how Orthodox thought, especially but not exclusively in the interwar years, tended to pay special attention to the concept of the person (or hypostasis) as a key to theology and anthropology, even if the results were rather diverse. This mirrors, in important ways, developments in Roman Catholic theology, especially under the influence of the ressourcement movement (‘Nouvelle Théologie’) and its clarion call to return to the patristic sources of the Christian tradition.⁷⁷ In the latter part of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first, the most important representative of Orthodox personalist thought is undoubtedly the Greek Orthodox Metropolitan John Zizioulas (1931–). This is not the place to engage in an in-depth reading of Zizioulas’s work and achievements; several of the contours of his approach to personhood have been outlined above. What deserves attention for our purposes is the controversy that has arisen over Zizioulas’s repeated assertion that the meaning of person or ‘hypostasis’ as he conceives it is present in the patristic ⁷³ See the comments by his French translator J.-L. Palierne in Popovitch [sic] (1997), p. 457. An English translation of this text can be found in Popovich [sic] (1994), pp. 65–95. ⁷⁴ Popovich (1994), p. 72. ⁷⁵ Popovich (1994), p. 73. ⁷⁶ Popovich (1994), p. 82. ⁷⁷ Two classic summaries, from the Catholic perspective, of the theological ‘awakening’ to the deep meaning of the concept of the person are provided by Ratzinger (1990) and von Balthasar (1986). For further analysis, see Patterson (2016).

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sources, especially the Cappadocian Fathers, something that has in turn drawn the ire of historical theologians in particular.⁷⁸ It is an important debate as it touches on fundamental questions of methodology as well as content. Among the first and also most balanced critiques of Zizioulas’s claims is that of the Belgian Franciscan André de Halleux (1929–1994). In his article ‘Personnalisme ou essentialisme trinitaire chez les Pères cappadociens? Une mauvaise controverse’, de Halleux pleads for restraint from both sides, neither condemning Zizioulas’s theological personalism outright, nor endorsing its claims. One of de Halleux’s main concerns is to show that interest in the Trinitarian nature of God is not as foreign to the Latin West as Zizioulas would lead his readers to believe, nor is there an absence of positive interest in the theology of God’s transcendent ‘essence’ or ‘substance’ in the East. De Halleux can even compliment Zizioulas’s vision as a ‘theological synthesis that integrates the Greek patristic tradition with contemporary aspiration remarkably well’.⁷⁹ Such a charitable assessment of Zizioulas’s method and results is not shared by, for instance, Lucian Turcescu or Jean-Claude Larchet: the former calls Zizioulas’s thought a straightforward and abusive ‘foisting’ of modern categories onto patristic texts, and one comes away from Larchet with the impression that he sees the thought of Zizioulas (and Yannaras) as the new fount of all heresies.⁸⁰ Despite a measure of sympathy with his aims, de Halleux’s major objections to Zizioulas include the argument that in the Cappadocian Fathers the category of koinoinia of ‘communion’ applies to the divine nature rather than ‘the dialogical, interpersonal relations’.⁸¹ He likewise asserts that, given that the philosophy of ‘the intersubjectivity of the person’ is so recent, there is ‘a great risk of anachronism in reading into the patristic concept [of hypostasis] the formal expression of the existential values of freedom and love’.⁸² He nevertheless concludes by conceding that the thought of the Cappadocian Fathers ‘implies a theology of the person distinct from the essence and that Cappadocian ontology can in this manner serve as a foundation for the Christian personalism of today’.⁸³

⁷⁸ For examples of this reaction, see de Halleux (1986ab); Ayres (2003); Turcescu (2003); Loudovikos (2011); Casiday (2014), pp. 143–55; and Anatolios (2014); see also Papanikolaou (2004); Russell (2006); Torrance (2011); Larchet (2011), pp. 207–396; and Koutloumousianos (2015). ⁷⁹ De Halleux (1986a), p. 135. ⁸⁰ Turcescu (2003), p. 98, and Larchet (2011), pp. 207–396, for instance the closing line: The personalist and existentialist presuppositions of Yannaras and Zizioulas, expressed in a systematic manner with a small number of key concepts and formulations or entrenched antinomies, gives place to a complete reinterpretation of Trinitarian theology, Christology, anthropology, ecclesiology and Orthodox spirituality which considerably distorts their meaning and reveals itself to be profoundly reductive [p. 396]. ⁸¹ De Halleux (1986b), p. 289. ⁸² De Halleux (1986b), p. 290. ⁸³ De Halleux (1986b), p. 291.

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Many of Zizioulas’s critics do not tend to concede territory in this way. One reason for this appears to be methodological. While de Halleux can uphold Zizioulas’s overall method (which is self-consciously that of Florovsky’s neopatristic synthesis) without endorsing all his findings, most of Zizioulas’s detractors do not. Among the recurring critiques levelled at Zizioulas (as well as the theology his thought represents) is that the sources have been irretrievably distorted through the application of modern terms, questions, and concepts, resulting in what Behr characterizes as an ‘odd mixture of metaphysics and mythology’.⁸⁴ Zizioulas in turn has countered on questions of both method and content. In terms of method, in a spirited defence of his approach directed at two Greek colleagues critical of his work, Zizioulas insists on the existential relevance of dogma, and how the question should not be whether the old can be interpreted in new ways, but whether or not there is an essential faithfulness in each case.⁸⁵ What is particularly interesting about this article is that Zizioulas openly compares and contrasts his thought with a number of personalists.⁸⁶ Thus he distances himself from what he sees as the purely ‘sociological’ dimension of the French personalists Maritain and Mounier, and argues that Berdyaev, Buber, and Gabriel Marcel all make communion or commonality (like the ‘sobornost’ of the Slavophiles) ontologically prior to the person, something he rejects. Kierkegaard and existentialism as a whole are praised for emphasizing the significance of freedom, but prove fruitless when attempting to reconcile ‘the one and the many’. He writes that ‘person and essence are not in conflict, as in the personalism of existentialism, and for this reason freedom is a positive and affirmative stance; in other words, it is identified with love’.⁸⁷ What Zizioulas tries to emphasize is that through Christ we are irreversibly confronted with the truth of the personal God and that ‘from the moment this theological reality of the person is revealed before our eyes, theology has not only a right but a duty to place any philosophical concept of the person under the light and the control of this concept’, and again, ‘theology is now called on to influence philosophy, and this is precisely what our humble efforts are attempting to do’.⁸⁸ The evangelical impulse of the argument is notable, namely to place human thought and culture at the feet of revealed theology, something which again ties him back to the methodology proposed by Florovsky. ⁸⁴ See Behr (2006), pp. 16, 173–4. For milder criticism, see Ludlow (2007), pp. 52–68. ⁸⁵ Zizioulas (2010), pp. 17–40. ⁸⁶ Interestingly, among the Orthodox thinkers he commends in this article is John Romanides (who is often seen as an ideological opponent of Zizioulas) for his stress on God’s revelation as supremely personal, from person to persons: Zizioulas (2010), p. 32. ⁸⁷ Zizioulas (2010), p. 22 (emphasis in original). In a more recent article he further clarifies his position, stating that ‘in Christ it has been shown that freedom is not freedom from (nature and the Other) but freedom for. It is identical to love’: Zizioulas (2013), p. 105. ⁸⁸ Zizioulas (2010), p. 39 (emphasis in original).

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On the level of content, two overall ‘weaknesses’ in Zizioulas’s personalist vision have repeatedly been highlighted. The first has to do with the negative concept of human nature as signifying ‘necessity’ and thus something from which the person needs to be ‘freed’. As I have argued elsewhere, when the terms ‘nature’ and ‘person’ are understood in the sense of the Pauline ‘flesh’ and ‘spirit’, much of the perceived problem evaporates.⁸⁹ Zizioulas himself has also clarified his understanding of the concept of nature in a more positive light, even if the discussion needs to be continued.⁹⁰ The second overall weakness attributed to Zizioulas’s personalism is tied to the sheer weight he gives to the term hypostasis in the Greek patristic tradition, especially over against the term atomon or ‘individual’. While acknowledging the occasional theological equation of the two terms in some authors (such as St John of Damascus applying atomon to the persons of the Trinity), Zizioulas nevertheless doubles down on this issue, stating that non-conciliar uses of the term atomon for person or hypostasis cannot be taken as normative.⁹¹ This stubbornness opens Zizioulas further to the charge of anachronism, of investing terms (in this case hypostasis and atomon) with meanings that they had at best only sometimes and certainly not always or consistently in the sources.⁹² As we shall see in Chapter 3 on St Theodore the Studite, the concept of the individual or atomon, and specifically of being a human being ἐν ἀτόμῳ (‘in an individual manner’), is given an important positive and constructive theological role that is hard summarily to dismiss. The terminological question has, I would argue, brought much of the debate regarding the meaning of personhood in patristic and Byzantine sources to an unfortunate impasse. While the historical theologian can happily demolish any number of claims by systematic theologians regarding the meaning of hypostasis in the sources, few if any positive alternatives are offered beyond this process of deconstruction. Clearly what Zizioulas and others are proposing is a particular vision of the human ideal, of human perfection, based on their reading of several sources of the Orthodox tradition in a modern philosophical key. These readings are heavily embedded in wider intellectual currents and developments that, in terms of their personalism, have just been outlined. Real historical issues notwithstanding, I would contend that there is an urgent need to shift such debates away from fiery disagreements over terms towards questions of underlying meaning, to the fundamental issues at stake, which are inescapably issues of theological anthropology. In the case of this present study, the intention is to offer neither a wholesale vindication nor condemnation of the particular approach and conclusions evidenced, for ⁸⁹ See Torrance (2011), p. 703. ⁹⁰ See Zizioulas (2013). ⁹¹ Zizioulas (2006), p. 175. ⁹² For a rather thorough analysis of Maximus’s use of the terms hypostasis, prosopon, and atomon (often synonymously), see Larchet (2018).

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instance, in the work of Zizioulas. But it does seem reasonable to suggest that instead of historical theologians throwing up their arms at the entirety of Zizioulas’s thought, whether in despair, anger, or disbelief, it would be far more productive to revisit the sources more carefully and more widely from the perspective of the theme of human perfection in Christ, which is after all the underlying and driving theme of much modern Orthodox personalist thought, including that of Zizioulas.⁹³ As will be argued further in the next section and in the concluding chapter, only in this way can Orthodox theological anthropology regain its proper footing and advance. The personalist impulse in modern Orthodoxy has proved pivotal and foundational for its self-presentation and self-understanding in the contemporary world. While not without controversy,⁹⁴ it has certainly been a fruitful avenue for articulating a strong theological anthropology that relates the doctrine of the Trinitarian God to the life and call of the human being. This is a call to perfect loving communion with God and neighbour, a communion realized in the ecclesial Body of Christ by the action of the Holy Spirit. As a means of expressing the concept of human perfection, however, personhood is neither an isolated nor the only relevant theme in modern Orthodox theology. It could perhaps be conceived as the framework for much contemporary Orthodox theological anthropology, but to fill out this framework, one needs to look at another prominent theme in modern Orthodox discourse, taken up in some detail in subsequent chapters: the theme of deification.

Deification as a Christocentric doctrine That the Orthodox approach to human perfection is inextricably tied to the doctrine of deification is well known.⁹⁵ The usual entry point for discussions of the doctrine is St Athanasius of Alexandria’s famous dictum that ‘he was made man, that we might be made God/deified’ (αὐτὸς γὰρ ἐνηνθρώπισεν, ἵνα ἡμεῖς θεοποιηθῶμεν),⁹⁶ a sentiment seen also earlier in St Irenaeus, as well as in the New Testament (which comes closest to this particular form of expression in 2 Cor. 8:9: ‘though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich’). This entry point is unmistakably Christological: deification is a corollary of the Incarnation and cannot be properly ⁹³ Together with this volume, which is a modest attempt to do this, see also the contributions to Torrance and Paschalidis (eds.) (2018). ⁹⁴ Together with the debate over terms and methodology mentioned above, one could also add discussions of the relevance of human rights language for Orthodox anthropology, as well as the relationship between the term ‘human being’ and ‘human person’. See, for instance, Papnikolaou (2012), Yannoulatos (2003), and Prevelakis (2018). ⁹⁵ The best historical introduction to the doctrine of deification is Russell (2004). ⁹⁶ St Athanasius, On the Incarnation 54:3 (PG 25:192B).

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expressed in any other way without grave doctrinal risk. It is only Christ for whom it is ‘not robbery’ to be equal to God, and thus the deification, divinization, or theosis of human beings can only legitimately take place in him. The bringing about of the deification of man is especially linked in the sources with the activity of the Holy Spirit, by whom Christ himself is first made man (‘of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary’). It was the question of deification or theosis that even served as a central context for unequivocally affirming the divinity and consubstantiality of the Holy Spirit with the Father and the Son. As St Gregory the Theologian, the apparent coiner of the term theosis, writes: ‘if [the Holy Spirit] is not to be worshipped, how can he deify me by baptism?’⁹⁷ To be incorporated into Christ through baptism by the Holy Spirit was itself seen as the inauguration of deified life: to ‘become gods’ is none other for St Gregory than ‘to become as Christ is’.⁹⁸ The development of the doctrine of deification as a natural outcome of Christology is an uncontroversial fact for the Greek patristic tradition. Its presence in subsequent Byzantine and modern Orthodox theological discourse is relatively constant, though the recovery of deification as a central and key motif for Orthodox identity vis-à-vis the West began to soar (as in the case of personalist approaches) from the early part of the twentieth century. As interest in deification has grown, not only as an Eastern Christian motif but also as a concept present in Western Christian traditions and even as a potential means of dialogue with non-Christian faiths, discussions have increased and diversified over the precise nature and meaning of deification, of ‘being as Christ is’.⁹⁹ This section cannot hope to capture the full complexity of the issue. Instead, an outline of some of the major and influential ways in which Orthodox and patristic scholars have considered the meaning of deification will be offered. This in turn will contribute to setting the stage for our subsequent chapters, all of which are an attempt to take forward our understanding of the Byzantine and Orthodox doctrine of deification. Although a sense of the presence and importance of deification was never abandoned by the Orthodox (especially, in the modern period, given the centrality of the motif in the ‘Philokalic’ movement), the beginning of positive and serious scholarship on deification in patristic and Byzantine sources in the West can be traced to a series of studies by the Orthodox theologian Myrrha Lot-Borodine in 1932–1933, whose interest in the topic was spurred by a talk

⁹⁷ St Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 31:28 (PG 36:165A). ⁹⁸ St Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 1:5 (PG 35:397C): γενώμεθα ὡς Χριστὸς, ἐπεὶ καὶ Χριστὸς ὡς ἡμεῖς· γενώμεθα θεοὶ δι᾽ αὐτὸν, ἐπειδὴ κἀκεῖνος δι᾽ ἡμᾶς ἄνθρωπος. ⁹⁹ For further studies and reflections on deification, together with Russell (2004) see Christensen and Wittung (eds.) (2007); Meconi and Olson (eds.) (2016), which is devoted to the concept in Roman Catholic sources; and Arblaster and Faesen (eds.) (2018).

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on deification given by Florovsky.¹⁰⁰ In 1938 the more widely known work (La Divinisation du chrétien d’après les Pères grecs) by Jules Gross was published.¹⁰¹ Understandably, the Orthodox across the spectrum would lay claim to this doctrine as fully their own, a phenomenon that continues in contemporary Orthodoxy. What precisely, then, does it mean to be deified? In answering this, one can start with the issue of how much weight one is supposed to give to the term: is it a literal deification, and if so, how literal?; or is it simply a nominal deification, an imputation merely of the title ‘god’ or ‘divine’ to the Christian, which has little to no content? In his careful study of the language of deification in the Greek patristic tradition, Norman Russell provides his readers with a kind of taxonomy to help us come to grips with the diversity of ways deification terminology is deployed across the vast range of sources he surveys. He suggests four main ways in which deification is understood: nominally, analogically, ethically, realistically. If anything, Russell errs on the side of caution in his analyses, even suggesting that the fulsome language of St Gregory the Theologian on deification is ultimately mitigated and that for Gregory, ‘in the last analysis we become gods only by analogy’.¹⁰² This caution extends to all four categories of deification language he identifies: in the case of the higher ‘ethical’ or ‘realistic’ types of deification, their force is subsumed for Russell under the category of ‘metaphor’.¹⁰³ Even granting a strong sense of what a metaphor is, the choice of this term is troubling, since it is hard not to see such language as at fundamental odds with a large swathe of realistic if not ‘literal’ language concerning deification in the sources. Russell must work hard to soften such language in order to make it metaphorical.¹⁰⁴ The issue, as will be argued in more detail in the following chapters, is bound up with Christology: for theologians such as Maximus and Symeon (I would also add the earlier Greek fathers, including Gregory of Nazianzus), to say that human deification is ‘metaphorical’ and never literal would be tantamount to saying that the Incarnation itself was ‘metaphorical’ and not literal. The doctrine of deification simply cannot be detached from the doctrine of the Incarnation: to pronounce on one is to impact the other. Certainly deification

¹⁰⁰ Lot-Borodine (1970) in which the studies from the 1930s are reprinted; on Florovsky as inspiration see Louth (2015), p. 95. ¹⁰¹ Gross (1938). ¹⁰² Russell (2004), p. 222. ¹⁰³ Russell (2004), pp. 1–3. Russell has recently argued that ‘deification for the later Fathers [such as Gregory Palamas] is more than a metaphor’, but without clarifying why this should be the case for them but not, say, for Gregory the Theologian or even Maximus the Confessor (whose understanding of deification is described as ‘analogous and nominal rather than realistic’ in Russell (2004), p. 294): see Russell (2019), p. vii. ¹⁰⁴ Together with the overly cautious taxonomy offered by Russell, one can add that just as in the case of investigating patristic concepts of personhood by solely tracking uses of the term hypostasis, so too when examining deification almost exclusively through an analysis of specific terminology in the sources (theosis, apotheosis, theopoeisis, etc.), one risks isolating terms from their broader context and coming to a somewhat stilted conclusion.

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is not literal if by ‘literal’ is narrowly meant the loss or exchange of created human nature for uncreated divine nature. But the two-nature Christology upheld by the Orthodox tradition already protects against this danger: Christ’s humanity remains intact, even while being truly and literally deified by the hypostatic union. While the deification of the Christian is not a ‘hypostatic union’ in the same sense, it is nonetheless a grafting of the Christian by the grace of the Holy Spirit into the deified humanity of the God-man. It will be argued that this is a key component of the Byzantine understanding of the human ideal. The concept of ‘literal’ deification is itself, however, a source of thorny theological problems and debates, even granting an acknowledged continued distinction between the created and the uncreated. As has been mentioned, in modern Orthodox theology all sides enthusiastically embrace the doctrine of deification, but this does not necessarily correspond to an equivalence in their understanding of the concept. Tentatively, one could perhaps even draw a line between the major representatives of Orthodox theology of the early twentieth century on precisely this issue, visible in the subtle difference between focusing on deification in terms of the God-man and deification in terms of ‘Godmanhood’.

The God-man versus Godmanhood: delineating Orthodox approaches to deification Vladimir Solovyov’s Lectures on Godmanhood (or sometimes ‘Divine Humanity’ or ‘the Humanity of God’), delivered in St Petersburg in 1878, represent a key moment in the history of modern Orthodox thought.¹⁰⁵ They form a direct inspiration for Bulgakov, whose major theological trilogy has the overall title Dogmatics of Godmanhood. As the term ‘Godmanhood’ indicates, a centerpiece to this manner of thinking is a strong theory of deification. For Solovyov, the divine principle and the world soul strive toward ‘the deification (theosis) of all that exists’.¹⁰⁶ He argues that ‘man not only has the same inner essence of life—all-oneness [or ‘all-unity’]—as God: he is also free to desire to have it as God; i.e. he may of himself wish to be like God’.¹⁰⁷ Godmanhood is an underlying constitutive element in the world for Solovyov, which means that the Incarnation of Christ, while a key and definitive revelation, is nonetheless still only a manifestation of a larger process: ‘His [viz. God the Word’s]

¹⁰⁵ On Vladimir Solovyov (1853–1900) and his impact on subsequent Russian Orthodox thought, see Valliere (2000), esp. pp. 143–72. ¹⁰⁶ Solovyov (1948), p. 178. ¹⁰⁷ Solovyov (1948), p. 182.

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personal incarnation in an individual man was but the final link in a long series of other incarnations, physical and historical’.¹⁰⁸ When we turn to Bulgakov’s intricate theological system, we find a clear effort to continue Solovyov’s project in a more doctrinally informed and responsible way, especially in terms of its Christology. Nevertheless, the attraction of the principle of ‘Godmanhood’ (which in Bulgakov functions in a similar manner to his concept of Sophia) creates significant interpretative problems from the perspective of broader Orthodox theology. Consider the following: So great is God’s love for creation that, in calling the latter to being, he gives it His Own, the Divine Sophia, as the foundation of its being, in order, further, to give it Himself as well, uniting it with His own Divine life. This is precisely the foundation of the Divine-human process. Humanity, the center and cryptogram of the world, is the image of the Divine Humanity [i.e. of Godmanhood]. It is thus called to approach the Proto-image, and this convergence can go so far as to become a living identification with the Proto-mage. This is the task and goal of creation. God creates future ‘gods by grace’ for inclusion in the multihypostatic multiunity of the Holy Trinity and in the unity of Divine life.¹⁰⁹

Bulgakov’s ‘maximalist’ view of deification is unmistakable. What is of particular interest, however, is that here and elsewhere he repeatedly insists on a common ‘foundation’ between God and creation, grounded in the principle of Sophia (Wisdom), heavenly and creaturely, by and in which deification takes place. While deification is clearly a ‘supernatural’ reality for Bulgakov, it is also ‘normal for man.’¹¹⁰ The normalcy of deification comes from God’s preeternal design for humanity, a design that is not simply a pre-eternal will for humanity (which is a patristic notion), but a truth that already somehow exists in Sophia: ‘in the Creator and in creation, Sophia is the bridge that unites God and man; and it is this unity of Sophia that constitutes the Chalcedonian “yes,” the foundation of the Incarnation’.¹¹¹ Despite his best intentions, the allencompassing and binding role of Sophia in Bulgakov’s system, as alluded to earlier in this chapter, cannot but contract (at the very least) the position and significance of Christ. This contraction can be seen to occur, I submit, through the subtle difference between emphasis on the God-man (as we see it in the sources and in many of Bulgakov’s contemporaries) and emphasis on ‘Godmanhood’. With Godmanhood as an overarching theological and hermeneutical principle, the person of Christ as God-man, however central and important he remains, will always be somehow conceptually dwarfed by the larger principle of which he is the exemplar. As Godmanhood increases in the

¹⁰⁸ Solovyov (1948), p. 194. ¹⁰⁹ Bulgakov (2004), p. 356 (emphasis in original). ¹¹⁰ Bulgakov (2008), pp. 249–50. ¹¹¹ Bulgakov (2008), p. 445 (emphasis in original).

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systems of Solovyov and Bulgakov, perhaps ironically the God-man tends to decrease.¹¹² The reverse trajectory is the norm in the Orthodox tradition, and in the early twentieth century was pursued, for instance, by St Justin Popović, whose unremitting focus on the historical God-man as the ‘supreme value and ultimate criterion’ undercut the notion of a pre-eternal sophianic unity of Godmanhood of which the coming of the God-man is the fulfilment. ‘What is the essence of Orthodoxy?’, he asks, before responding: ‘It is the God-man Christ. Everything that is Orthodox has a divine-human character: knowledge, the senses, the will, the mind, morality, dogma, philosophy, and life’.¹¹³ This approach gives way to a ‘theanthropic methodology’ for all Christian theology, locked not on the principle of Godmanhood, but on the God-man himself, the ‘one thing new under the sun’ (cf. Eccl. 1:9).¹¹⁴ One could argue for a similar focus on the God-man rather than Godmanhood in Lossky, but this is so especially for Florovsky and Sakharov.¹¹⁵ What this difference in focus achieves is not necessarily a radical change in the conception of human destiny as deification, but a firmer anchoring of the notion of deification to a Christological rather than a larger cosmological foundation, an anchoring that is more obviously in line with the sources of the tradition. Given Bulgakov’s framework, it is perhaps unsurprising that he cannot help but posit the universal salvation of all, the inevitable victorious outworking of the Godmanhood that grounds all worlds.¹¹⁶ The attainment of deification is ultimately dependent not so much on directly becoming a member of the ecclesial Body of Christ (something presupposed in the sources) as on simply being a member of the cosmos, since in the final analysis the cosmos and the Church of the deified are (or at least inevitably will be) one and the same.¹¹⁷ More could undoubtedly be said on this issue, including the perceived Origenism of Bulgakov’s position and the various tactics used by Florovsky, Lossky, and others to counter his thought (including a stress on the created/ uncreated distinction and the apophatic nature of theology). The concern here, however, is to point out the common thread of deification shared by all parties, but one that is expressed and understood from different vantage ¹¹² This is a danger, moreover, that is not limited to theological systems of the past. ¹¹³ Popovich (1994), p. 81. ¹¹⁴ Popovich (1994), pp. 88, 93. ¹¹⁵ For Lossky, see his remarks in Lossky (1974), pp. 117–23. For Sakharov, see His Life is Mine, where among other things he writes: ‘For us, Christians, Jesus Christ is the measure of all things, divine and human. In Him dwelleth the fullness of the Godhead and of mankind. He is our most perfect ideal’: Sophrony (1977), p. 31. ¹¹⁶ For Bulgakov’s eschatology, see Bulgakov (2002), pp. 379–526 and Slesinski (2017), pp. 239–49. ¹¹⁷ This admittedly harsh criticism regarding the collapse of ecclesiology and cosmology in Bulgakov is similar to that levelled by Lossky, who describes Bulgakov’s sophiology as ‘an ecclesiology gone astray’ in which ‘the idea of the Church is confounded with that of the Cosmos’: Lossky (1957), p. 112.

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points, which in turn yields different results. In particular, it has been argued that one way of looking at these different vantage points is through the subtle but important distinction between Godmanhood and the God-man: it should be clear that for this author, the latter must take precedence over (and be understood as the source of) the former, at least if indeed genuine continuity with the main sources of the Orthodox tradition is desired.¹¹⁸ It is this overall concern that animates the following chapters, attempting in each case to draw out fresh insights from the Byzantine theological tradition as to how one’s Christological priorities, especially regarding the humanity of Christ, can (and should) deeply affect one’s conception of the human ideal and human perfection. This in turn, I will argue, poses some hard questions as to the manner and mode in which theological anthropology is articulated in modern Orthodox discourse, calling attention to a number of potential pitfalls that can be avoided only with a thoroughly Christocentric gaze. Thus in Chapter 2, the frequent and easy association of Greek patristic and Byzantine concepts of human perfection and the human ideal with the category of epektasis, or never-ending growth, progress or ‘positive change’, will be analysed with special reference to the intricate theology of St Maximus the Confessor. The aim of the chapter is to demonstrate the extreme care theologians must take in articulating theologies of the final or eschatological state of the saints, but also and primarily to emphasize the relevance of the theology of the humanity of Christ for this enterprise as a whole, never dissociating the human ideal in the abstract from the reality of Christ as perfect man and ‘captain of our salvation’ (Hebrews 2:10). Chapter 3 continues with this theme of the concrete versus the abstract with a study of the humanity of Christ in St Theodore the Studite, a monumental yet relatively little-studied figure in Byzantine theology. Here his developed theology of the concreteness and specificity of Christ in his humanity is discussed, something that deeply affects his understanding of the human ideal and is connected with his understanding of the Virgin Mary. The ideal for Theodore is intimately tied to the concrete ‘earthiness’ of our given ¹¹⁸ While the patristic and Byzantine period does not look directly at the issue of ‘Godmanhood’ as such, there is an interesting precedent in the concern found in, for instance, Maximus the Confessor and (less directly) John of Damascus to assert that Christ is ‘not an individual’, on which see Larchet (2018). Although personalist theologians such as Zizioulas are keen to marshal this statement to a personalist end (pitting individual against person/ hypostasis), its use in context has a different and rather philosophical motive. What is being said is that since there is no such genus as ‘Christness’, Jesus Christ cannot be an individual of that genus, since to be the God-man, Christ must combine the incommensurable genera of divinity (divine nature) and humanity (human nature) in his single person/hypostasis. In other words, Christ is not an ‘individual’ because there is no such thing as ‘Godmanhood’ of which he would be the instantiation or concrete expression. The terminology and context are rather different to that of the discussion being analy sed here, but the parallels are nonetheless striking. I have written a brief article on this matter, forthcoming in Studia Patristica.

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humanity and the specificity of the path to perfection. It is found in the total veneration of the Incarnate Christ in thought, word, deed, and image through the keeping of his life-giving commandments, that same Christ who condescends through sacramental embrace to make us, in our ever-particular and concrete humanity, his own. Chapter 4 turns to the thought of St Symeon the New Theologian and his wide-ranging and doctrinally conditioned vision of deification. With Symeon we reach a special summit in the Byzantine theology of human perfection. It is a theme that marks nearly all his writings and which prompts long and powerful meditations on the relation between Christological (and Trinitarian) doctrine and the human ideal, the precise meaning and experience of perfection, as well as the state of the saints in the age to come. Because of Symeon’s frequent and explicit interest in relating the intricacies of the doctrinal to the experiential or lived life of the Christian, it is argued that he can justly be seen as a legitimate forerunner to the modern Orthodox impulse for connecting theological doctrine and anthropology more clearly. In modern Orthodox thought, the mechanism of deification is largely connected with the theology of the uncreated energy or activity of the Triune God, undividedly distinct from his imparticipable divine essence.¹¹⁹ This common uncreated energy of God, which is, more simply put, the uncreated life of God, is understood as the ‘content’ of deification, that which the saints receive from God. In Chapter 5, then, the theologian of divine energy par excellence, St Gregory Palamas, is the main subject of study. In particular, this chapter seeks to address a certain measure of confusion (already in the fourteenth century and again in contemporary theology) over how to relate the doctrine of the uncreated energy of deification to the centrality of Christ. It will be argued that any strong dissociation of the doctrine of participation in the divine energies from Christology is a perilous path from the perspective of any Orthodox theology of human perfection, and that close attention to Palamas’s thought reveals his awareness of and contributions to this issue. To encounter the divine energy or act is inextricably bound up with encountering the person of Christ, whose humanity serves as the only true locus of mediation between God and humanity, the only ‘place of meeting’ where deification and thus the human ideal can be found. Reinvigorating the doctrine of human participation in the divine energies with its Christological premises, then, is the task of Chapter 5. A key concern for the chapters on Maximus, Theodore, Symeon, and Gregory Palamas is to step back from many of the controversies outlined in this chapter (especially vis-à-vis personalism) so as to be untrammelled by purely terminological considerations, or by the temptation to apply

¹¹⁹ A classic introduction to this theme can be found in Lossky (1957), pp. 67–90.

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anachronistic concerns or concepts hastily to the sources. We shall nevertheless see in each case several hitherto unnoticed or little-observed themes and arguments of crucial importance to the questions that govern so much of modern Orthodox thought on theological anthropology, including its explicitly personalist iterations. Only a limited degree of dialogue with modern Orthodox theology will take place in these chapters of retrieval, chiefly to allow the sources to speak to us from their own depths and on their own terms. Cumulatively, I consider the results to be a clarion call for future Orthodox theological anthropology to be placed first and foremost on a firmly Christological footing. In the concluding chapter, which is not a straightforward summary of the work, the findings of the previous chapters are brought together through the prism of a twelfth-century Byzantine controversy regarding Christ’s humanity, centred on the verse ‘my Father is greater than I’ (John 14:28). There we see, through an often neglected and misunderstood Middle Byzantine doctrinal debate, a striking synthesis of the Byzantine theological tradition on the matter of Christ’s humanity as the gateway to human perfection. This in turn sets the stage for a sustained engagement with another key representative of modern Orthodox theology, namely John Behr. Behr’s wide-ranging work has as a driving theme the issue of theological anthropology, of relating scriptural and patristic theology, and in particular the Passion of Christ, to what it means to be human. This engagement with Behr forms the final section of the book. The central plea of this chapter—and of this work—is that if the richness of the Orthodox tradition is to continue to bear much fruit in the fields of theological anthropology, systematics, and beyond, there must be a full consciousness of the Christological imperative for such work. This need not (indeed cannot) imply an abandonment, for instance, of the Trinitarian insights of recent decades, but it is required in order to give such insights their proper bearings. A focus on Christology likewise holds much promise for dialogue between Eastern and Western theological anthropology that more than ever needs to work with common ground.¹²⁰ It is, in short, the contention of this volume that Christology cannot be merely an intellectual entryway, launchpad, or a useful point of reference for elaborating a theological anthropology and thereby discovering the path and meaning of the human ideal, and that Christ the God-man must serve as the theologian’s governing category for such a task, ‘the beginning and the ending, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty’ (Rev. 1:8).

¹²⁰ Several inspiring works from Western theologians that meditate on Christ’s humanity and its significance in the common Scriptural and patristic sources spring to mind, including, from each end of the chronological spectrum, Emile Mersch’s ressourcement work on the Mystical Body of Christ and Brian Daley’s recent study God Visible: see Mersch (1938) and Daley (2018).

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2 Perpetual progress or eternal rest? Contemplating the eschaton in St Maximus the Confessor

Now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. 1 Corinthians 13:12 Τhe apostle left behind the names pertaining to nature . . . and the name of God, which formerly stood at an infinite distance from him, he came to share by grace, becoming and being called God. Ambiguum 20.3

In Chapter 1, an overview was offered of modern Orthodox theological anthropology with special attention given to personalist thought, tracking its historical development, major positions, and some of the criticisms it has drawn, not least from patristic scholars. If nothing else, critics of this theological movement have demonstrated the precariousness of leaning too heavily on patristic and Byzantine discussions of the terms ‘nature’ and ‘person’ in isolation for the articulation of a univocal vision of human personhood patterned after divine, Trinitarian personhood. That said, it was argued that what Orthodox theological personalism targets is, at root, a vision of the human ideal, of human destiny and fulfilment which attempts at once to lay claim to Orthodoxy’s doctrinal heritage as well as offer solutions to contemporary concerns. It was argued that such a goal—surely an admirable one for historical and systematic theology alike—needs firmer historical grounding and a wider scope than, for instance, the permutations of the term ‘hypostasis’ over time, or the tired stimulus of an allegedly insurmountable East–West binary. Above all, however, it needs to pay unremitting attention to Christology as the true source and destiny of theological anthropology. In this and subsequent chapters, while maintaining a similar goal to that largely espoused by Orthodox personalism (namely, articulating a theological understanding of the human ideal or human perfection), an attempt is made to change the overall paradigm for attaining this goal by focusing on the

Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ. Alexis Torrance, Oxford University Press (2020). © Alexis Torrance. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198845294.001.0001

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humanity of Christ. This is a move away from the impasse of terminological debate towards a broader and richer retrieval of the human ideal and human perfection in the Byzantine theological tradition, focusing on debates regarding human sanctification and perfection that the Byzantines were directly invested in. We start these forays into the human ideal in Byzantine theology with a chapter on the notions of progress and rest in the eschatological state. If we were to draw up a popular consensus of what characterizes the Greek patristic, Byzantine, and Eastern Orthodox understandings of human destiny and eschatology, our findings would almost certainly revolve around two terms: theosis (deification) and epektasis or perpetual progress (lit. ‘stretching out’). A consensus involving the idea of theosis is largely justified historically, though its meaning is still a matter of considerable debate.¹ Having epektasis or perpetual progress serve as a consensus term, however, is much more difficult historically. Not just the word but also the concept underlying it are harder to find in the sources than one might expect. The purpose of this chapter is not to dismiss the notion of perpetual progress or claim its outright absence from Eastern Christian tradition, but rather to question its normativity in early Byzantine theology. It is one thing to detect the presence of perpetual progress language in one or another author (usually St Gregory of Nyssa), and quite another to make it a lens through which all of Christian anthropology and eschatology is viewed and articulated. To set up the discussion, the chapter begins with several illustrative modern texts that lend credence to the claim that Eastern Christianity is popularly conceived and conveyed as embracing an epektatic vision of Christian eschatology. From here the framing of the issue is continued by alluding to the recent critique of eschatology as perpetual progress in Paul Griffiths’s Decreation, as well as to a dissenting voice from within Eastern Orthodoxy, the ascetic theologian St Sophrony Sakharov. The chapter then turns to some key problems that plague the modern discussion, revolving around an ingrained tendency to collapse the categories of life here below, life after death, and life in the age to come into one another and, together with this, an at times unclear, muddled, or unhelpfully loaded opposition of words like ‘progress’, ‘change’, and ‘increase’ on the one hand, and ‘static’, ‘motionless’, and ‘stagnant’ on the other. Having framed the question and articulated some of the problems associated with it, we can then turn to early Byzantine theology itself. Beginning with the few texts that clearly imply some kind of epektatic eschaton, attention is turned to Maximus the Confessor. He is particularly noteworthy as someone claimed by both sides in the discussion. Attempting a synthesis of Maximus’s theology is fast becoming a rite of passage among

¹ See the overarching discussion of deification above, in Chapter 1.

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Byzantine theologians: the attempt here does not pretend to be exhaustive.² Its purpose is to convey Maximus’s overall eschatological vision and tie it to the discussion of epektasis. His is a vision, I will argue, involving above all an eternal rest in the ineffable glory of the uncreated and perpetually dynamic— but not ‘progressive’—divine life.

1. PERPETUAL P ROGRESS AND ITS DISCONTENTS

Epektasis as normative The idea that the Christian East understands the human as a dynamic being called to ascend ever upwards, to progress constantly in the inexhaustible knowledge and experience of God, has become for many a matter-of-fact claim. John McGuckin, in his The Orthodox Church, writes: Orthodoxy sees the human being . . . as a dynamic of ascent: a creature whose destiny is open-ended and always in the process of being fulfilled . . . . St Gregory of Nyssa spoke of this ascent as epektasis, a complex term that evokes the endless ‘stretching out’ of the terms of human nature as the creature always ‘reaches out’ to the God who exceeds all created limits.³

Another passage along these lines comes in the concluding paragraph of Kallistos Ware’s highly influential The Orthodox Way: ‘Here below’, says Newman, ‘to live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often’. But is this the case only here below? St Gregory of Nyssa believed that even in heaven perfection is growth. In a fine paradox he says that the essence of perfection consists precisely in never becoming perfect, but in always reaching forward to some higher perfection that lies beyond. Because God is infinite, this constant ‘reaching forward’ or epektasis, as the Greek Fathers termed it, proves limitless. The soul possesses God, and yet still seeks him; her joy is full, and yet grows always more intense. God grows ever nearer to us, yet he still remains the Other; we behold him face to face, yet we still continue to advance further and further into the divine mystery. Although strangers no longer, we do not cease to be pilgrims. . . . Never, in all eternity, shall we reach a point where we have accomplished all that there is to do, or discovered all that there is to know.⁴

A final example of an appeal to the Byzantine past for an epektatic notion of the afterlife comes from the well-known Orthodox philosopher Christos Yannaras, this time in a meditation on the thought of Maximus directly. ² For a more in-depth study of Maximus’s theological vision with respect to the destiny of the human being, see Larchet (1996). ³ McGuckin (2011), p. 198. ⁴ Ware (1979), p. 138.

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He writes that Maximus offers us an ‘ontological clarification’ regarding life after death that mercifully, he argues, does away with the terrifying notion of ‘rest’: In the funeral service of today’s ‘Orthodox’ Churches, which is formulated in a purely religious language, supplications for the ‘eternal rest’ of the deceased and for the forgiveness (of sins, of faults, of crimes) that this ‘rest’ presupposes are continuously repeated. However, for the man who has tasted in his earthly life the joyous adventure of research, of creating, of a knowledge that remains always unlimited, of the vast diversity of beauty, of the astonishment of love and of childbearing, of the expressive abilities of Art, for this person an ‘eternal rest’ (that is, a perhaps voluptuous but surely stagnant inactivity, some kind of retirement without an end through death) would be a complete nightmare.⁵

For Yannaras, the exhilirating rush of scholarly and family life somehow serves as a fitting analogy for the age to come, something that is, moreover, put in direct opposition to the notion of rest. In these three citations above, Gregory of Nyssa and then Maximus figure as the exemplars for a concept of epektasis, which is then readily applied to the whole Eastern Orthodox tradition. It was of course the Jesuit scholar Jean Daniélou (himself a sympathizer if not an architect of the ‘personalist’ and ‘existentialist’ move in patristic studies) who worked on and popularized this notion from Nyssen. His classic work Platonisme et théologie mystique was first published in 1944, a date in itself worthy of note.⁶ During the ravages of the Second World War, Daniélou threw himself into the study of Gregory and emerged with a hopeful, optimistic, epektatic view of human nature designed for growth towards and in God. It was a view he carried firmly with him through the post-war years of rebuilding a shattered world, into Vatican II and beyond.⁷ Its popularity as a thoroughly Christian view rooted in the depths of tradition yet somehow fresh and vigorous should not surprise us. Morwenna Ludlow assesses this popularity helpfully as follows: [Epektasis] has proved particularly attractive to modern writers who have set Gregory’s idea of perfection as movement or growth in contrast to static conceptions of perfection (the contrast being often characterized, implicitly or explicitly, as the difference between Christianity and Platonism or Hellenism). Gregory’s viewpoint is praised either because he seems to do more justice to theological ideas about what it means to be fully human (to be finite, temporal, changeable, yet active and capable of positive transformation) or because absolute moral perfection is thought to be an infinite ethical task.⁸

⁵ Yannaras (2013), p. 384. ⁶ Daniélou (1944), esp. pp. 291–307. ⁷ For a helpful discussion of the twentieth-century scholarly renewal of interest in Gregory of Nyssa, see Barnes (2020). Barnes does not explicitly discuss epektasis as an impetus, though he does address the attractiveness to ressourcement theologians of Gregory’s conception of God as ‘adiastemic’ and creatures as inherently ‘diastemic’. ⁸ Ludlow (2007), pp. 127–8.

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This is not a chapter about Gregory of Nyssa, but these points are required background for the larger discussion, for two reasons. First, it seems that conclusions gleaned from the writings of Gregory of Nyssa have unhelpfully been applied to all Eastern Christian writers without much close attention to detail, and second, the whole enterprise of positing a fresh-yet-traditional perspective on the human being as epektatic is a highly contextualized one. Together with the context of post-war optimism in the socio-political sphere, and the ‘implicit or explicit’ anti-Hellenism mentioned by Ludlow, there is also a kind of anti-Western context too, specifically against perceived defects in High Medieval Latin theology and Baroque Thomism. Instead of a ‘static’ vision of the divine essence, we are presented with a dynamic of perpetual and eternal movement, increase and growth, one that the early church, the Byzantines, and the Orthodox have apparently had all along.⁹ Whether or not, and in what sense, medieval East and West can be contrasted on the issue of eschatology cannot be explored in detail here, though this would merit close attention. What will be argued, however, is that it would be far too simplistic to describe the Greek patristic or Byzantine approach to eschatological perfection purely in epektatic terms of ‘perpetual progress’, which at the very least would help nuance or redraw the comparison of Eastern to Western medieval theology on this matter. The idea of the normativity of epektasis that prevails in many theological circles has not, however, gone completely uncontested. Two separate challenges deserve consideration.

Problems with epektasis A recent challenge to the whole category of epektasis for the discussion of eschatology or ‘the last things’ comes in Paul Griffiths’s Decreation: The Last Things of All Creatures.¹⁰ The monograph’s most controversial thesis concerns the fate of the damned. To summarize, Griffiths proposes with utmost clarity an annihilationist view, in which the souls of the damned are decreated by God, reduced to oblivion and returned to non-being in a kind of great cosmic mercy killing. One could say that God, in Griffiths’s vision, becomes the supreme agent of assisted suicide. What is significant for our purposes, however, is how in the course of the work he discusses, or rather dismisses, the notion of epektasis. Using seemingly clear logic, he refuses to countenance

⁹ For an example of this juxtaposition at work, see Bradshaw (2004), pp. 256–7. ¹⁰ Griffiths (2014). Its cold, hard logic is surpassed only, in the opinion of this author, by its chillingly macabre conclusions.

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an eschatological epektasis of perpetual progress: by definition, epektasis cannot be equivalent to a ‘last thing’.¹¹ As he explains: Novissima [novelty-free last things] and epektasies are contradictories: if future novelty without end, then no novissimum; if a novissimum, then no future novelty without end. There is no third thing, no last thing, which is not one or other of these . . . . [F]or every creature, its terminus is either a novissimum or an epektasy. The position taken in this work is that all creatures reach a last thing, and that, therefore, none have an epektatic future.¹²

Griffiths here precludes the notion of epektasis from ‘the last things’ and thus from eschatology. Unfortunately, the dismissal, while clear, is not entirely developed. What seems to be rejected is a particular ‘brand’ of perpetual progress that deliberately pits itself against notions of rest, stasis, finality. This is a brand popularized in modern lecture halls, seminaries, and text books, but as will be shown in the next section, it is one which even Gregory of Nyssa would have trouble with, for the simple reason that it ignores the apophatic coincidence of opposites (e.g. stasis/movement) that the ancient proponents of epektasis assume. Nevertheless, it is a legitimate logical, philosophical, and even theological problem: is there, in the end, a final rest to the people of God (cf. Heb. 4:9)? A more directly theological concern regarding epektasis was raised in the late 1950s by the Eastern Orthodox ascetic and theologian St Sophrony Sakharov. Sakharov (1896–1993) is well known in the Eastern Orthodox world, and to a degree in the West as well, though this is not the place to rehearse his biography.¹³ In 1958 he wrote to his friend, the leading Orthodox intellectual and churchman Fr Georges Florovsky about a theological article he was putting together. Among the points Sakharov is concerned to address is the nature of deification, and so the question of the goal of the human being. The key to understanding this, he stresses, is the human nature of Christ and what occurs to the humanity of Christ. However, this can be conceived in different ways, and so he asks Florovsky: Did Christ the Man become a bearer of the divine eternity in His immutable human nature, or is He subject in eternity itself to that which some of the Fathers of the Church thought: that is, as man, He lives eternity as an unceasing—yes, a triumphant—ascent to Him? Or did He achieve a true ‘Sabbath’ and is no longer subject, even in his humanity, to any further ‘development,’ ascension, and so on?¹⁴ ¹¹ Griffiths (2014), pp. 25–7. ¹² Griffiths (2014), p. 27. ¹³ He was briefly mentioned in the previous chapter: for his intellectual biography, see N. Sakharov (2002). ¹⁴ Sakharov (2020), Letter 7, p. 30. In his response, Florovsky largely agrees with Sakharov, but lays emphasis on the need to recognize the distinction between the hypostatic union effected by the Son of God and the union by grace effected in the saints. Sakharov in turn agrees, though

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The question, it seems, is almost rhetorical, and it is clear when reading his published article that Sakharov distinctly favoured the latter interpretation. In his section on deification in the article, he opens unequivocally: ‘In Christ, created human nature is deified to ultimate perfection, for “in Him abides all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9)’.¹⁵ This in turn matters for the understanding of our own deification since ‘Christ is the inalienable foundation and the ultimate criterion for the anthropological teaching of the Church’.¹⁶ Having established this, he goes on to speak of the nature of this deification and raises the issue of epektasis: While all the Fathers confess the unknowability and transcendence of the [divine] Essence, their way of conceiving the eternal life of created rational beings, and the degree of their deification, is not always identical. Some of them conceive participation in the Kingdom as an infinite ascent towards absolute perfection; others describe it, on the contrary, as an ‘eternal rest’. These latter consider that any existence qualified by a ‘becoming’ is not yet integral perfection.¹⁷

As the article progresses, Sakharov places himself squarely in the second camp, using his Christological argument as the basis and relying in particular on texts from Maximus the Confessor. His Christological argument is summarized as follows: [I]n the limits of earthly life, the human nature of Christ, while enhypostasized by the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, still appears as ‘perfectible’; before all was accomplished (cf. Jn 19:30), his human nature was found in a state of growth (cf. Lk 2:52), was subject to temptation, even to the Agony in the Garden; a certain ‘division’ was thus present in Him, if only because of the incommensurability of his two natures. After the Ascension, this incommensurability vanishes and Christ as Man becomes equal to God, ‘being seated at the right hand of the Father’, not according to the divine essence, it is true, but according to the divine energy, according to the divine Act.¹⁸

We thus have two broad-based challenges to epektasis, one on a more logical/ philosophical basis, the other on a Christological one. Griffiths takes issue with eschatological epektasis as not strictly speaking a ‘last thing’, and Sakharov argues that if our destiny as human beings is revealed through and bound up again with an emphasis on the wondrous significance of the commonality of the human nature in Christ’s uncreated hypostasis and in our created hypostases: see Sakharov (2020), Response 1, pp. 46–47, and Letter 12, pp. 59–62. ¹⁵ Sophrony (1988), p. 35. For an English translation of this article see Sophrony (2014), pp. 13–62. ¹⁶ Sophrony (1988), p. 36. ¹⁷ Sophrony (1988), p. 37 (emphasis in original). ¹⁸ Sophrony (1988), p. 35–6. This appeal to Christ’s ascension as signifying total deification is reminiscent of statements to be found both in St Justin Popović and Sergius Bulgakov: see Popovitch [sic] (1997), pp. 310–22 and Bulgakov (2008), p. 405. On Sakharov’s ‘maximalist’ view of deification (including its connections and contrasts with Bulgakov), see N. Sakharov (2002), pp. 143–69.

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with the humanity of Christ, then to have epektasis we must consider Christ’s human nature to be ever-developing/-growing, which he rejects. The second of these, the Christological question, is for this study the more interesting one, especially when turning to the concerns of the sources. It sheds light on a weakness of epektatic models of perfection that is seldom or awkwardly addressed, namely, how uneasily epektasis sits with deification or ‘becoming God’ as the way to express eschatological existence. Proponents of epektasis as descriptive of the eschatological state, such as McGuckin and Ware, are invariably also proponents of deification: the two, as stated above, are often taken as the two ‘markers’ of Greek patristic, Byzantine, and Orthodox thought on sanctification and perfection. As such, an impression is given that the two terms can be combined with ease: deification or ‘becoming God’ can simply be equated with a never-ending epektatic process.¹⁹ One glaring problem with this, however, is that such a combination is hardly if ever explicitly made in any of the sources, even Gregory of Nyssa (who can speak of theosis and of epektasis separately, but not in combination). Such a leap is, I believe, a symptom of the larger problems at play. Only rarely do we find an acknowledgment that epektasis and deification are not, on the face of it, obvious companions. At root, the language of theosis or deification connotes, after all, some kind of identity between the divinized person and God, whereas epektasis serves precisely to deny such an identity. Combining the two may ‘soften’ the concept of deification in ways that appeal to modern sensibilities, but the temptation to foist that combination on the whole Byzantine Christian tradition would render a disservice to the complex ways in which deification is discussed and developed in that tradition, often with no reference to notions of progress, development, growth, epektasis, etc. Others have, of course, noted this difficulty. Norman Russell, for instance, mentions it when contrasting Nyssen’s perpetual progress with Dionysius’s union with the God beyond being.²⁰ Brian Daley too, in his seminal The Hope of the Early Church, detects this tension as one of five ‘areas of disagreement’ within patristic era eschatology. He also underlines its significance: [T]he issue must be seen . . . as an anthropological, even a metaphysical question: is human perfection to be found in continued growth or in the gift of changelessness? . . . [I]t has wide-ranging implications for the Church’s way of imagining the content of the final salvation that is promised.²¹

¹⁹ That this impression is widely felt can be seen, for instance, in the philosophical work of Timothy Pawl and Kevin Timpe on heavenly ‘growth in virtue’. In discussing their view of a continuous moral ‘growth’ of human beings in heaven, they write that they ‘draw a connection between our view and the eastern tradition of deification’, which is then connected in the same paragraph to ‘Gregory of Nyssa’s doctrine of epektasis’. See Pawl and Timpe (2017), p. 100. ²⁰ Russell (2004), pp. 260–1. ²¹ Daley (1991), pp. 222–3.

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Together with the specific challenges to epektasis just mentioned, there are further problems that need articulation. The first has to do with our understanding and use of words like ‘progress’, ‘change’, ‘growth’, ‘increase’, ‘development’, ‘movement’, and ‘open-endedness’ to describe human destiny, both in general and in Eastern Christian sources in particular. There are perhaps ways in which each of these vogue words can be theologically appropriated in a manner that is sensitive to the historical sources, but this certainly cannot be done straightforwardly, and in the case of some such words and concepts (like ‘change’ and ‘open-endedness’) it would be almost impossible. Something that is often lost is the subtlety of Greek Patristic and Byzantine approaches, in which we never find an idealization of constant change or flux, even if we can find at times an idealization of increase or progress. On the reverse side, the assumption that words like ‘immutability’, ‘stasis’, and ‘immoveability’ are not only enemies of our modern predilections but also of the Byzantines’ is misleading. Often such words are linked with loaded descriptors like ‘stagnant’ or ‘static’ or simply ‘boring’. The issue of possible tedium in the eschaton was indeed dealt with by the Byzantines, as will be discussed, but not necessarily at the expense of immutability, immoveability, and so on. If anywhere, the burden of proof lies with those who want to turn the tables on the overwhelming textual evidence for the primacy of eschatological ‘rest’. Is it enough to explain away the early Christian and Byzantine concern with such concepts as the ‘immoveability’ of the eschatological kingdom (cf. Heb. 12:28—βασιλεία ἀσάλευτος) as unfortunate Platonic or Hellenistic lapses? This brings us to the final problem to be raised with regard to the discussion as a whole. Not only is there a marked terminological imprecision at play, but often also a chronological one, for want of a better word. The concern of this chapter is primarily Byzantine theorizations of eschatological life—life in the age to come. This is not necessarily the same as theorizations about spiritual life in the here and now, nor even as theorizations about life after death but before the general resurrection. There are, as it were, three stages or ‘spaces’ that always must be borne in mind when reading the sources: the space of earthly life, the ‘middle’ space after death but before the resurrection, and the creedal ‘life of the age to come’ for which every Nicene Christian must ‘look’ and seek. This point might appear rather basic for a theological monograph, but it is not being made facetiously. If we begin to wade through the evidence that patristic and Byzantine scholars have marshalled in support of an eschatological notion of epektasis, it will quickly become evident that almost all such texts are properly speaking, in context, about the spiritual life here below.²² One illustrative example, which serves also to shed light on the scope ²² The importance of distinguishing the language of progress or ‘extension’ regarding the Christian’s earthly sojourn from the promises to come is helpfully discussed in Deseille (1960), col. 785.

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of the problem, can be seen in a popular English translation of Gregory of Nyssa’s The Life of Moses: ‘Once it is released from its earthly attachment, the soul becomes light and swift for its movement upward, soaring from below up to the heights . . . . The soul ever rises higher and will always make its flight yet higher’.²³ In isolation, this sounds like the soul is being freed from its body in order to soar in an unending epektasis, and on first impressions appears to be a proof text for an ‘epektatic’ eschatology. But in context this is not Gregory’s point at all. He is speaking specifically about the struggle in this life to turn from the downward pull of bodily passions upwards to the virtues. The ‘earthly attachment’ from which the soul is released is not the body here, but what would perhaps be better rendered the soul’s ‘earthly, passionate attachment’ or ‘earthly craving’ (ἡ γηίνη προσπάθεια). The tendency to conflate the three ‘spaces’ of before death, after death, and the age to come must be resisted if we wish to engage the discussion in a historically sensitive and responsible way. What is claimed for one of these spaces (e.g. Paul’s stretching out to that which lies ahead in his earthly spiritual struggle, mentioned in Philippians 3:13) need not be immediately applicable to the others. In other words, one cannot use lines about spiritual life here below as automatic proof texts for theories of the eschatological state.

Perpetual progress in early Byzantine theology: the evidence As we turn to early Byzantine theology, and Maximus in particular, this last point about the mystery of the age to come is worth underscoring. Whether we find a tendency to conceptualize the eschaton as perpetual progress and/or as eternal rest, we consistently find in the sources a note of reserve, of hesitation and tentativeness. I share this reserve, this acknowledgement of mystery. It is, after all, a thoroughly Scriptural sentiment: ‘it does not yet appear what we shall be’ (1 John 3:2). However, most authors, and Maximus especially, do not excuse themselves on this account from saying something about the eschaton, often something quite developed. The resources that allow for this are again Scriptural. Although ‘it does not yet appear what we shall be’, nevertheless, the text continues, ‘we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is’ (1 John 3:2). All agree that by virtue of the Christevent, something meaningful and true can be said about the eschaton, even if it can never be said exhaustively. On the side of perpetual progress in the age to come, there are relatively few texts that clearly articulate this vision, and each requires nuance. Three will be mentioned. The first, not strictly early Byzantine but of some significance, is ²³ Gregory of Nyssa, De Vita Moysis 2.224–5 (PG 44.401A), translated by A. Malherbe and E. Ferguson in Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Moses (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1978), p. 113.

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from Irenaeus (130–202), and speaks of continuing to learn from God in the age to come, specifically the mysteries of Scripture, ‘so that God should forever teach, and man should forever learn the things taught him by God’.²⁴ What he envisages is a continual discipleship of the saved whereby God permanently divulges the inexhaustible knowledge contained in Scripture. The purpose of his argument, however, is mainly to dissuade his audience from providing unseasonable and forced answers to problems of scriptural interpretation: better, he says, to leave such problems ‘in the hands of God’ who will eventually reveal their solution, if not in this life then the next. Another relevant passage in Irenaeus comes in Against Heresies 4, in the lines directly preceding his famous declaration that ‘the glory of God is a living human being’. He discusses Christ as the Word of God revealing the Father to humanity, ‘presenting the human being to God and preserving at the same time the invisibility of the Father . . . that [the human being] should always possess something towards which he might advance’.²⁵ The continuous revelation or unveiling of the ultimately invisible and ineffable God prompts a conception that could be seen as ‘epektatic’ (though Irenaeus is not explicitly discussing eschatology here). To nuance the picture further, at the end of Against Heresies we have Irenaeus’s well-known eschatological vision. While here he posits gradation and progress among the righteous resurrected, he also conceives a consummation to this movement articulated in Paul’s terms of God being ‘all in all’ (1 Cor. 15:28). He ends with the bestowal on the righteous of what ‘eye has not seen nor ear heard’ (cf. 1 Cor. 2:9). The eschatological gift is bound up with a completion and perfection that takes human beings beyond the angels, who themselves cannot ‘search out’ the divine wisdom by which ‘the creature should contain the Word, and ascend to him, passing beyond the angels, and be made after the image and likeness of God’.²⁶ How this concluding image of the eschatological state fits with the image of forever learning new things in Against Heresies 2 is an interesting question, but it is not to my knowledge much discussed in secondary literature, and does not necessarily have an easy answer.²⁷ We should not jump from Irenaeus to Gregory of Nyssa without at least mentioning the figure of Origen (184–253). Unfortunately, the topic of Origen’s eschatological view of human destiny is too dense and complex to ²⁴ Irenaeus, Against Heresies 2:28:3 (ed. Harvey, 1:351). ²⁵ Irenaeus, Against Heresies 4:20:7 (ed. Harvey, 2:218–19). ²⁶ Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5:36 (ed. Harvey, 2:429). ²⁷ For some discussion of eschatology in Irenaeus, see Behr (2013a), pp. 69–70, 133. Behr’s overall sense of Irenaeus’s theology as driven by the concept of the creation of ‘living human beings’ is helpful, though his insistence on the ‘eschatological finality’ of the event of the cross for that purpose is a matter for debate. For further discussion of Behr’s theological anthropology, see Chapter 6.

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discuss in detail here.²⁸ What we will see repeatedly, however, in this chapter and others, is the spectre of ‘Origenist’ speculations providing a context for one or another view of human perfection. Whether the threat of ‘satiation’ in the vision of God from which one can theoretically fall away, or the ambivalent (if not negative) eschatological value ascribed to the material world, such Origenist themes help frame much subsequent theological discussion. One image, however, deployed by Origen and influential in the later Byzantine tradition, can be highlighted. This is the image of iron in fire discussed in On First Principles 2:6 to illustrate the participation of the human soul of Christ in God. Just as the iron receives all the properties of fire so as to become ‘wholly fire’, Origen understands the human soul of Jesus as the ‘vessel’ joined to God through which the divine fire imparts its ‘warmth’ to the saints. The Christology lying behind Origen’s use of this image is problematic by later standards of orthodoxy (since he appears to posit a pre-existent human soul of Jesus abiding in the ‘fire’ of the Word), but his message regarding the centrality of Christ’s humanity for deification, and the use of the iron-in-fire image to convey the concept of the deification of humanity, both resonate with the later tradition. Returning to epektasis proper, however, the major source is of course Gregory of Nyssa, who understands the perfection of human nature as an ever-increasing growth in virtue, a growth which is without limit.²⁹ His clearest intimations of an eschatological epektasis occur in his Commentary on Song of Songs (In Cant.), and arguably also in Life of Moses. In the eighth homily of In Cant., Gregory cites the famous Philippians passage about ‘stretching out’ to what lies ahead and interprets it as follows: [Paul] teaches us, on the one hand, that what is ever and again discovered of that blessed Nature that is the Good is something great but, on the other hand, that what lies beyond what is grasped at any particular point is infinitely greater; and during the entire eternity of the ages this becomes the case for the person who participates in the Good, since those who participate in it receive increase and growth in that they encounter ever greater and better things.³⁰

The reference to this stretching out as applicable ‘during the entire eternity of the ages’ is one of the rare places where the concept is explicitly expressed eschatologically. When we turn to Gregory’s Life of Moses, strictly speaking we are confronted with a treatise not on eschatology, but on perceiving in Moses a model of the spiritual life. It is significant that Gregory’s conception of ²⁸ For a recent detailed analysis of this theme in Origen, see Tzamalikos (2007) and also the recent edition and translation of Origen’s famous work On First Principles, with extensive introduction and commentary: Behr (ed. and trans.) (2018). ²⁹ Gregory of Nyssa, De Vita Moysis 1:10 (GNO 25:5). See also his On Perfection (GNO 30.213–14). ³⁰ Gregory of Nyssa, In Cant. 8 (246), trans. R. A. Norris, pp. 258–9.

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progress here is connected with the limitlessness of virtue rather than with an aversion to ‘stasis’ per se. Although the evidence must largely be inferred, it has been well argued that Gregory’s vision of epektasis counters the Origenist notion of satiety (κόρος), that is, that souls could grow satiated and bored of the vision of God, and thus fall away.³¹ He is by no means against a certain kind of stasis or stability, even immutability, but he conceives of it in a particular way, as a stability or immutability in virtue, in the Good, which is limitless and thus ‘insatiable’. The clearest example of the combination of movement and stasis in his conception is found in Life of Moses 2.243–4, where Gregory describes spiritual ascent as being at once stasis and movement—τὸ αὐτὸ καὶ στάσις ἐστὶ καὶ κίνησις—perhaps a precursor to Maximus’s concept of evermoving stasis dealt with in the next section.³² A third and less discussed text, though one thematically similar to what we find in Gregory’s Life of Moses, comes in the influential seventh-century ascetic treatise The Ladder of Divine Ascent by John of Sinai or John Climacus. He writes: Creatures have received from the Creator their order and beginning, and some also their end. But the limit of virtue is limitless . . . . If some who are good workers go from the power of action to the power of divine vision, and if love never fails, and if the Lord will guard the coming in of your fear and the going out of your love, then the limit of love is limitless. We shall never cease progressing in love, either in the present age or in the age to come.³³

A ceaseless progress and advance is posited for the age to come, something Climacus goes on in the same passage to attribute also to the angels. As in Gregory this is done on the basis of the limitlessness of virtue, specifically the virtue of love. It is probably fair to assume a rebuttal here of the Origenist theory of satiety (pre-existent souls becoming sated with the vision of God and falling away), especially given that John shows some familiarity elsewhere with Origenism, at one point warning against what he terms ‘the disease of the atheist Origen’, which there refers to apokatastasis or universal salvation.³⁴ What is clear is that the progress Climacus envisages is tied to an everdynamic experience of the infinity of divine love. It will be argued in what follows that this is not necessarily so far removed from the prioritization of

³¹ Heine (1975); see also Blowers (1992). ³² Gregory of Nyssa, De Vita Moysis 2 (GNO 25:118). In his recent study on embodiment and virtue in Gregory of Nyssa, Hans Boermsa offers a strong case for Gregory’s understanding of eschatology as intimately connected with participation in God’s ‘adiastemic’ life, a life unconditioned, in other words by ‘distance’: Boermsa (2015). This might offer another fruitful path to nuancing our approach to epektasis in Gregory of Nyssa, an avenue that unfortunately cannot be pursued in this chapter, which is dedicated first and foremost to the thought of Maximus. ³³ John Climacus, Ladder of Divine Ascent, Step 26.ii.37 [26.153] (PG 88.1068AB). ³⁴ John Climacus, Ladder of Divine Ascent, Step 5.41 (PG 88.780D).

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‘eternal rest’ that we find in Maximus, though for specific reasons Maximus is wary of using the language of ‘progress’ (προκοπή) to describe it.³⁵ Having mentioned what are perhaps the most transparent but also among the only extant ‘proof texts’ for an epektatic vision of the eschaton in early Byzantine theology, it is time to turn to a possible alternative to this approach, centred on Maximus. The concept of deification is key here. As was argued above, it is hard not to see the development of theosis or deification language in the Greek tradition as in tension with, rather than as obviously allied to, a concept of perpetual progress. To speak of becoming, in Christ and by the grace of the Holy Spirit, what God is by nature, and of acquiring as a consequence the divine attributes of immortality, incorruptibility, immutability, and so on, is far more concretely a destination, a ‘last thing’ or novissimum, than what is implied in epektasis. This itself, however, touches on a thorny problem: does deification really entail acquisition of the divine life in its actuality, in its fullness? As discussed in Chapter 1, many commentators, even sympathetic ones such as Norman Russell, tend to shy away from seeing this in the sources, often for fear of pagan and/or pantheistic readings of Christian salvation. Do we not need a category such as epektasis to maintain the absolute distinction and otherness between Creator and creature? But again, if we fully adopt epektasis language, how far do we compromise the meaning itself of deification, of truly becoming by grace what God is by nature? To help us answer such questions, we turn to the eschatology of Maximus the Confessor.

2. THE E SCHATOLOGY OF MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR

Some preliminaries Scholarship devoted to the person and work of Maximus the Confessor (c.580–662) is abundant and ever-increasing.³⁶ We will not devote much ³⁵ A recent article by Ovidiu Sferlea develops the theme of a strong connection between Gregory of Nyssa and John Climacus on the notion of perpetual progress: Sferlea (2017). He joins the chorus of voices who see epektasis as a fundamental key for understanding Byzantine eschatology, including Symeon the New Theologian and Gregory Palamas as strong proponents of this approach. The relevant texts will be briefly discussed in the chapters on Symeon and Palamas respectively: in the first case, the context is another rebuttal of the Origenist notion of ‘satiety’, and in the second, Palamas is inverting Barlaam’s ‘cheapened’ view of human perfection as straightforwardly attainable in this life. For neither, however, is epektasis a governing or frequent concept in their views of deification, whose accent—as in the case of Maximus to be discussed presently— almost invariably falls on a union with God without distance, separation, or confusion. ³⁶ For a recent, wide-ranging appraisal of Maximus complete with extensive bibliography, see Allen and Neil (2015). See also van Deun and Mueller-Jourdan (2015), Vasiljevich (2013), and

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space to introducing his life and thought here, in part because this has been done many times by others, but also due to ongoing and involved debates about his precise biography, especially his early life. Whether we see Maximus as Constantinopolitan or Palestinian in origin will have little bearing on the theological analysis to follow.³⁷ What is at least beyond dispute is the key role played by Maximus as a representative of Neo-Chalcedonian Byzantine theology. He was a prolific and wide-ranging author: for our purposes the major texts of interest come predominantly from his earlier period, namely the late 620s and early 630s, before he turns most of his attention to the more explicitly doctrinal threats of monoenergism and monotheletism. These discussed works include the Ambigua to John, the Ambigua to Thomas, the Questions to Thalassius, and the Theological and Economical Chapters.³⁸ For all his complexity and what Photius of Constantinople lamented was a repetitive and obscure style,³⁹ there is a remarkably broad and synthetic consistency to his theology, something that accounts for his popularity both in Byzantium and in modern theological circles. Work on Maximus’s eschatology has tended to be preoccupied with whether or not he held to a form of apokatastasis or universal restoration (and, consequently, universal salvation).⁴⁰ The notion rests on a combination of passages that speak in general terms about the universal restoration of human nature and/or creation as a whole in Christ, ultimately to be revealed eschatologically, together with a few passages where Maximus speaks in an apparently cryptic manner about the need to ‘honour by silence’ various more mystical or lofty interpretations of Scripture. This has been enough for many to suppose that Maximus subscribes to at least some kind of vision of universal salvation, even if it perhaps must likewise be ‘honoured by silence’ as something true but for the most part pastorally inexpedient.⁴¹ The problems with this approach to Maximus’s eschatology are manifold, and have been outlined in some detail by Brian Daley.⁴² A sufficient response to, or rebuttal of, Daley’s arguments has yet to appear.⁴³ The dismissal, for instance, of Maximus’s repeated and occasionally developed references to hell as an everlasting state the still important collection edited by Heinzer and Schönborn (eds.) (1982). The new date-list of Maximus’s works in Jankowiak and Booth (2015) is invaluable. ³⁷ This debate, centred on the place and reliability of an early Syriac life of Maximus written by a detractor, is summarized in van Deun and Mueller-Jourdan (2015), pp. 375–88 and Allen (2015). ³⁸ Some discussion of Opusculum 1 and other texts is also included. ³⁹ Photius, Bibliotheca 3 (ed. Henry, 80–1). ⁴⁰ Probably the most influential suggestions in this regard belong to Hans Urs von Balthasar: see von Balthasar (2003), 354–7. See also the longer treatment in Ramelli (2013), pp. 738–57. ⁴¹ See Andreopoulos (2015), and Blowers (2016), pp. 247–53. See also Louth (2007b), p. 245. ⁴² See Daley (1982) and also Larchet (1996), pp. 652–65. ⁴³ Von Balthasar makes mention of some of the arguments in a series of footnotes in von Balthasar (1988), pp. 245–48, but dismisses them without real or deep engagement.

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as constituting a kind of lip service to post-Justinianic institutional orthodoxy rather than an insight into Maximus’s own thought seems, in the absence of compelling evidence, to be little more than wishful thinking.⁴⁴ Let us consider an example that has been taken by several recent commentators to imply that Maximus espoused a kind of apokatastasis, from his Commentary on Psalm 59: The present psalm is inscribed with the opening words Unto the end, for those who shall be changed in view of the transformation and change in deliberative will and in free choice from infidelity to faith, from vice to virtue, and from ignorance to knowledge of God, which have come about for humanity at the end of time (cf. 1 Cor. 10:11) through the advent of Christ. [It is also thus inscribed] in view of the natural change and renewal which will later, in grace, transpire universally at the end of the ages through the very same Saviour and God, when all the human race shall be translated from death and corruption to immortal life and incorruption through the anticipated resurrection. For an inscription of a title to David: that is to say, to Christ himself, in view of the destruction of evil which, in the divine incarnation—itself a kind of ‘inscription’—Christ accomplished in himself as our Leader and Saviour (Acts 5:31), and which he effects in those who with him live piously in the manner of Christ (cf. 2 Tim. 3:12; Titus 2:12). Yet this phrase also has in view the complete and final disappearance of death and corruption which is yet to happen through Christ.⁴⁵

Even Brian Daley, who alerts us to this passage, finds in it a rare ‘unqualified optimism’ that could conceivably point to a notion of universal salvation in Maximus, though he warns that given its context as ‘a brief, pastoral exposition of scripture’ rather than ‘a careful statement of his eschatology’, it cannot be pushed too far.⁴⁶ Upon closer inspection, however, this text may not hold out the kind of ‘optimism’ many infer. Such optimism depends on a conflation of two distinct events that Maximus is quite careful here to distinguish. He clearly takes the Psalm’s inscription ‘unto the end, for those who shall be changed’ in two senses. In the first sense, there is a change from infidelity to faith, vice to virtue, and ignorance to knowledge which occurs among those who, thanks to the incarnation of Christ ‘at the end of time’ (referring to Christ’s incarnation as itself revealing the meaning and end of time), embrace faith, virtue, and knowledge. A little further on this sense is repeated in reference to Christ who destroys evil in the Incarnation, a destruction effected ‘in those who with him live piously in the manner of Christ’. Then there is a ⁴⁴ Von Balthasar makes this argument in von Balthasar (1988), pp. 245–8. For references and commentary on Maximus’s understanding of hell, see Daley (1982), pp. 327–39. ⁴⁵ Maximus the Confessor, Exposition of Psalm 59 lines 7–23 (ed. van Deun, 3–4), translated in Blowers (2016), pp. 248–9 (slightly amended). ⁴⁶ Daley (1982), p. 322. See also Andreopoulos (2015), p. 330 and Blowers (2016), pp. 248–9 for the consideration of this text as positive evidence for Maximus’s belief in a version of universal salvation.

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second sense, in which ‘those who are changed’ in the end refers to the general resurrection of all from death and corruption to life and incorruption. This second sense is again repeated further on where Christ’s victory over death and corruption at the end of all ages is emphasized. There is no reason, as commentators have done thus far, to equate or elide these two senses. If anything, Maximus carefully delineates, using specific terminology, what is given to all in the age to come (freedom from death and corruption, which simply implies that all are resurrected from the dead) from what is given to the faithful, beginning even now thanks to the Incarnation (faith, virtue, knowledge). The rest of the commentary is in fact concerned with the latter question of ascetically living according to the commandments, and thus I am not convinced by Blowers’s argument that ‘the element of moral admonition is virtually overshadowed by the projection of a complete victory in the end, benefiting all’.⁴⁷ This argument depends on a blurring of these two distinct interpretations Maximus is offering, a blurring which Maximus himself studiously avoids. At the very least, it does not strike me as an adequate passage upon which to build a vision of universal salvation in Maximus.⁴⁸ Several other texts could be examined in this context, but the theme, which is not a direct concern of this study, cannot overly detain us here.⁴⁹ Another concern with regard to Maximus’s eschatology in the secondary literature, and which in fact emerges in the passage just cited, is the notion of the ‘realized’ or ‘inaugurated’ nature of the eschaton by virtue of the Incarnation. The coming of Christ into the world—God made man—is nothing less for Maximus than the entry of the eschaton within time and history. This breaking-in of the

⁴⁷ Blowers (2016), p. 249. ⁴⁸ The above argument regarding Maximus’s distinction between universal ‘restoration’ and the experience of salvation is borne out also in Questions and Doubts 19 (ed. Declerck, 17–18), where Maximus gives three acceptable senses in which the term apokatastasis can be understood: first, the restoration that occurs in each person who fulfils their inherent logos of virtue; second, the restoration of all human beings to incorruption and immortality through bodily resurrection; and third, linked to this, the restoration, together with the body, of the powers of the soul to their original state ‘in understanding, not in participation of the good things’ (τῇ ἐπιγνώσει οὐ τῇ μεθέξει τῶν ἀγαθῶν—ed. Declerck, 18.19) (emphasis added). Maximus is making a crucial qualification at this juncture: all rational souls will have their natural powers fully restored, but that does not imply that they will participate in the kingdom. This restoration is done to prove that ‘the Creator is not the cause of sin’ (ed. Declerck, 18.21), i.e. once these powers are restored in the full cognizance of each person, no one will be able to blame God for sin by claiming there were original ‘defects’ in the Creator’s design of the human soul. It explicitly does not imply, in and of itself, ‘partaking of the good things’ to come. ⁴⁹ See especially Maximus’s Ambiguum 65:3 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:278–9) where eternal well-being (τὸ ἀεὶ εὖ εἶναι) is explicitly put in opposition to ‘eternal ill-being’ (τὸ ἀεὶ φεῦ εἶναι); and also Ambiguum 21:12 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:438–9) on the condemnation that endures for ‘infinite ages’ for those who abuse the powers of the soul. See also Maximus’s Exposition of the Lord’s Prayer lines 502–5 (ed. van Deun, 56), where the deprivation of the single joy of companionship with the Word is described as ‘the punishment without end’ (ἡ κόλασις ἀτελεύτητος). On the matter of Maximus’s ontological view of hell, see Zizioulas (2012).

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eschata through the Incarnate Christ is in turn usually linked to Maximus’s understanding of the eschatological dimension of the liturgy (as well as Scripture). The liturgical dimension of Maximus’s eschatology is evidenced most especially in the Mystagogy, where he considers the liturgical act to be a recapitulation of, and participation in, the life and work of Christ.⁵⁰ Unlike the presence or absence of apokatastasis, the ‘realized’ aspect of his eschatology and its exegetical and liturgical expression is a relatively uncontroversial point in Maximian studies.⁵¹ Again, however, while much could be said regarding the nuances and implications of realized or inaugurated eschatology in Maximus, our primary concern is to examine Maximus’s eschatology as it pertains to the state of the saved in the age to come, with particular reference to the concepts of movement and rest, even if, as we will see, the glimpsing of the eschatological ideal beginning already in this life is an inescapable part of Maximus’s vision. Together with Gregory of Nyssa, the figure of Maximus has been key to conveying the popular notion that eschatology in Byzantine theology is primarily epektatic. An article by Blowers, to which we shall return shortly, laid out many of the arguments in favour of the idea that Maximus’s eschatology contains at least a modified model of ‘perpetual progress’ as it was conceived by Gregory of Nyssa.⁵² As with the topic of apokatastasis, Maximus’s and Gregory’s approaches to this issue are frequently associated.⁵³ Some have called this association into question, however, wondering whether Maximus even knew of Gregory’s approach.⁵⁴ In outlining the major contours of Maximus’s eschatology, some further light can at least indirectly be shed on this question, but more importantly on the larger issue of how the human ideal was understood and presented in Byzantine theology.

⁵⁰ The liturgical side—including the sacramental and especially Eucharistic elements—of Maximus’s thought cannot be dealt with in this study, but from the historical perspective, see especially Booth (2014), who argues convincingly that Maximus (together with his close associates John Moschos and Sophronios of Jerusalem) does much to work out a synthesis of ascetic and sacramental spirituality in the seventh century. From the theological perspective, see Loudovikos (2010) for a provocative study of Maximus’s ‘eucharistic ontology’. ⁵¹ See Blowers (1992); Cattoi (2015b); Andreopoulos (2015), pp. 334–8; and Blowers (2016), pp. 137–41 (realized eschatology), 166–95 (liturgical dimension). For an illuminating analysis of Maximus’s ‘eschatologically oriented exegesis’, see Törönen (2007), pp. 157–62. ⁵² Blowers (1992), who reiterates his position in Blowers (2016), p. 116. ⁵³ See, for example, Christou (1982), p. 270; Berthold (trans.) (1985), p. 172n38; Portaru (2015), p. 128; Andreopoulos (2015), p. 333; Mitralexis (2017), pp. 73–5. ⁵⁴ An excellent brief discussion of the issue can be found in Larchet (1996), pp. 670–4, referred to again in what follows. See also the remarks in Constas (2017), pp. 97–102. One might add that, as intimated above, what exactly Gregory’s own position is vis-à-vis perpetual progress is still a matter of debate.

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Christocentric deification and the suspicion of change What is not always clearly stated in studies of Maximus is that to approach the Confessor’s eschatology is to approach his doctrine of deification. The two are indissolubly connected, given that the content of salvation in the age to come is for him precisely theosis or deification.⁵⁵ As with his theology as a whole, Maximus’s understanding of eschatology and deification is thoroughly Christocentric.⁵⁶ He is driven by the idea that Christ’s great gift is the deification of those who love him. The pursuit of this gift, and its acquisition in the form of a pledge and foretaste even in this life, is tied to his understanding of sanctity in Christ. As he puts it in his prologue to the Ambigua to Thomas, the saints were those in whom Christ ‘became the soul of their souls’.⁵⁷ Setting ourselves on the course of eschatological deification is setting ourselves on the course to ‘become living images of Christ, or rather become one with him through grace . . . or even, perhaps, become the Lord Himself, if such an idea is not too onerous for some to bear’.⁵⁸ However we wish to deal with it, there is an unremittingly maximalist view of human destiny in Christ for the Confessor. In Ad Thalassium 22, which deals with the tension between realized and future eschatology (and so realized and future deification), he juxtaposes the entry of the eschaton into history through the Incarnation of Christ with its fulfilment in the saints in the age to come. He writes: For if he himself reached the limit [πέρας] of the divine activity by which he was made man, becoming like us in every manner [κατὰ πάντα τρόπον] only without sin . . . he will certainly [i.e. in the future age] also reach the limit [πέρας] of the divine activity by which man is made God in every manner [κατὰ πάντα τρόπον] only without, evidently, identity of essence with him.⁵⁹

This is, of course, an exegetical expansion of the classic patristic exchange or tantum-quantum formula that God was made man in order that man might become God. What is significant is Maximus’s concern that the human being is called to be deified in every manner, way, or ‘mode’ (τρόπος), without ⁵⁵ Larchet (1996) remains the most exhaustive and important work on deification in Maximus. See also Larchet (2015). ⁵⁶ For more on the Christocentricism of Maximus’s thought, see Tollefsen (2008) and Blowers (2016). ⁵⁷ Ambigua to Thomas prologue (ed. and trans. Constas 1:4–5): τὸν Χριστὸν . . . ψυχὴν αὐτοῖς τῆς ψυχῆς γεγενημένον. ⁵⁸ Ambiguum 21:15 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:444–5). This position should be distinguished from the so-called isochristoi heresy of certain Origenist monks (whereby one could attain absolute equality with Christ), which rested on rather different cosmological assumptions, and where Christ is more an exemplar of perfection than its source. The isochristoi were condemned in the twelfth and thirteenth anathemas against Origenism issued in conjunction with the Second Council of Constantinople (Fifth Ecumenical Council) in 553, for which see Price (trans.) (2012) vol. 2, pp. 270–80 and 286. ⁵⁹ Ad Thalassium 22 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 7:139.36–41).

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however becoming identical with the divine essence itself. In other words, the mode in which the deified live is considered by Maximus to be totally divine, even if their humanity remains intact in its essence. He goes on in the same text to delineate the ‘age of activity’ (our present age) and the ‘age of passivity’ (the future age), in which our natural human activities in striving for virtue will have reached their ‘limit’, and where the divine power of deification beyond human nature and ‘transcending all infinity’ will enact the eschatological life among the worthy.⁶⁰ His argument implies that in the age to come, God does not live in one way and the saints in another way: they live in exactly the same way, only one lives it as God by nature and the other as human by nature, the person of Christ the God-man (who bears both natures in himself) serving as the locus in and through which this occurs.⁶¹ The importance of this position will become clearer as we delve deeper into Maximus’s understanding of the content of deified existence. First, however, a theme of relevance in the Confessor’s thought ought to be underlined, even though it is not directly related to the age to come. This has to do with Maximus’s wariness, when discussing our present condition, of any glorification or idolization of the concept of change.⁶² This is worth mentioning because of the possible but misleading association discussed above between ‘dynamic’ views of salvation such as that found in Maximus, and a notion of constant positive ‘change’. In Ambiguum 8, which deals with the inherent instability and disorder of matter, Maximus concludes with a lamentation of our current state: ‘the only thing it has that can be called permanent and stable is its impermanence and instability’.⁶³ Constant change and flux, and the threats of disorder, disintegration, and uncertainty, are to my knowledge never given a positive meaning by Maximus. Thus again in Ambiguum 10, a lengthy treatise which contains an involved meditation on the nature of time and the aeon/age, he explains that ‘the saints learned that the world in due sequence will necessarily come to an end, for they rightly gathered that it is not possible, nor rationally coherent, to consider as eternal that which is not always the same, not immune from change and alteration’.⁶⁴ The categories of change or alteration, in other words, can have no place in the age to come, the age of eternity, and are in fact something tiresome and

⁶⁰ Ad Thalassium 22 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 7:141–2). ⁶¹ It is worth noting that in the scholia to Ad Thalassium 22 (schol. 7), a strongly worded summary of Maximus’s position states that ‘the one found worthy to participate in the divine is made God by an identity grounded in stability [τῇ κατὰ τὴν στάσιν ταὐτότητι]’ (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 7:147; trans. Constas, 156). For further discussion of Ad Thalassium 22, see Blowers (1997). ⁶² The Greek words Maximus generally uses to denote change are τροπή, ἀλλοίωσις, and less frequently μεταβολή. ⁶³ Ambiguum 8:4 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:148–9). ⁶⁴ Ambiguum 10:83 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:276–7).

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regrettable. As we will see, even the category of motion or movement (κίνησις), while positive and in a certain sense applied by Maximus to the future age, needs careful interpretation. In the passage just cited, Maximus is sharply distinguishing the experience of change or alteration from the goal or end of creation in Christ, which is communion with the eternal, and as such, with the immutable, immoveable, and uncreated. Another place in which Maximus demonstrates his suspicion of certain ideas that often seem to be implied in modern proposals of epektasis comes in Ambiguum 13. This is a discussion of a line in Gregory of Nazianzus regarding ‘those who have itching ears and tongues’. He writes that such people are those who wish only to hear or tell of something new (cf. Acts 17:21), and who are always delighted by innovations and in ‘relocating the boundaries established by their fathers’ (Prov 22:28, 23:10) . . . and who take pleasure in the ephemeral and exotic, and who rise up against whatever is well known, well established, and unchanging, as being dull, commonplace, and of no value.⁶⁵

To a modern ear, this seems far from the visionary and fresh-thinking Maximus so often touted in secondary literature; someone with a bold, optimistic anthropology. The dissonance occurs only, however, when we hear the term ‘optimistic anthropology’ with its usual contemporary connotations of achievement through scientific, technological, political, cultural (perhaps also ethical) innovation, change, and progress. While the argument for an optimistic anthropology in Maximus can certainly be made, it cannot be made along these lines. If his anthropology is to be described as optimistic, it is so because God became a human being, not because of creation’s or man’s natural abilities or capacities. These abilities and capacities may be Godgiven, but they are not deifying. They are there, in fact, to be aligned with God’s eternal purpose or logos for us, a logos which belongs to human nature but also summons that nature beyond itself to the supranatural state of deification.⁶⁶ The straining to align all our activities with God’s uncreated and unchanging purpose, will, or logos for us sums up the content of Christian life for Maximus. In Ambiguum 37 he discusses John the Baptist as a prototype of such a person, whom he describes as ‘a symbol of an unchanging state [of mind]’ (τῆς . . . κατὰ τὴν ἕξιν ἀτρεψίας σύμβολον).⁶⁷ He goes on to describe John as a ‘type’ in a most interesting way, as follows: ‘John, therefore, is a type of all those who through repentance are spiritually reborn in virtue and knowledge, and who through progress [προκοπή] reach the end of their course ⁶⁵ Ambiguum 13:2 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:348–9). ⁶⁶ For more on the dense theology of the Logos and the logoi in Maximus, see Tollefsen (2008), pp. 64–137. Maximus elaborates his theory of Logos and logoi at length in Ambiguum 7 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:75–141): Ambiguum 7 is briefly discussed in the following section. ⁶⁷ Ambiguum 37:2 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:74–75, modified).

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having maintained their state [of mind] unchanged [ἄτρεπτος].’⁶⁸ Progress even here below, for Maximus, is not strictly speaking about change, but about virtue: in fact, progress comes most readily when our disposition, habit, or state is stable, fixed, and immutable in virtue.⁶⁹ Interestingly, the framework envisaged by the Confessor for such an unchanged state of virtue is that of μετάνοια (lit. ‘change of mind’) or repentance.⁷⁰ Taken together, this text and those above demonstrate that, for Maximus, that which is subject to change, alteration, and flux is not considered an ideal in and of itself. If we wish to speak of the category of ‘positive change’ in his thought, it would need to be linked primarily with the possibility of repentance, as well as the ‘change’ and ‘innovation’ wrought in humanity by the coming of Christ,⁷¹ but neither of these are changes for the sake of change: they both, in fact, have humanity’s partaking of unchanging divine life as their goal and target.

The blessed Sabbath In Maximus’s Theological and Economical Chapters, we find repeated devotion to the idea of attaining, through the practice of the commandments, a kind of immutability and even immoveability. In an exegesis of Joshua 10:12, in which ⁶⁸ Ambiguum 37:3 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:74–75, modified). ⁶⁹ This is in turn intimately connected with the complex question of the ‘gnomic’ or ‘deliberative’ will (γνώμη) in Maximus’s thought. Larchet (1996), p. 139 highlights the moral dimension of this question for Maximus (i.e. the γνώμη as being that by which one disposes oneself towards good or evil). The goal of immutability in virtue ultimately implies immutability of γνώμη, which is in a sense, in other Maximian terms, the shedding of γνώμη itself or ‘gnomic surrender’ (see Ambiguum 7:12 (ed. Constas 1:90)). Thus when Maximus earlier attributes γνώμη (deliberation) and προαίρεσις (choice) to the humanity of Christ, it is always described as ‘intact’, ‘uncorrupted’, ‘immutable’, etc., a condition that Christ in turn gives to the faithful: see Ad Thalassium 42 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 7:285–9); Exposition of the Lord’s Prayer lines 135–53 (ed. van Deun, 34–5); and Ambiguum 4 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:24–5). When Maximus finally rejects the presence of human γνώμη in Christ, it is not on the basis that this ‘deliberative’ will is equivalent to ‘fallen’ will, nor that it is a ‘hypostatic’ or ‘personal’ will, but that it represents a mutability and malleability of the will which is liable to moral vacillation and hesitation. Christ’s human will, he insists, is from the moment of incarnation in a condition of immoveable rest (στάσις ἀκίνητος) in God, and is thus incapable of such vacillation (and for this reason is not deliberative or ‘gnomic’): Opusculum 1 (PG 91:29C–32B). This implies that the deified human will of the saints is similarly incapable of ‘deliberation’ or ‘choosing’, and thus is no longer ‘gnomic’, the will having by grace attained a state of ‘immoveable rest’ in likeness to Christ. On the face of it, this is a rather difficult concept to match up easily with a notion of ‘perpetual progress’ in the age to come. For more on the issue of γνώμη and will in Maximus in general, see McFarland (2015), Bathrellos (2004), and Hovorun (2008). ⁷⁰ For more on the concept of repentance in Greek patristic and early Byzantine ascetic theology, see Torrance (2013). ⁷¹ See Ambiguum 41 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:102–21), where Maximus, in an exegesis of a text from Gregory of Nazianzus, discusses the ‘innovation’ of human nature that took place in the Incarnation through the virgin birth in terms of a change in human nature’s ‘mode’ or τρόπος.

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Joshua orders the sun to be still over Gibeon and the moon to be still over the valley of Aijalon, he interprets the passage as follows: Gibeon is the higher intellect [νοῦς]. The valley is the flesh that has been humbled to death. The sun is the Logos illuminating the intellect [νοῦς], supplying it with the power of contemplations and turning it from every ignorance. The moon is the natural law, which persuades the flesh to lawfully submit to the spirit and receive the yoke of the commandments. The moon signifies nature because it is mutable, but in the saints it abides immutable [ἐν τοῖς ἁγίοις ἄτρεπτος διαμένει] because of [their] unchanging state of virtue.⁷²

Attributing immutability to the saints is not uncommon for Maximus. A little later he describes the gift that Christ as Truth gives to the worthy in terms of ‘an immutable state of good’.⁷³ The attainment of the repose of immutability in virtue is linked to a theme dear to Maximus’s heart: reaching the Sabbath.⁷⁴ He defines the spiritual Sabbath, for instance, as ‘the condition of dispassion and peace according to virtue in both soul and body, that is to say, an unchanging state [ἀναλλοίωτος ἕξις]’.⁷⁵ This term suits well his preference for eschatological images of rest and completion, though it is deployed in complex and nuanced ways that are worth exploring. In general, the word ‘Sabbath’ signifies for him, as he puts it, ‘the completion [ἀποπεράτωσις] of practical, natural, and theological philosophy’.⁷⁶ It denotes, in other words, an ending to apparently even the highest activities, though never an end to ‘good’ or ‘virtue’. He tends to interpret the term Sabbath in two ways. In the first sense, the Sabbath belongs to the beginning of spiritual life and represents ‘only the cessation of passions’ (τὴν τῶν παθῶν ἀργίαν μόνην) as opposed to the full acquisition of virtue.⁷⁷ It refers, in other words, not to a complete rest from labour as such, but a rest from slavery to the passions. The labour and ascetic pursuit of the virtues is, in this context, a ‘keeping of the Sabbath’. He can thus write that ‘he who has put to rest the substance of past defilements in himself by action through the virtues, has started on other more divine dispositions’.⁷⁸ He interestingly contrasts the honouring of the Sabbath under the Law by a straightforward physical rest

⁷² Theological and Economical Chapters 2:44 (PG 90:1141A). ⁷³ Theological and Economical Chapters 2:70 (PG 90:1156D); literally an immutable state ‘of the good things’. ⁷⁴ He treats the theme in many places, though it recurs with greatest frequency in Theological and Economical Chapters 1:35–60 (PG 90:1096C–105A). See also Theological and Economical Chapters 2:64–5 (PG 90:1152D–53A). ⁷⁵ Theological and Economical Chapters 2:65 (PG 90:1153A). ⁷⁶ Theological and Economical Chapters 1:36 (PG 90:1097B). ⁷⁷ Theological and Economical Chapters 1:52 (PG 90:1101C). ⁷⁸ Theological and Economical Chapters 1:35 (PG 90:1096C).

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with the Gospel revelation of the need to illumine the real meaning of the Sabbath through the performance of good deeds.⁷⁹ While the Sabbath might represent a more preliminary cessation of the passions which presupposes an active struggle and labour for virtue, it is likewise used by Maximus in a second and more all-embracing sense. He considers the Septuagint terms ‘Sabbath’, ‘Sabbaths’, and the rarer ‘Sabbaths of Sabbaths’ (Σάββατα Σαββάτων—Lev 16:31; 23:32 LXX). On the latter, he writes: ‘The “Sabbaths of Sabbaths” are the spiritual rest of the rational soul that has withdrawn the intellect from all the more divine principles in beings, and has altogether bound itself to God alone by loving ecstasy, and has, through mystical theology, made itself completely immoveable [ἀκίνητος] in God.’⁸⁰ In the preceding passage we face Maximus’s second and more exalted understanding of the Sabbath as a spiritual category. It represents here not simply the divestiture of the passions and the pursuit of virtue, but the acquisition of an ‘immoveable’ end in God, the ‘unchanging state’ cited above.⁸¹ Even here, however, Maximus is not content to ‘rest’. There is a preoccupation not only with the spiritual meaning of the Sabbath as a state descriptive of the saints dwelling immutably in God, but also with the more properly eschatological ‘eighth day’ that follows. Perhaps the most succinct explanation of his thought in this regard is the following: He who has divinely fulfilled in himself the sixth day with fitting works and thoughts, and has himself accomplished his own works well with God, has traversed in understanding all the substance of the things subject to nature and time, and has been translated into the mystical contemplation of the ages of ages. In an unknowable way he enjoys the Sabbath of the intellect [νοῦς], leaving behind and surpassing the totality of beings. But if he is also made worthy of the eighth day, he is raised from the dead, by which I mean from all that comes after God, whether things sensible or intelligible, whether principles or ideas. He lives the blessed life of God, who alone in very truth is called and is life, and such a one himself becomes God by deification [αὐτὸς γενόμενος τῇ θεώσει θεός].⁸² ⁷⁹ Theological and Economical Chapters 1:35 (PG 90:1097A). This chapter has been used to argue for Maximus’s appropriation of an epektasis model for the afterlife from Gregory of Nyssa: see Berthold (trans.) (1985), p. 172 n 38. However, the context more clearly points to the spiritual struggle in this life to grow in virtue. Maximus’s argument that the terminus of each ‘growth’ in virtue leads to yet more growth is made in contradistinction to the natural order, in which the end of growth is death. While one could apply this logic to the eschatological state, Maximus does not himself do so here. He is more explicitly eschatological (using in the process rather different language and imagery) in the subsequent chapters of this text, looked at in what follows. The same point, incidentally, can be made of Berthold’s comments on Mystagogy 5, which is explicitly about the experience of sanctification in the life of the Church rather than the adoption of a model of eschatological epektasis: see Berthold (trans.) (1985), p. 218 nn 45–6. ⁸⁰ Theological and Economical Chapters 1:39 (PG 90:1097C). ⁸¹ Theological and Economical Chapters 2:65 (PG 90:1153A). ⁸² Theological and Economical Chapters 1:54 (PG 90:1104AB).

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Maximus is directly prompted in Ambiguum 65 to elaborate on the theme of the seventh and eighth days via a ‘difficulty’ in Gregory of Nazianzus’ Oration 41 on Pentecost which speaks of the eighth—and simultaneously first—day that is ‘received from the age to come’ and that somehow fulfils the ‘Sabbath of souls’.⁸³ In this text Maximus associates the ‘mystically blessed Sabbath’ with ‘eternal being’ which brings ‘a halt to nature in terms of its potential’ and establishes ‘for all things the limit of all ages and times’.⁸⁴ Depending on their use of free choice (προαίρεσις), rational creatures will inherit this Sabbath of eternal being as either ‘well-being or ill-being . . . receiving cessation from all motion’ (πάσης λαβοῦσαι παῦλαν κινήσεως).⁸⁵ This is followed by the eschatological eighth day, which he describes thus: The eighth and the first, or rather, the one and perpetual day, is the unalloyed, allshining presence of God, which comes about after things in motion have come to rest; and throughout the whole being of those who by their free choice have used the principle [λόγος] of being according to nature, the whole God suitably abides, bestowing on them eternal well-being.⁸⁶

The language of ‘eternal well-being’ is part of Maximus’s well-known triad of humanity and creation as a whole moving from being to well-being (or illbeing) to eternal well-being (or ill-being).⁸⁷ What concerns us here is the emphasis he places on ‘cessation of movement’ as integral to entry into the eschatological state. The framework he proposes, in other words, does not sit in any easy or straightforward manner with epektatic models of the eschaton, however modified they might be. Even when speaking of spiritual life here below—let alone life in the age to come—Maximus’s language is often full of references to seeking that which is unchanging, immutable, or immoveable. There may be growth, development, or progress in this age, but these categories clearly undergo a ‘sabbatification’ that gives way among the worthy to immutable divine life through their deification. Let us examine in more detail how Maximus describes this eschatological, deified state.

Born(e) into the age to come In Ambiguum 7, among the most famous of Maximus’s works, the eschatological existence of the saints is directly discussed. He writes that the deified ⁸³ Ambiguum 65 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:274–81). ⁸⁴ Ambiguum 65:2 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:278–9). ⁸⁵ Ambiguum 65:3 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:278–9). This paragraph, alluded to in note 49 above, twice juxtaposes ‘eternal well-being’ (τὸ ἀεὶ εὖ εἶναι) and ‘eternal ill-being’ (τὸ ἀεὶ φεῦ εἶναι), something which speaks directly against the notion that Maximus held a doctrine of universal salvation. ⁸⁶ Ambiguum 65:3 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:278–9). ⁸⁷ This triad is discussed in detail in Larchet (1996), pp. 165–74.

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become instruments of the divine nature. For God in His fullness entirely permeates them, as a soul permeates the body . . . filling them with His own glory and blessedness, graciously giving them eternal, inexpressible life, completely free from the constituent properties of this present life, which is marred by corruption . . . . He will be to the soul, as it were, what the soul is to the body, and through the soul He will likewise be present in the body . . . so that the soul will receive immutability [ἀτρεψία] and the body immortality. In this way, man as a whole will be deified, being made God by the grace of God who became man. Man will remain wholly man in soul and body, owing to his nature, but will become wholly God in soul and body owing to the grace and the splendour of the blessed glory of God.⁸⁸

This is a dense passage, but it is hard to mistake the maximalist understanding of deification here. While the human being remains intact in terms of nature (‘wholly man in soul and body’), the person’s manner of existence or way of life becomes wholly divine, ‘completely free from the constituent properties of this present life’, immortal and not subject to change. The interest in contrasting the present with the future state is significant. The continuity between present and future lies in the persistent integrity of the human person (or hypostasis) and thus that person’s human nature before and after entering the eschatological and resurrected state of deification. But there is striking discontinuity with respect to the mode of that person’s life, since in the deified state, it is now God himself who directly animates and governs the person’s being with his uncreated and immutable life, like a soul animating and governing a body. In other words, even if the Christian can experience a foretaste of the deified state here below (cf. Paul’s line, ‘it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me’⁸⁹), this foretaste remains at a fundamental level in tension and discontinuity with the manner or mode of existence that obtains in the present life (subject as it is to corruption).⁹⁰ This, however, might be worth emphasizing given that lying behind many popular expressions of epektatic eschatology is a strong sense of the continuity not only of human nature as such throughout the ‘process’, but of the person’s mode of existence as well: what begins as a fervent ‘stretching out’ of desire ⁸⁸ Ambiguum 7:26 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:112–13, modified). ⁸⁹ Gal 2:20, mentioned in Ambiguum 7:11 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:88–9). ⁹⁰ This discontinuity is expressed in various ways by Maximus, perhaps most succinctly with the notion of a triad of ‘births’ corresponding to a person’s movement from being to well-being to eternal well-being. The first birth is physical birth, the second birth is baptism, and the third birth is the resurrection. A sense of continuity arises from the fact that it is the same person by nature that is born and reborn, but a sense of discontinuity is clear from the need for a ‘new birth’ in the first place, a new birth that presupposes some kind of break from, or modification of, what comes before (in terms of ‘mode’ of existence). See Ambiguum 42 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:142–3). In the case of baptism and resurrection, these two ‘births’ are clearly closely related, the latter rendering ‘eternal’ (i.e. permanent, unchanging, and incorruptible) what baptism gives as a pledge of future inheritance. On baptism in Maximus’s thought, see Larchet (1996), pp. 409–24.

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towards God in this life simply continues unabated in the next and without end. Without the category of discontinuity or modification, where entry into the kingdom is truly a ‘new birth’ into a state only darkly glimpsed, comparatively speaking, in the life of the Church (itself thanks to the ‘new birth’ of baptism), an injustice is done to the basic framework of Byzantine eschatology, not least as we find it expressed in the thought of Maximus. An eschatological model of epektasis risks minimizing or trivializing the distinction between what is proper to this age and what is proper to the age to come, and in so doing also risks blurring the lines between what Byzantine theology would label as being ‘of the world’ and what is of God.⁹¹ Elsewhere in Ambiguum 7, Maximus again dwells on this continuity/discontinuity dynamic among the deified, where there is a continuity of human nature and its natural faculties with a discontinuity in the manner of life (which is now wholly divine and thus above nature).⁹² He writes regarding the saints as ‘those who freely accept to be subjected’ to the Father and who thereby surrender ‘voluntarily and wholly to God . . . eliminating any wish that might contravene His will’.⁹³ He firmly distances this, however, from an annihilation of human nature or will in the divine: I am not implying the destruction of our power of self-determination, but rather affirming our fixed and unchangeable natural disposition, that is, a voluntary surrender of the will/gnomē [ἐκχώρησιν γνωμικήν], so that from the same source whence we received our being, we should also long to receive being moved, like an image that has ascended to its archetype, corresponding to it completely . . . so that henceforth it has neither the inclination nor the ability to be carried elsewhere, or to put it more clearly and accurately, it is no longer able to desire such a thing, for it will have received the divine energy—or rather it will have become God by deification . . . . This occurs through the grace of the Spirit which has conquered it, showing that it has God alone acting within it, so that through all there is only one sole energy, that of God and of those worthy of God, or rather of God alone, who in a manner befitting His goodness wholly interpenetrates all who are worthy.⁹⁴

Maximus goes on to compare this ‘eclipsing’ of all intelligible and sensible reality by the divine life to the disappearance of the light of the stars when the ⁹¹ Thus political theologies have emerged based on, or informed by, an epektasis model of perpetual progress, and intellectual historians of the economy have latched on to this model’s notion of ‘unlimited desire’ as a key to unpacking the logic for and defence of ‘unlimited growth’ in capitalist economics. See, for instance, Steenbuch (2016), p. 585 and Leshem (2016), pp. 93–6. While such creative efforts are interesting in their own sphere, they reflect more the current trends of the early twenty-first century rather than the concerns of Byzantine theology proper. ⁹² One could also, following Ambiguum 41, speak of this discontinuity with what has gone before in terms of the ‘innovation’ (καινοτομία) of the mode of humanity’s existence in Christ. See Ambiguum 41 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:102–21). ⁹³ Ambiguum 7:11 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:88–9). ⁹⁴ Ambiguum 7:12 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:88–91, modified).

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sun is shining, though he adds that just as there is an infinite distance and difference between the uncreated and the created, so too here his analogy falls short of the greatness of God’s outshining of the saved.⁹⁵ There is a certain forcefulness to Maximus’s language and imagery for the eschatological state in this passage. While he affirms their natural continuity, the radical ‘eclipsing’ of the saved by divine activity could be misconstrued. In a later work (Opusculum 1), Maximus was in fact asked to clarify the meaning of his phrase that ‘one energy’ is shared by God and the saints in the eschaton, especially given his strong advocacy of two natural energies (rather than one) persisting in Christ, divine and human. Rather than retract his position, as is often assumed, he defends it with vigour. The passage is worth citing at length: Regarding the ‘one energy’ that was referred to in the seventh chapter of the Ambigua on the great Gregory, the meaning is plain. For describing the future state of the saints, I spoke of one energy [or ‘activity/operation’: ἐνέργεια] of God and the saints which deifies all the saints in the beatitude for which we hope, [the energy] existing in God according to essence and becoming that of the saints by grace. Or rather, I added, [the energy is] of God alone since the accomplishment of the deification of the saints by grace occurs only by the divine energy, the capacity⁹⁶ for which we do not ourselves have implanted in our nature. And that for which we do not have the capacity, we do not have the action [τὴν πρᾶξιν] either, the action being the completion of a natural capacity. Putting something into action depends on capacity, and the capacity depends on essence [οὐσίας]. For the action is from capacity, and the capacity from the essence and in the essence . . . . Deification is not one of the things we are naturally disposed to bring about through a capacity, it not being ours: for there is in nature no principle [λόγος] of what is above nature.⁹⁷ Thus deification is not an accomplishment [πρᾶξις] of our capacity, since we do not have the capacity for it by nature, but an accomplishment of the divine power alone. It does not take place in the saints in exchange for righteous works, but is a demonstration of the Creator’s liberality. He does this by decree for those who love that which is good, whereby He Who Exists will be shown by nature, according to principles [λόγοι] that he himself knows, such that he might be known perfectly and yet remain utterly incomprehensible. I have therefore not abolished the natural energy of those who undergo

⁹⁵ Ambiguum 7:12 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:90–3). ⁹⁶ Or ‘power’ (δύναμις): the sense of ‘potentiality’ or ‘potency’ is often lost with the English word ‘power’, so I have opted for ‘capacity’ here and in what follows. The exception is when Maximus speaks of divine rather than human δύναμις, which I render ‘power’, all in an effort to best convey the Confessor’s meaning. ⁹⁷ This statement might seem to imply that Maximus does not consider the goal of deification to be a defining logos of human nature, which is not the case. It is rather a logos or ‘divine will’ that, while belonging to human nature, cannot be achieved ‘naturally’, i.e. through human capacity and activity. His point here is to stress that deification ultimately occurs by divine power and activity alone, above and beyond human natural capacity. For more on the logos of deification in Maximus as something that cannot be actualized ‘within the framework of a pure natural potential internal to a being’, see Tollefsen (2008), pp. 115–19.

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this—whose energy, being disposed by nature to be perfected, is stilled, and only the brightness of the good things that are undergone is manifest—but I have only pointed out the effective supra-essential [ὑπερούσιος] power of deification, which comes to pass by grace among the deified.⁹⁸

Maximus develops his strong position by insisting in detail that there is absolutely no power or capacity inhering within human nature that can bring about or effect the state of deification. As such, deification must be solely the work and gift of God, a work that does not occur ‘in exchange for righteous works’ but by divine decree (θέσις), out of the sheer liberality of God. Lest we make Maximus sound too Lutheran in this respect, his point is not to negate the work of virtue, but to ensure that the gift of deification is placed entirely on the divine plane as something unattainable with only the resources of human nature in itself. Human striving, with divine assistance, can ‘equip’ the person for deification, but it can never attain it. This is not only because God’s help is always needed, but because Maximus conceives the undergoing (sometimes poetically rendered ‘suffering’) of deification as a stilling and cessation of human striving itself. His major qualification in this text is that such a position does not imply that the ‘natural energy’ of the deified is thereby annulled or abolished in the eschatological state (and neither, he goes on, does it imply that Christ’s natural human energy is abolished). This raises the paradox of a kind of ‘active passivity’ of the saints,⁹⁹ who are active with the activity of God, but not thereby subsumed into God. As Constas summarizes it, the divine energy, activity, or operation ‘enables divinized human beings to act by means of an energy that is not theirs by nature or essence’.¹⁰⁰ Together with the eschatological persistence of natural human energy or activity, earlier in the same Opusculum (as in Ambiguum 7 cited above) Maximus also insists on the persistence of the natural human will. Otherwise, he argues, if the will of God and will of the saints were numerically identical and the same, the saints would have done everything that God ever willed, like create the world or save humanity. While what God and the saints desire or will might be the same, and here he gives salvation as an example, there will always be that which saves (God) and that which is saved (the saints), which in turn implies a permanent difference of nature and thus of will.¹⁰¹ ⁹⁸ Opusculum 1 (PG 91:33A–36A). ⁹⁹ A term discussed in Blowers (2016), pp. 120–1 and further elaborated by him with reference to the passion of Christ in chapter 7, esp. pp. 230–46. On the surface, it is somewhat in tension with Maximus’s delineation of ‘the age of activity’ (this age) and ‘the age of passivity’ (the age to come) in Ad Thalassium 22 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 7:137–47), but even there Maximus is not positing the elimination of human activity or energy as such, but simply that having reached its natural ‘limit’, human activity (and the human being as a whole) gives way to the divine and supranatural activity of deification that it cannot ‘enact’ on its own or ‘naturally’. ¹⁰⁰ Constas 1:480 n 16. He rightly, in my opinion, sees Maximus developing a clear distinction between divine essence and divine energy. ¹⁰¹ See Opusculum 1 (PG 91:25A–28A).

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As well as his concern for the continued and full integrity of created human nature in the deified state, whose mode of existence is rendered divine without thereby causing a rupture to, or dissolution of, the nature itself, Maximus likewise addresses the threat of Origenist notions of satiety (κόρος) in the eschaton, mentioned earlier in this chapter with reference to John Climacus. This is the idea that the deified could somehow grow ‘sated’ or weary of the eschatological state and thus fall away. The Confessor takes this up in the same Ambiguum 7 that we have been discussing. His tactic is to associate deification with the highest forms of ‘pleasure and passion and joy’. As ‘pleasure’, deification is ‘the consummation [τέλος] of all natural strivings’ even if, as we just saw, Maximus does not consider deification itself to be ‘natural’ to the human being. As ‘passion’, deification is ‘an ecstatic power, elevating the passive recipient to the state of an active agent’ (signifying the kind of ‘active passivity’ of the saints mentioned in the previous paragraph). As ‘joy’, deification ‘encounters nothing opposed to it . . . nor fears the possibility of any future satiety [κόρον]’.¹⁰² He continues by re-iterating his opposition to a satiable deification: We have shown that there are absolutely no grounds for thinking that the steadfast foundation in God of those deemed worthy of it can be shaken even slightly. For it is simply not possible that those who once come to be in God should reach satiety and be drawn away by wanton desire. As a minor proof of this, we can add the following argument: satiety by definition is the quenching of appetite, and this happens either because the appetite desired things that were trivial, or because it was repulsed and nauseated by things that were base and repugnant . . . . It is obvious that neither of these can apply to God, who by nature is infinite and infinitely attractive, and who rather increases the appetite of those who enjoy Him owing to their participation in that which has no limit.¹⁰³

This is one of the very few passages in which an epektasis-like argument is made by Maximus regarding the age to come. The danger of satiety is avoided, he explains, because rather than being trivial, base, or repugnant, God is precisely the opposite: if anything, the divine life, as limitless, ever ‘stretches out’ (ἐπιτείνειν) the human appetite that partakes in it. The position is not developed, however, and he clearly does not intend it to circumvent his emphasis on deification as an immoveable and ‘steadfast foundation’, nor as a definitive consummation or end (τέλος). As Larchet has argued, passages such as this should not be too readily equated with the epektasis of Nyssen since, while the infinity of God implies here an infinity (and thus insatiability) of appetite among the saints, nowhere does Maximus claim that this equates to a ‘progress’ or a ‘tension’ of some kind that constantly spurs the soul on. It is

¹⁰² Ambiguum 7:27 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:112–15). ¹⁰³ Ambiguum 7:28 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:114–17).

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rather, Larchet continues, more easily read as a simple rejection of Origenist satiety, and while significant, it is by no means a controlling or recurring feature of Maximus’s eschatological vision.¹⁰⁴ It is not to be lightly dismissed, but must be situated as part of Maximus’s broader concern to maintain a view of the eschatological state in which the saints cannot be shaken ‘even slightly’, where even the possibility of vacillation, hesitation, or sin is completely excluded as the saints enjoy the blessed repose of the divine life. We have so far discussed Maximus’s eschatology in terms of his yearning for the rest and repose promised to the people of God, the blessed Sabbath through which the faithful are birthed into the kingdom of the eighth and first day. In this state the saints are deified in ‘every mode’ of their existence by the transcendent and supra-essential work and activity of God himself, attaining to ‘the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ’ (Eph. 4:13), whose incarnate reality as perfect God made perfect man is itself the reason, means, and cause of this deification. It is, in short, a specific destination and involves an arrival that is understood to be qualitatively different from the journey that leads to it. While Maximus recoils from the notion that the deified state could ever be subject to ‘satiety’, the infinite ‘stretching out’ he occasionally mentions is never billed as a ‘journey’ of self- or God-discovery. It is always conceived as a steady and permanent state, albeit a permanently dynamic one. But its dynamism does not imply for him such qualifiers as ‘growth’, ‘progress’, or ‘development’ so often attributed to that word. Maximus’s most well-known and discussed ‘dynamic’ qualifier for the deified state is that it involves ‘evermoving rest’ (ἀεικίνητος στάσις). We turn, then, to this concept, specifically the role of motion or movement (κίνησις) in his overarching eschatological vision, and how its occasional presence and deployment is heavily conditioned by his concern to affirm a real end or telos to movement in the eschaton.

From ever-moving rest to undivided union This subtitle is perhaps provocative to some readers, and it is deliberately so. A tendency has emerged in scholarship to build up an understanding of Maximus’s eschatology (and even of his thought as a whole) on the basis of his relatively rare use of the term ‘ever-moving rest’.¹⁰⁵ Rather than bracket out his concept of ever-moving rest, using it with near exclusivity to describe his eschatological vision, it will be argued in this section that greater dividends are yielded when ever-moving rest is viewed within a broader context. It will be shown that despite this phrase being widely used in scholarship as a kind of ¹⁰⁴ See Larchet (1996), pp. 670–4, where he also deals with several other relevant passages. ¹⁰⁵ For two recent examples of this approach, see Mitralexis (2017) and Manoussakis (2015), p. 89.

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shorthand or cipher for the summit of Maximus’s eschatological vision, Maximus himself complements it with many other different—equally arresting—concepts and images. Before arriving at this destination, let us first explore Maximus’s insistence on the age to come as a transition from motion to stasis or rest. We have seen this idea at work above in the section ‘The Blessed Sabbath’. Elsewhere, however, the notion of rest or the cessation of movement to describe the age to come is even more in evidence. The Confessor famously adjusts if not inverts the Origenist triad of rest–movement–genesis (itself heavily dependent on Neoplatonic categories) to describe the initial trajectory of rational creatures. In the Origenist schema as it is understood and targeted by Maximus, rational beings pre-existed in a state of rest, reaching a satiety that resulted in movement away from God and a consequent fall into the created world (i.e. genesis). Instead, using an array of philosophical as well as theological arguments, Maximus insists on a triad of genesis–movement–rest: that is, rational souls do not pre-exist, but are created simultaneously with the body (genesis), which in turn begets movement towards an end (rest or stasis).¹⁰⁶ His mainstay argument is that the rest or stasis of creatures cannot precede their movement or motion. It is this commanding concern for the goal of stasis as an end to motion that is most significant to our discussion. In Ambiguum 15, which explains a passage from Gregory of Nazianzus regarding the knowledge of God through sight and natural law, Maximus declares that the end of the natural motion of whatever has been originated is rest [στάσις], which, after the passage beyond finite things, is produced completely by infinity, for in the absence of any spatial or temporal interval [διάστημα], every motion of whatever is naturally moved ceases, henceforth having nowhere, and no means whereby, and nothing to which it could be moved, since it has attained its goal and cause, which is God, who is Himself the limit of the infinite horizon that limits all motion.¹⁰⁷

The term or end of all things that move, for Maximus, is stasis or rest. A little later in the same Ambiguum he articulates this vision of the future age, ‘when all things will be free from all change and alteration, when the endless, multiform movement of beings around particular objects will come to an end in the infinity that is around God, in which all things that are in motion

¹⁰⁶ For a discussion of this triad of terms see Sherwood (1955), pp. 92–102 and Tollefsen (2008), pp. 68–81. The latter notes that while helpful, the idea that Maximus inverts the Origenist triad risks losing sight of the sense in which there is also a ‘rest’ or ‘remaining’ (μονή) in the beginning through the uncreated logoi of beings: see Tollefsen (2008), p. 75. The relationship between protology and eschatology is beyond the purview of this study, but is discussed in Blowers (2016), pp. 199–224. ¹⁰⁷ Ambiguum 15:7 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:368–9).

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will come to rest.’¹⁰⁸ This rest or stasis constitutes a real rather than a mere hypothetical end to the motion that precedes it. He is clear that by its very nature the concept of rest implies no motion: ‘when the word “rest” is spoken, I understand it to mean solely the cessation of motion.’¹⁰⁹ A final, strong affirmation of rest as a chief characteristic of the future state can be gleaned from Ambiguum 46, in a passage giving an eschatological reading of the biblical phrase ‘a year acceptable to the Lord’ (cf. Isa. 61:2; Luke 4:19): [When] all the ages will have reached their appointed limit . . . the whole reason for the movement of things in motion will reach its completion; and the worthy will receive the promised, ultimate beatitude of deification, and . . . every motion in them with respect to everything will attain its immediate limit and rest in the permanence [μονιμότητα] that is in God Himself.¹¹⁰

Again, as we have repeatedly seen, when Maximus thinks of the eschaton, he thinks in terms primarily of rest, immoveability, immutability, unchangeability, end/completion, limit, and permanence. His understanding needs to be nuanced, of course, but by and large, such is his chosen language. In order to build a Maximian vision of the eschatological state, in other words, it would be wise that it be ‘fitly framed’ with these as basic conceptual building blocks, even if they require a ‘fitting together’ with important clarifications, such as Maximus’s insistence on the supremely vital and dynamic nature of this state of rest (which he does not envision as one of ‘inertia’ or ‘staticity’). The reverse course is the popular one, rendering Maximus’s eschaton a dynamic of eternal increase, development, and growth tempered by clarifications as to the stability or rest that is an inherent part of, but not the controlling element in, his eschatological perspective. This reverse course is charted by looking in detail not at the majority of passages cited so far, but at a limited set of Maximian terms, in particular his coinage ἀεικίνητος στάσις or ‘ever-moving rest’ (together with the phrase στάσιμος ταυτοκινησία or ‘stationary identical movement’) in relation to the eschatological state. This term occurs in four places in Maximus’s corpus: in Ambiguum 67, Ad Thalassium 59 and 65, and Opusculum 16.¹¹¹ Given its importance and recurring relevance in contemporary scholarship both about Maximus and inspired by him, it is worth examining more closely, in particular in Ad Thalassium 59 and 65 where it is explicitly linked to the age to come.¹¹² ¹⁰⁸ Ambiguum 15:9 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:372–3). ¹⁰⁹ Ambiguum 15:10 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:374–5). ¹¹⁰ Ambiguum 46:4 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:204–5). ¹¹¹ Ambiguum 67:10 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:296–7); Ad Thalassium 59 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:53.131–2); Ad Thalassium 65 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:285.545–6), and Opusculum 16 (PG 91:185A). ¹¹² For further discussion of ‘ever-moving rest’, see Larchet (1996), pp. 667–70 and Plass (1984). For philosophical background to this term and more especially ‘stationary identical movement’, see Gersh (1973).

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In Ad Thalassium 59, Maximus interprets 1 Peter 1:10–11, specifically the meaning of the prophets’ ‘seeking out’ and ‘researching’ of salvation. It is an important text for the understanding of Maximus’s understanding of sanctification in that he insists that the knowledge of divine mysteries revealed by the grace of the Holy Spirit to the saints necessitates the participation of the human faculties and capacities that receive these revelations—that is, he espouses a synergistic model of divine–human co-operation. As he summarizes it, ‘it is not right to say that grace alone produces of itself the knowledge of mysteries in the saints without the natural capacities capable of receiving knowledge’.¹¹³ Prophecy and divine revelation from on high do not, that is, abolish, suspend, or destroy what is naturally human: the human being fully participates in their reception. This echoes the point Maximus makes in Opusculum 1 regarding the continuity of human identity even in the state of deification. The thrust of the text has to do with spiritual life here and now, although Maximus does move on to a more eschatologically oriented meditation when he interprets the verse in 1 Peter that precedes the passage at hand. It reads, ‘receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls’ (1 Pet. 1:9). He discusses this salvation and end of faith for believers as their final return to the logos conformed to their end, which initiates for him a sequence of descriptors for what occurs to those being saved. It is at this juncture that ‘ever-moving rest’ is introduced as a definition of ‘the salvation of souls’.¹¹⁴ It is one, however, among a multitude, and is not placed in any obviously conspicuous or central position in the sequence. It is preceded by the definition that salvation is ‘the fullness of desire’ (ἡ πλήρωσις ἐφέσεως), and the fullness of desire is the ever-moving rest of those who desire around the object of desire; and ever-moving rest is the continual joy without interval [ἀδιάστατος] in the object of desire; and continual joy without interval in the object of desire is the participation in divine things surpassing nature.¹¹⁵

The passage continues at length, one descriptor giving way to another in his attempt to describe the indescribable. From participation in supernatural divine realities he moves to the likeness of that which participates to that in which it participates, then rather boldly to the identity of energy or activity (ἡ ταυτότης κατ᾽ ἐνέργειαν) of the saints and God which the saints receive ‘by likeness’. Not stopping there, he ties this to ‘the deification of those worthy of deification’ which itself contains, fulfils, and completes all times and ages. In turn, this state is described as a ‘union without interval’ (ἑνότης ἀδιάστατος): the adjective used connotes a union between God and the deified that posits no ¹¹³ Ad Thalassium 59 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:46.28–47.47). ¹¹⁴ Ad Thalassium 59 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:53.131–2). ¹¹⁵ Ad Thalassium 59 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:53.130–4).

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intervening ‘distance’ between them. Such a union is described in equally strong language to be a ‘going out’ or ‘departure’ (ἔκβασις) from the measurement of beginnings and ends, which is itself described as ‘the all-powerful and supra-powerful activity of God . . . unmediated, infinite and unto infinity’.¹¹⁶ Maximus’s use of ‘ever-moving rest’ here, while an important qualifier, is nevertheless more peripheral than central to his literary portrait of salvation. The climax of his description is not—as we might expect given the term’s popularity in scholarship—ever-moving rest, but a deified state of union without interval or dimension that is the unmediated and infinite operation of God in the saved. Certainly, ever-moving rest provides an important clarification of Maximus’s position, but it should not be treated as a simple equivalent to epektasis. The emphasis falls sharply on the completed and ‘unintervaled’ nature of the deified state, on stasis rather than movement. But Maximus’s use of movement as a qualifier for stasis does indicate an apophatic reticence regarding the inexpressibility of the eschatological state. In Ambiguum 15, Maximus insists that ‘God neither moves nor is stationary . . . He is beyond all motion and rest’.¹¹⁷ While this distinguishes God’s nature from that of creatures, the logic of deification in Maximus clearly leads him to posit the sharing of the saints by grace in this divine state beyond motion and even rest. Our impoverished human language can only indicate this with something like ever-moving rest: we could perhaps rephrase it without damaging Maximus’s intention as an ever-dynamic rest, where dynamism is not necessarily the same as progress, growth, development, or increase.¹¹⁸ A similar assessment is in order, I would argue, for the other eschatological use of the term ever-moving rest, in Ad Thalassium 65.¹¹⁹ This long text is a spiritual interpretation of several verses in 2 Samuel 21 regarding David and the Gibeonites. The term itself is introduced in a discussion of the significance and meaning of numbers and days, specifically the Sabbath, Pascha, and Pentecost: God the Logos is identified with each of these, the Logos who in his providence brings created nature to be in God via his Sabbath, Pascha, and ¹¹⁶ Ad Thalassium 59 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:53.134–54.159)—ἡ ἄμεσος δὲ καὶ ἄπειρος καὶ ἐπ᾽ ἄπειρον . . . ἐνέργεια τοῦ θεοῦ πανσθενὴς καὶ ὑπερδύναμος. ¹¹⁷ Ambiguum 15:11 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:374–7). ¹¹⁸ The problem of nomenclature for theological discussion of the eschata inevitably has an intractable quality to it by virtue of the subject matter, and I recognize that the terms ‘dynamic’ and ‘dynamism’ defended several times in this chapter are themselves also open to diverse interpretation and critique. By using these terms I am simply trying to capture the vitality of Maximus’s vision which, while resistant to concepts of change, growth, or progress, is by no means thereby trapped in a stale, ‘monotonous’ view of the age to come. The age to come for Maximus is ‘life in abundance’ (cf. John 10:10)—this again is what I mean by ‘dynamic’—but this need not necessitate unending progress or growth. ¹¹⁹ Ad Thalassium 65 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:285.545–6).

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Pentecost. Unsurprisingly, the Confessor’s emphasis is on this goal as a completion and ending of movement. When created nature transcends time and space, which he glosses as a transcendence of ‘limited rest and movement’, it is united to the divine logos of providence ‘which is by nature simple, stable, not having any circumscription, and because of this having no movement at all’. In such a state, ‘having come to be in God . . . it will have a state of evermoving rest and stationary identical movement [στάσιν ἀεικίνητον ἕξει καὶ στάσιμον ταυτοκινησίαν]’.¹²⁰ The primary point Maximus is making has to do with the discontinuity between movement (together with rest) as we know it here, and the state of the age to come. There is a complete cessation to movement and even rest as they are circumscribed by the limited and finite confines of creaturely existence in time and space. The terms ‘ever-moving rest’ and ‘stationary identical movement’ are an attempt here to express something that is beyond both creaturely movement and rest, rather than a signal of their perpetual extension, intensification, or ‘maximization’: it is an expression of the divine state which transcends these categories and is bestowed on the deified. It points to the dynamism and vitality of the age to come (wholly ‘energized’ as it is by the divine life), but not to any sense of continuous development, growth, or progress. This is borne out by other terms and phrases Maximus uses in the same text, such as the saints receiving ‘the crown of immutability through deification’ (τῷ διαδήματι τῆς κατὰ τὴν θέωσιν ἀτρεψίας)¹²¹ and, in the concluding lines, beatitude being manifested in them ‘unchangeably’ (ἀναλλοιώτως).¹²² Maximus’s rare use of ‘ever-moving rest/repose’ is not, I submit, a catch-all hermeneutical key for understanding his eschatology. Only two of its four uses are directly relevant to eschatology. In Ambiguum 67 it occurs in a rather cryptic numerological passage regarding two ‘extremes’ and the ‘mean’ between them to describe the ‘extremes’.¹²³ Its use is incidental to the overall text. And in Opusculum 16, while there are echoes of the language used in Ad Thalassium 59, it is here applied in praise of the spiritual life of the recipient here and now (whose desire is wholly taken up and fulfilled in God).¹²⁴ While certainly a helpful and insightful qualifier for trying to speak of a state unconstrained by the boundaries of created existence—that is, a state beyond our sense of motion and rest and directly suffused with the life and energy of God—‘ever-moving rest’ is one of a vast array of terms, images, and

¹²⁰ ¹²¹ ¹²² ¹²³ ¹²⁴

Ad Thalassium 65 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:283.501–284.546). Ad Thalassium 65 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:301.785). Ad Thalassium 65 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 22:307.870). Ambiguum 67:10 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:296–7). See Opusculum 16 (PG 91:185A).

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metaphors in Maximus’s arsenal for discussing eschatology, and one he uses in a comparatively infrequent and undeveloped way. Throughout this study the thread of the Confessor’s eschatological ‘maximalism’ has been highlighted: while retaining the fullness of their natural and hypostatic or personal identities, in the age to come the saints nevertheless undergo deification ‘in every manner’, coming to an ineffable and eternal rest in which they become ‘instruments’ (ὄργανα) of the divine nature, acting with ‘the energy of God alone’, begotten and borne into the age to come by an energy beyond nature, immutable, changeless, and without extension, interval, or dimension. In short, the saints live, as themselves, the life of God himself. Two further examples of this ‘maximalist’ perspective will be proffered before turning to a conclusion.

Inheritors of his holy name We have seen much of Maximus’s exalted language to describe the age to come, but not all, and it would be remiss to omit some of his most striking descriptions. The first is in fact a widespread idea in his corpus that the deified are properly named and known by what governs them, that is, by divine names. This idea is summarized in Ambiguum 3, where the Confessor describes the saint becoming God to the same extent that God became man, after which ‘through the complete abandonment of nature you are known by grace alone’.¹²⁵ Such a statement in isolation appears jarring, and should be nuanced given his insistence in other texts on the integrity and continuity of both natural and hypostatic identity in the age to come. Yet it should not thereby be ‘explained away’: Maximus firmly holds to the view of a total deification of the saints. It is spelled out in more detail in Ambiguum 20. There he discusses a passage in Gregory of Nazianzus about Paul’s experience of the third heaven. He uses it as an occasion to meditate on how we name things, and how man can come to be named ‘God’ by grace, but never by nature: ‘for the grace of deification’, he explains, ‘is completely unconditioned, because it finds no faculty or capacity of any sort within nature that could receive it. . . . [W]hat takes place would no longer be marvellous if deification occurred simply in accordance with the receptive capacity of nature’.¹²⁶ We saw him making this point earlier, in the passage from Opusculum 1. However, while there is no inherent natural capacity for deification in the human being, when it occurs, Maximus argues that the human being can and should in this case be called

¹²⁵ Ambiguum 3:5 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:20–1). ¹²⁶ Ambiguum 20:2 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:408–11).

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‘God’. The summit of Paul’s experience was to be assumed by God as his own and, he writes, from that point forward, the apostle left behind the names pertaining to nature and its qualities that had properly been his . . . and the name of God, which formerly stood at an infinite distance from him, he came to share by grace, becoming and being called God, in place of any other natural or conditional name that he had prior to his assumption.¹²⁷

Through deification (a mode of life that begins here below, as in Paul’s experience of assumption to the third heaven—cf. 2 Cor. 12:2), the saints inherit the very name of God, which then becomes their primary appellation, their new first and last name. Another and even bolder instance of Maximus’s language emerges in his exegesis of Melchizedek in Ambiguum 10. To account for the enigmatic references to Melchizedek in Hebrews—‘without father, mother, genealogy, with neither beginning of days, nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God’ (Heb. 7:3)—Maximus employs the same tactics we just saw. ‘He became by grace what the Giver of grace is by nature,’ he says. He marvels that this man went beyond limits and boundaries, ‘vaulting over every time and age’.¹²⁸ Because of his righteousness, by grace Melchizedek now bears within himself, unblemished and fully realized, the likeness of God the begetter, for birth creates identity between the begetter and the begotten . . . . [H]e was not named from any natural or temporal properties—such as father and mother, or genealogy, or beginning and end of days—for he left these things behind and was completely released from them, and instead was named from those divine and blessed characteristics . . . on account of divine and uncreated grace.¹²⁹

This Godlike status, which Maximus goes on to ascribe to all the saints, is explained as nothing less than becoming uncreated by grace: ‘thus he becomes without beginning or end, no longer bearing within himself the movement of life subject to time . . . but possesses only the divine and eternal life of the Word dwelling within him.’¹³⁰ Maximus’s unmistakable daring here, whereby man becomes ‘without beginning’ (ἄναρχος) by grace, is a striking instance of his thoroughgoing concept of deification, one that halts at no divine attribute. This makes it all the more surprising that for scholars such as Blowers we find just such a ‘halting’. Near the close of his article on perpetual progress in Gregory of Nyssa and Maximus, having mentioned some of Maximus’s concerns to ¹²⁷ ¹²⁸ ¹²⁹ ¹³⁰

Ambiguum 20:3 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:412–13). Ambiguum 10:44 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:216–17). Ambiguum 10:44 (ed. and trans. Constas 1.218–19). Ambiguum 10:48 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:224–5).

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maintain a notion of ‘stasis’ or ‘stability’ in the eschaton, Blowers suddenly pulls back and writes: ‘Indeed, it would be nonsensical to deduce that human beings could ever become “unmoved” as God himself is immoveable.’¹³¹ Many might indeed find it nonsensical, but would Maximus? Given his unrelenting insistence, as we have seen, on ascribing every divine name and attribute to the saints in the eschatological state, whether it be immortality, immutability, immoveability, or being without extension, dimension, end or even beginning, Blowers’s statement seems puzzling. If what is meant is that it would be nonsensical to deduce that Maximus believes that all these attributes become natural attributes of the saints, then certainly so: the uncreated nature of God and the created nature of the saints remain for ever naturally incommensurable. But the wonder of deification for Maximus is precisely that, in and through the Son of God’s hypostatic assumption of created nature, there is given to human beings the possibility, by the uncreated grace and energy of the Spirit, to be fashioned as gods, living just as God lives, in that life’s every ‘mode’ (τρόπος) and with its every attribute or name.¹³²

The stature of the fullness in the mystery of love This chapter has sought in general terms to open up the horizons of scholarship, both specialized and popular, that commonly imputes an epektatic model of the eschaton to the Greek patristic and Byzantine Christian tradition. In suggesting this paradigm shift away from an a priori preference for concepts of growth, development, or progress in the age to come that are not easily found in the sources, a firm foundation has been laid for the overall objective of this monograph, which is to reassess and reframe our approach to the human ideal and human perfection in Byzantine theology. Specifically, it has been emphasized and re-emphasized that we must distinguish between Byzantine theological concerns regarding life in this world and life in the age to come.¹³³ What is affirmed of one is not necessarily a clear statement regarding the other, though the two are obviously never completely severed. We have seen in the case of Maximus that his thought regarding the human ideal in the age to come constantly turns first and foremost to a vision of total deification, rest, cessation of motion, immutability, immoveability, etc. by the ¹³¹ Blowers (1992), p. 165. ¹³² Including, of course, immoveability. To exempt God’s immoveability from the deified state would be tantamount, in Maximus’s schema, to arguing that immoveability is either not a divine attribute, or that it is itself identical to the essence or nature of God, something that Maximus— following the Cappadocian rejection of the Eunomian equation of divine names/attributes and divine nature—would fiercely deny. ¹³³ There is likewise the separate question of the ‘middle state’ between death and the resurrection of the body, on which see in particular Constas (2001) and Marinis (2016).

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grace of God, a vision which is then occasionally glossed or clarified with statements regarding the impossibility of satiation in that state, as well as the inapplicability of our constraining and limited concepts of time and space (hence its characterization as ‘ever-moving rest’). His priorities, however, are clear, and they are not to be equated with, or I would argue even mapped onto, an epektatic understanding of eschatology. That being said, for all of Maximus’s stark imagery and terminology suggestive of a clear break between this age and the age to come, a careful balance of the continuities and discontinuities between the two must be maintained. The age to come is ‘upon us’ (cf. 1 Cor. 10:11) because of the Incarnation, and is known and experienced in the life and liturgy of the Church. To live in the Church is to ‘know in part’ (cf. 1 Cor. 13:9), in a real way, that which is to come, and while ‘eye hath not seen, nor ear heard’ the things in store, even Paul can immediately qualify himself on this point, declaring that ‘God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit’ (cf. 1 Cor. 2:9–10).¹³⁴ Not only is there a continuity, in other words, in the natural and personal (or hypostatic) identity of the saints (who remain for ever human and themselves), but there is a continuity also of grace and divine life, given in part now, and known fully then. Maximus beautifully explains this position in a text that serves to summarize his whole approach to the question at hand: Some seek to know what will be the state of those judged worthy of perfection in the kingdom of God—whether there will be progress and change or a settled state of sameness—and how one should think of bodies and souls. To this one might conjecture an answer by using the example of bodily life, where there is a twofold reason for food: for both the growth and sustenance of those who are fed. For until we reach the perfection of bodily stature we are fed for growth; but when the body achieves the measure of its increase it is no longer fed for growth but for sustenance [συντήρησις]. In the same way there is a twofold reason for food for the soul. For while it is growing it is fed with virtues and contemplations until it no longer passes through all its stages and arrives at the ‘measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ’ (Eph. 4:13). At this point all progress ceases [πάσης προκοπῆς ἴσταται] in its increase and growth through various means and is fed directly (in a way which surpasses the mind and thus growth as well) a form of incorruptible food to sustain the Godlike perfection given to it and to manifest the infinite splendours of this food. Likewise, when it receives through this food eternal well-being dwelling within it, it becomes God in the participation of divine grace.¹³⁵ ¹³⁴ Maximus discusses the juxtaposition of realized and future eschatology in Ad Thalassium 22 (eds. Laga and Steel, CCSG 7:137–47). ¹³⁵ Theological and Economical Chapters 2:88 (PG 90:1165D–68B), translated in Berthold (trans.) (1985), p. 167 (modified). There are striking parallels between this text and Origen’s De Principiis 2.11.7, where the analogy of the twofold use of food occurs in a discussion regarding the attainment of perfection in the celestial abodes. Their positions, however, should be distinguished. The ‘food’ on which the saints feast in Origen is the understanding of the meaning and

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Growth, development, progress, all cease in the age to come, but this cessation is not for a lack of life or dynamism or vitality. God’s bestowal of grace is eternal, the dependence of the creature on the Creator absolute, but what had in this life been for growth, is now for sustenance. The life-giving grace of God in the kingdom of heaven and in the life of the Church is one and the same, but its function and its measure shift from this age to the next. It is a discontinuity of sorts (no more growth, no more development, no more progress), but this is arguably eclipsed by the continuity of the gift, which even in this life, as Maximus argues, can render the saints somehow immutable and immoveable in virtue. The summit of virtue, which contains in itself the whole logos or meaning of virtue, is love (ἀγάπη).¹³⁶ Love is what brought God to us in Christ, and is what brings the saints to deification: God and humanity are even described as ‘paradigms’ of one another on the basis of this love.¹³⁷ To embrace Maximus’s vision of eschatological perfection is to embrace a vision of love: ‘for nothing is more truly Godlike than divine love, nothing more mysterious, nothing more apt to raise up human beings to deification’.¹³⁸ The law and the prophets, he continues, ‘were succeeded by the mystery of love, which out of human beings makes us gods’.¹³⁹ It would not be too forced, I think, to argue that the incorruptible food of the age to come, which sustains the saints in the state of immoveable deification, is precisely, for Maximus, the fullness of divine love, a love revealed and given to humanity in the person of the Word of God.¹⁴⁰

causes of events, which is in turn linked to the contemplation and understanding of God. He envisages a variety of ‘food’ which the saints discerningly eat or abstain from, as well as a progression in the celestial abodes themselves before the attainment of perfection. There is likewise an emphasis on the food being somehow measurable and ‘suitable to this [human] nature, which has been made and created’. Maximus heavily modifies, if not inverts, this perspective through his strong emphasis on a final deification through the single ‘incorruptible food’ of divine grace. Another distinction between them lies in Origen’s preoccupation at this juncture with the saints learning the nature of the stars, which is not of interest to Maximus’s eschatology. Translation of Origen’s text can be found in Butterworth (trans.) (1966), pp. 191–2. ¹³⁶ Much of Maximus’s oeuvre is configured around the theme of love, for instance his Four Centuries on Love. A summary of his devotion to, and understanding of, the concept of love can be found in his Epistle 2 (PG 91:392D–408B), translated in Louth (1996), pp. 82–90. ¹³⁷ In Ambiguum 10:9 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:164–5). See also Ambiguum 7:23 (ed. and trans. Constas 1:106–7), where Maximus describes ‘the beautiful exchange’ whereby God is made man and man is made God through love. ¹³⁸ Epistle 2 (PG 91:393B), translated in Louth (1996), p. 82. ¹³⁹ Epistle 2 (PG 91:393BC), translated in Louth (1996), p. 82. ¹⁴⁰ This also echoes the sentiments of John Climacus discussed earlier. For more in-depth studies of the concept of love in Maximus see, for instance, Blowers (2016), pp. 254–83 and especially the monograph by Harper (2019). For important preliminary work indicating Maximus’s reconfiguration of Evagrian spirituality on the basis of his concept of love, see Constas (2016).

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This, in sum, is Maximus’s view of the eschatological state: the reaching of a rest, an end, a telos, the Pauline ‘measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ’ (Eph. 4:13), which is nothing less than becoming God by grace. Try as they might, popular epektasis models of the eschaton do not capture the thrust and weight of Maximus’s vision. His approach, and that of early Byzantine theology more broadly, is diminished if not distorted when forced to fit any paradigm of perpetual progress in the age to come. Moreover, the use of epektasis to serve as an artificial wedge between the ‘progressive’ Greek East versus the ‘static’ Latin West is hardly a constructive—that is, edifying— enterprise. Serious discussions of the similarities and contrasts of the medieval East and West on eschatology are much needed, but they should not be framed along such lines. While Christian theologians know that in this age we at best ‘see through a glass darkly’ (1 Cor. 13:12), they know also that the rich resources of Scripture and tradition can and should spur a continuous, serious, and common search for a better understanding of, and orientation towards, the life of the age to come. For the theologian, this is simply an endeavour to know ever more deeply what it means to say that we are called to be saints, to be children of God, to know even as we are known, to see him as he is, to partake of the divine nature, to call God ‘our Father’, to be joint-heirs with Christ. As Sakharov argued in the 1950s, in the end, the question of eschatology is inextricable from the question of the humanity of Christ, eternally enthroned at the right hand of the Father.¹⁴¹ For those that are in Christ, that are ‘his own’, what is true of him becomes true also of them. As perfect God made perfect man, he makes the possibility of an eschatological deification concretely and permanently real. In his person, humanity finds not only its original cause, but also its final end, its place of eternal, ever-dynamic, and ineffable rest. The humanity of Christ, as the specific and particular point of access to human perfection in Byzantine theology, is the subject to which we now turn.

¹⁴¹ For an example of Maximus’s strident association of Christ’s humanity, enthroned bodily, with the content of salvation itself, see his attack on those who argue for an ultimate dissolution of the body in the age to come: Ambiguum 42:13–20, esp. 17–20 (ed. and trans. Constas 2:144–61, esp. 152–61).

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3 Perfection before our eyes St Theodore the Studite on the humanity of Christ

Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me and see. Luke 24:39 Now our nature is in the heavens, worshipped by every visible and invisible creature. Small Catecheses 7

In the previous chapter, we hinted at the intimate connection that exists for Byzantine theology between the eschatological fulfilment of the human being and the status of Christ’s humanity. Ever since the epistles of Paul, to know the latter is in a fundamental sense to know the former. This is the thrust, for example, of the image of Christ as the Last Adam (ὁ ἔσχατος Ἀδάμ) and ‘second man from heaven’ developed in 1 Corinthians 15: ‘as is the heavenly [man], such are they also that are heavenly, and as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly’ (1 Cor. 15:48–9). To attain perfection is already in the New Testament to bear the image of Christ’s humanity. What that entails, however, was the subject of considerable contention in the Byzantine Empire. How strong, for instance, is Paul’s juxtaposition of earthly and heavenly in this passage? He argues that ‘flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God’ (1 Cor. 15:50), but he is doing so in the context of the New Testament’s most developed and sustained defence of the doctrine of the bodily resurrection. Conflict over the precise nature of the embodiment of Christ as ‘heavenly man’ reached a head during the two periods of iconoclasm (726–87; 814–42). For the iconoclasts, passages like 1 Cor. 15 indicated that images of Christ were a denigration of his ‘heavenly image’ to the ‘earthly’ level of the flesh, a level in turn disavowed by Paul. For the defenders of icons, attention was paid

Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ. Alexis Torrance, Oxford University Press (2020). © Alexis Torrance. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198845294.001.0001

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to the special negative moral valence of the terms ‘flesh’ and ‘earthly’ as they were being used by Paul: he was not, they argued, disavowing the body in itself (which was destined for glory), but was finding the meaning of embodiment in the resurrected and incorruptible flesh of Christ, a transformed but nevertheless abidingly human and thus depictable flesh. Among such avid defenders of images was Theodore the Studite (759–826). We shall give a brief overview of his life, and turn then to his thought.¹

THEODORE THE S TUDITE Born to a wealthy Constantinopolitan family in 759, Theodore was to become one of the most pivotal figures in the history of Byzantine Christianity.² At the instigation of his monastic uncle Plato, at the age of twenty-two Theodore (together with the rest of his family) entered monasticism, converting the family estate at Sakkoudion in Bithynia for this purpose. He was eventually appointed abbot in 794, but he and his community were soon forced out and dispersed because of Theodore’s vocal opposition to the emperor Constantine VI’s second marriage to Theodote, a cousin of Theodore on his mother’s side. This so-called ‘moechian controversy’ (from the Greek for ‘adultery’) was to be the first of several high-profile controversies in Theodore’s career. With the accession of Constantine VI’s mother Irene to the imperial throne in 797, Theodore and his monks were restored to Sakkoudion, only to move shortly thereafter, at Irene’s invitation, to the venerable Studite monastery in Constantinople. From here Theodore’s work of monastic reform began in earnest, and his monastic communities grew to a confederation of as many as 1,000 monks, concentrated at Studios in the capital and in Bithynia.³ Conflicts with imperial and ecclesiastical authorities flared up again beginning in 806, first over the appointment of the layman Nikephoros to the office of patriarch, and later (in 808) over the rehabilitation of a central figure in the moechian controversy, the priest Joseph, who had officiated at the wedding of Constantine VI and Theodote. The last and most major provocation to Theodore’s theological sensibilities came, however, with the revival of iconoclasm in 815 under the emperor Leo V. Theodore called for widespread defiance of Constantinople’s iconoclasm and was promptly exiled from the city, an exile that continued until the death of Leo V five years later (820). Under his successor

¹ Some material for this chapter can be found in an earlier article: see Torrance (2017). ² For a more detailed discussion of Theodore’s life and times, and for the sources of much of the sketch that follows, see Pratsch (1999), and Cholij (2002) pp. 3–78. ³ See Cholij (2002), p. 45; others claim the total number must have been more modest: see Leroy (2007), 53–4.

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Michael II, Theodore was freed but iconoclastic policy remained officially in place. He settled in Anatolia, continuing to lead his monastic disciples and to serve as a central spokesperson and organizing force among those in favour of icon veneration. He died in 826, and leadership of the ‘Studite reforms’ he had initiated was continued under his disciple Naukratios. Following the death of the last iconoclast emperor Theophilus in 842 and with the consequent vindication of icon veneration as well as the restoration of the Studite monastery to Theodore’s disciples, Theodore’s double legacy as monastic reformer and defender of icons was solidified in the Byzantine theological tradition. Despite Theodore’s monumental influence on that tradition, he is generally praised in scholarship more for his administrative, legislative, and perhaps pastoral genius than for any real theological acumen. Cholij summarizes and espouses this approach when he writes that Theodore was ‘by temperament a practical person and a man of action rather than a speculative theologian’, who engaged in a ‘“lazy” method of doing theology’ common for his day.⁴ Even his three Antirrhetics on icon veneration, while seemingly sophisticated, ‘do not evidence any original creative thinking’, and thus, Cholij argues, ‘Theodore’s passion and his forte lay in the practical application of Christian theory’ rather than in theology proper.⁵ Among the purposes of this chapter is to challenge this assessment, thereby changing a certain paradigm with respect to the manner in which Theodore is studied theologically. The view expressed by Cholij of Theodore the ‘lazy’ theologian is not shared by all.⁶ But it is true even among those who look closely and seriously at the theological and philosophical content of Theodore’s work that attention is almost exclusively paid to the three Antirrhetics rather than his letters, pastoral catecheses, poetry, or other writings.⁷ There are clear reasons for this, the first of which is the generally lengthier and more sustained nature of Theodore’s arguments in the treatises on icons, making them more obvious candidates for closer scrutiny. Similarly, most of the studies in question are specifically about the Byzantine theology of images rather than about Theodore’s overall theology. We see, then, a form of bifurcation in the theological study of Theodore: one to do with his pastoral theology (including its liturgical dimension), represented in particular by the pioneering work of Leroy as well as Cholij; and another focused almost exclusively on his theology of images. These two tendencies have a lot to do with the questions that are brought to bear on Theodore’s corpus: is our interest in Theodore the monastic reformer and

⁴ Cholij (2002), pp. 24–5 (italics in original). ⁵ Cholij (2002), p. 25. ⁶ Most recently see the important study, from the perspective of Aristotelian philosophy and its Byzantine reception, in Erismann (2017). ⁷ See for instance the discussions of Theodore in Ken Parry’s excellent study of iconophile theology: Parry (1996).

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churchman or Theodore the defender of icons? The question that concerns this chapter, namely Theodore’s understanding of human perfection in the incarnate Christ, pushes us to combine and explore several facets of Theodore’s thought that are not often viewed together. In particular, while paying close attention to Theodore’s understanding of the humanity of Christ in the Antirrhetics and its theological and anthropological implications, we will likewise look to Theodore’s epistolary and catechetical work to help illuminate the ways in which his Christocentric theology of human perfection is concretely, and often creatively, worked out. It is argued that across these texts we see a strong impulse in Theodore to prioritize what might be described as a grounded, rugged ‘earthiness’ of the human ideal. He has an almost overriding concern to emphasize, in the person of Christ, the irrevocably incarnate nature of human perfection, a perfection worked out above all in the outwardly humdrum but inwardly glorious life of the monastic coenobium.

1. THE ONE HUMAN NATURE O F CHRIST, OF MARY, AND OF US

Introduction Recent work on the category of nature (φύσις), and specifically human nature, in the thought of Theodore has helped shed light on the philosophical progeny as well as creativity of his ideas.⁸ This chapter will concentrate on the theological aspects involved, though these are inextricably interrelated with the philosophical. In this part, a summary of Theodore’s position on Christ’s human nature as it is discussed in Antirrhetics 1 and 3 is offered. His hesitancy over the issue of conceiving human nature as a ‘universal’ in itself (apart from particular human beings) is highlighted, and this is briefly put into conversation with the somewhat different approach to human nature found in Gregory of Nyssa. From here, the pivotal role of Mary’s humanity in Theodore’s understanding of Christ’s human nature is examined and discussed, and it is put in conversation with Apollinarius of Laodicea’s concept of the parental transmission of ‘essence’ or οὐσία from one generation to the next. In particular, Theodore’s insistence on the whole of human nature being present in every single human being (i.e. in every human person or hypostasis), and that this and any nature never exists as an ‘abstract’ in itself, has important consequences that help to shape Theodore’s entire theological and pastoral vision. Having come to grips with the more theoretical aspects of his thought ⁸ Especially Erismann (2017).

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as expressed in his works in defence of images, we will turn to its application in Theodore’s more pastoral oeuvre, thereby knitting together a fuller picture of his understanding of human perfection through the humanity of Christ.

Christ’s human nature The importance for Theodore of addressing the question of nature was rooted in the first instance in the theological arguments against images raised by the iconoclasts, summed up in the so-called Christological dilemma proposed by the iconoclast emperor Constantine V.⁹ According to this argument, images of Christ had to be rejected because either one was attempting to circumscribe with artistic endeavour the uncircumscribable divine nature of Christ (something impossible to do), or one was claiming to represent the human nature of Christ, thereby dividing the humanity from the divinity. Of course, the defenders of icons rejected this false dilemma. To the charge that an image of Christ can only be an image of his human nature, which would in turn imply a Nestorian division between Christ’s humanity and divinity, Theodore makes the famous claim in his Antirrhetics that ‘every image is the image not of a nature [φύσις] but of a hypostasis’.¹⁰ When Christ is represented in an image, it is his person or hypostasis that is represented, not divine or human nature. Theodore’s position has important implications, including the fact that a nature in abstraction, whatever nature it is (including human nature), is undepictable.¹¹ He tells us that in depicting, for instance, Peter, we do so on the basis of his specific properties (ἰδιώματα) added to the common ‘definition’ (ὅρος) or species (εἶδος). This is equivalent to the venerable Cappadocian axiom that a hypostasis is equal to the nature (φύσις) or essence (οὐσία) plus individuating properties (ἰδιώματα). In Theodore, the terms ‘common definition’, ‘species’, ‘nature’, and ‘essence’ are basically used interchangeably.¹² So far, his argument is relatively conventional, although applied in a novel situation. But on what basis is he saying that human nature cannot be depicted? Is this nature a universal that is real but inherently undepictable? Or is it undepictable precisely because human nature is not in fact real or existent in the abstract, but only through its hypostatic instantiations? ⁹ This is discussed in many places. See, for instance, Louth (2007a), pp. 56–7; Parry (1996), pp. 100ff; Sahas (1986), pp. 30–2. ¹⁰ Antirrhetics 3a.34 (PG 99.405A). ¹¹ Earlier in Antirrhetics 3 Theodore appears to take this line further to argue that not only is abstract nature incapable of being represented, it is also non-existent; but we shall return to this in what follows. ¹² See, for instance Antirrhetics 3a.17 (PG 99:397B) which speaks of the ‘common essence’, as well as 3a.21–2 (PG 99.400BD).

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Theodore argues for the latter option, though with some qualifications. He does indeed strongly argue that human nature as a whole has its existence only in particulars or individuals: ‘All things that are general have their existence in individuals’.¹³ He goes on: ‘Humanity in general would be destroyed without the existence of individuals’.¹⁴ Theodore makes this point in reaction to the charge that Christ assumed ‘humanity in general’ or ‘universal man’ (ὁ καθόλου ἄνθρωπος) and is thus not a particular or individual human being (and is therefore undepictable). He therefore adds that ‘humanity cannot be in Christ if it does not subsist in him as in a certain [individual]; otherwise we would have to say that Christ became incarnate in the imagination [ἐν φαντασίᾳ]’.¹⁵ Interestingly, Theodore immediately goes on to countenance the possibility that Christ could have assumed our nature in general (ἡ καθόλου ἡμῶν φύσις) but his point is sarcastic: in that case he could only be contemplated by the intellect (νοῦς) and touched by reasoning (διάνοια). This is almost certainly, as Cattoi points out, a tacit attack on intellectualist strands in the Byzantine ascetic tradition, exemplified in Evagrian spirituality, whereby Christ’s humanity is known ‘noetically’ rather than materially.¹⁶ The concern to push back against intellectualism in ascetic practice is forcefully carried through into Theodore’s pastoral approach, as we shall see in Section 2 of this chapter. That Theodore is mocking such an idea as impossible becomes clear further on when he says: ‘If the incarnate Christ were called only God or Man by scripture [viz. as his proper names], then he would have only assumed our nature in general; yet [this nature] cannot subsist except when contemplated in an individual [ἐν ἀτόμῳ], as I have already demonstrated’.¹⁷ In other words, to summarize Theodore’s argument, if Christ had just taken so-called general or generic human nature (a term being deployed here by his opponents), he would be unable to be named ‘Jesus’, but would have had to be named ‘Man’. He would, moreover, be indistinguishable from all other members of the human species, which for Theodore is absurd. In terms similar to what we find in Leontius of Byzantium, he says ‘there cannot be a nature that is without hypostasis (ἀνυπόστατος)’,¹⁸ and thus the hypostasis of the Word individuates or particularizes the humanity of Christ. Though following Leontius on this point, Theodore does not, to my knowledge, deploy Leontius’s famous use of ¹³ Antirrhetics 3.a.15 (PG 99.396D): τὰ γὰρ καθόλου ἐν τοῖς ἀτόμοις τὴν ὕπαρξιν ἔχει. ¹⁴ Antirrhetics 3.a.15 (PG 99.396D): Μὴ ὄντων δε τῶν καθ᾽ ἕκαστα, ἀνήρηται ὁ καθόλου ἄνθρωπος. ¹⁵ Antirrhetics 3.a.15 (PG 99.396D–397A). ¹⁶ See Cattoi (2015a), p. 206 n 23 and see also pp. 19–24 and 31–2. Another clear example of Theodore combating this intellectualist strand of spirituality can be seen in Epistle 380 (ed. Fatouros 2:511.15–513.71). ¹⁷ Antirrhetics 3.a.18 (PG 99.397CD). ¹⁸ Antirrhetics 3.a.22 (PG 99.400D). For Leontius, see Daley (2017).

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the term enhypostaton to describe the hypostatic union of two natures in one hypostasis.¹⁹ He seems content to call the individuating features of the humanity of Jesus (height, hair, etc.) hypostatic properties (ὑποστατικά ἰδιώματα) that belong to the one hypostasis of the Word.²⁰ These properties are evidently not merely ‘accidental’ in Theodore, which might imply that they could disappear, thereby giving ammunition to the iconoclasts: Theodore insists that these properties endure. This itself is an interesting line of argumentation, but it is not explicitly enshrined with the term enhypostaton.²¹ Theodore thus holds the view that human nature only has subsistence in individual human beings. To take the discussion further, it would be worth comparing his understanding with some of the concerns of Gregory of Nyssa, who provides an interesting counter-example. For Theodore, conceptualizing human nature as a universal that precedes or is more than logically separate from individuals would appear to jeopardize his careful argumentation in favour of icons and their veneration. He refuses to reify human nature in the abstract, and basically argues that to do so is to topple into an imaginary world with an imaginary Christ. When we turn to human nature in Gregory of Nyssa, things are rather different. For here, as Zachhuber and others have demonstrated, human nature does appear to ontologically precede particular human beings. The precise status of human nature as a universal in Gregory of Nyssa is still contested, but in general two strands are detectable: the first and most common views human nature as a universal in an extensive sense, that is, human nature contains within itself the numerical fullness (the ‘total number’) of human beings; the second views human nature as an ontologically prior ‘item’ that constitutes each human being’s essence.²² What is interesting, and the reason it is relevant to our discussion, is that Theodore does not conceive of human nature as a universal in either of these ways. Indeed, some might ask whether he conceives of human nature as a universal at all. In the passages mentioned he seems to mock the idea of Christ assuming human nature in general or generic humanity, seeing it as an impossibility. But is it impossible because there is no such thing for him as ‘humanity in general’, or is it for another reason? Looking more closely, we find something more nuanced than an outright rejection of generic human nature. What Theodore rejects is not the notion of universal human nature as such, but the understanding of it as an abstract ‘item’ separate from individual human beings. We have already seen him happy to use language that tracks the Cappadocian distinction between what is common/general (and so shared ¹⁹ For discussion of this term in the preceding centuries, see Gleede (2012). ²⁰ Antirrhetics 3a.18–20 (PG 99.397D–400A). ²¹ Similarly, while Cattoi (2015), p. 23 describes Theodore’s approach as a use of the concept of communicatio idiomatum (communication of properties), Theodore does not explicitly appeal to it, perhaps for legitimate reasons. This is further discussed in Parry (1996), pp. 106, 109–10. ²² See Zachhuber (2000), p. 74.

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by all members of the human race) and what is particular to each person or hypostasis. He does, however, go further. Thus he can also speak of Christ, for instance, as having assumed the ‘whole of [human] nature’ (τὴν ὅλην φύσιν), which is recognized, however, ‘in an individual’ (ἐν ἀτόμῳ).²³ He says this in response to the charge that his Christ is a ‘mere man’, going on to explain that Christ is ‘not one of many, but God made man’.²⁴ Here one could argue that Theodore is claiming that Christ is a human being with the ‘whole nature’ in a special sense, simply to avoid calling him a ‘mere man’. But this is not the case. He is not simply one human being among many because he uniquely possesses the whole of human nature, but because he possesses that nature as the Son of God and God. In fact, when he returns to these themes in part one of the third refutation, the idea of human nature as a whole or the ‘universal man’ (ὁ καθόλου ἄνθρωπος), far from being non-existent, belongs rather for Theodore to every human being. This is clear when Theodore argues that ‘that which is general’ (τὰ καθόλου) exists only ‘in individuals’ (ἐν τοῖς ἀτόμοις). His example to illustrate this is ‘the humanity in Peter and Paul and in the others of the same species’.²⁵ In other words, every human being contains the totality of human nature. Theodore’s discussion of ‘universal man’ is not, that is to say, a feature of his Christology only, but of his philosophical anthropology more broadly. As Erismann summarizes Theodore’s position from the point of view of Byzantine philosophy, we have here ‘an exact formulation of the Aristotelian version of realism about universals: universals are real entities, but they exist only in individuals’.²⁶ The significance of this understanding of each human being bearing the whole of human nature will emerge as the discussion proceeds. But let us continue to concentrate on Christ’s humanity. It might be worth noting that Theodore’s discussion of Christ’s human nature provides both a simultaneous help and a hindrance to the modern Orthodox personalist approach outlined in Chapter 1. On the positive side, his understanding of nature in this context gives a clear priority to the category of person or hypostasis, without which there would be no nature. Similarly, the value of the icon is to be found exclusively in its relationship to the person or hypostasis it represents rather than to a ‘nature’. Zizioulas takes note of this and duly marshals Theodore to his personalist cause.²⁷ At the same time, however, Theodore repeatedly appeals to the concept of ‘individual’ (ἄτομον) to elaborate his theory, whereby every nature has to be expressed ‘in individuals’ (ἐν ἀτόμοις), such that the humanity of Christ is also known ‘in an

²³ Antirrhetics 1.4 (PG 99.332D). ²⁴ Antirrhetics 1.4 (PG 99.333A). ²⁵ Antirrhetics 3.a.15 (PG 99.396D). ²⁶ Erismann (2017), p. 185. He notes also here the parallel to this position in Maximus the Confessor. ²⁷ See, for instance, Zizioulas (2011), p. 90. See also Torrance (2018).

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individual’ (ἐν ἀτόμῳ), signifying here the one person or hypostasis of Christ. Theodore’s free, even pivotal, use of the term ‘individual’ is something that sits awkwardly with the person vs individual dichotomy central to Orthodox personalist thought. This points us again to the difficulty of relying on terminological criteria to make a strong case for precedents to personalist thought in Byzantine theology. At the same time, Theodore’s particular use of the word atomon need not set him at odds a priori with personalist thinkers. Theodore’s concern in appealing to the language of ‘individuality’ has to do with his emphasis on the specificity of Christ’s humanity, in particular its circumscribability (and thus depictability in icons). His fierce reaction to and disdain for iconoclasm elicits in him, in a manner rarely seen among other Byzantine theologians, a deep and vivid devotion to the enduring particularity of Christ as a human being. For example, in Epistle 359 we find Theodore rehearsing a long-standing iconophile argument that if one were to argue that Christ is no longer depictable (ἄγραπτος), that would have to mean that Christ is no longer human and consubstantial with us, since to be depictable is a characteristic of being human. In making this argument, however, he rather uniquely dwells on Christ’s physical features, enumerating a whole list down to his ‘eyelids’ (βλεφάροι);²⁸ all of these belong to Christ, as man, forever. Theodore’s logic is that if we are to deny one of Christ’s human properties (in this case ‘depictability’), we must deny them all, and vice versa: if Christ is depictable, as the iconophiles claim, then he possesses all his human properties intact, only now, in the resurrected state, no longer subject to corruption. This all-or-nothing approach in Theodore is striking: ‘If [Christ’s] depictability disappears, how is it that not all his corresponding [human] properties disappear with it? For the property (ἰδιότης), says the Theologian, is immoveable (ἀκίνητος). How then does a property keep moving and undergoing change? Let the opponent answer.’²⁹ Theodore is creatively applying a text from Gregory of Nazianzus regarding the immoveability of the hypostatic properties of unbegottenness and begottenness in God the Father and God the Son to the hypostatic properties of the Son of God as a human being. He insists on the permanence of all the distinguishing properties of Christ’s specific humanity as belonging always and forever to the person or hypostasis of the Son after his incarnation. In response to the potential challenge posed to his position by such scriptural texts as no longer knowing Christ ‘after the flesh’ (2 Cor. 5:16), Theodore dismisses the charge as based on faulty exegesis and retorts with the risen

²⁸ Epistle 359 (ed. Fatouros, 2:493.7). ²⁹ Epistle 359 (ed. Fatouros, 2:493.23–6). The allusion is to Gregory the Theologian, Oration 29:12 (PG 36:89B), who is speaking about the immoveability of the hypostatic properties of Father and Son (unbegottenness and begottenness).

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Christ’s declaration: ‘Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself ’ (Luke 24:39).³⁰ There is a continuous refusal in Theodore to allow any sense in which Christ ‘escapes’ from his humanity, whether in terms of possessing the whole integrity of human nature in himself, or of possessing his particular individuating or hypostatic characteristics (ὑποστατικά ἰδιώματα) right through his passion, death, resurrection, and ascension. We earlier saw him describe anything less than this as the positing of an incarnation that occurred only ‘in the imagination’ (ἐν φαντασίᾳ). This is a common trope for Theodore. Thus in a letter to his uncle Plato regarding the iconoclast threat, he associates the iconoclast position with the idea that God became man merely ‘in appearance and imagination’ (ἐν δοκήσει καὶ φαντασίᾳ).³¹ This is repeated in another letter where the iconoclast position entails for Theodore that the whole of Christ’s economy of salvation took place only ‘in appearance and imagination’.³² It is not unusual for ascetic authors to disparage the faculty of imagination as lending itself to dangerous flights of fancy that lead anywhere but to God. Yet Theodore is not in fact discounting ‘imagination’ (φαντασία) as such, only the idea that Christ’s incarnation was somehow not fully concretized. The artistic endeavour of icon painting, after all, was partly dependent on the faculty of imagination, and this was not lost on Theodore.³³ We have so far focused on the more theoretical side of Theodore’s approach to the human nature of Christ, but this is necessary to better appreciate his views on the attainment of perfection in Christ. The importance for Theodore of Christ’s humanity as a specific and particularized humanity, bearing indissoluble human properties and characteristics that persist to all eternity in his one divine hypostasis, has been emphasized. Similarly, his sense in which human nature considered as a ‘universal’ is wholly present in Christ, just as it is in every human being, has been highlighted. It should not be forgotten that Theodore articulates these positions on the simultaneous particularity and universality of Christ’s humanity in the context of theological—and

³⁰ His response to the text of 2 Cor. 5:16 is developed in Epistle 380 (ed. Fatouros 2:513) where ‘the flesh’ refers, following Gregory of Nazianzus, to the passions and our sin; and again at length in Antirrhetics 2:41–7 (PG 99:381B–388A). Interestingly, with regard to the special capacities of Christ’s resurrected body, he seems content to say that just as Christ could defy natural law in his earthly ministry when he walked on water, proving that he was not subject to these laws, so too his resurrected body is ‘without density’ (ἔξω παχύτητος) until he freely shows his human properties to the disciples: see Antirrhetics 2:46 (PG 99:386AB). ³¹ Epistle 57 (ed. Fatouros 1:166.68–9). ³² Epistle 416 (ed. Fatouros 2:581). ³³ In Epistle 380 (ed. Fatouros 2:517) Theodore argues that in rejecting the icon we reject the imagination, which is one of the five powers of the soul (drawing on John of Damascus). If we reject one of the soul’s powers, we put them all in jeopardy. He even insists on an elevated place for the faculty of imagination, which he appears to argue can in certain cases literally ‘imprint’ the images it receives back onto material reality (his examples include Laban’s flocks in Genesis 30 and an allusion to Heliodorus’ Aethiopica).

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specifically iconophile—devotion. This is a devotion to the person of Christ present in his painted image. It celebrates the condescension of the Word to our lowly estate, and glorifies his continuing presence in the ecclesial Body, a reality which is in turn guaranteed by the continuity and permanence of the particular and universal humanity of the resurrected Son of God. Christ’s human nature depicts, in his person, perfection before our eyes. Not, certainly, because of what he looks like, but because of who he is. For all of Theodore’s insistence on Christ’s distinct human features (hair, hands, even eyelids), he is not concerned with their precise shape or colour or ‘quality’. It is the fact that Christ is ‘God made man’—always God and now always a human being—that drives his thought and devotion. The ‘man Christ Jesus’ (1 Tim. 2:5) is for Theodore the inescapable source of salvation, sole access to the sacred. But Jesus of Nazareth does not appear out of thin air. As Theodore argues, there is no such thing as an abstract nature that is not particularized in a hypostasis. Christ’s humanity is not an abstraction which he assumed from nowhere: it has its own personal, hypostatic source. In Theodore’s mind, devotion to the humanity of Christ is inseparable from devotion to that source, namely Mary the Mother of God.

The humanity of Mary In his work against the iconoclasts, Theodore makes a noteworthy reference to Mary as the source of Christ’s humanity. This in itself is unremarkable given that such a statement was long an article of faith (‘he was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and was made man’). What is relatively undeveloped in the creedal statement, however, receives important theological elaboration at the hands of Theodore. This occurs in the second part of his third Refutation, where he is arguing that Christ has a depictable, artificial (τεχνητός) image because of the circumscribability of his human nature.³⁴ He writes: That which is artificial [i.e. the product of a craft] is so through imitation of what is natural. For nothing is said to be artificial if it is not first preceded by the natural. So then, there is an artificial image of Christ, since he is the natural image of the mother who bore him. But if the latter is true and the former is false, he would not be the natural image of her who bore him, not having an artificial image as she does, which is absurd.³⁵

Theodore’s logic is the following: every painted image of something or someone (a product of art and thus ‘artificial’) imitates something natural. The ³⁴ Antirrhetics 3.B1-3 (PG 99.417AD). ³⁵ Antirrhetics 3.B1 (PG 99:417A) (emphasis added).

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‘artificial’ depends on the natural, and is legitimate in the case of a human being since a human being has an inherent capacity to be represented (i.e. is circumscribed and thus ‘circumscribable’).³⁶ What is interesting is that Theodore immediately relates this argument to Mary: Christ must have an artificial image since he is ‘the natural image [εἰκῶν φυσική] of the mother who bore him’, even if he is concurrently the natural image of God the Father. He hinges his argument, in other words, on Mary’s role as the source of Christ’s humanity. What applies to her also applies to him, and thus if she, as a human being, is subject to circumscription (making her depictable), then this must also apply to Christ in his humanity. Given that possession of human nature always entails circumscribability and thus depictability, Christ cannot possess human nature from his mother and simultaneously be undepictable. There is an implicit argument from Theodore here that for the iconoclast arguments to make sense, Mary would have to be undepictable, or rather, at a deeper level, human nature would have to be detachable from circumscription and depictability, which for Theodore is ‘absurd’. He continues his argument as follows: Each image has a likeness to its archetype, but the natural [image] in a natural manner, and the artificial [image] in an artificial manner. The natural image is indistinguishable in essence and likeness from that of which it is the imprint: thus, according to his divinity, Christ is indistinguishable from his Father, and according to his humanity, from his mother. The artificial image is identical in likeness to, but different in essence from, the archetype, such as an image of Christ in relation to Christ himself. There is, therefore, an artificial image of Christ, towards whom the image has its relationship.³⁷

What is worth highlighting here is that Theodore adds to his definition of what it means for Christ to be Mary’s ‘natural image’ by describing him as ‘indistinguishable’ (ἀπαράλλακτος) from her ‘in essence and likeness’, just as he is likewise indistinguishable from the Father. To understand the humanity of Christ, we must look, for Theodore, to the humanity of Mary, since the two are ‘indistinguishable’. This theme is important in Theodore’s wider oeuvre. In one of his iconophile acrostic poems, entitled ‘Lawful praise to the Theotokos, as to one worthy’, he speaks more poetically on the topic, addressing Mary directly: You gave birth divinely, in a seedless manner, and from you, the new heaven, came forth Light, praise of the Cherubim, the Cause which was before them,

³⁶ Another example Theodore gives in this direction is that of a person’s shadow inhering in the person even if the shadow is not being cast at a particular moment, the shadow here being equivalent to the ‘artificial’ image: Antirrhetics 3.D2 (PG 99.429A). ³⁷ Antirrhetics 3.B2 (PG 99:417AB).

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Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology lessening the night of every ancient deceit. Him you embraced, and you carry in your arms one most depictable, adorned with a divine form in your image, as your Master and true Son.³⁸

Here Theodore is again linking the depictability of Christ to his being in the image of Mary. In his refutation of John the Grammarian’s iconoclastic poems, Theodore reiterates the natural identity between Christ and Mary, declaring that ‘nothing that is found in the nature of the mother is wanting’ from the one she bore, since every son is the natural image of his source.³⁹ Just as Christ as Son of God receives the fullness of divine nature from the Father, so too as Son of Man he receives the fullness of human nature from the Virgin. Though he does not raise this issue, Theodore’s position presupposes little to no philosophical distinction between male and female members of human nature.⁴⁰ Christ is male, but wholly from a female: there is no other source beyond or outside Mary for Christ as a male human being in Theodore’s framework. Christ’s whole humanity is fashioned ‘out of ’ Mary’s humanity. This can be so since, as discussed, Theodore understands each member of the human race to contain the ‘whole’ of human nature; every human being is ‘the universal man’ (ὁ καθόλου ἄνθρωπος), not least Mary.⁴¹ By way of comparison, it might be worth mentioning briefly at this point the views of Apollinarius of Laodicea regarding the transmission of human ‘essence’ (οὐσία) via parentage, as they are in some ways echoed by Theodore. In a reply to Basil of Caesarea regarding the appropriateness of the term ‘consubstantial’ (ὁμοούσιος) to describe Father and Son, Apollinarius posits the transmission of essence or ousia from Father to Son, comparing it with human beings who pass on human ousia through parentage, with the ultimate source of the ousia being Adam.⁴² Since all human beings are consubstantial or homoousios because of this generational transmission of the ousia, so are the Father and the Son homoousios. At first sight this could be seen as rather in ³⁸ Poems Against the Iconoclasts (PG 99.438D–440A). ³⁹ Refutation of John the Grammarian 4 (PG 99.445AB). ⁴⁰ It might be worth noting in this context that by Middle Byzantine standards, Theodore counts a relatively large number of female disciples among his correspondents, ranging from monastics to laity. For more on this, see for instance the discussion and translation of Theodore’s letters to Eirene the Patrician in Mitrea, M. et al. (trans.) (2015) and the discussion, edition, and translation of Theodore’s funerary catechism for his mother in Efthymiadis and Featherstone (2007). ⁴¹ Of course, we must remember that for Theodore, Christ’s human generation does not occur ‘by nature’ through sexual intercourse, but ‘beyond nature’ (ὑπὲρ φύσιν), by the Holy Spirit. He can thus lay strong emphasis on the virgin birth. The significance of the virginal generation of Christ lies for Theodore in its recapitulation of the original virginal generation of the first human being, Adam, as well as Adam’s perceived virginal state before the fall: see Great Catecheses 3.90 (ed. Coza-Luzzi, 57). For references to Mary giving birth to Christ ‘beyond nature’, see Theodore’s Canon for the funeral of a monk, 82, 169, 345 (ed. Magri, 283, 286, 292). ⁴² Apollinarius’s letter is found in Basil of Caesarea, Letter 362 (ed. Courtonne 2:222–4).

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tune with Theodore’s views, but there are two key differences. For Apollinarius, there is a certain ‘division’ of the ousia in the propagation of human beings as embodied, something that is not applicable to God. Theodore does not think of human nature as itself ‘divided’ on account of embodiment. Likewise, Apollinarius’s understanding of the transmission of ousia is not only derivative, but also somewhat subordinationist.⁴³ Neither idea would sit well with Theodore’s understanding of the whole of human nature being present in each of its members, though the logical similarity of their respective positions is clear. We have seen the humanity of Mary as a linchpin in Theodore’s defence of images of Christ. Beyond this context, the Theotokos receives the kind of devoted deference from him that one would expect for the middle Byzantine period. Many of his letters appeal to her intercessions and protection.⁴⁴ Among Theodore’s most developed meditations on her comes, however, in his Encomium on the Dormition of Our Holy Lady, the Mother of God.⁴⁵ As we saw in the case of Christ, Theodore here likewise pays particular attention to Mary’s human features and their persistence in an ‘incorruptible form’ through her dormition and rising. He declares: Today she who was heaven on earth is wrapped in a cloak of incorruptibility . . . . Now the Mother of God shuts her material eyes, and opens her spiritual [or ‘noetic’] eyes towards us like great shining stars that will never set, to watch over us and to intercede before the face of God for the world’s protection. Now those lips, moved by God’s grace to articulate sounds, grow silent, but she opens her [spiritual] mouth to intercede eternally for all of her race. Now she lowers those bodily hands that once bore God, only to raise them, in incorruptible form, in prayer to the Lord on behalf of all creation. At this moment her natural form, radiant as the sun, is hidden; yet her light shines through her painted image, and she offers it to the people for the life-giving kiss of relative veneration . . . . She has fallen asleep in peace and righteousness—fallen asleep, I say, but she is not dead! . . . With what language should we speak of your mystery? . . . By that ineffable act of generation, you have transformed nature; for who has ever heard of a virgin conceiving without seed? O wonder! See, now: the mother giving birth is also still an incorrupt virgin, because God was the cause of her conceiving! So in your life-giving sleep, since you are different from all the rest, you alone have rightly found incorruption for both [soul and body].⁴⁶ ⁴³ Not only in terms of human nature being passed on, but also in the Father–Son relationship. Thus he speaks of the Son as identical to the Father because they are homoousios, but it is an ‘inferior identity’: Basil of Caesarea, Letter 362 (ed. Courtonne 2:224). ⁴⁴ See for instance, Theodore the Studite, Letters 31.116; 42.52; 79.18, etc. (ed. Fatouros 1:88; 1:124; 2:200). ⁴⁵ Theodore’s Encomium on the Dormition can be found in PG 99:720B–729B. It is translated in Daley (1998), pp. 249–56. ⁴⁶ Theodore, Encomium on the Dormition 1–2 (PG 99:720D–724A), trans. Daley (1998), pp. 249–51.

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At first, Theodore appears to be proposing a strong sense of discontinuity between the ‘earthly’ and the ‘spiritual’ or ‘noetic’ in Mary: what is earthly dies, and what is spiritual comes to life. Yet as we go on we find that Theodore on the contrary envisages a deep continuity: the earthly may give way to the spiritual, such that her ‘natural form’ (φυσικός χαρακτῆρ) is now ‘hidden’ from our eyes, but it uniquely persists in her bodily translation from death to incorruptible life, and can be venerated through her painted image. Her case is certainly unique for Theodore, in that no other has or ever will enter the fullness of the resurrected life before the general resurrection: even Enoch and Elijah ‘await the time’ of Christ’s second coming.⁴⁷ This uniqueness stems from both her God-bearing role and her person, the two being inseparably intertwined for Theodore. ‘No one,’ he says, ‘has ever been judged higher than she, who is greater than all others’, before addressing her directly: ‘you are beyond us, you exceed our powers; you incomparably surpass in height and greatness the summit of heaven’.⁴⁸ This special place for the Virgin Mary might lend itself to the idea that her humanity is of a different order in Theodore’s mind to that of the rest of mankind. But her glory is not linked to a difference in nature, but to the fact that the Incarnation that took place through her was precisely through one of us. Theodore calls on the first mother Eve to rejoice, because in the person of Mary she has borne ‘a child of blessing’.⁴⁹ Theodore sees no problem in associating the humanity of Mary, that is to say, with the humanity of Eve. Of course, the question of Mary and original sin (and whether her humanity needed to be ‘exempted’ from this sin via an ‘immaculate conception’) is not on Theodore’s radar, though we will briefly return to the question shortly. Of related interest is the idea that was apparently circulating in some monastic circles that the Virgin existed ‘before the ages’. In a letter, Theodore rejects such a notion: ‘whenever you encounter this, deny it and neither so much as say nor think it, but it would be well to confess that she was begotten by a man and a woman, Joachim and Anna’.⁵⁰ His emphasis here is on Mary sharing in the common mode of human generation, not on her possessing an ‘exceptional’ human nature, even if he certainly thought of her as the most exceptional of all created beings, whether human or angelic. If in the person of Mary we have an incomparable summit among human beings that cannot be equalled or rivalled, it is above all because in and through her our whole nature is offered to, and received by, God himself in the person of the Word. But her particular and specific humanity does not ‘disappear’ in this process. As we have repeatedly seen, Theodore has no ⁴⁷ ⁴⁸ ⁴⁹ ⁵⁰

Theodore, Encomium on the Dormition 3 (PG 99:724BC), trans. Daley (1998), p. 252. Theodore, Encomium on the Dormition 5 (PG 99:728BC), trans. Daley (1998), p. 255. Theodore, Encomium on the Dormition 2 (PG 99:721C), trans. Daley (1998), p. 250. Theodore, Letter 490.17–20 (ed. Fatouros 2:722).

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patience for any idea of humanity that is not abidingly concrete, particular, and thus specific. If this is so for the ‘eyelids’ of Christ, it is true also for the eyelids of Mary, in whose image, in his humanity, Christ is. Indeed, faced with the question, ‘what did Christ look like?’ we could paraphrase Theodore for an answer: he looks like his mother, Mary. Her humanity and his are in an intimate and powerful bond that Theodore argues not even death could sever. Sharing in Christ’s bodily incorruption, though shrouded from our dulled vision, she continues with eyes, lips, and hands to ever watch over, intercede, and care for her own. She is a picture of human perfection, whose painted image conveys the healing warmth of her personal presence.⁵¹ But her specific humanity, her specific perfection, is never ‘untethered’ in Theodore’s mind. It is tethered first to her ‘Master and true Son’ who gives her life and perfection, but also to her context as the daughter ‘of a man and a woman’ in the House of Israel, and ultimately as the offspring of Eve. The humanity of Mary, in other words, is both specific to her and universal. She depicts the human ideal in a particular and unsurpassable way, but in doing so she summons the whole human race not simply to wonder and glory, but to action and emulation. This latter point is nicely captured in one of the ‘salutations’ (χαιρετισμοί) Theodore offers to Mary in his Encomium on the Dormition: ‘Hail, sacred book of the ordinances of the Lord, and newly written law of grace, through which we can know what is pleasing to God’.⁵² To behold Mary is to look upon a way of life that Theodore expects all to both marvel at and pursue. This takes us beyond the discussion of the particular humanity of Christ and Mary to that of every human being. How, then, do Theodore’s theological (and philosophical) concerns as outlined thus far carry over into his understanding of the ‘perfecting of the saints’ (Eph. 4:12)?

2. FROM THE H UMANITY OF CHRIST TO THE HUMANITY OF THE S AINTS

Our corrupted nature raised above the heavens We have seen that for Theodore, the human nature of Christ is fundamentally the human nature of Mary. We have likewise briefly seen that Theodore does not seem to consider the human nature of Mary as in turn any different from ⁵¹ For another meditation by Theodore specifically on images of Mary (which act as her ‘shadow pouring forth wonders’), see his Iambics concerning various arguments 35 (ed. Speck, 184). ⁵² Theodore, Encomium on the Dormition 5 (PG 99:725D), trans. Daley (1998), p. 254 (modified).

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that of the rest of humanity. Given later developments in the Latin Christian tradition that argue for her ‘exemption’ from original sin (resulting in the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception), it might be worth dwelling a little more on this theme in Theodore.⁵³ It is also relevant to a popular theological debate regarding the humanity of Christ as being ‘fallen’ or ‘unfallen’.⁵⁴ This is not the place to discuss the concept of original sin in detail.⁵⁵ Theodore clearly espouses the common Christian teaching whereby the fall of Adam affected all subsequent human beings.⁵⁶ In concert with the Greek Christian tradition as a whole, however, he understands this primarily in terms of the transmission of corruption and the liability to death, and not in the sense of any transmission of ‘guilt’ or actual ‘sin’ from one human being to another. Adam’s sin ‘banished us from paradise’ and ‘worked corruption in us instead of incorruption’.⁵⁷ He summarizes the fall thus: Do you not know what sin has produced? Did it not introduce death into the world? Did it not corrupt the earth? Did it not fill the inhabited world with burial grounds and tombs from ages past until this day? For man was incorruptible before the transgression, and none of what we have just mentioned would have occurred in the beginning if the first-formed man had remained steadfast in the commandment given him.⁵⁸

Theodore’s view of the fall is thus very much centred on this loss of incorruption (which Adam possessed not by nature but ‘by grace’) and the consequent death that results.⁵⁹ In the postlapsarian state, human beings are caught in the unrelenting grip of mortality, easily duped and tossed to and fro by the wiles of the devil. But this state does not imply that human nature after the fall of Adam is itself sinful, which would be a confusion of categories for Theodore. As in Paul, the corruption and death of human beings may be the ‘wages of sin’, but they are not themselves ‘sin’. If then human nature is not intrinsically ‘guilty’, the major impetus for positing Mary’s and consequently Christ’s humanity as of a different order than that of other human beings (whether this is described in terms of an ‘unfallen’ human nature or a ⁵³ Some argue for a teaching akin to that of the Immaculate Conception in certain late Byzantine theologians, but it necessitates a rather creative reading of a small selection of sources: see Kappes (2014). ⁵⁴ The case for Christ’s assumption of ‘fallen’ humanity can be found in Ware (1979), pp. 74–6, and Meyendorff (1987). A spirited and expansive case for Christ’s assumption of ‘unfallen’ humanity can be found in Hatzidakis (2013). ⁵⁵ For a variety of perspectives on the topic of original sin, see Jacobs (2008). See also Anderson (2009) and the influential but polemically charged work on ‘ancestral sin’ by Romanides (2002). ⁵⁶ See, for instance, his Great Catecheses 3.90 (ed. Coza-Luzzi, 57). ⁵⁷ Small Catecheses 79.24–5 (ed. Auvray, 273). For further discussion of Theodore’s understanding of creation and fall, see Cholij (2002), pp. 207–14. ⁵⁸ Small Catecheses 4.40–5 (ed. Auvray, 13–14). ⁵⁹ On the immortality of Adam by grace, see Small Catecheses 117 (ed. Auvray, 402–6).

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humanity ‘free from original sin’) is removed. Theodore does not see the need to bifurcate the category of human nature in this way, partly due to his refusal to countenance any human nature in abstracto. In assuming humanity from Mary, Christ is assuming our humanity. The nature itself is wholly the same, even if, as we shall discuss, Christ is offering us something wholly new through his humanity. That the human nature of Christ received from the Virgin is wholly the same as that of other human beings is perhaps most starkly put in Short Catecheses 30, where Theodore declares that Christ ‘assumed our nature corrupted by sin’ (τὴν ἐξ ἁμαρτίας φθαρεῖσαν ἡμῶν φύσιν ὑπεδύσατο).⁶⁰ The force of this statement is, as Cholij points out, unique in Theodore’s corpus: it may be, he argues, simply a hyperbolic product of Theodore’s devotion to Christ’s co-depictability with us.⁶¹ That said, this phrase is not inconsistent with some of his statements elsewhere. Thus Christ is described at one point as having taken on ‘our lowly and worthless nature’ (τὴν ταπεινὴν καὶ οὐδαμινὴν ἡμῶν φύσιν).⁶² If we look at the context for such phrases, some further light is shed on the meaning Theodore intends. In the first case, ‘assuming our nature corrupted by sin’ is mentioned in an interpretation of Paul’s phrase that Christ ‘who knew no sin was made sin for us’ (2 Cor. 5:21). He immediately juxtaposes the verse with 1 Pet. 2:22: ‘who did [‘made’] no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth’: the repetition of the verb ποιέω (‘do’ or ‘make’) in both verses was not lost on Theodore. The phrase is specifically not intended to mean that Christ’s human nature is itself sinful, but that it was given over to corruption, which in turn is not, in Theodore’s mind, the same as to be given over to sin. Theodore continues by arguing that Christ ‘“took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses” [Matt. 8:17] and was wounded for us, even enduring the dishonourable death’.⁶³ He is not, in other words, being particularly creative here: Theodore fully subscribes to the patristic trope that the Son of God voluntarily submits to the consequences of Adamic sin (corruption and death) for the healing of human nature, yet without sin.⁶⁴ What his position further implies is that the source of Christ’s humanity—that is, the human nature of Mary—was indeed subject to the consequences of the fall (corruption and death): she was not in that sense ‘immaculately conceived’, but would not, in any case, need to be within Theodore’s theological and philosophical ⁶⁰ Small Catecheses 30.14–15 (ed. Auvray, 110). ⁶¹ Cholij (2002), pp. 215–16. ⁶² Small Catecheses 8.7 (ed. Auvray, 26). ⁶³ Small Catecheses 30:15–17 (ed. Auvray, 110). ⁶⁴ This is the meaning of other similar phrases in Theodore, such as the line ‘he submitted to the appropriate laws of nature’ (ἐδούλευσε τοῖς καθήκουσι νόμοις τῆς φύσεως) in Small Catecheses 7.27–8 (ed. Auvray, 23), and the rhetorical question, ‘did he not join essentially with [συνουσίωται] our labours and burdens and other blameless passions?’ in Epistle 359.16–17 (ed. Fatouros 2:493). Christ’s humanity is not sinful, but is nonetheless freely subjected to the basic and universal pangs of human existence, which taken in themselves are ‘blameless’ (ἀδιαβλήτος).

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framework, since human nature’s inherited liability to corruption was not itself understood as containing sin or guilt. In the second case, we catch the phrase ‘our lowly and worthless nature’ in a lesson on the Ascension, that is, in a discussion of the movement of our ‘lowly and worthless’ nature to its enthronement at the right hand of the Father in the person of Christ. While Theodore does not shy away, then, from emphasizing the humanity of Christ as fully identical with our own (consubstantial or homoousios with his mother and with us),⁶⁵ he does so with an eye to the exalted and incorruptible destiny of human nature in Christ. Thus ‘our lowly and worthless nature’ in the act of Christ’s ascension is ‘led up to the royal throne where it is worshipped by every heavenly power’.⁶⁶ In another catechetical lesson for the forefeast of Ascension, we are treated to similar themes: ‘how great a mystery, transcending nature, for our nature is raised up above the heavens’.⁶⁷ He continues a little later: Do you see to what height of glory humanity [τὸ ἀνθρώπινον] has been elevated? Is it not from earth to heaven? Is it not from corruption to incorruption? . . . For though we were estranged and enemies in our mind through the works of evil, we were not only reconciled completely to God the Father through our Lord Jesus Christ, but we have leapt up to sonship, and now our nature is in the heavens, worshipped by every visible and invisible creature.⁶⁸

As in Maximus, Theodore sees the work of Christ as bringing about something higher for humanity than simple restoration or reconciliation. In the person of Christ, our nature is now enthroned ‘above the heavens’, above every creature. This, according to Theodore, is clearly a reality not simply for Christ, but one to be shared by those that are his. We return here to the paradox of the ‘one and the many’ in Theodore’s treatment of human nature. Christ’s humanity is the one human nature common to all, the ‘universal man’ (ὁ καθόλου ἄνθρωπος), but it is specifically instantiated in him ‘in an individual manner’ (ἐν ἀτόμῳ). What occurs to the humanity of Christ is not, that is, automatically applicable to every member of the human race. This comes back to there being no such thing for Theodore as an abstract humanity separable from humanity’s particular members. If we took Theodore’s language regarding Christ’s ascension at face value, one might be tempted to see him arguing for the inevitable exaltation of every human being ‘above the heavens’. By refusing to posit a universal human nature either in terms of numerical extension (where human nature would be equivalent to the total number of human beings) or in terms of ontological priority over its individual members (i.e. as a category ⁶⁵ Theodore describes Christ’s humanity as homoousios with his mother in Epistle 70.43–4 (ed. Fatouros 1:187), and with us in Epistle 359.22 (ed. Fatouros 2:493), an idea already enshrined in the Chalcedonian Definition. ⁶⁶ Small Catecheses 8.7–9 (ed. Auvray, 26). ⁶⁷ Small Catecheses 7.2–4 (ed. Auvray, 22). ⁶⁸ Small Catecheses 7.12–13, 18–20 (ed. Auvray, 22–3).

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‘detachable’ from particular persons), Theodore removes the possibility of an automatic universal salvation (or apokatastasis) for other members of the human race simply because of the status of Christ’s humanity.⁶⁹ For the exaltation of Christ’s human nature to be effected in other members of that nature, it must in each case occur, in Theodore’s terms, ἐν ἀτόμῳ, individually and concretely. At the same time, this does not imply an ‘individualistic’ or ‘moralistic’ view of salvation, as we shall see. It simply affirms that to share in the glory of Christ is to share in it hypostatically, in a personal way unique to each human being in their relationship to Christ. For this to take place, that relationship must be actively established and sustained, which brings us to Theodore’s theology of sanctification.

The healing of my nature Christ’s assumption of human nature is clearly not for his own benefit, but for that of the human race. To share in the divine sonship that he offers means, in the first instance, to be baptized into him: ‘let us give thanks to him for he has led us to the adoption of sons through holy baptism’.⁷⁰ To be reborn and engrafted onto Christ’s humanity by baptism is to be ‘beautified in grace’, recovering the lost image and likeness of God.⁷¹ Baptism is a precondition for salvation: ‘if I am uninitiated, it is not possible that I, not having been baptized, be saved’.⁷² Clearly for Theodore human salvation is utterly dependent on the gift of Christ. Once that gift is received in baptism, the human being is knit firm to his saving humanity, and is now summoned to a continual nourishment in the Church’s sacraments.⁷³ Above all, this nourishment is to be found in the Eucharist. Theodore’s theology of the Eucharist is in perfect harmony with his theology of the image, whereby the humanity of Christ serves as a locus—rather the locus—for human contact and communion with the divine. The reality of the Eucharist expresses the love of God, who in the person of Christ ‘not only

⁶⁹ He can speak of an apokatastasis, but it is explicitly ‘of the just’: Small Catecheses 56.32–3 (ed. Auvray, 203). Theodore elsewhere explicates the term by borrowing from Maximus’s discussion of it in the Questions and Doubts (for which, see above, Chapter 2, Section 2, note 48): Epistle 471 (ed. Fatouros 2:676–8). ⁷⁰ Small Catecheses 29.10–11 (ed. Auvray, 106). ⁷¹ Small Catecheses 100.22–4 (ed. Auvray, 344). See also Small Catecheses 120 (ed. Auvray, 415–19), where our nature, having become sick (νενόσκησεν) through great love of pleasure in the fall, is strengthened (ῥωσθεῖσα) in the waters of baptism, being brought back to its original state. ⁷² Epistle 383.42–3 (ed. Fatouros 2:529) translated in Cholij (2002), pp. 221–2. ⁷³ For an examination of Theodore’s approach to the sacraments, see Cholij (2002), 153–205.

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died for us, but also set himself forth for us as food’.⁷⁴ This food is the unsurpassable gift of constant divine nourishment: He nourishes our spirit by the undefiled mysteries, full of a tenderness that is greater than that of a mother or wet-nurse, and he embraces us lovingly. A mother, in fact, nourishes her own infant with her milk only for a certain time; but our true Master and Father gives his own body and blood as food and drink all the time. O impenetrable goodness, O unsurpassable gift! How is it possible not to love him, not to cherish him, and not to cleave to him without cease?⁷⁵

During the period of his second exile, 809–11, Theodore writes a letter to his uncle Plato, also in exile, about their common tribulations and his own particular griefs and afflictions. In the midst of his sorrows, he finds solace in the Eucharist: I have found this one consolation (and this must be attributed to you, my father [viz. Plato]) from reading and examining the teachings of the East, namely the need for Hesychasts, if possible, to partake of divine communion each day. I the wretched one have availed of this and have thus found aid, my mind drawing back from passionate movements through the fearful reception of the gifts. For what could be greater for the joy and illumination of the soul than divine communion?⁷⁶

Elsewhere, in a monastic exhortation to the ascetic life where he commends the virtues of prayer and tears as ‘availing much’, he suddenly breaks off and declares: ‘but before all and above all the partaking of the holy things’.⁷⁷ He then proceeds to chastise his monks for not preparing and communing more frequently. Theodore views the Eucharist as the pinnacle of Christian life precisely because it unites the human being to the specific and saving humanity of Christ. He takes the iconoclasts to task for bringing in the Eucharist as an argument against icons. Some iconoclasts argued that the Eucharist alone represented Christ and thus no other image was admissible. Theodore retorts that, first of all, this argument implies that the iconoclasts are ‘conceding that Christ can be circumscribed, while earlier on you denied the very same thing’.⁷⁸ But more importantly, they seem to be implying that the Eucharist ⁷⁴ Small Catecheses 107.57–8 (ed. Auvray, 369). ⁷⁵ Small Catecheses 24.33–8 (ed. Auvray, 89), translated in Cholij (2002), pp. 198–9 (modified). ⁷⁶ Epistle 554.48–55 (ed. Fatouros 2:849). ⁷⁷ Small Catecheses 107.38–9 (ed. Auvray, 368). ⁷⁸ Antirrhetics 1:10 (PG 99:340AB), trans. Cattoi (2015a), p. 52. Elsewhere Theodore attacks the iconoclasts on this point, saying that since they do not believe Christ can be depicted, then during communion they must be eating something incapable of circumscription, which might as well be an apparition (φάντασμα): Epistle 532.98–100 (ed. Fatouros 2:798–9).

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is the body and blood of Christ only in ‘image’ rather than ‘truth’, which he dismisses as blasphemy: ‘why then do you talk nonsense taking as types the mysteries of truth?’.⁷⁹ His devotion to the defence of images does not, in other words, lead him to conflate the significance of painted images of Christ with the Eucharist, or even to consider them as being in the same category. What connects the two, however, is Christ’s circumscribable humanity, depictable in word and image, and fully present ‘in truth’ at the Eucharistic altar. This point emerges again in an important letter from Theodore addressing several iconoclast positions for the benefit of his disciple Naucratius. The argument of the iconoclast Epiphanius centres on God being uncircumscribable and thus incapable of depiction. Theodore marshals the usual arguments to his cause for the circumscribabilty of Christ based on his humanity and insists that this entails the depictability not of divine nature, but nevertheless of God made man in the person of the Word. His argument culminates—not without a measure of sarcasm—with a discussion of the Eucharist: If he [viz. Epiphanius] happened to hear that we have ‘eaten God’, perhaps he might not only shudder, but fall completely to pieces, not bearing to hear it. But what did Christ say? ‘He who eats me, the same shall live through me’ [John 6:57]: he cannot be consumed in any other way, except in the flesh. Hence when Christ, existing as both perfect God and perfect man, is named according to one of the two natures of which he consists, this is also understood to be properly said of the other [nature], without the particularity of each [nature] being diminished or confused in the unity of the hypostasis.⁸⁰

We have here the articulation of a kind of ‘communication of idioms’ logic, whereby what is said of Christ as ‘Son of Man’ can be applied to Christ as ‘Son of God’ because of the singularity and unity of Christ’s person. Theodore uses it to defend the striking expression that through the partaking of the Eucharist we are given to ‘eat God’. This unusual and forceful image serves to underline Theodore’s unremitting focus on the attainment of perfection as a corporeal act, always connected in some way to the humanity of Christ, a humanity which is, to extend his argument, the very humanity of God. In joining ourselves to this humanity through baptism and the Eucharist, our own particular humanity finds its deepest purpose and fulfilment. While previously lost to the pull of corruption and death, through the humanity of

⁷⁹ Antirrhetics 1:10 (PG 99:340B), trans. Cattoi (2015a), p. 53 (modified). Theodore does not directly address the iconoclast position whereby the Eucharist is understood to be a natural image of its prototype (i.e. consubstantial with it, like the Son being a natural image of the Father), but implicitly rejects this kind of understanding also, since a natural image approach would imply that the Eucharistic elements constitute a separate ‘hypostasis’ which, while being consubstantial with Christ’s flesh, is nevertheless hypostatically distinct from it. He insists, instead, that they mystically are the body and blood ‘in truth’. ⁸⁰ Epistle 380.111–19 (ed. Fatouros 2:515).

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Christ we are not only brought to incorruption and immortality, but are likewise ‘made God’ in him. Theodore describes it thus: Our good God has fulfilled all things for us . . . calling us back from the corruption that afflicted us through the first-formed man, and not only this, for he has also made us God [θεώσας ἡμᾶς] through his holy flesh, by which we are made worthy to be called his brethren, and are one body with him [σύσσωμοι], and fellow sharers [συμμέτοχοι] and joint-heirs [cf. Heb. 2:11; Eph. 3:6; Rom. 8:17].⁸¹

Given Theodore’s devotion to Christ’s humanity, it should come as little surprise that he emphasizes the corporeal nature of perfection: deification occurs through Christ’s ‘holy flesh’, making us ‘one body with him’. In this event, however, the particularity of the deified is clearly preserved: they are now Christ’s ‘brethren’, sharers and heirs with him. This status is by no means an empty or shallow one for Theodore: it calls for a radical commitment to the way of Christ. Not to struggle to ‘be holy’ in the face of such a gift is to deny oneself access to the gift itself. As one might expect, this sentiment runs right through his pastoral works for the monks under his care. In one of his catechetical lessons, while setting forth the examples of the saints who abide in Christ, he calls his monks to imitate them, and in doing so succinctly sums up his vision of the Christian life, at once sacramental and ascetic, when he says, ‘let us mix our blood with his holy blood, for it is mighty’.⁸² The Christian life is understood by Theodore to be a giving and mixing of blood that binds us to Christ as true ‘brethren’. It is a giving of blood, however, that depends first on the ‘mighty’ blood of Christ, which gives us the original shape and form of perfection, as well as the power to attain it. In a general sense, the content of the Christian life and so of this giving of blood is of course linked to the Gospel commandments. But we shall look more particularly at the Christian way of life most prized and discussed by Theodore: that of coenobitic monasticism.

The earthiness of the holy: seeing perfection in the coenobium Thus far we have seen how Theodore understands Christ’s humanity from a number of perspectives: taken in itself (in the context of the iconoclast controversy), in relation to Mary, and in relation to Theodore’s view of Christ’s work and gift of salvation. We come now to the question of the reception of that gift. The emphasis I wish to highlight in this respect is the continuity of Theodore’s concern to uphold what we might call a strongly material or ‘earthy’ theology devoted to the incarnate Christ. This is clearly at ⁸¹ Epistle 459.18–25 (ed. Fatouros 2:654). ⁸² Small Catecheses 70.41–2 (ed. Auvray, 244–5): μίξωμεν τὸ αἷμα ἡμῶν μετὰ τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ ἁγίου, δυνατὸν γάρ.

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work in Theodore’s defence of images, where not only the icon of Christ but more categorically the physical veneration of the icon of Christ was for him a litmus test of basic doctrinal orthodoxy.⁸³ As Theodore argues, simply to possess or display the icons without venerating them was not good enough: this was equivalent in his mind to iconoclasm and thus heretical.⁸⁴ To refuse to physically kiss or otherwise venerate the image is tantamount for him to abandoning the prototype; to deny the image due reverence was to treat the incarnation with indifference; and to deny images altogether was to deny the incarnation. This sense that on account of the incarnation the divinity must be received, known, and venerated through the tangible material world is a constant thread in Theodore’s thought. It lies behind not just his forceful arguments for the veneration of icons, but, as we have seen, in his sacramental theology too—something especially evident in his approach to the Eucharist. Together with the sacramental (which is inextricably tied to the liturgical) dimensions of Theodore’s concern to concretely assimilate to the exalted human nature of Christ, I would contend that this mentality is also connected to his particular concerns regarding monastic life. While this is not the place to lay out all of Theodore’s rich understanding of monasticism and his specific approach to the daily life or rule of the monk, a summary can be offered.⁸⁵ In brief, he sees the monastic state as a ‘third grace’ given by God, the first being our initial creation, and the second our restoration through baptism.⁸⁶ It signals, through the practice of virginity, the incorruptible age to come and a semi-angelic existence, where the monk is ‘in the flesh and yet above the flesh’.⁸⁷ Theodore’s praise of monasticism could be construed as the praise of something ultimately ‘immaterial’ and detached from his concern for the materiality of the sacred seen elsewhere. But this, I think, would be to misunderstand his rhetoric. His model for monasticism is not ultimately something incorporeal or immaterial, but the incarnate Christ, to whom the monk is mystically espoused through the monastic profession of virginity.⁸⁸ It is love for Christ that begets monasticism: ‘there is one desire and one true love, our Lord Jesus Christ, the fair and beautiful bridegroom’,⁸⁹ and again,

⁸³ This issue of physical veneration—that is, kissing the icon—marks a particular concern, according to Louth, of the second period of iconoclasm: see Louth (2007a), p. 98. ⁸⁴ Antirrhetics 1:20 (PG 99:349CD). ⁸⁵ For more on the monastic ideal in Theodore, see Cholij (2002), pp. 229–38, and for indepth analyses of the daily life of the Studite monks under Theodore, see Leroy (2007), pp. 47–79 and 155–210, and Leroy (2002), pp. 41–116. ⁸⁶ Small Catecheses 24 (ed. Auvray, 87–90). This approach to monasticism as a special gift after creation and baptism is repeated in Small Catecheses 100 (ed. Auvray, 343–5). ⁸⁷ See, for example, Small Catecheses 35 (ed. Auvray, 127–30). ⁸⁸ See Small Catecheses 57 (ed. Auvray 203–6). ⁸⁹ Epistle 483.21–3 (ed. Fatouros 2:708).

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‘our one love is the bridegroom Christ, “the most beautiful among the sons of men” [cf. Ps. 44:3 LXX]’.⁹⁰ What is of interest here, however, is not so much that Theodore celebrates and defends the monastic estate in itself, but his priorities in doing so. The monasticism that Theodore cherishes is by no means the life of the solitary, free from human community and human labour. It is the monastic community in its fully coenobitic form that he has in mind, with communal meals, communal work, communal prayer, and even common clothing and perhaps communal dormitories.⁹¹ Theodore is at pains to emphasize the coenobitic form of monasticism—of which he is both advocate and in some ways architect—as constituting the apogee of Christian existence. This way of life can of course be linked, and often was, to the famous passage in Acts 2:44, where the early believers ‘had all things in common’. Yet interestingly, and in tune with his concern to find in the incarnate Christ his supreme model, Theodore lays emphasis on the submission of Christ to others in service as the real inauguration of the coenobitic form of monastic life. More than this, he puts this in contrast to other forms of monastic living: Know this, my beloved and much desired, that our Lord Jesus Christ himself, the giver of inscrutable good things, when he came to earth, did not embrace the eremitical life, nor that of a stylite, nor any of the others we mentioned, but the definition and rule of obedience. For he himself has said, ‘I have descended from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of my Father who sent me’ [John 6:38] . . . . If then my children and brethren, as you see, he took on the submissive mode of life, which is our own, in preference to the others, are you not glad? Do you not rejoice? Are you not filled with delight and inspiration that you live in such likeness to the Lord?⁹²

This move by Theodore to exalt the coenobitic life above other forms of monasticism is not isolated. Thus in one of his epigrams in honour of those who practise submission (i.e. coenobitic monks) he calls on his coenobitic listeners not to be distracted by ‘deserts or columns’ because ‘you surpass them all’ by running the course of Christ, the first witness or ‘protomartyr’ of obedience.⁹³ His reason for prioritizing coenobitic monks is first and foremost their ongoing obedience in imitation of the obedient Christ (as opposed to hermits, who cannot practise the art of obedience in the same way). This interest in concrete obedience to a specific abbot or elder in a particular community reveals something of Theodore’s concern, I would argue, for a ‘down-to-earth’, concretized spirituality. Indeed, among his frequent worries ⁹⁰ Small Catecheses 118.31–3 (ed. Auvray, 408). ⁹¹ The habit was swapped on a weekly basis, leading to monastic clothing being known to the Studites as ‘the exchanges’. On the issue of monks sharing monastic cells as well as this exchange of clothing, see Leroy (2007), pp. 57–8 (common dormitories), and 168 (clothing). ⁹² Great Catecheses 16.28–33 (ed. Cozza-Luzi 9/2, 44). ⁹³ Epigram 5 (PG 99:1781B).

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as an abbot is the reality of unruly monks leaving their proper task or rank to adopt what they perceive to be the more exalted eremitical life or other spiritual pursuits. In his Short Catecheses (delivered in the latter part of his life), Theodore repeatedly warns against pursuing such fantasies out of season. He reminds his monks at one point of a cautionary tale from among their own ranks, a certain reader of the psalms in church (psalterios) who ran off to become a stylite only to end up becoming a bloodthirsty iconoclast.⁹⁴ To Theodore, this temptation is a form of escapism, a flight of the imagination away from one’s duties and as such away from the path that conforms to the obedient humanity of Christ. He attempts to counter the dangers of an escapist or intellectualist approach with frequent meditations on the spiritual depth of every mundane monastic task.⁹⁵ He even carries this through when distinguishing the different kinds of labour performed by the coenobitic monk, such that a true monk ‘does not desire a seated handiwork, or work in the scriptorium, or book binding, but that which is the will and desire of the spiritual father and considered generally advantageous, such as cooking, and digging, and gardening, and other such like tasks’.⁹⁶ The ‘earthiness’ of Theodore’s spirituality is on full display here, showing his preference not simply for coenobitic life over the eremitical, but for the coenobitic monk who gets his hands dirty over the one who yearns for the more intellectual, more sheltered, and/or ‘softer’ tasks of the monastery. Theodore writes epigrams highlighting the special blessings that go with each of the concrete tasks of the coenobitic community.⁹⁷ Thus the steward (oikonomos) shares the work of St Stephen, ‘watching diligently over each as over your own members’.⁹⁸ The cellarer too is promised the reward of Stephen for dealing with ‘the fire of innumerable requests’ for food and drink from the monks.⁹⁹ The infirmarer, as ‘bearer of the burden of the sick’, is engaged in a ‘divine matter’, and if he works diligently will receive ‘light unapproachable, the good inheritance of heaven’.¹⁰⁰ Similar sentiments are expressed for the canonarch, guestmaster, refectorer, tailor, and so on. The epigram for the cook is particularly vivid in its praise of the office: ‘fire burns you now, but the fire to come will not condemn you’.¹⁰¹ There is, I submit, a firm connection to be made between Theodore’s concerns as leader of monks and Theodore as defender of images. As we saw, among his charges against the iconoclasts is that of relegating Christianity to the imaginary: if we deny the depictability of Christ, he says, we must say ⁹⁴ Small Catecheses 38 (ed. Auvray, 139–42). ⁹⁵ See Small Catecheses 23 (ed. Auvray, 84–6). ⁹⁶ Great Catecheses 1.87 (ed. Papadopoulos-Kerameus, 622). ⁹⁷ These can be found in Theodore’s Iambi de variis argumentis (PG 99:1780C–92B, also edited by P. Speck). ⁹⁸ Epigram 7 (PG 99:1781CD). ⁹⁹ Epigram 12 (PG 99:1784D). ¹⁰⁰ Epigram 17 (PG 99:1785D). ¹⁰¹ Epigram 14 (PG 99:1785A).

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that the Incarnation itself occurred simply ‘in the imagination’ (ἐν φαντασίᾳ).¹⁰² Bearing in mind Theodore’s understanding of monastic life, we can see why any kind of disembodied approach to Christ’s human nature would be so troubling to him. Emphasis on the material, tangible Christ goes hand in hand in Theodore’s oeuvre with an emphasis on the mundane and ‘earthy’ aspects of coenobitic monasticism. Rejecting either was perceived as an incalculable theological loss. The conceptual underpinning that binds these pastoral and theological concerns is Theodore’s approach to the humanity of Christ. This is worked out most fully on a philosophical level in his iconophile Antirrhetics, but the same premises are at work in his epistles and catecheses. On the surface, the spirituality of Theodore, because of its resistance to any kind of other-worldly mysticism and its celebration of the mundane and seemingly banal tasks of the coenobitic monk, may not be attractive to many.¹⁰³ But, spending time with his thought, one begins to piece together a theological vision that, while indeed fully ‘grounded’, is not thereby mundane or common. His vision takes its cue from the logic of Christ as God incarnate, perfect God become perfect man, who invites all to share in his perfection through that humanity he assumed from the Virgin. Indeed, the Virgin Mary is herself a key nexus of his thought, since the humanity of Christ is taken and received not abstractly, but specifically from and through her. Having taken her humanity, which is our common humanity, to himself, he offers it back to the faithful for salvation through his ecclesial body. Grafted in to this body through baptism, and continually nourished with that very body through the Eucharist, the Christian strains to imitate and venerate Christ in every manner available: whether through word, thought, image, or way of life. Theodore understands the highest path to be found in coenobitic monasticism—a flight from ‘the world’, but not thereby from one’s humanity. The perfection and deification offered through Christ and received by the saints is, as Maximus had emphasized in greater detail, something that is itself ‘beyond nature’; but Theodore makes absolutely sure that we do not conceive this as an ‘abandonment’ of human nature.¹⁰⁴ Human perfection can only be found, after all, in the abiding humanity of Christ. In order to reach perfection, there is no alternative than to find and cling to that humanity. The more strictly philosophical concerns regarding nature and hypostasis that were discussed in the first part of this chapter are always presented by Theodore in the context of, and give way to, a particular vision of Christian ¹⁰² See Antirrhetics 3.15 (PG 99:397Α). ¹⁰³ Leroy (2007), p. 78 also points out this possibility, and likewise urges his readers not to be ‘deceived’ by the seemingly commonplace nature of Theodore’s theology. ¹⁰⁴ Theodore alludes to this point in a catechesis for the Feast of All Saints, in which he describes the saints as having ‘worked within nature what was beyond nature’ (ἐνήργησαν τὰ ὑπὲρ φύσιν ἐν τῆ φύσει): Small Catecheses 10.13–14 (ed. Auvray, 36) (emphasis added).

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doctrine and Christian life. In dealing with some of his priorities not only on the dogmatic level but also in his pastoral work, I hope to have shed some light on the significance of his understanding of human nature as only ever contemplated ‘in an individual manner’ (ἐν ἀτόμῳ). This approach has, in short, a double function. The first is to direct Theodore’s audience to the circumscribed Word incarnate, in whom the whole of human nature has found its resting place and exaltation. The second is to direct the audience self-reflexively, to the whole of human nature possessed individually by each of his listeners and readers, a humanity that is currently not at rest and not exalted. While wholly the same, the human nature of Christ and that of us is, without a radical personal transformation on our part, wholly disconnected. The disconnection is overcome, for Theodore, through a common embrace, a mutual act, whereby God the Word embraces us in his humanity, and we embrace him with ours. This takes place above all in sacrament, in liturgy, and in the exercise of Christ’s commandments which, for those who can receive it, includes the humdrum but Christ-like life of the coenobium.

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4 I am called by two names, human and divine Dogma and deification in St Symeon the New Theologian

We shall be like him. 1 John 3:2 Receive and lay hold of the ‘matter’ of immaterial fire . . . becoming as gods, possessing the whole glory of God within you in two essences, indeed, in two natures, in two energies and in two wills. Hymn 13

In attempting to further elucidate the theology of sanctity and perfection in the middle Byzantine period, one is beckoned away from the richly pastoral thought of Theodore the Studite to the poetic heights of Symeon the New Theologian (949–1022). The entire theological approach of this devoted ascetic, abbot, writer, and poet might be said to be structured around the meaning, significance, attainability, and even necessity of human perfection in Christ. Symeon is in some ways the theologian par excellence of attaining the ‘fullness of Christ’, and as such cannot be ignored in this volume, even if his understanding of sanctity has been well studied by others.¹ Rather than be content simply to repeat the insights of the substantial secondary literature on Symeon, this chapter aims to build upon and use them to sketch out the larger canvas of Symeon’s theology of perfection. Section 1 concerns what I have termed the ‘heresy of mediocrity’ that serves as a backdrop and impetus for all of Symeon’s thought regarding the pursuit of sanctification and deification. It is argued that through his painstaking concern to combat any theological approach that denies or relativizes the possibility of Christian holiness and perfection, Symeon offers us a fresh and far-reaching framework in which to

¹ On the life and thought of Symeon, see especially Krivocheine (1986) and Alfeyev (2000). See also Turner (1990). Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ. Alexis Torrance, Oxford University Press (2020). © Alexis Torrance. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198845294.001.0001

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understand the human ideal. Specifically, this concern gives rise to intense reflection on sanctification and perfection as a conscious experience of the grace of the Holy Spirit, an idea explored in some detail. Furthermore, Symeon invests this position with a significance of dogmatic proportions, whereby his maximalist view of sanctification here below is presented as a doctrinal imperative, and its denial as heresy. We come in Section 2 to the original and creative ways in which Symeon relates his concept of perfection to dogma, particularly Christology. In looking at the specific and detailed manner in which Symeon’s Christology conditions his view of sanctification and deification, a variety of key yet understudied themes in Symeon emerge. These will each be looked at, and include: the human ideal as Christological rather than angelic; the relationship between theological dogma and the image of God; approaching the human ideal with the categories of Chalcedonian and Neo-Chalcedonian thought; and the role of the person of Mary as paradigm and ‘mother’ of the human ideal’s fulfilment. Finally, a concluding section examines how certain tropes in Symeon regarding personal communion with God and neighbour bear more than a passing resemblance to themes in modern Orthodox personalism, making his thought a widely unacknowledged yet significant precedent on this front. However, before we look in detail at Symeon’s theology of the human ideal, let us look briefly at his life.

SYMEON THE N EW THEOLOGIAN Symeon (949–1022) was born in Galati, Paphlagonia, to a wealthy family, in a period of Byzantine imperial ascendancy.² Under the Macedonian dynasty, and in particular the reign of Basil II (976–1025), the empire experienced a period of stabilization and expansion that gave new confidence to all levels of Byzantine society. It is in this context that Symeon (whose pre-monastic name may have been George) lived and flourished.³ He was sent to Constantinople as a boy where he received a middling education: at either 14 or 20 he began to frequent the Studios monastery in the city where he became acquainted with a certain elder named Symeon (known as ‘the Pious’ or ‘the Studite’) of whom he would become a devoted disciple.⁴ Under the guidance of his elder, the ² For Symeon’s vita, see Niketas Stethatos, The Life of Saint Symeon the New Theologian (ed. Hausherr and now ed. and trans. Greenfield), from which much of the following is drawn. ³ For more on this critical period in Byzantine history, see Holmes (2005) and Kaldellis (2017). ⁴ Symeon the Studite himself wrote ascetic treatises, of which one survives and is edited by H. Alfeyev: Symeon the Studite, Ascetic Discourse (SC 460). For more on Symeon the Studite and

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young Symeon seems to have lived a quasi-monastic lifestyle, although he remained at work in the city (serving by turns as a government administrator and a household manager). He eventually became a novice at the Studios monastery, quite possibly in 977 at the age of 27 or 28, but his excessive zeal both for religious practices and his spiritual father led to his expulsion and resettlement at the nearby monastery of St Mamas. Symeon quickly rose to the rank of abbot, being installed by Patriarch Nicholas II in around 980, at the tender age of 31. For reasons unknown (perhaps his strictness or his high expectations), thirty of the monks at St Mamas rebelled against him during the patriarchate of Sisinnios (996–8), but with patriarchal support he survived the coup and remained abbot until 1005, at which point he retired from the abbacy to focus on prayer and writing. It is likely that most of his works date from the period 1005–22. Together with the spiritual experiences that continually informed his teaching and writing, Symeon’s spiritual father was of decisive significance to the formation of his thought.⁵ His devotion to his spiritual father was so strong that upon the latter’s death he immediately instituted an annual liturgical feast in his honour that became tremendously popular. This rapid growth caught the attention of Stephen, metropolitan of Nikomedia and a high-ranking official (synkellos) in the patriarchal and imperial court, whose suspicions of the sanctity of both Symeons was aroused.⁶ We cannot know exactly what drew Stephen of Nikomedia’s ire against Symeon, though his suspicions of Symeon’s emphasis on the conscious experience of grace certainly played a role. When Symeon staunchly refused to temper the grandeur and publicity of his elder’s feast, he was eventually forced into exile at Chrysopolis across the Bosphorus around 1009, where he established a small monastic community dedicated to Saint Marina. It was not long before Patriarch Sergius (who always seemed to have given his personal if not official support to the veneration of Symeon the Pious) fully rehabilitated the younger Symeon and offered him both his old monastery of St Mamas and a bishopric with a seat on the synod, both of which he refused for the quieter life at St Marina’s, where he died on 12 March, probably in 1022. Thanks to the efforts of Niketas Stethatos, who had a personal connection to Symeon (though was a mere teen at his

his thought (a thought greatly enlarged and developed by Symeon), see the introduction to this edition by Alfeyev: SC 460:12–57. ⁵ On the concept of spiritual fatherhood in Symeon, see Turner (1990). ⁶ This episode sheds precious light on the little discussed topic of the canonization of the saints in Byzantium. In particular, the informality of the process compared with the medieval West is striking. The issue cannot be looked at in detail here, but see the remarks in Talbot (1991), and Høgel (2002), pp. 59–60. While some measure of institutional procedure for the official canonization of saints is put in place by the Paleologan period, the informality of the process right through to the modern Orthodox Church deserves the further attention of historical analysis and theological reflection.

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repose), Symeon’s relics were transferred back in triumph to Constantinople during the Patriarchate of Michael Cerularius in 1052. This probably came as the culmination of Niketas’s labors in editing and disseminating Symeon’s writings. After the transfer of relics, he composed Symeon’s Vita, which is the main source of our information about him. Niketas himself (c.1005–c.1090) deserves special mention since our knowledge regarding Symeon and his writings is inescapably linked to the efforts of Niketas. He is known for a great variety of texts in his own right, including treatises on the soul, on the limits of life, on paradise, on hierarchy, as well as epistolary, anti-Latin, anti-Armenian, and liturgical works.⁷ On the whole, he owes much to his beloved Symeon,⁸ and he doubtless affects our own perception of Symeon given his preeminent role in collecting and disseminating the corpus. One of Niketas’s works worth singling out for our purposes is a brief oration Against the Accusers of the Saints (Κατὰ Ἁγιοκατηγόρων).⁹ Here Niketas argues succinctly for the possibility and even necessity of living saints in every generation. Indeed, the idea summed up by that rare word ἁγιοκατηγόρος (‘accuser of the saints’) is essentially what motivates so much of Symeon’s work, spurring him towards a sustained theological reappraisal of what sanctity means. Let us turn to that reappraisal.

1. MEDIOCRITY ROUTED

The threat of a mediocre ideal This is hardly the first analysis of Symeon’s theology, and as mentioned above, some important work on various aspects of his thought is being taken for granted. For instance, the studies of Krivochéine, Golitzin, and Alfeyev have done much to prove that Symeon’s place in the theological tradition of the East is largely mainstream rather than on the periphery.¹⁰ Also in the background is the work of Hausherr, Ware, and Turner on the concept of spiritual fatherhood in Symeon,¹¹ as well as Hunt’s study of his notion of tears,¹² and the examinations by an array of scholars of his views concerning deification,

⁷ For discussion of Niketas’s life and thought, as well as an edition of several of his works and letters, see Nicétas Stéthatos, Opuscules et lettres (ed. Darrouzès, SC 81). ⁸ Despite remarks to the contrary by Kazhdan (1991), who sees Stethatos’s respect for ecclesiastical hierarchy as at fundamental odds with the thought of Symeon. ⁹ This text is edited and discussed in Paschalidis (ed.) (2004). ¹⁰ See Krivocheine (1986), Golitzin (1994), Alfeyev (2000). ¹¹ Ware (1990); Hausherr (1990); Turner (1990). ¹² Hunt (2004), pp. 171–224.

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light, love, authority, and epistemology.¹³ Building on such work, the sources are approached more directly from the perspective of his overall understanding of sanctity and the human ideal. The burning problem that Symeon returns to again and again in his writings is the danger of what could be termed a ‘heresy of mediocrity’ in the church. This approach is characterized by any stance or pretext that would excuse the Christian from the pursuit of perfection through Christ’s commandments and/or deny the possibility of real and conscious experience of communion with God here below. In one of his hymns, Symeon describes those who espouse such a position thus: They complain about everything and believe nothing, deceiving themselves, or thinking (senseless ones) to comfort themselves with vain hopes. With eloquence and as ones refined they deliver their elevated discourses, allegorizing things as it suits them, to the utter disregard of your fearful commandments. They do not wish to seek you, for they suppose already to possess you, or, if they confess to not possessing you, my God, then they proclaim that you are completely unattainable to all, that no one among men is able to see you, nor does there exist [say they] anyone who surpasses them in knowledge. Either they teach that you are attainable and accessible to everyone, or else that you are completely unattainable and inaccessible, but in both cases they stumble, not understanding human and divine things, being plunged in darkness.¹⁴

Symeon is targeting a form of intellectualist and self-satisfied Christianity that is detached from the keeping of Christ’s commandments and the experience of grace, and is even given to justifying such a detachment. He repeatedly laments this state of affairs throughout his writings. In Epistle 4, a text dealing with ‘self-appointed teachers who, without the grace from above, confer apostolic dignity upon themselves’, the theme comes sharply into focus.¹⁵ These so-called teachers, says Symeon, spread around the idea that ‘to become even now like the apostles or our holy fathers is impossible for us’.¹⁶ Even more egregiously, such a teacher ‘not only asserts this to be impossible, but also stigmatizes as arrogant and blasphemous those who dare to assert that it is possible’.¹⁷ Symeon is here alluding to the persecution he himself is experiencing on account of both his devotion to his own elder as a saint equal to the ¹³ See Ware (1972), (2003); McGuckin (2005); Krueger (2006); McInnes (2012); and Abraham (2017). ¹⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 55.171–85 (SC 196:266–8; ed. Kambylis, 442–3). ¹⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Epistle 4 (ed. and trans. Turner, 138–81). ¹⁶ Symeon the New Theologian, Epistle 4.315–16 (ed. and trans. Turner, 164–5). ¹⁷ Symeon the New Theologian, Epistle 4.316–18 (ed. and trans. Turner, 164–5).

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saints of old and his insistence that this state of sanctity is to be sought after by every Christian. He makes this explicit later in the same letter in a passage worth citing at length: Intercede for me a sinner, who am hated on account of Christ, persecuted because I wish to live devoutly in Christ; condemned by everybody because I alone of everybody am found doing honour to my spiritual father and teacher; by them I am called a heretic because I teach everybody to seek for grace from above and for the advent of the Holy Spirit and their being conscious of it, and because I teach that without this no pardon for sins comes into effect in any way at all in any mortal being, nor severance from passions and lusts, nor the honour of adoption as sons, nor sanctification. I am called a heretic because I teach too that those who share in [the Spirit] are not only free from all lusts and passions and unseemly logismoi [or ‘thoughts’], but also are themselves gods abiding in God, and have come to exist outside the reach of flesh and world, and are not just holy themselves and live while in the body as if they had no body, but also look on all the rest of the faithful as holy, and not merely as holy but as people who have put on Christ and have become christs.¹⁸

We here have a helpful summation by Symeon of his position. To obscure or undermine the quest for the Christian ideal is understood to be an incalculable loss. This ideal is seen in terms of the conscious experience of the grace of the Holy Spirit, which is in turn connected to specific fruits: an experiential forgiveness of sins;¹⁹ the laying aside of passions and lusts; freedom from evil thoughts; and deification, which is above all expressed in a pure love of neighbour, and in whose light one’s fellow human beings are considered ‘christs’ in Christ. It is interesting that Symeon’s concept of personal sanctity is characterized by the idea of treating all like Christian saints, even if they presumably are not all saints. It is a paradox he insists on a little later in the same epistle: [A]s I said, he who has advanced up to this level looks on all men as Christ, loves them as Christ, honours them as Christ, does not despise any of those who seem to us unimportant and small, and does not hate, vilify, slander, or calumniate anybody, or consent to listen to others who do so.²⁰

The state of sanctity is a state of love for one’s neighbour, even one’s enemy. When Symeon’s adversaries forbid the idea that there can be saints in their generation, or if they argue that sanctity and salvation are something given by ¹⁸ Symeon the New Theologian, Epistle 4.459–74 (ed. and trans. Turner, 176–9). ¹⁹ Symeon’s insistence on the need for forgiveness of sins to be grace-filled gave rise to a controversial position that placed the capacity to forgive sins in the hands of living saints who had received this special grace, rather than directly connecting it to institutional ordination. This is expressed above all in Epistle 1 (ed. and trans. Turner, 26–65). On this question, see Krausmuller (2016), though see also the comments in Englezakis (1974). ²⁰ Symeon the New Theologian, Epistle 4.478–83 (ed. and trans. Turner, 178–9).

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God but not experienced, he sees them as definitively shutting the door on this kind of love, and thus on the evangelical life as a whole. We will return to Symeon’s understanding of love for the other a little later. What is especially relevant for us here is, in the first instance, Symeon’s diagnosis of the core theological problem of his day (a self-satisfied ‘mediocrity’ in Christian life), as well as his insistence on the affective category of the conscious experience of grace as the counterweight and solution to this problem. These two aspects of the issue, the diagnosis and the treatment, deserve further attention.

Mediocrity as heresy What Symeon perceives among his contemporaries is not only a dulled sense of the Christian calling, but the ossification of this stance into a way of life that, for him, is really a form of death. He writes: The extremes were united by my Saviour; but the blind have not seen their union, and the dead say they have never perceived it. They think they live, they think they see—what great madness!— and say in their unbelief, ‘No one knew or lived this by experience or perceived it with the senses, they are only words which are taught and which we learn’.²¹

In an earlier hymn he calls this the ‘deadly deceit’ (πλάνη ὀλέθρια) that plagues his age.²² Symeon is vexed not only by whole-hearted adoption among his contemporaries of one or another form of mediocrity (either that sanctity is impossible now, or that it is given without being actively experienced), but by the fact that when sanctity or even the thought of sanctity presents itself, people turn wildly hostile. In one of his discourses, he describes such a scenario in which Christians become ‘enraged dogs’ and exclaim: Stop! . . . Who has actually become such as were the holy fathers? Who saw God or is able to see him in any measure at all? Who has received the Holy Spirit to the extent of being made worthy through him of seeing the Father and the Son? Stop, if you do not wish us to stone you with stones.²³

Perhaps Symeon’s most sustained analysis of the ‘heresy of mediocrity’ comes in Catechesis 29, a text dedicated to the theme. Whereas elsewhere Symeon complains of being branded a heretic for his teaching on the possibility of sanctification, he here turns the tables on his opponents and argues that to ²¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 34.5–11 (SC 174:426–8; ed. Kambylis, 305). ²² Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 32.17 (SC 174:402; ed. Kambylis, 295). ²³ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourses 9.370–5 (SC 129:246).

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deny this teaching is itself a grave heresy. The logic of these ‘heretics’ is often the following: ‘If we had been in the days of the apostles, and were deemed worthy like them of beholding Christ, we would also have become saints like them’.²⁴ Symeon dismantles this argument by saying that Christ is still at work, and in fact has put us in better and more suitable circumstances for keeping his commandments (since he is now recognized even by kings and rulers as true God, whereas during his earthly sojourn, not many recognized him for who he really was). He considers the same argument applied to ‘the times of the holy fathers’ rather than the time of Christ, and gives it the same treatment: if anything, the saints of old made things easier for us by overthrowing a whole gamut of heresies and successfully confronting all manner of false christs, false apostles, and false teachers.²⁵ Having gone through a range of heresies that were overcome by the church, he laments the current heretics he faces, namely ‘those who say that there is no one in our time, in our midst, who can keep the evangelical commandments and become like the holy fathers’.²⁶ He continues: They have not fallen into a particular heresy, but if I may say so, into all of them at once, this one surpassing and overshadowing all the others in impiety and excess of blasphemy. He who speaks thus overturns all the divine scriptures. It seems to me that the empty person who says such a thing has testified that it is in vain that the Holy Gospel is still read out, and in vain that the writings of Basil the Great and the rest of our sacred and holy fathers are read, or even that they were written . . . . Those who speak like this shut the heavens which Christ opened for us and close off the path which he himself beat for us.²⁷

For Symeon, the heresy of mediocrity signifies the jettisoning of the whole Christian message. Without the active pursuit of Christ’s commandments and the experience of grace, scripture and tradition may as well be abandoned. As he sees it, if the former two are lacking, the latter two are, in real terms, hollow and empty. This brings us to one of Symeon’s central claims with respect to the sanctification and salvation of the human being: they are something that must be experienced knowingly and consciously by the believer here and now. Symeon’s position has led to his being grouped as part of a strand in Eastern ascetic literature that prioritizes ‘conscious experience of God’, in the company of the likes of Macarius and Diadochus.²⁸ This is helpful as far as it goes, though one would be hard pressed to find any Byzantine ascetic literature that does not ascribe some measure of importance to the experience of grace. What might be said is that Symeon is not as concerned in his writings by the danger ²⁴ ²⁵ ²⁶ ²⁷ ²⁸

Symeon the New Theologian, Catechesis 29 (SC 113:164). Symeon the New Theologian, Catechesis 29 (SC 113:168–70). Symeon the New Theologian, Catechesis 29.138–41 (SC 113:176). Symeon the New Theologian, Catechesis 29.145–61 (SC 113:178). See Meyendorff (1983), p. 73.

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of delusory experiences that could be mistaken for grace-filled ones than he is by the threat of denying the very possibility of the experiential encounter with God. The accent falls on his exuberant confidence in the attainability and reality of such experience through the mercy of Christ and the keeping of his precepts. The most perilous delusory experience for Symeon is precisely to be beholden to the kind of minimalist approach to Christian life that he repeatedly attacks. Symeon has little patience for Christians who excuse themselves from the call to holiness, especially those who do so on account of a self-satisfied sense that they somehow already possess divine life and the gift of the Holy Spirit without actually experiencing it. His most biting criticisms in this regard occur in Hymn 50, where he meditates on the knowledge of God given to the saints by the Holy Spirit, contrasting it with the ‘stillborn’ who do not know God. The person in the latter category is subject to ‘a terrible monstrosity, a deceitful faith, thinking himself to be a son of God and not knowing his own Father’.²⁹ He continues: If then you say that you know him ‘by faith’ [πίστει], and consider that you are a son of God ‘by faith’, let the incarnation of God also be ‘by faith’, and say not that he was made man in actual deed [ἔργῳ] nor that he was literally [αἰσθητῶς] born. But if he was made Son of Man in reality, then he in every wise makes you son of God in actual deed. If he did not take on a body in an imaginary way [ἐν φαντασίᾳ], neither is it in an abstract way [ἐν ἐπινοίᾳ] that we in every wise become spirit. But just as truly as the Word became flesh, so too does he ineffably transform us and make us children of God in truth [ἐν ἀληθείᾳ].³⁰

Symeon’s argument is deeply reminiscent of Theodore’s defence of images discussed in Chapter 3: for Theodore, to deny images was to deny the reality of Christ’s incarnation; for Symeon, to deny the experiential reality of sanctification brought by Christ was likewise to relegate the incarnation to the world of the abstract and the imaginary. If the incarnation of God was not merely a concept, but an event fully and literally ‘fleshed out’ in history, then the sanctification and deification of human beings that springs from this event must also, according to Symeon, be fully and consciously ‘fleshed out’ among the faithful. As the hymn progresses, he offers a sustained reflection on this idea:

²⁹ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 50.169–71 (SC 196:168; ed. Kambylis, 401). ³⁰ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 50.172–83 (SC 196:168–70; ed. Kambylis, 401–2).

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Remaining immutable in divinity, the Word was made man, assuming flesh; preserving man immutable in flesh and soul he made me God entire. He assumed my condemned flesh and clothed me with divinity entire, for being baptized I put on Christ, not in a literal manner, but certainly spiritually [νοητῶς]. And how is he who has put on the Son of God not God by grace and adoption, in perception [αἰσθήσει] and knowledge [γνώσει] and contemplation [θεωρίᾳ]? If it is unconsciously [ἀγνοίᾳ] that God the Word was made man, then it is fitting to suppose that in like manner I too become God unconsciously. But if God was wholly reckoned as man in knowledge [γνώσει], action [πράξει], and contemplation [θεωρίᾳ], I have become wholly God by communion with God in perception and knowledge, not according to essence but by participation [μετουσίᾳ], an opinion altogether necessary for the orthodox to hold.³¹

Symeon’s logic is firmly Christological, reflective of his broader understanding of the content of perfection: what is true of Christ becomes, by our participation in him, true of us. Consequently, if we say that our sanctification in him occurs according to an abstract faith or conception that has no bearing on, or connection to, our own consciousness, self-awareness, or inner state as a whole, then Symeon insists that for consistency we must also hold that the Incarnation itself must have taken place only in abstracto, and thus has no real bearing on reality as we experience it. Christology and sanctification are inextricably bound in Symeon’s theology: their ‘entanglement’ must be respected, and any claim with regard to one will affect claims regarding the other. In this vein, Symeon elevates his position regarding the conscious experience of sanctification to a kind of article of faith: since the church’s doctrine holds that God became man not in mere appearance, imagination, or conception, but in truth and reality, it follows as axiomatic for Symeon first that the deification of human beings in Christ must similarly take place and be experienced in truth and reality, and further that this understanding of sanctification must be considered (like its Christological premise) an inescapable tenet of orthodoxy. We are already seeing, in other words, Symeon’s fondness for tying sanctification to dogma, something that will be examined in more detail in Section 2 below.

³¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 50.184–202 (SC 196:170; ed. Kambylis, 402).

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The meaning of experience Symeon is hardly the first strong proponent of deification in the Byzantine theological tradition, but his particular emphasis on its experiential aspect is worth pausing over. The opponents that he charges with the heresy of mediocrity are not only those who deny that deification takes place, but also those who acknowledge it in theory but not in practice. Later in Hymn 50 he returns to this theme, summoning his listeners to reject this heresy and ‘to become God by grace not in word, appearance, and conception [οὐ λόγῳ, οὐ δοκήσει, οὐ ἐπινοίᾳ] nor only in a faith deprived of works, but in experience, in reality, in noetic contemplation, and in most mystical knowledge [πείρᾳ, πράγματι καὶ θεωρίᾳ νοερᾷ καὶ γνώσει τε μυστικωτάτῃ]’.³² Symeon’s vocabulary here is significant, juxtaposing as he does appearance and conception with experience and true contemplation. This kind of ‘enthusiastic’ language could be construed by Symeon’s critics as borderline Messalian, a question we will come to presently, though we can already note that an emphasis on the experiential quality of sanctification does not necessitate an inherently Messalian outlook. This is not the place to catalogue all of Symeon’s statements regarding the conscious experience of grace, but his position is clear. Those who claim that they partake of the divine light ‘unconsciously’ (ἀναισθήτως) prove only that they are themselves ‘unconscious’.³³ He also uses images to drive the point home: just as a pregnant woman knows when she is pregnant, so too having Christ formed in oneself does not go unnoticed.³⁴ And again, if when we do not wear clothes our bodies notice, so much more do those clothed in Christ consciously know that God dwells in them. If they do not, the problem is not with the clothing (i.e. with baptism and the gifts of grace), but with those receiving it: such people are in fact corpses rather than living human beings, and this is why the clothing is not felt.³⁵ So far, while speaking of Symeon’s emphasis on the conscious experience of grace, I have deliberately refrained from describing it in terms of an emotion or ‘feeling’ in his work. It might be tempting to elide these categories, but caution should be exercised here. Much of the trouble arises from the difficulty in mapping complex and nuanced terms from one language to another.

³² Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 50.230–5 (SC 196:174; ed. Kambylis, 404). ³³ Or ‘insensible ones’ (ἀναίσθητοι): Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 34.99–100 (SC 174:434–6; ed. Kambylis, 308). ³⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 10 (SC 129:322); incidentally, the verse that speaks of Christ being ‘formed’ in Paul’s disciples at Galatia (Gal 4:19) is a prized scriptural text in Symeon. ³⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 5 (SC 129:84); the latter part of the argument distances Symeon from a Messalian outlook, arguing as he does for baptism’s inherent efficacy.

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Symeon is certainly a fervent defender of the need for a conscious inner perception (αἴσθησις) of grace, and this might well be understood to be equivalent to the ‘feeling’ of grace, but only if we make the distinction between a ‘feeling’ or ‘sensation’ and an ‘emotion’, a term which would most naturally be rendered in Symeon as πάθος or ‘passion’.³⁶ Symeon may not be suspicious of the active perception of grace, but that does not mean he is not suspicious of ‘emotions’ and ‘feelings’ as we might understand them. Rhetoric regarding the uprooting of the passions, emotions, and feelings that throw the soul into confusion and disarray, and the ideal of dispassion (ἀπάθεια), is as strong in Symeon as in any Byzantine ascetic writer.³⁷ We thus need to be wary of investing Symeon’s understanding of sanctification with too much of an ‘emotive’ sense without at the same time stripping it of the central and overriding concern for grace being consciously known and experienced by the recipient in the deepest recesses of the human heart and soul. At one point Symeon describes what he means by spiritual experience (or rather what he does not mean) in a manner that helps us better understand his perspective. In Hymn 55, he meditates on the joy (χαρά) imparted to the faithful by Christ here and now, which is the joy of the age to come and the contemplation of the divine countenance. To the repentant, Christ imparts this divine joy, a vision experienced ‘clearly’ and ‘distinctly’ (τρανῶς), ‘by no means in apparition [ἐν φαντάσματι], nor in intellectual thought [νοός ἐνθυμήσει], nor in mere remembrance [μνήμῃ τῇ ψιλῄ], . . . but in the truth of a divine reality [ἀληθείᾳ πράγματος θείου] and of a fearful work᾽.³⁸ Symeon here wishes to distance his conception of conscious spiritual experience from a host of categories it might otherwise be confused with. The encounter with grace is not the same, for instance, as an encounter with joyful mental images or apparitions connected with the imagination, nor is it equivalent to positive, cheerful thoughts, nor again is it a question of happy memories bubbling up inside the believer. The human faculties of imagination, thought, and memory, in other words, are neither the source nor even the primary locus of the experience of grace for Symeon. The coming of divine joy can and does certainly affect these faculties in Symeon, as it does the whole constitution of the human being (even the body, which gives rise to Symeon’s strong interest in the nature of tears), but he nevertheless insists on a distinction between the ephemeral natural functions of the human being and the visitation of grace, which he defines as ‘the truth of a divine reality’ and ‘a fearful work’. The paradox at play here concerning a full conscious experience that is, at the same time, an experience not properly definable or exhaustible in ³⁶ For more on emotion and passion in the ancient and late antique world which Symeon inherits, see Sorabji (2000) and Papadogiannakis and Vinzent (eds.) (2017). ³⁷ On dispassion in Symeon, see Krivocheine (1986), pp. 349–60. ³⁸ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 55.21–5 (SC 196:254; ed. Kambylis, 437–8).

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terms of straightforward human psychology, is for Symeon both inescapable and also quite necessary. The issue will resurface as we approach the end of this chapter. Symeon’s vivid language in describing the experience of grace, and the relationship at times between his terminology and that of the Macarian homilies, has prompted some in modern scholarship to posit Messalian tendencies in his thought. His liberal use of the term αἰσθητῶς (‘sensibly’, ‘perceptibly’, ‘consciously’, also ‘literally’) to qualify his understanding of the manner in which spiritual experience occurs is particularly notable in this regard, as it was a term long associated in the Byzantine tradition with Messalian notions. As Krivochéine has demonstrated, even copyists of Symeon’s works were sometimes inspired to ‘fix’ the potential problem by switching αἰσθητῶς for the less controversial εὐαισθήτως (‘keenly perceived’ or ‘easy to perceive’).³⁹ The issue is further complicated by the antiinstitutional tone evident in several of Symeon’s works (especially on the issue of grace-filled unordained monks having the capacity to remit sins), as well as the interpolation of later texts by the condemned heretic Constantine Chrysomallos into a fringe collection of Symeon’s works.⁴⁰ The enthusiastic exuberance of Symeon’s appeal to experience still leads to his being painted on occasion with a Messalian brush.⁴¹ But to impute ‘latent’ or ‘unconscious’ Messalian tendencies to Symeon purely on the basis of this kind of language is at best a speculative enterprise and at worst a clear distortion of Symeon’s thought. One of the problems lies in the malleability of the term ‘Messalian’ (or ‘Euchite’) itself, both in the sources and in scholarship.⁴² By and large, the term loosely applies to any tendency that denigrates the sacraments of the church and their efficacy (thereby consciously distancing itself from the institutional church), that leans in a dualist direction (usually with a teaching on ‘two souls’, one sinful and the other sinless), and/or that places the primary locus of salvation in ascetic effort. There were of course many more or less structured varieties of these beliefs with more or less elaborate mythologies and ritual practices, but when confronting Messalianism we are generally dealing with the abovementioned tendencies rather than a large and coherent religious system.⁴³

³⁹ See Krivochéine’s remarks in SC 96:151–4. ⁴⁰ On the Chrysomallos affair and the issue of interpolation, see Gouillard (1973) and (1978); Turner (1988), p. 364; and Angold (1995), pp. 487–90. ⁴¹ Recently, for instance, in Ivanov (2006), pp. 174–94, and see also Krausmuller (2006), p. 103. ⁴² The most helpful scholarly study of the early history of Messalianism (including its relationship to the Macarian Homilies) is Stewart (1991); on Macarius in particular, see Plested (2004). ⁴³ Most scholars would not, for example, consider Messalianism to be the name of a coherent ‘religion’ stretching from early Christian Gnosticism through the Bogomils to the last Cathar

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It has been well demonstrated by others that the theology of Symeon does not properly square with any of these tendencies.⁴⁴ His deep devotion to the ‘institutional’ Eucharist, for one, makes the Messalian argument rather weak from the outset. If anything ties Symeon to the Messalian fringes of middle Byzantium (whether Eleutherios of Paphlagonia, Theodore of Blachernae, Basil the Bogomil, or Constantine Chrysomallos), it is not so much doctrinal content as a common zeal for the category of experience. However, it is received ecclesiastical doctrine that gives meaning to this category for Symeon, in a way that is essentially at odds with the other cases.⁴⁵ For him, the issue of experience can only be resolved within the institutional church, given that he considers the church’s sacraments as the fundamental source of Christian life and experience.⁴⁶ In that sense, the prospect of entering into schism over the matter is never really raised by Symeon. True, one might be tempted to interpret Symeon’s introduction of the term ‘heresy’ to characterize the position of his opponents as a summons to actively break communion with them, but in context the use of this term is clearly a stern call for his audience, and the church as a whole, to take the injunctions of the gospel more seriously and literally, not a petition to inaugurate an ecclesiastical division. He sees his role as attempting, in the face of mass apathy, to protect and safeguard, rather than to question, the possibility of perfection afforded within the church. The defence of the sanctity and venerability of Symeon’s elder may have been the primary context and backdrop for the articulation of Symeon’s disdain for the ‘heresy of mediocrity’, but it is clear from his writings that this concern went beyond the question of his elder to become a leitmotif for his theology as a whole. Sanctity and deification were an imperative to be pursued by every Christian, and were to be experienced here and now in a real and conscious manner. Symeon at times even makes such experience a precondition for salvation: ‘I will show you clearly that it is necessary here below to

stand by Pierre Autier in fourteenth-century France, an image partly propagated by Steven Runciman’s Medieval Manichee: Runciman (1982). ⁴⁴ See especially Turner (1988), as well as Hatzopoulos (1991); Alfeyev (2000), pp. 3, 239 n 213, 171 n 128, 130 n 25; and Krivochéine (1986), pp. 10, 31–32 n 19. ⁴⁵ As he puts it when describing his understanding of the orthodoxy required of bishops: ‘someone who in modern times refrains from surreptitiously introducing a dogma into the Church of God is not thereby orthodox, but an orthodox is someone who has achieved a mode of life consistent with right doctrine [ὁ βίον τῷ ὀρθῷ λόγῳ κεκτημένος συνᾴδοντα]’: Epistle 1.310–12 (ed. and trans. Turner, 52, 55; emphasis added). The argument is consistent with his meditation on the meaning of faith (πίστις) in the Practical and Theological Chapters 1:9–13 (SC 51bis:44–6), where ‘faith is to die on account of Christ for his commandments, and to believe that this death is a source of life’: Practical and Theological Chapters, 10.27–9 (SC 51bis:44). ⁴⁶ On the sacramental theology of Symeon (with special emphasis on baptism and the Eucharist), see Krivochéine (1986), pp. 103–23, 141–8 and Alfeyev (2000), pp. 87–95, 197–207.

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receive the whole kingdom of heaven, if you wish to enter it also after death’.⁴⁷ Symeon’s characteristically severe position on this matter is somewhat softened in context, where the ‘whole kingdom of heaven’ is received by us now in ‘seed’ form (drawing on the relevant gospel parables), but his point is nevertheless plain: it is possible and necessary to pursue the fullness of perfection, and never settle into a stance of self-satisfied or self-assured mediocrity. Symeon’s staunch position on this is unsurprisingly taken up in the writings of Niketas Stethatos. As mentioned earlier, he does this most directly in the brief tract Against the Accusers of the Saints.⁴⁸ The themes and language we have seen in Symeon recur in this text, which gives in condensed form the same defence of the idea that true sanctity must be considered possible and necessary in every age. He writes: Just as God was, is, and shall be, so also his gifts and his graces will remain irrevocable. For his greatness being one, whether in times past or now, this greatness has always been at work. If Christ is God and Holy, the saints also bear this [divinity and holiness]: ‘for in that day’, he says, ‘you shall know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you’ [John 14:20].⁴⁹

Like his hero, Niketas insists on the recognition of sanctity as the common and achievable objective of Christians, on the basis of God’s promises and gifts. As we have seen in Symeon, the Christocentric quality of his argument is obvious: to experience the gift of God is ultimately to be ‘in Christ’, and through this to be a bearer of his divinity and holiness. There is a particular richness to this Christocentric perspective in Symeon, however, that deserves discussion. We turn now to the task of plumbing some of the depths of his Christologically oriented understanding of human perfection.

2 . C H RI S T O C E N T R I C P E R F EC TI O N

‘Unto angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come’ (Heb. 2:5) Being part of the Byzantine monastic tradition, Symeon was well-acquainted with angelic imagery for the holy life. The trope of the monk as a proleptic participant in the resurrected state (‘neither married nor given in marriage, but like the angels in heaven’— Matt. 22:30//Mark 12:25), was well established by the eleventh century. This angelic paradigm was not lost on Symeon, who discusses the need ‘to be like the angels [ . . . ] if not in nature, then at least in ⁴⁷ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 17.750–4 (SC 174:64; ed. Kambylis, 138). ⁴⁸ Niketas Stethatos, Against the Accusers of the Saints (ed. Paschalidis). ⁴⁹ Niketas Stethatos, Against the Accusers of the Saints, 72–5 (ed. Paschalidis, 517).

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dignity’, a dignity that involves being directly illumined ‘by the first and divine light’.⁵⁰ As such, the saints can be called ‘equals to the angels’ (ἰσάγγελοι, a term used in Luke 20:36),⁵¹ and in Niketas’s Vita, Symeon himself is given the traditional epithet of ‘earthly angel’ (ἄγγελος ἐπίγειος), coupled with ‘heavenly man’.⁵² Both Symeon and Niketas spend time reflecting and writing on the nature of angels and their role as guides if not models of Christian life.⁵³ But Symeon’s understanding of the human ideal does not end there, and is in fact only tangentially concerned with angelic imagery. It has been shown above that the dangers Symeon saw in the spiritual complacency of his contemporaries pushed him to ground a response on Christ’s incarnation rather than angelology. More than this, his Christocentric approach even pushes him to tacitly question the use and legitimacy of an angelic paradigm for the human ideal. In what might at first blush appear an audacious claim, Symeon goes so far as to propose an ultimate inferiority of angelic nature to human nature, precisely on the basis of his Christocentric concept of perfection. This is perhaps most fully developed in Hymn 7, where he discusses seeing Christ and being united with him through the Eucharist. The vision of God, he explains, renders me like the angels, perhaps making me, my Master, greater than them. For if in essence you are invisible to them and unapproachable by nature, but you are made visible to me, it is surely because in the essence of your nature you are mixed with me: for there is no division between what is yours, no separation at all, but your nature is your essence and your essence your nature. Therefore, partaking of your flesh I partake of your nature and I truly receive of your essence, communing in divinity. But becoming an heir in the body, I am also taken up higher than the bodiless, I become a son of God, as you said, not to angels, but to us, calling us gods thus: ‘I said, you are gods, and all sons of the Most High’ [John 10:35//Ps. 81:6]. Glory to your compassion and economy, for you became man, being God by nature, without change, without confusion, remaining one and the other, and you made me, a mortal nature, God

⁵⁰ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:5 (SC 122:218). ⁵¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Catechesis 8 (SC 104:88). ⁵² Niketas Stethatos, Life of St Symeon 8:113 (ed. and trans. Greenfield, 262–3). ⁵³ See especially Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:5 (SC 122:212–22) and Niketas Stethatos, On Hierarchy (SC 81:292–360); the latter oration is largely based on the Celestial Hierarchy and Ecclesiastical Hierarchy of Dionysius the Areopagite. For discussion of this, see Golitzin (1994).

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The angelic paradigm, while active in Symeon’s thought, gives way to the incarnate Christ, in whom something higher than angelic life is revealed. Moreover, while Symeon’s Christological statements here are somewhat poetic and fluid, the basis of his argument is clearly a Chalcedonian understanding of the unity of divine and human nature ‘without change, without confusion’, in the one person of Christ. This allows Symeon to compare being an heir of divinity ‘in the body’ through Christ’s body and blood to the paradoxically lower state of the bodiless or incorporeal angels, who do not commune with divinity in such a direct or unitive way. His affirmation of the embodied nature of perfection here is striking but not unusual in Symeon’s corpus, since it flows from his preoccupation with finding the ideal in Christ as embodied God. Similar themes emerge in Hymn 14, in which Symeon marvels with trepidation at the gift of priesthood and his unworthiness before it. He writes: Where the bread is placed and the wine is poured in the name of your flesh and your blood, O Word, there you yourself are, my God and Word, and these things become in truth your body and blood by the descent of the Spirit and the power of the Most High. With boldness we touch the unapproachable God, or rather him who abides in light that is unapproachable not only to this corruptible and human nature, but also to all the spiritual [νοεραῖς] armies of angels. This then is the ineffable work, this the undertaking beyond nature which I have been appointed to perform. It persuades me to keep death before my eyes and on account of it, leaving off pleasures, I am seized with trembling, knowing that it is impossible for me—and for all, I think— to serve worthily and thereby live an angelic life in the body, or rather one higher than the angels, in order, as the discourse has shown and as it truly is, to become in dignity more closely akin [οἰκειότερος] to him than they, as one who touches with his hands, and consumes with his mouth, him before whom they stand in fear and trembling.⁵⁵

The superiority of the human ideal to an angelic one is again discussed on the basis of the Eucharist, which places the human being in direct bodily contact with God. Symeon repeatedly returns to the notion of ‘dignity’ (ἀξία) in this context: because of God’s assumption of human nature in Christ, a divine humanity that is gifted to the faithful as food and drink in the Eucharist, ⁵⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 7.23–42 (SC 156:210–12; ed. Kambylis, 70–1). ⁵⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 14.55–74 (SC 156:270–2; ed. Kambylis, 98).

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human beings, albeit mortal and bodily (or rather as mortal and bodily), now have access to this unfathomable dignity inaccessible to the angels. Living according to this dignity is described as both necessary and impossible: all Symeon can do is embrace the remembrance of his mortality, flee pleasures, and serve his priestly functions with awe and trembling. A final example of this general way of thinking in Symeon can be found in Hymn 30, which discusses the effect of the ‘divine fire’ on the Christian. This divine fire is ‘inapprehensible, uncreated, invisible, without beginning and immaterial, completely immutable as well as uncircumscribable, unquenchable, immortal’.⁵⁶ He goes on to describe the coming of this divine fire into the repentant human soul, which it heals and purifies. Having done this, it mixes with the soul without being mixed and unites with her ineffably, in her essence essentially, altogether whole in the whole soul, and little by little it enlightens, purges and illumines, and, I know not how to explain it, the two are made one, the soul with its Creator and the Creator in the soul, alone with her alone, entire, he who holds all creation in the palm of his hand. Do not doubt that he in his entirety, with the Father and the Spirit, is contained in one soul, and that he embraces the soul in her entirety within himself. Contemplate, consider, give heed to these things! I have told you that this unbearable light, inaccessible to the angels [ἀπρόσιτον ἀγγέλοις], holds the soul within itself, and again that it dwells in the soul without wholly burning her up. Have you understood the depth of the mystery? He who is small among visible things, man, dust and shadow, has God entire at his centre.⁵⁷ ⁵⁶ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 30.18–23 (SC 174:342; ed. Kambylis, 266–7). This description of the fire and light of divinity is of a piece with that of Gregory Palamas and his defenders in the fourteenth century Hesychast Controversy. ⁵⁷ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 30.156–84 (SC 174:350–2; ed. Kambylis, 271–2). Symeon’s emphasis here on possessing God entire (ὁ Θεός ὅλος) points to his maximalizing

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This passage is notable in that it does not explicitly appeal to the argument regarding bodily access to divinity afforded by the Eucharist. Nonetheless, the incarnational backdrop that makes this divinizing experience possible is clear, and he unsurprisingly returns to the theme of the Eucharist later in the same hymn. It is interesting that the divine fire and light described by Symeon here is associated in the first instance with Christ, whose presence in the soul is inseparably accompanied by that of ‘the Father and the Spirit’. The process of deification, while often described elsewhere in the corpus as occurring ‘by the Holy Spirit’, is still always configured by Symeon in a Christocentric manner. As we saw in a passage from Epistle 4 cited earlier (in the section ‘The threat of a mediocre ideal’), the work of the Holy Spirit is to make human beings into ‘christs’. In all this we can observe a marked eclipsing of angelic imagery for the life of perfection in favour of a ‘full-bodied’ Christocentric approach. This approach has its roots in the New Testament, where the superiority of Christ to the angels is a frequent theme, and where the disciples of Christ are described as being privy to things that even ‘the angels desire to look into’ (1 Peter 1:12). Symeon’s unabashed pursuit and development of this theme as it relates to human potential and the human ideal, however, is noteworthy. In particular, he offers a thoroughgoing application of the logic of the doctrine of Christ’s incarnation to anthropology as a whole, whereby the glory of the angelic ideal fades before what the human being is called to achieve by virtue of Christ. It is precisely this transfer of theological dogma to anthropology that characterizes Symeon’s bold and poetic understanding of human perfection, and which, at least on the level of methodology, is not so far removed from the Orthodox personalism discussed in Chapter 1.

The meeting of God and the image of God Symeon’s exalted vision of a human ideal that surpasses the angelic arises primarily, as we have seen, from his understanding of the unity of the uncreated with the created accomplished through the incarnation. But Symeon does not thereby consider humanity to have received this exalted calling tendency when discussing the human ideal. At times, he can moderate this by underscoring the ‘incomplete completeness’ of the divine vision even in the age to come, for instance in Hymn 1.177–90 (SC 156:170–72, ed. Kambylis, 51–2). His concern in doing so (as we have seen in Maximus and others) is to avoid the threat of a possible ‘satiety’. Ware sees in Symeon a firm proponent of epektasis on the basis, among others, of Hymn 1, but, given texts such as the one just cited, this is at best a nuanced epektatic view, concerned more with the coincidence of movement and rest to avoid the risk of Origenism (he insists that God must remain ἀκόρεστος or ‘insatiable’ to all—Hymn 1.183) than with the rejection of an attainable perfection per se: see Ware (2003), pp. 24–5.

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only ‘incidentally’ on account of Christ’s coming: at several points he seems to argue that, from the beginning, the human being was summoned to fulfil this supra-angelic destiny concretely given to us through the incarnation. The basis for this approach can be found in Symeon’s comments on man as the image of God. In Ethical Discourse 4, for example, we find a lengthy meditation on the glory and perfection of ‘holy impassibility’ (ἡ ἁγία ἀπάθεια) to which the human being is called. Symeon suddenly breaks off and writes: Do you see this glory, you who truly desire it? Have you understood the majesty of the image described and how far each of us falls short of the glory and brightness of the saints? For this image is a model [τύπος] of what is accomplished in us: it is not we who have imagined it, far from it, but it was created and established aforetime by God. For in the creation, the Logos and Divine Artisan depicted beforehand as on a canvas that which was to occur for our salvation and renewal, in order that, seeing the model manifested in sensible reality, we might not doubt that in our case the truth itself is accomplished and brought about spiritually, . . . knowing that each of us is brought into being by God as a second world, a great one in this small, visible world.⁵⁸

Symeon’s ‘macrocosmic’ view of the human being is evident here, and it is combined with the idea of a preordained call of humanity to a perfection he can elsewhere describe as above that of the angels. The direct argument that the image of God in the human being renders the latter inherently higher than the angels is not made by Symeon (or Niketas), but a similar framing of the issue leads precisely to such an argument later in the writings of Gregory Palamas.⁵⁹ What Symeon does is form a deep link between the first creation and the new creation in Christ. He describes the formation of the human being in Hymn 53 thus, with Christ speaking in the first person: I formed the dust into a body and I breathed in a soul, not from my essence but from my power. ... Out of the two, one being was seen, I mean a rational creature, man ‘double’ out of both natures, in an ineffable manner: of a visible body, without perception or reason, ⁵⁸ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 4.789–800 (SC 129:64). His description of man as ‘macrocosm’, a second and great world in this small, visible one is a paraphrase of Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 38:11 (PG 36:324A). The idea is repeated by Niketas Stethatos, On the Soul 27 (SC 81:88) and On Paradise 3 (SC 81:158). ⁵⁹ See Gregory Palamas, The One Hundred and Fifty Chapters 39, 63–4 (ed. and trans. Sinkewicz, 126–7, 156–9).

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Symeon is meditating here on the human being as the centrepiece of creation, combining sensible and intelligible realities into a single whole. He locates the image of God here specifically in the human soul, but in a way that is still intimately connected to the body: to be a human being is always to be ‘double’ (διπλοῦς), an embodied soul. As double, Symeon explains that the human being has two forms of sight, sensible and intelligible. Through the fall of Adam, humanity’s intelligible sight is blurred, and although the light of Christ shining upon humanity remains undiminished, human beings are blind to it. The incarnation is then explained in terms of God’s eternal plan for humanity: Being completely invisible I partook of the materiality of flesh. I took on a soul being God unchangeable: I, the Logos, became flesh. And receiving a beginning of flesh, as man I was seen by all. Why then did I accept to do all this? Because it was truly for this cause, as I have said, that I created Adam: to see me. ... Behold how fervently I desire to be seen by men, that I even willed to become and to be seen as man.⁶¹

The purpose of humanity’s creation from the beginning was ‘to see Christ’. God forever willed to meet his created image face to face, and, due to Adam’s fall, this meeting was to occur through the self-emptying of God’s incarnation. Symeon does not speculate on what the precise mode of this meeting between God and man would have been without the fall, but he is clear that the results

⁶⁰ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 53.90–117 (SC 196:218–20; ed. Kambylis, 422–3). ⁶¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 53.196–223 (SC 196:226; ed. Kambylis, 426–7).

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obtained by the incarnation are the results that God had desired from the beginning: in the incarnate Christ, the vision of God is complete. This vision is, moreover, that of an image beholding and communing with its archetype. The concept of the human being as the image of God is mentioned in the above texts, but it deserves closer attention.⁶² Symeon generally connects the image of God to the soul, but more than this, he likes to develop Trinitarian motifs to describe this image. Thus in the fourth Ethical Discourse, he links the correct and unitive functioning of the classic tripartite aspects of the soul (the appetitive, spirited/desiring, and logical/reasoning) to Trinitarian doctrine: during the vision of God, ‘these three are one in the contemplation of the Trinitarian unity. . . . Indeed, the tripartite division of these is no longer recognized, but they are absolutely one.’⁶³ He makes a similar argument with regard to the image of God being contained in the soul, intellect (nous), and reason (logos) of the human being: while distinct, they are nevertheless one, and none pre-existed the other, in a manner analogous to the persons of the Trinity.⁶⁴ This ‘psychological’ analogy of the Trinity found in the human soul is significant, particularly as it is taken up again by Niketas.⁶⁵ In some ways it is the kind of argument one is not ‘supposed’ to find in Byzantium, if we are to believe the tired dichotomy of ‘social’ versus ‘psychological’ Trinitarianism used to characterize East versus West. This issue, however, does not directly concern us here. The reason it is of note for our purposes is not so much because of a ‘psychologizing’ tendency in Symeon’s theology, but because of how he resists taking this Trinitarian analogy of the soul in an abstract sense, that is, detached from active communion with God. Notice from the first example that the manifestation of the image of God in the human being only properly occurs for Symeon when the elements of that image are contemplating the divine. Without this correct functioning, the image of God in man is at best faint and blurred. Characteristically for Symeon, a distant and fuzzy analogy for the Trinity in the human soul will not suffice. This becomes clearest when, in his sixth Ethical Discourse, he revisits the Trinitarian analogy of the image of God in a rather different and heavily Christocentric way: Just as the one God is worshipped in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit without confusion and without division, so also man becomes God by grace, in God and soul and body without division and without confusion; neither does the body turn into a soul, nor does the soul transform into divinity, nor is God commingled

⁶² For a study of Symeon’s and Niketas’s understanding of the image of God and its relationship to the thought of Gregory Palamas, see Chouliaras (2017). ⁶³ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 4.426–9 (SC 129:38). ⁶⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Theological Discourse 1 (SC 122:112–14); also and in some detail in Theological Discourse 2 (SC 122:134–48). ⁶⁵ Niketas Stethatos, Against the Jews 9 (SC 81:422).

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with the soul, nor does the soul congeal with the flesh, God remaining what he is as God, the soul what it is by nature, and the body, as it was formed, of clay. He that has paradoxically brought together these things and blended intellect and immateriality with clay unites himself with both at once without confusion, and I become according to his image and likeness, as the Logos demonstrated. . . . Father, Son and Holy Spirit is the one God we worship. God, soul, and body is man created in the image of God, who is deemed worthy to be god.⁶⁶

The ‘psychological’ analogy of the Trinity in humanity, comprised of soul, intellect, and reason, gives way to the powerful triad of ‘God, soul, and body’. Symeon’s rationale for this lies primarily in his concern that, as with any theological concept, discussion of the imago Dei must relate to a living and conscious communion with God afforded in the person of Christ. Symeon is essentially arguing that the image of God in humanity is the deified state: to truly know the imago is to at once be ‘God, soul, and body’ without confusion or division. The Logos demonstrates and effects this tripartite image of God through the incarnation, offering it to all humanity ‘by grace’. Furthermore, this new triad likewise places an unmistakable emphasis on the constitutive role of the body in Symeon’s understanding of perfection, an emphasis stemming from his incarnational logic (to which we will return).⁶⁷ What we do not see in Symeon’s discussion is a clear distinction, common elsewhere in Byzantine theology, between the divine ‘image’ and divine ‘likeness’ in humanity, where the former reflects the God-given and inalienable potential of the human being, and the latter that potential’s fulfilment. Consonant with his overriding concern never to allow sanctity and perfection to become abstract categories, Symeon keeps image and likeness together: to be in the image of God can only have real meaning if we are simultaneously in his likeness. This question of the image and its fulfilment is dear to Symeon. He broaches it again in Hymn 44, the most lyrical of his meditations on the theme. Echoing his arguments in the Theological and Ethical Discourses, he considers the human being as made ‘in the image of the Logos, who gave us reason [λόγος]’, and specifically the human soul as ‘rational image’ of the Logos comprised of soul, intellect, and reason.⁶⁸ Symeon runs with this Trinitarian analogy once again, finding multiple corollaries between this triad and the being and life of the Trinity. But he suddenly stops short, evidently concerned ⁶⁶ Symeon the New Theologican, Ethical Discourse 6.161–78 (SC 129:130–2). ⁶⁷ This ‘triadic’ approach to the image of God in the human being as properly composed of ‘God, soul, and body’ is not original with Symeon. It is an idea stretching back to Irenaeus of Lyons: see Ireneaus, Against Heresies 5.6 and 5.16. It is likewise expressed in Byzantine writers after Symeon. See, for instance, Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.43 (ed. Meyendorff 1:205) where, drawing on the Macarian Homilies, Palamas defines the ‘hypostasis of the spiritual man’ as constituted by three parts: ‘the grace of the heavenly Spirit, the rational soul, and the earthly body’. ⁶⁸ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 44 (SC 196:72–4; ed. Kambylis, 360–1).

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that he will not be properly understood. His tone shifts as he seeks to drive home the moral relevance of his concept of the image Dei: You will never see this image, nor will you understand it, if you do not first purify, if you do not first wash the filth from your image, if you do not recover it from being buried in the passions, if you do not cleanse it perfectly, likewise strip it, and render it white like snow. When you have done these things and you are well purified and have become a perfect image, you will not see the archetype unless it is revealed to you by the Holy Spirit.⁶⁹

Symeon’s exalted understanding of the image of God leads him to insist that even to begin to know what it is requires an austere asceticism, an asceticism that might prepare for the desired end but itself cannot yield it, since the image of God can only in fact be revealed from on high through the grace of the Holy Spirit. Symeon’s hymn continues with a reflection on the work of the Holy Spirit in making the image real in the human being. This process is tied to ‘an exact imitation’ of the Spirit’s works, shown above all in the action of love, specifically ‘love for enemies’. Musing on this love, which treats all equally and sacrifices itself for the salvation of the other, Symeon finds his conclusion to the question of the image: These [acts of love] will make of you, my child, an imitator of the Master, and show you forth as a true image of the Creator, an imitator in all things of divine perfection.⁷⁰

In other words, to be in the image of God for Symeon means to love one’s enemies. This testifies, he argues, to the presence of the Holy Spirit, who makes new ‘the house of your soul and with it renders the body completely and entirely incorruptible, and makes you God by grace, in likeness to the

⁶⁹ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 44.96–112 (SC 196:78; ed. Kambylis, 362). ⁷⁰ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 44.141–6 (SC 196:80; ed. Kambylis, 363).

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archetype’.⁷¹ Within the same text, then, Symeon has moved from his tripartite ‘soul, intellect, reason’ discussion of the image of God to something strikingly similar to that of ‘God, soul, body’ elaborated in his sixth Ethical Discourse. Symeon here highlights the role of the Holy Spirit in accomplishing this image of God, but this does not make it any less Christocentric in his mind. Later in the hymn, where he is still describing the simultaneously deifying and image-making work of the Spirit among the saints, he characterizes it thus: As consubstantial with Christ and identical with him in nature as well as glory (being united to him), he makes them completely like unto Christ.⁷²

The theme of humanity’s imago Dei in Symeon is ultimately concerned with the living human ideal. For him, knowledge and discovery of the image of God is nothing less than the experience of the Holy Spirit’s deifying act of ‘Christification’, manifested through a life wholly conditioned by that of Christ, seen above all in love for one’s enemies. It is Christ, that is, who as the uncreated ‘image of the invisible God’ (Col. 1:15) reveals through his incarnation the content and purpose of the divine image traced in each human being. We have concentrated more on Symeon’s appeals to Trinitarian dogma in his discussions of the image of God in this section, and yet even in the texts cited above there is also an inescapable Christological impulse at work: that Symeon understands the image of God in the human being as ‘God, soul, body’ united ‘without confusion, without division’ already conveys the importance of Christological dogma to the articulation of his thinking on the human ideal. It is to this particular aspect of Symeon’s thought that we now turn.

Perfect man in a Chalecdonian key By conceiving the imago Dei in terms of the triad ‘God, soul, body’, Symeon is boldly relating Christological doctrine to anthropology as a whole: a human being ‘in the image of God’ is not only a deified human being, but strictly speaking someone in whom the content of the incarnation itself is repeated by grace. In order to convey this, Symeon repeatedly appeals to Chalcedonian and neo-Chalcedonian language when describing the deified human ideal. It has already been noted that Symeon understands the union of divinity and ⁷¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 44.160–4 (SC 196:82; ed. Kambylis, 364). ⁷² Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 44.378–83 (SC 196:96–8; ed. Kambylis, 371).

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humanity in the state of deification to be ‘without division and without confusion’ (ἀδιαιρέτως καὶ ἀσυγχύτως), thereby mirroring the Chalcedonian definition of the union of the divine and human natures in the person of Christ.⁷³ Such deployment of Chalcedonian categories in elaborating his concept of the saint (his ‘hagiology’) is not unusual. Thus in the foreword to his Hymns, he gives thanks to the Holy Spirit ‘for having become one spirit with me without confusion, without change, without alteration [ἀσυγχύτως, ἀτρέπτως, ἀναλλοιώτως]’.⁷⁴ Similar language is used to describe the union of Christ and the Church: ‘he unites himself to her, as to a single spouse, in a manner immaculate and more than ineffable, being joined to her without interruption [ἀδιασπάστως] and without separation [ἀχωρίστως], as to the one beloved and cherished by him’.⁷⁵ Unsurprisingly, we find it again with reference to the Eucharist, the locus for Symeon in which the ecclesial reality of divine-human communion is manifested: ‘being communicants of your undefiled flesh and blood, we confess that we hold and eat you, O God, without division [ἀδιαιρέτως] and without confusion [ἀσυγχύτως]’.⁷⁶ Developed Christological dogma acts in Symeon like a scaffold for his understanding of the human ideal. It would be fair to say that even at his most poetic, Symeon’s vision rests and is strongly dependent upon this dogmatic framework. He is not content, moreover, with simply transposing the terms of the Chalcedonian definition into his hagiology. We also find him bringing in the language of Neo-Chalcedonian Christology for the same purpose. Thus in Hymn 13 he writes: Listen, you who like me have sinned against God, hasten and run with vigour by your works, to receive and lay hold of the ‘matter’ of immaterial fire (when I say ‘matter’ I mean the divine essence) and kindle the spiritual [‘noetic’] lamp of the soul, that you might become suns shining in the world, even if you are not seen by those in the world, becoming as gods, possessing the whole glory of God within you in two essences [ἐν δύο ταῖς οὐσίαις], indeed, in two natures [διπλαῖς ταῖς φύσεσι], in two energies [διπλαῖς ταῖς ἐνεργείαις] and in two wills [διπλοῖς τοῖς θελήμασι].⁷⁷

Not only do the deified become gods by grace without confusion, division, and so on, but they can be described as existing in two essences, natures, energies, ⁷³ In Ethical Discourse 6.163–4 (SC 129:132). ⁷⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymns foreword.24–5 (SC 156:152; ed. Kambylis, 43). ⁷⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:6.160–2 (SC 122:234). ⁷⁶ Symeon the Theologian, Hymn 20.17–20 (SC 174:112; ed. Kambylis, 159). Cf. Ethical Discourse 10.191–2 (SC 129:272) which describes the divinity accompanying the Eucharistic elements that ‘mingles mystically and without confusion’ with the communicant. ⁷⁷ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 13.11–21 (SC 156:256–8; ed. Kambylis, 91–2).

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and wills. Symeon is evidently comfortable extending his argument to the use of the Neo-Chalcedonian position regarding the duality of energies and wills in Christ. He can conceive of no ‘gap’ between Christ and the saints, and in the same hymn he goes on to discuss the human ideal as the one who has become ‘deiform, receiving Christ in his bosom, made a Christian by Christ, having truly formed Christ in himself ’.⁷⁸ Above we encountered Symeon’s concept of the human being as ‘double’ or ‘dual’ (διπλοῦς) on the basis of the soul and body. But in his theological anthropology, the duality of the human being is reinterpreted in this Chalcedonian key. The traditional duality of soul and flesh to describe a human being is functionally merged,⁷⁹ allowing Symeon to replace this with a ‘duality’ in the human ideal that reflects the duality of Christ as God and man. He returns to this theme in Hymn 30. In the midst of a lengthy meditation on the experience of deification and becoming one with God, he writes: Having become one, I and he with whom I am united, how shall I name myself? God dual in nature [διπλοῦς τὴν φύσιν] and one in hypostasis has made me ‘double’ [διπλοῦν με εἰργασατο]. Making me ‘double’, he gave me two names, as you see. Behold the difference! I am man by nature, but God by grace.⁸⁰

Symeon continues with a discussion of how this ‘doubling’ occurs through the Eucharist, before saying: Those then who are one and two through partaking of Christ and drinking his blood, being united to both essences as well as to both natures of my God, become God by participation, called by the same name by which he is named, of whom they have substantially [οὐσιωδῶς] partaken.⁸¹

⁷⁸ ⁷⁹ ⁸⁰ ⁸¹

Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 13.33–5 (SC 156:258; ed. Kambylis, 92). Symeon explicitly makes this move in Hymn 13.22–31 (SC 156:258; ed. Kambylis, 92). Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 30.457–8 (SC 174:370–2; ed. Kambylis, 278–9). Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 30.478–87 (SC 174:372–4; ed. Kambylis, 279).

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On the basis of Christological dogmatic precedent, Symeon gives the notion of ‘duality’ a constitutive role in his understanding of human perfection in a manner not seen to the same extent elsewhere. To be perfect is to be ‘double’, human by nature but God by grace. It is significant that Symeon does not shy away from the idea that the deified human being somehow possesses ‘two essences’ and ‘two natures’. He clearly intends this to be understood in a qualified sense (‘by grace’), and does not directly espouse the position here that deification entails becoming God ‘by nature’ (he even tacitly rejects it). What drives his Chalcedonian poetic flourish when describing the human ideal is rather the idea that perfection involves participation in, and union with, the person of Christ. Since this union is with the God-man, who is dual in nature, energy, and will, the perfected human being ‘inherits’ these same traits by virtue of Christ. Symeon’s tactic in using such language is not to claim to be another Christ, but to constantly refocus the notion of deification and the human ideal on the Christ of Byzantine orthodoxy. His doctrinal consciousness whereby the one person Jesus Christ is perfect God and perfect man, ever abiding as both from the moment of his incarnation, ‘without confusion, without change, without division, without separation’, serves as the controlling lens through which Symeon understands the human ideal. In one of his most famous and controversial texts, Hymn 15, he narrows in on the abiding and sanctified humanity of Christ, specifically Christ’s bodily members. Christ’s humanity allows for all to be united in him, becoming a ‘single family’, all of the same race and all brethren. Because of this humanity, he simultaneously makes of each believer a house for himself in which he dwells as well as becoming the house of all in which all live.⁸² He continues his argument as follows: We become members of Christ, and Christ becomes our members: Christ becomes my hand and Christ my foot, I the all-wretched, and I the wretch am the hand of Christ and foot of Christ. I move my hand, and my hand is Christ entire, for understand me, the divine divinity is indivisible. I move my foot and, behold, it shines as his. Do not claim that I blaspheme, but receive these things and worship Christ who performs them. For if you desire it, you can become his member, and likewise every member of each of us will become a member of Christ, and Christ our member, and all that is without honour he will render honourable, adorning it with the beauty and glory of divinity, and abiding with God we will become gods, without any longer seeing the dishonour of the body at all, ⁸² Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 15.111–34 (SC 156:286–8; ed. Kambylis, 105–6).

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Symeon’s starkly embodied vision of perfection is on full display in this hymn. He goes on to identify Christ not simply with the hands and the feet, but even the reproductive organs. He preemptively chides those who blush at this, insisting that to think in any other way would limit and ultimately deny the humanity of Christ (and the redemption of our bodies). To illustrate that his point is a theologically necessary one, he brings in the womb of Mary, and declares that those who reject what he says are rejecting the sanctity of Christ’s birth. He clearly knows that his words will cause scandal, but he nevertheless insists on his point’s importance: while those who have not been fully clothed in Christ in ‘the entirety of your flesh’ and its every member will recoil or misunderstand him and his meaning, to deny or evade the point would, in his mind, be to deny the basics of Christology, namely that ‘he was made entirely man being entirely God, himself one, without division, altogether perfect man; the same is God, entire in the entirety of his members’.⁸⁴ Not only is nothing ‘left out’ in God’s assumption of human nature, but each member reveals ‘God entire’, since no member can be divided from the indivisible Godhead to which it is united. This argument applies for Symeon not simply to Christ’s own physical, bodily members, but to those of every believer joined to Christ and thus ‘members’ of his ecclesial body. A special place among such is assigned in the hymn, unsurprisingly, to Symeon’s elder.⁸⁵ But before that, his appeal to the womb of Mary is significant, as it is she who best and most fully encapsulates in Symeon’s thought the Christocentric human ideal. If perfection is understood by Symeon as a kind of repetition in each human life of Christ’s incarnation, to more fully grasp this idea we should turn to his developed understanding of the human source of this incarnation, the person of Mary.

Mary, Mother of God and of all the saints To attain perfection is to have Christ formed in oneself. In Hymn 1, commenting on the line ‘the upright dwell in your presence’ (Ps. 139:14 LXX), Symeon writes: ⁸³ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 15.141–59 (SC 156:288–90; ed. Kambylis, 106). ⁸⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 15.202–4 (SC 156:294; ed. Kambylis, 108). This hymn is discussed in various ways by Ware (2003) pp. 16–17, and Krueger (2006). ⁸⁵ For Symeon the Elder as an example of one whose entire body belonged to Christ, see Hymn 15.205ff. (SC 156:294; ed. Kambylis, 108–9).

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You are formed in them in an upright heart and it is with your form that they dwell in you, my Christ. O wonder, O paradoxical gift of goodness! Human beings are made in the form of God and he whom nothing can contain is formed in them, the unchangeable God, immutable in nature, who wills to abide in all the worthy.⁸⁶

We saw earlier that Symeon could connect the idea of Christ being formed in someone with the image of pregnancy. His point there centred on the Christian’s conscious awareness of the phenomenon: just as the pregnant woman knows she is pregnant, so too the one who ‘bears’ Christ within cannot be ignorant of it. In keeping with his understanding of the human ideal as a ‘recapitulation’ of the incarnation, the image of a Christian ‘conceiving’ and ‘bearing’ Christ occurs several times in Symeon’s works. But before dealing directly with this imagery, it is worth discussing his approach to the model and prototype upon which such imagery is based, namely the Virgin Mary. Reflecting the broader and well-established Byzantine piety of his day, Symeon has an intense devotion to Mary the Theotokos (or ‘God-bearer’). She is ‘beyond reproach, the virgin pure and most pure’ whom God chose ‘as his spouse’: I call her ‘most pure’ and ‘beyond reproach’ in relation to us and other human beings, comparing her to them and to us her servants. In relation to her spouse and the spouse’s Father, she is a human being, but holy, most holy and surpassing every human being of all generations with her undefiled purity.⁸⁷

Symeon wishes to maintain Mary’s unique place above all others, yet without making her equal to God. He goes on to describe the incarnation in detail, ‘the ineffable intercourse, the mystical marriage of God’.⁸⁸ With the cooperation of his consubstantial Spirit, the Word ‘assumes flesh endowed with reason and soul from her pure blood, and becomes man’.⁸⁹ Symeon appears to emphasize—even more explicitly than Theodore—the deep connection between the humanity of Mary and the whole humanity of Christ: body, soul, and intellect. For Theodore, this is implied in his argument regarding Mary as the source of the whole of Christ’s human nature, but this specific point is not spelled out by him. Symeon returns to this idea in the second Ethical Discourse in a meditation on the parallel between the creation of Eve from the side of Adam, and the creation of the New Adam

⁸⁶ ⁸⁷ ⁸⁸ ⁸⁹

Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 1.166–72 (SC 156:170; ed. Kambylis, 51). Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:9.43–9 (SC 122:248). Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:9.62–3 (SC 122:250). Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:9.60–1 (SC 122:250).

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(Christ) from the ‘side’ of the New Eve (Mary).⁹⁰ In the act of becoming incarnate, ‘God took flesh endowed with reason and soul from the Virgin . . . and in taking it from her he gave it his Holy Spirit and filled the soul with what it did not have: eternal life’.⁹¹ He repeats his point again a little later: Become incarnate, he was made man, possessing a body endowed with intellect and soul [ἐν ἑαυτῷ ἔννουν μετὰ ψυχῆς]: for this flesh which he aforetime took from Adam [to create Eve] he now assumes from the Theotokos ‘ensouled’ [ἐψυχωμένην] in an ineffable manner, thereby mystically renewing all our nature.⁹²

Mary in this way is the first to experience deification: ‘God the Word took flesh from the pure Theotokos, and in exchange he gave not flesh, but the Holy Spirit in a substantial manner [οὐσιωδῶς]. In the first instance he vivified her honourable and most immaculate soul, raising it from the dead’.⁹³ It is clear for Symeon that Mary is in need of Christ: though he considers her sinless, she is only deified and rendered perfect in and through the act of Christ’s incarnation, the union of her flesh with the Holy Spirit. As he puts it in the previous discourse, ‘from his all-immaculate mother he borrowed his allimmaculate flesh [σάρκα παναμώμητον], and in exchange for it he gave her divinity: O strange and new transaction!’.⁹⁴ Over the course of two sections in his first Ethical Discourse, Symeon elaborates his understanding of Mary as not only the ‘first’ among the saints, but also the ‘mother’ of every saint. His springboard for the discussion is an exegesis of the parable of the wedding feast(s) in Matthew 22:1–14. What drives his exegesis is the parable’s use of the plural (γάμους) to describe the wedding prepared by the king for his son: ‘Why did he not say, “he made a wedding feast for his son” but “wedding feasts”? This inspires in me a new thought [τὸ καινὸν τοῦ νοήματος]’.⁹⁵ Symeon’s new thought is that while the parable indicates in a primordial sense the mystical wedding that occurs between the Son of God and Mary to bring about the saving incarnation, this wedding is in the plural because it is repeated in the saints: ‘not bodily’ ⁹⁰ The juxtaposition of Adam and Christ and Eve and Mary is dear to Symeon, and has a long history in Christian thought stretching back to Paul (Adam/Christ) and Irenaeus (Eve/Mary). Symeon considers it again in Ethical Discourse 1:10 (SC 122:262) and Ethical Discourse 13 (SC 129:410–12). ⁹¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 2:7.144–5 (SC 122:376). ⁹² Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 2:7.215–19 (SC 122:382). It should be noted that Symeon is not definitive in these passages as to whether Mary is the source of Christ’s human soul and intellect (he cannot easily be labeled either a ‘traducianist’ or ‘creationist’ on the matter of the origin of the human soul), but his sense of the deep connection between Mary’s humanity and the whole of Christ’s humanity (body, soul, intellect) is nonetheless striking. For a similarly striking approach to the Virgin as ‘mother of both flesh and soul’ of Christ, see Nicholas Cabasilas, Homily on the Annunciation 5 (ed. Jugie, 488 [370]). ⁹³ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 2:7.210–14 (SC 122:380–2). ⁹⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:10.118–20 (SC 122:260). ⁹⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:9.74–5 (SC 122:250).

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(οὐχὶ σωματικῶς) as in the case of the Virgin, but nevertheless ‘spiritually [πνευματικῶς] and substantially [οὐσιωδῶς]’.⁹⁶ Mary is thus the first and primary initiate into the mystical wedding, but as such, she also inaugurates the possibility of deification for all. In particular, Symeon extends his emphasis on the Eucharistic fulfilment of the union of divinity with our humanity through Christ’s flesh and blood to include our participation in the flesh of the Virgin: Since it is inadmissible that he should take flesh again and be begotten bodily in each one of us, what does he do? He gives us for food that undefiled flesh which he took from the pure womb of the all-undefiled Mary and Theotokos. And as we eat of it, each of us faithful who worthily consumes his flesh has within himself the whole of God incarnate, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same Son of God and Son of the all-immaculate Virgin Mary, he who is seated at the right hand of God the Father.⁹⁷

Through participation in the Eucharist, Mary truly becomes ‘our mother’: He gives to the saints . . . the flesh which he assumed from her. And inasmuch as we have all received of his fullness, so too have we all partaken of the blameless flesh of his all-holy mother which he assumed. And just as Christ who is God and our God became her son, so too do we become—O unspeakable love for mankind!—sons of the Theotokos his mother and brothers of Christ himself, since it is because of the marriage most pure and surpassing knowledge that took place with her and in her that the Son of God was born of her, and in turn it is from him that all the saints are born.⁹⁸

He continues this line of thinking a little later by describing this kinship between Mary and the saints in some detail as follows: Thus the Mother of God is lady, queen, mistress, and mother of all the saints [μήτηρ πάντων τῶν ἁγίων], and the saints are all, on the one hand, her servants since she is Mother of God, and on the other, they are all her sons, inasmuch as they partake of the all-immaculate flesh of her Son. This is a word worthy of acceptance, for the flesh of the Lord is the flesh of the Theotokos. . . . The saints then are kin with her in a threefold manner: first, they have kinship as coming from the same clay and the same breath (which is the soul); second, because it is through the flesh assumed from her [i.e. the Eucharist] that they have fellowship and communion with her; and last, because of the sanctity according to the Spirit that occurs in them because of her, through which each has similarly conceived in himself the God of all, just as she did in herself. For though she gave birth to him bodily, she always had him within herself entire and spiritually, and now also she likewise has him, inseparable from herself.⁹⁹ ⁹⁶ ⁹⁷ ⁹⁸ ⁹⁹

Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:10.17–19 (SC 122:252). Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:10.54–64 (SC 122:256). Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:10.136–47 (SC 122:262). Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:10.166–84 (SC 122:264).

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Through bearing Christ, Mary realizes human destiny ‘in the flesh’ and ‘in the spirit’. The fulfilment of this destiny ‘in the flesh’—that is, the bodily incarnation of Christ—is unrepeatable, and becomes the basis upon which Symeon differentiates Mary from all other saints. Giving birth to Christ ‘bodily’ (σωματικῶς) makes her an inescapable nexus of redemption: since salvation comes through the pure flesh of Christ, and that flesh is Mary’s, she is intimately bound up with the salvation and deification of all. At the same time, Symeon is trying to balance a fitting reverence for Mary with his larger point, which is that all believers are called, like her, to conceive Christ and have him formed in themselves ‘substantially’ and ‘spiritually’. In the course of his argument he even appeals to Christ’s own injunction that his disciples become ‘his mother’ through doing the will of God.¹⁰⁰ Without wanting to suggest, given the ineffable and unrepeatable mode by which she bore Christ, ‘that any man is her equal—God forbid!’,¹⁰¹ he refuses to allow this to detract from the high calling of every Christian to nonetheless become the ‘mother’ of Christ in a true and substantial way. Symeon himself knows that his argument is in some respects a ‘new thought’ that might scandalize his listeners, which explains why he continually insists on the supremacy of the Virgin. His persistence, however, with the theme that believers are to become like the Theotokos in ‘bearing God’ serves to prove all the more his unflinching dedication to the idea that human perfection and deification should be considered the normative target of all. Earlier in the same discourse, he lays the groundwork for this transition from Mary to each believer when he interprets Ps. 43:10 (‘the queen stood at your right hand’) as follows: ‘If indeed they affirm that this refers to the only Theotokos, it also most suitably refers to the Church of her Son and God’.¹⁰² What is true of Mary is emblematic of what ought to be true of the believer. While maintaining her exceptional character and role in Byzantine Christian life and doctrine, Symeon cannot resist seeing her also as paradigm, the archetypal Christian after Christ who can and must be imitated. As ever, theological dogma must translate for Symeon into broader anthropological and existential concerns. We thus find him using the language of conception and gestation to describe the Christian ideal: Blessed is the one who has seen the light of the world being formed within himself, since having Christ like an embryo [ὡς ἔμβρυον], he shall be considered his mother, as he himself promised, who does not lie, saying ‘these are my mother and brothers and friends’; who are these? ‘Those who hear the word of God and

¹⁰⁰ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:10 (SC 122:258), alluding to Matt. 12:50//Mark 3:35, and cf. Luke 11:28. ¹⁰¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:10.83–4 (SC 122:258). ¹⁰² Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:7.12–15 (SC 122:238).

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do it’ [cf. Luke 8:21]. Thus those who do not keep the commandments freely exclude themselves from this grace, since such a reality [πράγμα] was, is, and will be possible, and it has taken place, it takes place, and it will take place in all who fulfil his precepts.¹⁰³

Symeon places the accent here on the continuous accessibility of this gift of consciously ‘conceiving’ Christ and bearing him within through the performance of the Gospel commandments. Any believer at any time can become Christ’s ‘mother’. That said, as we have observed elsewhere, Symeon has a particular affection for the sacrament of the Eucharist as the primary vehicle for this ‘God-bearing’ experience. It is thus not surprising to find similar sentiments regarding the believer bearing Christ in a hymn dedicated to the priesthood and the celebration of the Eucharist. He puts his reverence for this act in no uncertain terms: Who then, having become God by the grace of the Trinity and made worthy of the glory from on high, the first glory, would think that there is something more glorious than to celebrate the liturgy and behold the nature most high, effecting all things, ineffable, and unapproachable to all?¹⁰⁴

Symeon meditates on the purity required of priests and the danger of serving at the altar unworthily. Without questioning the legitimacy of a Eucharistic liturgy served by a priest in good canonical standing, he nonetheless dwells on certain markers that characterize the celebration of ‘the mystical and bloodless sacrifice’ performed ‘in truth’.¹⁰⁵ He switches to the first person to describe such an experience at the altar: There I beheld my filthy and prodigal heart [becoming] pure, spotless and virgin and heard the words, ‘Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you and in you forever’ [cf. Luke 1:28].¹⁰⁶

For Symeon, Mary is indeed the Mother of God and of all the saints, the one through whom salvation is made possible in the first place. But the dogmas that frame Symeon’s understanding of the Virgin inevitably overflow into his vision of the human ideal as a whole. The salvation she heralds includes becoming like her by receiving the same Christ she received, if not bodily in

¹⁰³ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 10.858–67 (SC 129:320–2). ¹⁰⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 19.56–60 (SC 174:98; ed. Kambylis, 154). ¹⁰⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 19.102–4 (SC 174:102; ed. Kambylis, 155). In Hymn 58 (SC 196:284–6; ed. Kambylis, 451–2), Symeon makes it clear that he does not question the validity of the Eucharist performed by unworthy clergy: the problem for such clergy is not that their Eucharist is illegitimate, but that while thinking they are holding and consuming ordinary bread, they are in fact encountering ‘fire’. ¹⁰⁶ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 19.130–3 (SC 174:106; ed. Kambylis, 156).

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the sense of a literal fleshly conception, then certainly ‘spiritually’ and ‘substantially’ through the consumption of the divine body and blood of the Eucharistic table and a life lived in accordance with evangelical precept. The place in which this deifying union occurs is the human heart, the inner vessel which, however defiled, is still summoned to a true virginal purity and the imitation of Mary through a personal bearing of Christ. This section has sought to summarize and illustrate various facets of Symeon’s Christocentric human ideal. If Mary can take centre stage from time to time in his thought, it is never to the detriment of this Christocentric ideal, but serves rather to reinforce it. This is because she is paradigmatic precisely as the human being closest to Christ. To strive for likeness to her is to strive, in Symeon’s mind, to make Christ the absolute centre of one’s life, to bear him and so be conformed to him: ‘you are formed in them . . . and it is with your form that they dwell in you, my Christ’.¹⁰⁷ When examining and illustrating Symeon’s vision of perfection, an ongoing process can be observed whereby what is creedal and dogmatic is rendered existential and living. The formulae and terminology that govern the Byzantine Church’s teachings on the person of Christ, the Trinity, and even the person of Mary are constantly being redeployed by Symeon for existential ends. He considers these formulae and terms to have a true and even nonnegotiable importance and meaning as they pertain to Christ, the Trinity, and Mary, but that meaning counts for little, according to him, if they do not in turn directly affect and govern the shape and content of Christian life. His whole approach to the human ideal can be seen in terms of this concern: relating ecclesiastical doctrine to lived perfection.

Symeon the ‘individualist’? The consistency of Symeon’s insistence that each and every believer seek perfection has led several scholars to brand his thought as representative of a hyper-individualistic spirituality and mysticism. According to this line of thinking, Symeon is unconcerned with the motifs of love for neighbour or a ‘horizontal’ communion between persons, but only has in mind a ‘vertical’ and solipsistic communion of the solitary with God. As Kazhdan and Epstein put it: ‘monastic individualism was epitomized by the activity and work of Symeon the New Theologian. . . . Symeon’s teaching was consistently individualistic.’¹⁰⁸ They see Symeon as obsessed with ‘internal enthusiasm’ and the ‘search for individual salvation’: his thought gives ‘a clear expression of an ideal isolation’.¹⁰⁹ Given Symeon’s conflict with some among the official ¹⁰⁷ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 1.166–7 (SC 156:170; ed. Kambylis, 51). ¹⁰⁸ Kazhdan and Epstein (1985), pp. 90–1. ¹⁰⁹ Kazhdan and Epstein (1985), p. 92.

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ecclesiastical hierarchy (esp. Stephen of Nikomedia) over the veneration of his elder, this position is somewhat understandable. It is an attempt (among many) to come to terms with Symeon’s thought by pitting him against the institutional church, and thus apparently against any ‘communal’ ideal. Like the Messalian charges against Symeon, however, this characterization is misguided. True, Symeon writes much on the inner world of the soul in its relationship to God, and the primary need for personal communion with Christ, but this need not imply a corresponding ‘individualism’ in his formulation of the human ideal. The charge of individualism has an added layer of significance for this study, given that Orthodox personalism is partly founded on the incommensurability of the concepts of ‘individual’ and ‘person’, where the former indicates self-enclosed isolation and the latter the fullness of relational communion. In this section, without making any claims for a terminological similarity between Symeon and the personalists on the basis of the ‘individual-versus-person’ dichotomy, several elements of his thought will be brought out that both push back against the charge levelled by Kazhdan and Epstein and demonstrate a certain and perhaps surprising kinship between Symeon’s theology and modern Orthodox personalism. On the basis of what has been discussed, the accusation of ‘individualism’ and an ideal of ‘isolation’ is misleading. Kazhdan and Epstein, for instance, attempt to contrast Symeon’s concept of perfection with the practice of ‘good deeds, charity, church services, [and] sacraments’,¹¹⁰ as if the former did not imply the latter in his thought. There is no need to rehearse again the centrality of the commandments (particularly love for one’s enemies) and the Eucharist in Symeon’s approach to the human ideal. It is worth highlighting, moreover, that Symeon was a coenobitic monk and leader of a coenobitic monastery, fully engaged in the life of a community. His emphasis on the role of obedience to one’s spiritual father can only be construed as ‘individualistic’ with difficulty, especially when one considers his understanding of the spiritual father as someone who lovingly lays down his life for his disciples.¹¹¹ Beyond these general points that call Symeon’s ‘individualism’ into question, there are certain features of his thought which point rather starkly in the opposite direction. In Symeon’s mind, communion with God is so far from harbouring an ideal of isolation that he thinks of isolation (and hence something like individualism) as a product of losing this focus on divine communion. This comes to the fore in a meditation on monasticism in Hymn 27. He plays with the term μοναχός (a monk, but literally a ‘solitary’, one who is ‘alone’), showing its ultimate inadequacy to describe the monastic state. ¹¹⁰ Kazhdan and Epstein (1985), pp. 91–2. ¹¹¹ The category of obedience, though central to Symeon’s thought, has only been touched on in passing as it has been adequately treated elsewhere: see Turner (1990) and Ware (1990). On the ‘qualifications’ and work of the spiritual father in particular, see Turner (1990), pp. 91–190.

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Strictly speaking, the monk is only truly such (i.e. ‘alone’) when ‘Christ the King’ dwells within him. And yet, he argues, ‘in such a case you are not alone [οὐ μονάζων], for the king lives with you’.¹¹² The monk is only ‘alone’ in a relative sense, namely in the eyes of the world, but ‘since you are united to the king and God, you are not alone, but are numbered among all the saints’.¹¹³ He continues his line of argument, asking: ‘if then someone has Christ abiding within him, how is it possible, tell me, to call him “solitary” [μόνος]?’.¹¹⁴ The one who is truly alone, he goes on, is the one who is separated from God. Being separated from God is then linked to a separation from other human beings: Each one of us is completely separated from other human beings, and all of us are isolated like orphans, even if we appear to be united by virtue of living together and mixing with one another in this numerous assembly.¹¹⁵

The proof of this endemic ‘individualism’ is death: ‘death shows that this is true’, since it levels all relationships and ‘dissolves the unity of the crowds’.¹¹⁶ Without pushing Symeon’s point too far, it is hard not to see parallels between this idea and the ‘individualism’ targeted by the likes of Zizioulas, an existence defined by death.¹¹⁷ Symeon is making his point in order to elevate the true monk as a figure who conquers the death that threatens his relationships through communion with Christ the conqueror of death. In doing so, he does not outright disown the term ‘monk’, but simply insists that it can only mean one who is ‘solitary’ or ‘alone’ in relation to the fallen world and its norms, a world ultimately consumed by death. In actual fact, the monk is conceived as the most communal of beings, intimately joined to the incorruptible Christ and thereby to all who live in him. Symeon’s instinct for understanding the ideal in terms of communion is far-reaching. In Catechesis 8, he describes those who are touched by ‘perfect love’. He recounts several cases of people he had encountered with the gift of such love. The last example is someone who serves as the epitome for Symeon’s point, and is portrayed as follows: I saw another who desired the salvation of his brethren with such zeal that often, with burning tears, he besought God the lover of mankind with all his soul either to save them with himself, or to condemn him with them, absolutely refusing to ¹¹² Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 27.6 (SC 174:278; ed. Kambylis, 236). ¹¹³ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 27.10 (SC 174:278; ed. Kambylis, 236). ¹¹⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 27.18–19 (SC 174:280; ed. Kambylis, 236). ¹¹⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 27.28–32 (SC 174:280; ed. Kambylis, 237). ¹¹⁶ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 27.34–8 (SC 174:280–2; ed. Kambylis, 237): τὴν ἕνωσιν τὴν τῶν πολλῶν ὡς εἰκὸς διαλύει. ¹¹⁷ The thought of Zizioulas is discussed in Chapter 1.

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be saved alone, from a disposition imitative of God and of Moses. For, being bound to them spiritually by holy love in the Holy Spirit, he preferred not to enter the very kingdom of heaven if it meant being separated from them. O holy bond, O unspeakable power, O heavenly minded soul, or better to say God-inspired, made exceedingly perfect in the love of God and neighbour.¹¹⁸

The acquisition of perfect love is never detached by Symeon from the ideal of communion, and not simply communion with God, but also with one’s neighbour. Love and communion with others is always a corollary of love for God. Symeon predictably sees the connection between the two in Christological terms. This is clearest in his third century of the Theological and Practical Chapters, where he writes: If Christ deigned to take the face of every poor person and if he is made like every member of the poor, it is for this cause: that no one who believes in him should raise himself above his brother but that each, treating his brother and his neighbour as his God, might consider himself lower not because he is a brother but because of the one who made him, and he receives and honours him as God, and empties out all his resources for his care, just as Christ God shed his own blood for our salvation.¹¹⁹

Symeon’s ‘mysticism’ is not, in other words, an escapist individualism, but involves a thoroughgoing vision of active love for God and love for neighbour, always configured Christocentrically. That Symeon understands the human ideal in ‘proto-personalist’ terms, whereby the human being is ultimately constituted through loving communion with God and neighbour, is most fully on display in his first Ethical Discourse. In the last section of this long treatise, Symeon grapples with the question of the age to come and the eschatological state. He has been confronted with the question of whether or not the saints will recognize one another in the kingdom of God: one side insists not (since they will be contemplating God alone), and the other says they will. Symeon is suitably apprehensive and tentative about taking on such lofty topics (which in their details are ‘unknown even to the angels of God’). Yet he nevertheless broaches it, coming down strongly in favour of the saints’ mutual recognition of one another. His main argument relates to Christology, specifically the relationship of the Father to the Son: Just as the Father was never ignorant of the Son, nor the Son of the Father, so also the saints, who have become gods by adoption through God’s abiding in them, will never be ignorant of each other, but they will each see the glory of the other, just as the Son sees that of the Father, and the Father that of the Son. And what will be the nature of the glory of the saints? The same as that of the Son of God . ¹¹⁸ Symeon the New Theologian, Catechesis 8.56–67 (SC 104:90). ¹¹⁹ Symeon the New Theologian, Theological and Practical Chapters 3:96 (SC 51bis:182).

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. . . See then, that the glory that God the Father gave to the Son before the ages is given by the Son to the saints, and all are one.¹²⁰

According to Symeon, the major error of those who deny the mutual recognition of the saints is to confuse the partial experience of God here below with that of the age to come. They claim, he says, that the saints will be taken up ‘in ecstasy’ (ἐν ἐκστάσει) in the same manner as now, and that they ‘forget themselves’ (ἐπιλανθάνεσθαι ἑαυτῶν) and those they are with. This is to gravely misunderstand scripture, according to Symeon, taking the ‘alteration’ (ἀλλοίωσις) and ‘rapture’ (ἁρπαγή) that saints might experience in the present to be identical to their future state. When they hear about such-and-such a holy man who enters divine contemplation for so many days to the extent of forgetting his body and surroundings, they simplistically think that this must apply also to the kingdom of heaven. By thinking in this way they prove only that ‘they are completely ignorant of divine mysteries of the Spirit’ and truly walk ‘in darkness’. What they do not realize is that ‘this rapture of the intellect is not for the perfect, but for beginners’.¹²¹ Here we touch the grandeur of Symeon’s vision. His emphasis on perfection in Christ is not a summons to a climactic out-of-body experience in which the individual communes alone with God. If there is a place for such experiences, it is at the outset, not the terminus of Christian life. One can sense here Symeon’s underlying concern for the fully ‘conscious’ experience of God, one fulfilled in the tripartite divine image of ‘God, soul, body’. What he introduces here is the notion that a deified person is not only fully conscious of God and his own self (soul and body) in the experience of deification, but is likewise fully conscious of, and in perfect communion with, all the other deified. He retools the classical allegory of the cave to illustrate his point: the purpose of Christian life is not to have just one encounter with the divine light while dwelling in the darkness of a cave (which might leave the erroneous impression that to encounter the divine light must mean abandoning our consciousness, body, and surroundings), but to live towards and in that light such that it becomes not an unusual encounter, but the very atmosphere in which the believer lives. As that happens, the true human ideal is revealed, an ideal realized in ‘God, soul, body’, one that forever embraces God and those in God with a love that never fails.

¹²⁰ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:12.307–18 (SC 122:294–6). The same question is addressed by Theodore the Studite who—unsurprisingly given his devotion to the continuity of Christ’s hypostatic properties in the resurrected state—comes to a similar conclusion, although his explanation is not as spiritually lofty as Symeon’s: see Theodore the Studite, Small Catecheses 22 (ed. Auvray 79–84). ¹²¹ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 1:12.319–39 (SC 122:296) (emphasis added: ἡ ἁρπαγὴ αὔτη τοῦ νοὸς οὐχὶ τελείων, ἀλλ᾽ ἀρχαρίων ἐστίν).

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While it would be wrong to label this idea ‘personalist’ in any straightforward fashion, Symeon’s appeal to the Father–Son relationship as constituting a wide-ranging hermeneutical key for understanding the human ideal is noteworthy. If one of the main perceived problems with Orthodox personalism among its detractors is its novel elision of theological and anthropological categories (as discussed in Chapter 1), the same charge would need to be levelled at Symeon. As we have seen, demonstrating the applicability of theological dogma to anthropology is a constant feature of Symeon’s thought. How far his results square with modern attempts is a separate question, though some possible points of contact have been highlighted.¹²² What is at least hard to deny, however, is the deep methodological consonance between the two approaches.

Conclusion There is a density to Symeon’s understanding of the human ideal that has not received the attention it deserves. This chapter has sought to remedy this state of affairs by narrowing in on two controlling features of his thought. The first is his fear of a Christianity of half-measures and compromises, begetting a state of mediocrity that inevitably dilutes the high ideals of the Gospel by ‘making excuses with excuses in sins’ (Ps. 140:4).¹²³ The second is Symeon’s systematically Christocentric approach to human perfection wherein theological dogma, and Christological dogma in particular, is brought to bear on anthropology to explain and describe the reality of deification. What is true of Christ becomes wholly true of his saints by adoption and grace, a truth experienced consciously even in the present life. He offers a succinct précis of this in his Theological and Practical Chapters: What is the goal of the economy in the flesh of the Word of God . . . if not, having partaken of what is ours, to make us communicants in what is his? For this cause the Son of God became Son of Man, that he might make us, human beings, sons of God, raising up our race by grace to what he himself is by nature, begetting us from above by the Holy Spirit and immediately leading us into the kingdom of heaven. Or rather, he grants us to have this kingdom within us, such that it is no

¹²² Together with the concepts of relationality and communion, one could also bring in Symeon’s understanding of the Eucharist. However, as stated from the outset, the purpose of this study is not to artificially match up the figures under discussion with modern Orthodox personalist thought, but to revisit the Byzantine Christian tradition on its own terms, ‘clearing the decks’ for constructive proposals that build on a sounder historical basis. ¹²³ Symeon repeatedly appeals to this psalm verse (Ps. 140:4 LXX) when discussing the threat of ‘mediocrity’: see, for instance, Ethical Discourse 2:1 (SC 122:314–16); Ethical Discourse 7 (SC 129:198); Ethical Discourse 10 (SC 129:326); Catechesis 4 (SC 96:328, 348), etc.

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longer in hope that we seek to enter it, but possessing it in truth we cry: ‘our life is hid with Christ in God’ [Col. 3:3].¹²⁴

Symeon is often dubbed a Byzantine ‘mystic’ because of the emphasis on mystical and contemplative experience throughout his writings. This is accurate up to a point, but if by ‘mystic’ we mean someone who eschews or passes over ecclesiastical dogma and practice in favour of a supra-institutional ‘spirituality’ (as many do), Symeon hardly qualifies. Far from bypassing the trappings of intricate Christian doctrine, Symeon makes them the basis and cornerstone of his vision. Moreover, his mysticism has a distinctly Eucharistic content that emerges from his consummate devotion to the ecclesial institution. His conflict with institutional authorities (notably Stephen of Nikomedia) serves in his mind to underscore rather than to question his devotion to the ecclesiastical institution as such. An official ‘softening’ of the church’s stance on the goal and accessibility of perfection would be tantamount, for Symeon, to the loss of ecclesiastical identity itself. If the human ideal shown and given in Christ is not the unobscured goal for all the church’s members, then the meaning of the church as an institution collapses, and the meaning of the Christianity of its members is likewise called into question. It might be tempting simply to dismiss Symeon’s approach as wildly puritanical, heartless, even tyrannical. Yet Symeon himself would identify the veiling of the Christian ideal as a far greater tyranny than its unremittingly forceful proclamation. For to veil the ideal is to attempt to obscure the face of Christ, and to excuse one’s failure in achieving it is to stunt the Gospel and refashion its message after a different image. Symeon stands adamantine in his refusal to allow such a clouding of the human ideal to capture the church (and thereby, in his mind, subvert Christianity itself). This stance renders his corpus at once lofty and also highly ‘pressurized’. The absolute need for the conscious experience of Christocentric perfection by the Holy Spirit is a concern found around every corner, practically on every page of his extensive writings. Symeon rarely appears directly concerned with the possibility of discouragement among his audience before these expectations. That said, much of his meditation on perfection (especially in the Hymns) is full of self-reproach at his own shortcomings, and a sense of shame in the face of the ideal: ‘How did you deign to make me your member, the impure, the prodigal, the prostitute? . . . For this repugnant and corrupt tent is united to your allimmaculate body, and my blood is mixed with your blood’.¹²⁵ The trouble for Symeon lies not so much in being unworthy of the deifying gift (for none is worthy), but in a lack of faith that such a gift even exists, and that God will freely give it to the repentant heart. Whereas elsewhere Symeon argues for the

¹²⁴ Symeon the New Theologian, Theological and Practical Chapters 3:88 (SC 51bis:176–8). ¹²⁵ Symeon the New Theologian, Hymn 2.2–13 (SC 156:176; ed. Kambylis, 54).

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conscious experience of God’s kingdom here and now as a prerequisite for entering the kingdom after death, at one point he admits that perhaps a fervent and deep desire for divine light might be enough: Blessed are those who seek to enter the light with their whole soul, despising all the rest, since, even if they have not yet attained entry to the light while in the body, perhaps they will depart with good hopes of entering all the same, obtaining it only moderately [μετρίως], but obtaining nonetheless.¹²⁶

What matters most to Symeon is keeping the ideal intact and pursuing it relentlessly. Without the repentant pursuit of this goal, without recognizing and seeking to demolish the wall of sin that separates us from it, ‘not only will we be unable to know God, but we will not even know that we are human’.¹²⁷ The ideal of attainable deification in Christ, in other words, even if unattained or only partly attained here below, must be upheld according to Symeon if for no other reason than to preserve and articulate what it means to be a human being, to give bearings to a humanity that, without this ideal, loses all knowledge of itself, swallowed up by the void of its own meaninglessness. The quest for human meaning clearly finds its resting place for Symeon in his Christocentric concept of divinization, wrought by the Holy Spirit and exemplified in the person of Mary. A fully formed ideal of deification in Byzantine theology, however, is often more readily associated with a later figure, namely St Gregory Palamas, someone who continues to elicit strong theological discussion, controversy, and even polarization. It is to his thought and its legacy that we now turn.

¹²⁶ Symeon the New Theologian, Ethical Discourse 10.817–20 (SC 129:318). ¹²⁷ Symeon the New Theologian, Theological Discourse 1.255–7 (SC 122:114) (emphasis added).

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5 The energy of deification and the person of Jesus Christ in St Gregory Palamas In thy light shall we see light. Psalm 36:9 We shall eternally see this power, the brightness of which comes from his worshipped body. Triads 1.3.29

A core theme for much of modern Orthodox theology is the essence–energies distinction, which has been deployed as a hermeneutical key to solve all manner of theological and philosophical puzzles, from the concept of deification to the threat of secularization.¹ According to this distinction, God in his nature or essence is utterly incomprehensible and unattainable, yet his natural—and thus uncreated—energies or activities can be experienced in the created world through divine condescension: thus God is truly knowable in his energy/activity even if he can never be known or ‘grasped’ in his essence. Maintaining this distinction, it is argued, is necessary to safeguard the notion of real sanctification and deification, whereby the human being, in the process of being sanctified, truly encounters and knows the uncreated God himself rather than a created (and thus non-divine) reality. A key implication of this distinction is that God’s sanctifying and deifying grace, as a manifestation of divine energy or activity, is uncreated. The torchbearer for this distinction and its detailed defence is the late Byzantine theologian St Gregory Palamas (c.1296–1357). In fact, the modern Orthodox emphasis on the essence–energies distinction is so intertwined with the retrieval of Palamas that the Orthodox figures who appeal to this distinction in articulating their theological vision—Vladimir Lossky, Dimitru

¹ Recent examples of work that seeks to connect the denial of the essence–energies distinction to the onset of secularization in Western culture can be found in, for instance, Bradshaw (2004), pp. 263–77 and Yannaras (2007a).

Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ. Alexis Torrance, Oxford University Press (2020). © Alexis Torrance. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198845294.001.0001

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Staniloae, Georges Florovsky, John Meyendorff, Christos Yannaras, John Romanides, Kallistos Ware, and others—are often branded ‘Neo-Palamite’ thinkers.² This is not the place to discuss the modern Orthodox emphasis on the essence–energies distinction in detail, though the topic will inevitably reemerge in the course of this chapter. Nor is it the purpose of this chapter to trace the reception and use of Gregory Palamas in the post-Byzantine and modern eras: this reception, and in particular the surge of scholarly interest in the thought of Palamas (beginning in earnest in the early twentieth century), is a striking phenomenon that has thankfully begun to garner close scrutiny in its own right.³ The focus instead will fall on the theology of Palamas himself (as well as his immediate opponents), revolving in particular around the concept of the deification of the human being by uncreated grace. This, I argue, allows Palamas’s understanding of the attainment of the human ideal by divine energy to be more broadly contextualized than is often the case. By paying close attention to Palamas’s Triads before branching out to his other writings, the key contention of this chapter will be set out—namely that his articulation of the concept of deification by divine energy or grace is repeatedly connected to the humanity of Christ. This humanity serves as the locus, for Palamas, through which the uncreated and deifying energy of God is communicated and received in the created order. Thus despite tendencies in both detractors and even some supporters of Palamas to portray the essence– energies distinction as something that could undermine or supplant the person and role of Christ in uniting God and humanity (and by extension, God and the world), it will be argued that Palamas’s understanding of human sanctification by divine energy contains a strong and unmistakable Christocentrism that is, moreover, also reflected in the work of his defenders and sympathizers of the fourteenth century. The chapter proceeds as follows: first a brief overview of the Hesychast Controversy itself is offered in which the controversy related to Hesychast practice is delineated but not altogether rent from the controversy related to the associated doctrine of divine energies. The anti-Palamite challenge to the theology of divine energies from sources medieval and modern is then summarized, revolving around charges of ditheism or polytheism; the compromising of divine simplicity; and the substitution of the concept of energy for the divine persons, specifically the person of Christ. These sections demonstrate that in order to adequately discuss these charges against Palamas, close attention must be paid to Palamas’s theology of sanctification and deification. The analysis of Palamas’s approach to deification will form the heart of the chapter, where the Christocentric argument is fleshed out.

² The phenomenon of ‘Neo-Palamism’ is ably discussed in Pino (2018). ³ See the helpful overview in Plested (2015) and especially Russell (2019).

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1. TH E HESYCHAST CONTROVERSY AND THE ANTI-PALAMITE CHALLENGE TO DIVINE E NERGIES

The Hesychast Controversy The basic biography of Gregory Palamas has been set out by others, notably in the seminal but in some ways controversial study by John Meyendorff, and more recently by Robert Sinkewicz.⁴ Born in c.1296 to a noble family in Constantinople, Palamas received a good education before deciding to espouse the monastic life on Mount Athos at a young age in around 1314. By the beginnings of the Hesychast Controversy in 1335, Palamas had been labouring as a monk in a variety of locations on Athos and Verroia (near Thessaloniki) in both eremitical and coenobitic contexts, serving briefly as abbot of the Athonite monastery of Esphigmenou. From 1335 and for the next twenty-two years until his death as Metropolitan of Thessaloniki in 1357, he would be embroiled in a theological debate which, while in an important sense was settled by the imperial Church in his favour during his lifetime, nevertheless persisted beyond his death. The controversy in question is sometimes termed the Hesychast Controversy, sometimes the Palamite Controversy. Meyendorff tends to identify or equate the two, while others, such as Rigo and Nadal Cañellas, insist on distinguishing them.⁵ The main reason in favour of distinguishing them lies in the fact that several adversaries of Palamas following his initial conflict over Hesychasm with Barlaam of Calabria (c.1290–1348) professed themselves to be defenders if not practitioners of Hesychasm itself, but enemies of Palamas’s way of explaining it, not least among them the monk Gregory Akindynos (1300–48). At the same time, to speak of a Palamite Controversy as strictly distinct from the Hesychast Controversy is also somewhat misleading, since from the outset the controversy was always tied to a debate regarding the knowledge and experience of God—not simply monastic practices—a thread that remains unbroken for Palamas throughout the course of the controversy. In any event, it is at least worth highlighting this potential distinction between debating Hesychastic practice/experience and its dogmatic underpinnings, even if the two tend to go hand in hand. As mentioned, what can be termed the Hesychast Controversy began as a conflict over the doctrine of the knowledge of God.⁶ Gregory Palamas first ⁴ See Meyendorff (1964) and Sinkewicz (2002). See also the English translation of Palamas’s fourteenth century Vita by St Philotheos Kokkinos found among the invaluable set of texts relating to Palamas in Russell (trans.) (2020), pp. 37–210. For the following sketch, as well as for the dating of Palamas’s works, I am most indebted to Sinkewicz. ⁵ See especially Meyendorff (1984) and Nadal Cañellas (2006), vol. 2, pp. 89–91. ⁶ This driving aspect of the initial phase of the controversy is convincingly laid out in an article by Sinkewicz: see Sinkewicz (1982).

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crossed swords with the monk and intellectual Barlaam of Calabria over the issue of using Aristotelian logic (specifically demonstrative syllogism) when discussing God. Barlaam had deployed an argument against the Latins on the basis of his understanding of apophaticism that since God is utterly unknowable and indemonstrable, the procession of the Holy Spirit is likewise unknowable and indemonstrable.⁷ This was ostensibly an argument against the Filioque (the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father ‘and the Son’), but Palamas saw it as a weak argument that misused the logic of apophaticism, resulting in a doctrine of God that was devoid of any positive, demonstrable bearings in reality. Whether or not Barlaam or Palamas was the superior disciple of Aristotle in this debate need not concern us (though Sinkewicz makes a strong case that it is Barlaam⁸); what is important is that it launches a larger discussion about human knowledge of, and access to, God, and thus about human sanctification and the human ideal. The precise contours of Barlaam’s theological position are harder to reconstruct, certainly as they are developed in several lost anti-Hesychast treatises (fragments of which are preserved in Palamas’s writings). We do, however, have several of his letters related to the Hesychast Controversy, edited with an invaluable introduction and discussion by Fyrigos.⁹ While Palamas, in good Byzantine rhetorical style, may well have exaggerated and caricatured Barlaam’s approach, there are at least three substantial points of conflict for the purposes of our discussion that should be highlighted. The first has to do with the nature of apophaticism, and thus with the reception and interpretation of Dionysius the Areopagite, the champion of apophatic theology. Barlaam seems to hold to a rather intellectualist view of what negative or apophatic theology entails: a way of denial that not only protects divine transcendence but makes any direct apprehension of God an a priori impossibility.¹⁰ Palamas reacts strongly against this, arguing that the way of negation in the sense employed by Barlaam is only a preliminary step that does not preclude the gift of true knowledge and apprehension of God (even if, from a human perspective, such knowledge is indeed unattainable). For him, knowledge of God is certainly beyond knowledge or affirmation, but it is also beyond unknowing or negation.¹¹ Furthermore, Palamas’s reading of Dionysius’s theology in general is strongly Christocentric in a manner that attempts to undermine Barlaam’s ⁷ It is worth noting that although Barlaam’s early and influential work was against the Latins, he ended up joining the Latin Church (partly as a result of the Hesychast Controversy) and writing spirited treatises in defence of the West, eventually dying as Bishop of Gerace in his native Calabria in Southern Italy. ⁸ In Sinkewicz (1982), p. 198; see also Ierodiakonou (2002). ⁹ Fyrigos (2005) and see also Trizio (2011). ¹⁰ This aspect of Barlaam’s thought is discussed in detail in Sinkewicz (1982). ¹¹ Meyendorff succinctly summarizes Palamas’s approach to apophaticism in Meyendorff (1964), pp. 205–7.

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tendency to view Dionysius’s hierarchies as presenting a highly stratified, derivative, if not distant view of the connection between human knowledge of God and God himself. We shall return to this in what follows. The second issue, the driving force behind the first treatise in the second of Palamas’s Triads,¹² is Barlaam’s devotion to the idea of the unicity of truth.¹³ What might strike many as an eminently reasonable and laudable position— namely that ‘truth is one’ and thus the search for truth wherever it is to be found (especially through philosophical and scientific inquiry) has a common goal and somehow puts one in contact with divine truth—was fervently opposed by Palamas. At stake for him, as we shall see in more detail later, was the Christian revelation itself that ‘makes foolish’ the wisdom of this world. To affirm the unicity of truth in the way proposed by Barlaam was ultimately to make natural knowledge about the world obtainable through rational inquiry continuous with the knowledge of God received by supernatural grace.¹⁴ It was to place all knowledge and ‘truth’ on a continuum that made a mockery of the tension if not opposition clearly articulated by Paul (and James) between ‘the wisdom of this world’ and ‘the wisdom of God’.¹⁵ Palamas’s fierce rhetoric in this regard has doubtless helped give him an anti-intellectualist, even anti-rational, reputation, whereby the human ideal can only be attained by actively rejecting and denigrating reason and science. This would not be a fair assessment, as will become clearer later. Suffice it to say here that Palamas’s concern is to distinguish sharply between what human beings can achieve ‘of themselves’, by nature, and the supernatural goal of human life as this is revealed and given to us in the person of Jesus Christ by the condescension and activity of the Holy Spirit. To be sure, the gift of human knowledge about the world is indeed, for Palamas, a gift from God, a grace, and as such he ‘gives it the honour it is due’.¹⁶ But it has its proper scope and place as a preliminary kind of knowledge, a gift given to nature that of itself, as natural rather than spiritual, ‘does not attain the things of the Spirit’.¹⁷ This in ¹² The Triads refers to three sets of three treatises or ‘trilogies’ (nine treatises in total) written by Gregory Palamas against Barlaam between spring 1338 and spring–summer 1340. ¹³ This concept in Barlaam is unpacked in particular by Trizio (2011). For Palamas’s sustained rebuttal, see Triads 2.1 (ed. Meyendorff, 1:225–317). Interestingly (and perhaps tellingly), this is the only treatise from the Triads that does not figure at all in the English selections translated by N. Gendle in consultation with Meyendorff. ¹⁴ It is important to underscore at the outset that for Palamas (and Byzantine theology in general), the term ‘supernatural’ refers to that which is above all created nature and thus belongs to the uncreated order of God himself: there is no created supernatural order for Palamas which intervenes between God and the rest of creation. Lossky rightly summarizes this point when he writes, ‘that which western theology calls by the name of the supernatural signifies for the East the uncreated’: Lossky (1957), p. 88 (emphasis in original). ¹⁵ On aspects of this issue, see Constas (2018). ¹⁶ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.25 (ed. Meyendorff vol. 1, 277). ¹⁷ Gregory Palamas, The One Hundred and Fifty Chapters 20, (ed. and trans. Sinkewicz, 102–3).

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turn pits Palamas against a corollary position in Barlaam, namely that the pagan intellectuals of old could be considered properly ‘illumined by God’ because of their philosophical achievements (notably in this context their intimations regarding God’s ultimate unknowability and the need for faith).¹⁸ As Palamas forms and lays out his doctrine of human deification by divine light, the juxtaposition of natural illumination that cannot save or unite to God and spiritual illumination that saves and effects divine union remains pronounced. As we shall see, the juxtaposition turns on the importance of Christ and adherence to Christ as the sole source of divine illumination and thus human fulfillment. The third substantial issue worth mentioning here has to do with the perceived effects of divine illumination on the human being. Of course, perhaps the main catalyst for Palamas’s lengthy debates with Barlaam hinged on the latter’s disdain for the Hesychast physical method of prayer (he famously called the Hesychasts ‘navel-gazers’ and ‘navel-souled’), and in particular the claims of some Hesychast monks to have beheld, even with their physical eyes, the divine light. Barlaam sees in this a dangerous form of the ancient heresy of Messalianism and seeks to place the question of spiritual experience on another footing. His apophaticism regarding the unknowability of the divine nature does not thereby preclude him from positing a form of divine contemplation. This contemplation of God is connected, however, with ‘purification from intellectual ignorance’ through knowledge, a knowledge obtained, at least in significant part, via the efforts of rational inquiry.¹⁹ When turning to the question of Hesychastic experiences themselves, Barlaam appears to vacillate between a wholly negative assessment (i.e. these visions are demonic) and a more neutral or positive one that takes into consideration the pervasive language of divine vision in the Christian tradition. On the neutral or positive side, he associates the manifestation of God’s intelligible light (which cannot, incidentally, be perceived by the senses) with the deadening or mortification of the passionate part of the human soul (the seat of what we would generally term ‘emotions’, such as anger and eros). For Barlaam, this illumination occurs through religious life and the practice of Christ’s commandments, which in turn effects ‘dispassion’ in the believer. Although it is a seemingly traditional ascetic trope, Barlaam identifies dispassion with a wholly ¹⁸ Barlaam first articulates this position near the end of his lengthy first letter to Palamas, where he draws on the Neoplatonic philosopher Syrianus to make his point: see Barlaam, Epistle 1.95 (ed. Fyrigos, 260–2). ¹⁹ It should be noted that Barlaam was himself devoted to the pursuit of philosophy and the sciences, especially geometry and astronomy: see Fyrigos (2005), pp. 162–6 and 170–2 and Sinkewicz (1982). As we shall see further in Section 2, this particularly irked Palamas, for whom such pursuits were unbecoming of the monastic life. He pleads at one point with Barlaam (whose monastic credentials he questions) not to pursue these preoccupations that yield no true communion with God: Triads 2.1.27 (ed. Meyendorff vol. 1, 279).

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negative ‘killing’ of the soul’s passions—an observation that provokes Palamas’s ire. As with the case of apophaticism, Palamas accuses Barlaam of misunderstanding and misappropriating acceptable language from the tradition, in this case dispassion (which properly refers, he says, to healing the abuse of our natural passions, not their wholesale destruction), for his own ends. Again, we will have an opportunity to examine Palamas’s own position in more detail presently, but his major grievances with Barlaam on this point have to do with two things. First, that for Barlaam what is hierarchically inferior in the human constitution (namely, the passionate part of the soul, as well as the human body with its corporeal senses) appears to be excluded from participation in God, something which for Palamas flies in the face of the inherent goodness of the entirety of our created nature assumed and redeemed in Christ. Second, that for Barlaam this form of illumination through Christian ascetic practice comes across as something both separate from, and inferior to, the subsequent purification from intellectual ignorance that needs to occur through the life of reason, a position which for Palamas is simultaneously an unacceptable elevation of the role of intellectual life for human destiny, and a radical deprecation of the worth and content of the Gospel.²⁰ From this we can already see that even in its early stages, the Hesychast Controversy involved an impressive range of interlocking issues related to theology and the spiritual life. Another of these, of course, is the doctrine of divine energies. Palamas does not in fact mention divine energy and its importance in much detail until the third treatise of the first triad (written in spring 1338). Even there, it occurs as an ancillary point in an argument by Palamas that contrasts the ‘natural man’ with the ‘spiritual man’.²¹ His concern is to safeguard the veracity of the direct experience of God vouchsafed to the saints even in this life, an experience that affects their heart, mind, soul, and even body. The nature of the light that shone from Christ on Mount Tabor is a bone of contention in this regard, and Palamas is quick to ridicule Barlaam’s position that this light is a created, sensible light.²² The theological implication of Palamas’s position that the light and grace of God that deifies the saints must be uncreated is not, however, further spelled out until the third triad written a full two years after the first set (spring–summer 1340).²³ Palamas’s elaboration of the doctrine of divine energies and its attendant distinction between divine essence and energy occurs in response to Barlaam’s lost treatise variously titled Against the Messalanians or On Deification, a work ²⁰ See especially Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.37–8 (ed. Meyendorff 1:301–5), which includes a long citation from Barlaam. Also Barlaam’s Epistle 3.57 (ed. Fyrigos, 342–4). ²¹ See Gregory Palamas Triads 1.3.12 (ed. Meyendorff 1:133–5). ²² See Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.26–8 (ed. Meyendorff 1:165–71). ²³ See especially Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.1.31–4 (ed. Meyendorff 2:617–27); 3.2.6–13 (ed. Meyendorff 2:653–69); 3.3.6–10 (ed. Meyendorff 2:705–17).

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that evidently doubled down on the latter’s resistance to Hesychast theory and practice. It was ostensibly Palamas’s sustained defence of a true (even ‘real’) distinction between the divine essence that remains forever unknowable and inaccessible and the divine energy that purifies, illumines, and deifies human beings that triggered the animosity of the monk Gregory Akindynos. Up until that point, Akindynos had served a mediating role between Barlaam and Palamas.²⁴ In particular, a letter written by Palamas to Akindynos in early 1341 was a catalyst of sorts that convinced Akindynos of Palamas’s theological error.²⁵ Akindynos did not share Barlaam’s hostility to Hesychasm as such (he had become a monk in part thanks to the intervention of Palamas himself), though he could just as easily level the charge of Messalianism against Palamas and his followers. We will have occasion to examine the particular theological charges of Akindynos and other anti-Palamites against Palamas in the next section. In what remains here, it would be worth very quickly sketching the messy ecclesiastical fallout of the Hesychast/Palamite Controversy, and its connection to the complex political climate of the time. The first synodal intervention in this controversy took place in June 1341 when Barlaam’s positions were examined by the Patriarchal Synod in Constantinople. Palamas was vindicated and Barlaam was condemned for heresy, but the synod likewise proscribed further discussion and debate on the issues. Palamas fell foul of this injunction when he began writing against his newfound enemy Akindynos, and was imprisoned for a time. Akindynos, for his part, had the ear of Patriarch John Kalekas (lived 1282–1347) who gradually turned against Palamas and led a synod condemning him in 1344. Meanwhile, the synod of 1341 virtually coincided with the death of the emperor Andronikos III which led to a protracted civil war over the governance of the empire: the legitimate successor John V Palaiologos (1332–91) was then less than ten years old, and Andronikos’s chief minister, the Grand Domestikos, John Kantakouzenos (1292–1383), wished to reign as coregent with John V. The patriarch Kalekas supported a regency led by John V’s mother Anna of Savoy (1306–65) and political lines swiftly began coaelescing with theological ones: supporters of the regency of Anna and Kalekas tended to be on the side of Akindynos against Palamas, and supporters of John Kantakouzenos tended to

²⁴ For more on Gregory Akindynos, see the erudite and highly sympathetic studies by Nadal Cañellas (2002, 2006, 2007) as well as the introduction to the edition of his letters by Hero (1983), pp. ix–xxxiii. ²⁵ There is an ongoing debate regarding the original form of Palamas’s Letter 3 to Akindynos (ed. Chrestou 1:296–312), though on balance, without denying the possibility of a certain amplification in the letter as it is included in Chrestou’s edition, scholars tend to treat Nadal Cañellas’s reconstruction of Palamas’s letter on the basis of a single witness (Monacensis graecus 223) with a measure of reserve: see Meyendorff (1953), Nadal Cañellas (1974), Heyden (2017ab), Burri (2017).

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side with Palamas. These quasi politico-theological alliances were by no means cut and dried, however, evidenced perhaps most clearly by the fact that the empress Anna eventually turned against Kalekas and became sympathetic to Palamas, summoning a synod in 1347 that would depose and excommunicate Kalekas as well as Akindynos (who was then a deacon), and which upheld the Synodal Tome of 1341 ratifying Palamas’s theology. Upon Akindynos’s death in 1348, the leader’s mantle for the anti-Palamite party passed to the intellectual, historian, and eventual monk Nikephoros Gregoras (1295–1360) who would be condemned at the synod of 1351.²⁶ A polymath with a fervent devotion to Plato, Gregoras continued and extended Akindynos’s arguments against Palamas, even when this caused a significant rupture with erstwhile friends in high places, not least John Kantakouzenos.²⁷ Kantakouzenos, a strong supporter of Palamas and Palamite theology, entered the imperial palace in 1347, becoming emperor and remaining on the throne until 1354, at which point John V regained power and Kantakouzenos retired to a monastery, continuing his literary and theological activities as the monk Joasaph. This period was critical for the Palamite ascendancy: John Kalekas was replaced with Isidore Boucheiras, a disciple of Palamas, who promptly ordained thirty-two bishops (among them Palamas himself as metropolitan of Thessaloniki) and set about consolidating the Church around Palamas’s views. Despite political tensions between the successive patriarchs after Isidore’s death in 1350, Kallistos I (reigned 1350–3, 1355–63) and Philotheos Kokkinos (reigned 1354–5, 1364–76) were both also strong supporters of Palamas and his theology, which rapidly gave his thought a kind of official status in the Church of Constantinople. This official status was ratified at two further synods held there and in their resulting Tomes, the first in 1351 (where the anti-Palamite spokesman was Nikephoros Gregoras), and the second in 1368 (which condemned the anti-Palamite Athonite monk Prochoros Kydones). It was in 1368, just over ten years after his death, that Gregory Palamas was inscribed into the calendar of saints by Constantinople, to be commemorated on the second Sunday of Lent (emblematically following directly on the Sunday of Orthodoxy), further securing thereby his memory and status in the Church as ‘light/radiance of Orthodoxy’ (Ὀρθοδοξίας ὁ φωστήρ—the first words of the apolytikion or dismissal hymn written in his honour). The synod of 1368 marks an important if not definitive milestone in the history of the Hesychast and Palamite Controversy. True, some voices of

²⁶ For more on Nikephoros Gregoras, see Beyer (1971, 1978), Moschos (1998), and Manolova (2014). ²⁷ The first and most significant set of Gregoras’s Antirrhetics against Palamas was edited by Hans-Veit Beyer with a facing German translation, published in 1976: Nikephoros Gregoras, Antirrhetika I (ed. Beyer).

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dissent lingered in the East, but by and large what might be termed the ‘Palamite synthesis’ has remained a touchstone of the faith for the Orthodox Church to this day. That touchstone, to be sure, was often overlooked or forgotten in subsequent centuries, and serious scholarly interest in the controversy and its theological content would have to wait until the early twentieth century to really take flight (and that often among Western detractors of Palamas).²⁸ The sheer complexity and intricacy of the debates and figures involved in the controversy across the fourteenth century has likewise not yet received the full treatment it deserves.²⁹ Nevertheless, Gregory Palamas remains a towering figure not simply for the history of late Byzantine Theology but also for the self-understanding of modern Orthodoxy. His potential contribution to theological anthropology is our specific concern in this chapter. Before, however, we engage with his thought directly and in more depth, it is worth briefly laying out the main charges made by the opponents of Palamas’s theology (both in the fourteenth century and more recently), especially as those charges relate to his understanding of human deification by the uncreated divine energies.

The anti-Palamite challenge to deification by divine energies We have touched on some of the initial arguments against Palamas articulated by Barlaam, revolving around Barlaam’s approach to apophaticism, the unicity of truth, and the effects of divine illumination. Our purpose is not to rehearse all the anti-Palamite arguments in detail, but to at least mention the major and recurring ones, dwelling especially on the ‘substitution’ argument, where the energies of God allegedly replace Christ or the persons of the Trinity in bringing about human sanctification and perfection. When we engage with Palamas more directly and bring out the Christocentric impulse of the doctrine of divine energy in his writings, it will be argued that such an anxiety about Palamas’s thought is ultimately misplaced, though the contours of this and other prominent and recurring anti-Palamite arguments nonetheless ought to be delineated, especially as they rarely receive close attention. Having spent some time on Barlaam’s arguments, it would be worth turning now to his younger contemporary Gregory Akindynos. Initially, Akindynos was not enthusiastic about Barlaam’s attacks on Palamas. He wrote to Barlaam that while he was somewhat sympathetic on a theological level, Barlaam’s ²⁸ The fascinating history of this process is the chief subject of the excellent monograph by Norman Russell: Russell (2019). ²⁹ Along with the pathbreaking studies by Jugie, Meyendorff, Rigo, Russell, and others, several scholars have been chipping away at this problem through grappling with particular subtopics or case studies: see, for instance, Polemis (1996), Demetracopoulos (2011), Pino (2018), and Torrance (2018). See also the collection of studies in Athanasopoulos (ed.) (2015).

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‘insulting treatment of the holy Hesychasts’ and his ‘love of meddling’ were hard to bear.³⁰ As Gregory Palamas’s views on a strong distinction between divine essence and energy began to be firmly articulated, however, Akindynos set aside his reticence and openly turned against him. The chief complaint repeated ad nauseum in Akindynos’s works (as well as in the anti-Palamite works of Gregoras and others) is that Palamas has espoused a form of ditheism—if not polytheism—by positing God’s energies/activities as ‘lower than’ and ‘caused by’ the divine essence, contending by extension that Palamas reintroduces the pagan worship of, and participation in, countless uncreated ‘lower divinities’ that are at an ‘infinitely infinite’ distance from the ‘higher divinity’ of the divine nature. Looking beyond the more colourful aspects of this caricature that drew upon and extrapolated rather uncharitably from a limited mosaic of phrases and terms in Palamas’s writings, what Akindynos had latched onto was Palamas’s attempt to explain the simultaneous transcendence and immanence of God in the life of the deified or the saints, whereby the ‘deity’ or ‘divinity’ (θεότης) of God is truly transmitted and received in the experience of human sanctification, without thereby compromising the unapproachable and incommunicable divine essence itself. Palamas could on occasion use and defend what might best be described as the incautious language of ‘lower’ divinity to describe the gift of deification in relation to the unknowable divine essence, although he did so rarely and as part of an exegesis of Dionysius the Areopagite (especially Epistle 2 which speaks of God as ‘beyond God’ in relation to the gift of deification).³¹ Together with ditheism/polytheism and its attendant charge of worshipping a multitude of higher and lower ‘divinities’, Palamas was lumped together (as is wont to happen in Byzantine theological invectives) with an array of heresiarchs. As well as the constant charge of Messalianism (over the matter of ‘seeing God’ with the physical eyes and espousing ascetic techniques to get there), Palamas was accused especially of being a follower of Eunomius (and thus an Arian), of Nestorios, and of iconoclasm.³² On a more philosophical level, a preferred line of attack against Palamas that has better stood the test of time has to do with divine simplicity, which the essence–energies distinction seems to contravene. This becomes perhaps the central argument for later anti-Palamite devotees of Thomas Aquinas such as Prochoros Kydones, for whom the absolute identity of essence and energy in God is an inescapable corollary of the oneness and simplicity of God. This issue partly turns on the ³⁰ Gregory Akindynos, Letter 8 (ed. and trans. Hero, 26–9). ³¹ For a little more on this question, see Torrance (2018), pp. 123–6, and for one of Palamas’s direct responses to this charge regarding ‘lower divinities’, see his Antirrhetics against Akindynos 3.19 (ed. Chrestou 3:220–3). See also Triads 3.3.8 (ed. Meyendorff 2:709–11). ³² These accusations are perhaps most fully laid out in Nikephoros Gregoras’ Antirrhetika I 1.8–10 (ed. Beyer, 177–221) and 2.1–7 (i.e. over the course of the entire second treatise) (ed. Beyer, 223–349).

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definition of simplicity, as Palamas himself did not tire of pointing out. For him, simplicity (ἁπλότης) denotes the state of being non-composite, and just as the three hypostases/persons of the one Godhead do not introduce composition into God or threaten the divine simplicity by their ‘threeness’, so too God’s attributes do not subject him to composition or threaten his simplicity.³³ While God can be described as ‘simplicity itself ’, as an attribute of God that cannot define his essence, simplicity is also understood by Palamas to be a divine energy, that is, something that does not of itself exhaust what it means for God to be God.³⁴ The longstanding debate over divine simplicity is important, as is the related issue of the firm distinction (‘undividedly divided’) posited by Palamas between divine essence and divine energy, but these are not our main concern. For the question of human perfection through deification, the most serious charge of the anti-Palamites against Palamas’s model has to do with the danger of severing Christ from the vision of the human ideal in favour of intervening and mediating divine energies. Akindynos raises this complaint on several occasions. Thus in Letter 20 he opines that Palamas separates the deifying light from the Logos,³⁵ and in Letter 50 he develops this argument further: Is it not clearly their [viz. Palamas and his followers’] doctrine to affirm that the uncreated form and glory and power and life and wisdom of God are one thing and the essence another, and that the latter is ‘higher’ while the former are ‘lower,’ and the essence activates whereas the others are activated? For who is the ‘Wisdom and Power of God’? Is it not the Son and Logos? Who is the ‘Glory Whose Father is the Father of God the Logos’? Is it not He? . . . Did not ‘all things come to be,’ as they still do, ‘through the Son’ in the Holy Spirit . . . ?³⁶

Akindynos is claiming that Palamas has performed a bait-and-switch with his theory of divine energies, whereby what formerly belonged properly to the Son is now unmoored and separated from him as a ‘lower energy’. He puts the argument perhaps even more pointedly in Letter 66: Is it not true, then, that for these men even Christ takes a second place to the innovators of the faith who . . . expel Christ and His Father and the Holy Spirit . . . from Their own creation, and introduce instead other gods and divinities, creators and supervisors of the Universe and givers of gifts to all?³⁷

³³ See Gregory Palamas, On Divine and Deifying Participation 23–7 (ed. Chrestou 2:156–61; trans. Anderson, pp. 21–4). ³⁴ See Gregory Palamas, Dialogue between an Orthodox and a Barlaamite 36 (ed. Chrestou 2:199) and Plested (2019), pp. 9–10; see also the latter for more on the issue of simplicity in Palamas’s theology. ³⁵ Gregory Akindynos, Letter 20 (ed. and trans. Hero, 72–3). ³⁶ Gregory Akindynos, Letter 50.29–40 (ed. and trans. Hero, 210–11). ³⁷ Gregory Akindynos, Letter 66.65–71 (ed. and trans. Hero, 278–9).

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Akindynos, and the anti-Palamites in general, will not accept Palamas’s insistence that God’s energies or activities are by definition neither essences/ substances nor hypostases/persons, but are ‘of the essence’, belonging to the one divine substance and exercised in common by the three divine persons. For them, this is to project worldly categories of existence into the Godhead and ultimately to end up thereby with a pagan form of religion under the guise of Christianity. Such an assessment, moreover, is not limited to the early antiPalamites, but likewise recurs in modern discussions. Although for figures such as Jugie the emphasis of the critique falls on Thomistic concerns with divine simplicity, others are more troubled by the threat of replacing Christ and the divine persons in general with divine energies. Thus in his historical study of the Heyschast Controversy, L. Clucas writes that ‘the universe in which Palamas lives, whatever its attempt to repeatedly emphasize the person of Christ as the agent of deification in stage center, is essentially Platonic’.³⁸ He connects this, moreover, to what he sees as a ‘Monophysite Christology’ that gives no real place to the humanity of Christ, only the divinity: [T]he resulting emphasis on the divine nature of Christ and the role of ‘experience’ as opposed to intellectual or logical knowledge, or, or on the other hand, the ethical perfection of Christ’s human nature results also in the final consequences of the Monophysite Christology which always appealed to Christian Platonism.³⁹

A similar kind of critique, without necessarily connecting Palamas explicitly to ‘Platonism’ (which usually refers in this context to the Neoplatonism of Proclus), is also evident in more recent theological studies. In Catherine LaCugna’s influential personalist work God for Us, for example, Palamas is discussed with a measure of sympathy, but the author builds on criticisms by von Ivanka and Williams to take him to task on this issue: the ‘primary weakness of Palamite theology’, she writes, is that ‘despite its strong theology of grace, the creature cannot have immediate contact with a divine person, only with a person as expressed through an energy’.⁴⁰ As she sees it, this is a form of usurpation of trinitarian and Christological prerogatives where now ‘the divine energies . . . seem to function as intermediaries between the divine persons and the creature’.⁴¹ She sees Palamas’s doctrine of the energies as making the Trinity soteriologically ‘functionless’.⁴² Her repeated claim is that Palamas renders the experience of God ‘indirect’, rather than direct with the personal God.⁴³ ³⁸ Clucas (1975), p. 568. ³⁹ Clucas (1975), pp. 575–6. ⁴⁰ LaCugna (1993), p. 186. She draws on von Ivanka (1964), pp. 389–445 and Williams (1977). ⁴¹ LaCugna (1993), p. 196. ⁴² LaCugna (1993), p. 196, drawing on the criticisms aired by Podskalsky (1969), Wendebourg (1980), pp. 425–43, and Wendebourg (1982). ⁴³ See LaCugna (1993), pp. 190, 194.

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That such claims have persisted from the time of Palamas into modern historical and systematic theology is significant. It is even echoed to some extent in the work of John Zizioulas, for whom the language of ‘energies’ is insufficient and can be erroneously ‘maximized’ to the point of obscuring the centrality of the person of Christ.⁴⁴ He does not so much impute this problem directly to Palamas, however, but more to recent Neo-Palamite thinkers. Indeed, the Orthodox rush to uphold the doctrine of divine energies in the twentieth century has not been without its pitfalls. Even the language in Vladimir Lossky’s seminal The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church is not always as guarded or nuanced on the matter as one might expect. Thus, no doubt partly due to his devotion to Dionysius, Lossky spends time insisting on the ‘innumerability’ of the divine energies (linking them to the divine names), a topic never at the forefront of Palamas’s own mind or that of his followers (who, if anything, when challenged would err on the side of emphasizing the singularity or oneness of the divine energy, and not its multiplicity, let alone its innumerability).⁴⁵ In terms of the threat of ‘substituting’ energies for Christ, Lossky is largely cognizant and careful on this point, yet in his enthusiasm for the energies doctrine this tendency can still be detected. Thus in a gloss on John 1:10—where the light ‘was in the world, and the world was made by him and the world knew him not’—Lossky writes that ‘God has created all things by his energies’ (where one might expect ‘by his Son/Word’), thereby repurposing the Johannine Light and Logos to refer in the first instance to the divine energies rather than the person of the Son.⁴⁶ As mentioned, this is not a thoroughgoing element of Lossky’s thought, but an interesting tendency that can be glimpsed here and there. It is also apparent in the work of the personalist philosopher/theologian Christos Yannaras, who writes that ‘we ⁴⁴ See Zizioulas (2006), pp. 27–32. ⁴⁵ For Lossky’s stress on the innumerability of the divine energies, see Lossky (1957), p. 80. In context, Lossky deploys this argument in an interesting way as part of a larger attack on Bulgakov’s sophiology. The question of ‘energy’ rather than ‘energies’ is an important one that deserves closer scrutiny. Palamas himself uses Chalcedonian language to argue for a ‘both/and’ position, as when he argues ‘the divine and uncreated grace and energy of God is divided undividedly according to the image of the sun’s ray which gives warmth, light, life, and increase’, and thus ‘the divine energy of God is called not only one but also many by the theologians’: Gregory Palamas, One Hundred and Fifty Chapters 68 (ed. and trans. Sinkewicz, 162–3, modified). ⁴⁶ Lossky (1957), p. 89. This issue is even more pronounced in Koutloumousianos (2015), which, despite its many insights on the Orthodox theology of person and nature, contains theologically awkward phrases such as ‘It is God’s energy that saves human being’ (p. 162); ‘The imperative of deification can be satisfied only by pursuing the path of the energies’ (p. 166); and even ‘It is the operation of the divine energies that creates a direct relationship between a human being and the divine being’ (p. 166). This latter line not only seems to substitute ‘energies’ for Christ, but virtually hypostasizes the divine energies, somehow making them the operators of themselves, and thus quasi self-subsistent. This is just the kind of formulation (incidentally never found in Palamas himself) that would give credence to the anti-Palamite charge that the essence– energies distinction is but a species of polytheism.

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can speak of the mode of existence of God, since we know the divine energies’,⁴⁷ a phrase that at first blush appears to bypass the person of Christ for acquisition of the knowledge of God as Trinity (his ‘mode of existence’) in favour of the energies. Even here, however, there is nuance in that he goes on in the same chapter to meditate with some depth on the significance of Christ.⁴⁸ That said, the tension remains. The anti-Palamite concern that Palamas’s doctrine of deification by divine energies might put the centrality of Christ as sole mediator at risk is, as we have seen, a longstanding one and an issue that remains open for fuller discussion. Russell mentions the issue and briefly defends Palamas against the frequent charge that his approach lacks ‘any Trinitarian or Christological basis’ and that he places ‘an unnecessary intermediary between God and humanity’, and in a footnote provides a healthy list of texts from Palamas in support.⁴⁹ Russell brings it up again when summarizing the contribution of Yannaras to the reception of Palamas, whose ‘relational ontology’ is largely framed around the concepts of person and energy, and their interconnection.⁵⁰ A larger treatment of this question is found in the work of Radović and Yangazoglou, the former connecting and explicating Palamas’s doctrine as a corollary of his Trinitarian theology, the latter emphasizing some of the sacramental and thus Christ-oriented aspects of Palamas’s thought.⁵¹ As Palamas’s thought is elaborated in what follows, it will be argued that while pointing to a potential danger and abuse of Palamite theology, the ‘substitution’ argument ultimately stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of Palamas’s theology of deification, which is wholly dependent on the person of Christ. Before embarking on a closer reading of Palamas himself, the thought of the anti-Palamites should be briefly probed not only for the content of their concerns with Palamas’s theology, but likewise for their own positions on these same questions of human sanctification and deification. If, that is, Palamas’s theology of deification by uncreated grace is rejected, what is the positive alternative? For all parties involved over the course of the Hesychast Controversy, deification itself was not at issue (the vocabulary of deification was long established in Byzantine theology) but rather its meaning. Barlaam’s position, summarized earlier, saw the attainment of the human ideal and thus deification primarily in terms of the development of the highest rational faculty of the soul, its ‘illumination’ through purification from ignorance and the consequent mortification if not destruction of the soul’s lower,

⁴⁷ Yannaras (2007a), p. 83. ⁴⁸ See Yannaras (2007a), pp. 91–5. ⁴⁹ Russell (2019), p. 213. ⁵⁰ Russell (2019), p. 240. ⁵¹ Radović (2012) and Yangazoglou (2015), also discussed in Russell (2019), pp. 120–8. For more on the sacramental aspect (which will be touched on later in this chapter), see also Mantzaridis (1984, 1998).

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‘passionate’ faculties. In general, many leading anti-Palamites, including Gregory Akindynos, Prochoros Kydones, Isaac Argyros, John Kyparrisiotes, and others, disagreed with Barlaam’s rather intellectualistic approach to the question and his relativizing of the significance of grace-filled illumination by Christ. An exception might be Nikephoros Gregoras, whose love of Plato led him to posit the intellect or nous as somehow intrinsically divine and thus naturally capable of knowing divine reality.⁵² For the others, the nature of deification is expressed in various ways, often turning on their particular interpretations given to the light of Tabor in contradistinction to the Palamite reading. Barlaam had seen the light of the Transfiguration as merely a created symbol that came in and out of existence—a light inferior and subservient, in other words, to the light of rational knowledge. Most other anti-Palamites refused to go this far, generally calling the light created (at least in the form in which it was perceived by the disciples) but higher than rational light and accessible only by grace. Deification was still understood on this model to be a created reality among the saved, but one that surpassed all other material and intellectual delights. The more creative readings of Christ’s light among some anti-Palamites, such as Isaac Argyros and John Kyparrisiotes, revolved around seeing in this light the original beauty of Adam’s body restored in Christ, that is, still a created beauty, but a primordial radiance that was set aside by humanity at the Fall.⁵³ According to the Tomos of condemnation issued after his trial in 1368, Prochoros Kydones made use of a Christological argument to say that as Christ was God and man, so the light that emanated from his person could be said to be divine and human, although it was strictly speaking created.⁵⁴ For the question of deification, the result is somewhat ambiguous, but still at a remove from Barlaam’s position. Beyond the debates surrounding the light of Tabor, another anti-Palamite tactic (already summarized in the more recent case of LaCugna) is to speak of sanctification and deification simply in terms of direct identity with the hypostasis/person of the Son or that of the Holy Spirit, without the need to posit ‘mediating’ energies.⁵⁵ The strength of this argument lies in appeals to Scripture (e.g. ‘it is no longer I, but Christ who lives in me’—Gal. 2:20) and the

⁵² See, for instance, Nikephorus Gregoras, Letter 3 (ed. Peone 1:19–27). ⁵³ See Anonymous (Isaac Argyros?), Adversus Cantacuzenum 21 (ed. Polemis 73–5) and other citations gathered in the introduction to this edition: Polemis (ed.) (2012), pp. 53–4. ⁵⁴ On Prochoros Kydones’ position, see Russell (2019), pp. 159; 184–7 and his treatise De Lumine Taborico (ed. Polemis 327–79). In the latter, the accent is firmly on the created nature of the light and of all the divine names (wisdom, life, etc.) in which human beings participate. ⁵⁵ See LaCugna (1993), pp. 186–96. For an example among the anti-Palamites of the fourteenth century, see Gregory Akindynos, Letter 50.66–7 (ed. and trans. Hero, 212–13) in which he writes that ‘there is no other light except God the Logos, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, which divinely enlightens the saints’.

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perceived attractiveness of an unmediated identity with the person of the Son. But such a position also raises a number of questions of which Palamas himself was well aware: if the content of sanctification and deification is the very hypostasis of the Son (or the Holy Spirit), then does our own hypostasis/ person literally collapse or disappear in the process of sanctification? If not, what is it that distinguishes the hypostasis of the deified and the hypostasis of the Son (or the Holy Spirit) now that they are identified? Moreover, does not this understanding of sanctification and deification entail a strong form of ‘hypostatic union’ that is true, in dogmatic terms, only of the Incarnate Son? For Palamas, as we shall see in more detail in what follows, to avoid these pitfalls a third term must be acknowledged to describe this union, which is neither an ‘essential’ union nor a ‘hypostatic’ one, but a union by uncreated divine grace or energy. The source of this grace or energy, however, is unequivocally the Trinitarian God, in concrete terms the person of Jesus Christ through whom this grace is shed abroad in the hearts of the faithful by the Holy Spirit (cf. Rom. 5:1–5). I wish to end this section on the anti-Palamites by looking at a passage from Gregory Akindynos. Since the work of Martin Jugie, some scholarly attention has been given to the possibility of different kinds of Palamite teaching among the followers of Palamas, usually described in terms of a ‘softened’ or ‘mitigated’ version of his teaching, put forward by Palamas’s contemporaries embarrassed by his alleged ‘excesses’.⁵⁶ But on the question of the nature of deification, at least, the division within the anti-Palamite camp is far more marked than many care to notice or highlight, and consequently the vision of the human ideal they propose as an alternative is rather hard to pinpoint or articulate. We see this difficulty for the theologian come to the fore when, in a letter to a fellow anti-Palamite, Akindynos offers his own retelling of a debate he had with Palamas on the question of the light of Christ. He tells us that he was accused of calling the light of Tabor ‘created’ (which he appears to disavow to some extent), and when he was asked whether the light was created or uncreated, he tells us his response: I answered that since I knew that Christ had two natures combining divinity and humanity in one hypostasis, whatever belonged to his human and activated nature I believed to be created, and whatever belonged to the divine and allcreating nature I believed uncreated, for it is equally impious to believe that the uncreated is created and the created uncreated. Actually, I said, why ask questions and argue about these matters, and for what purpose?⁵⁷

⁵⁶ See for instance Jugie (1932) and Demetracopoulos (2011). For further comments on this issue, see Torrance (2018). ⁵⁷ Gregory Akindynos, Letters 62.48–55 (ed. and trans. Hero, 252–3).

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As the narrative continues, it becomes clear that this last question in fact sums up and contains the basic outline of Akinydnos’s own approach to such issues: even addressing them is problematic, and even daring to raise such questions indicates for him a crooked soul. He continues a little later: Indeed, now, questions such as ‘What is the beauty and glory of God?’; ‘What is the light that appeared on the Mountain?’; ‘What is life?’; ‘What is power?’; ‘What is energy?’; ‘What is divinity?’—such questions created for us the multitude of divinities.⁵⁸

If anything, Akindynos’s views represent a rather strange form of rigid conservatism, whose positive vision of the human ideal cannot be properly located for the simple reason that the questions themselves that surround the issue cannot be posed. To pose them is conceived as itself a form of arrogance and cannot be pursued without compromising Akindynos’s understanding of the Christian faith: the questions are the problem. Akindynos’s thought has a form of closed inflexibility on this point that is quite startling, and which unfortunately does not take us very far in terms of the articulation of an alternative positive vision of the human ideal.⁵⁹ Let us turn, then, to Palamas, who not only has no qualms about asking the questions shirked by Akindynos, but for whom the Christian even has a duty to ask and answer them in the context of the life of faith.

2 . G R E G O R Y P A L A M A S O N E P I S T E M O LO G Y AND DEIFICA TION IN CHRIST

Knowledge of the world and knowledge of God in Palamas: finding the impetus for the theology of divine energy To assess the challenge to Palamite theology over the issue of the role of Christ as sole mediator means setting forth his theology of deification and where the essence–energies distinction fits into it. In this section, the first concern is to examine how Palamas’s theology of the human ideal takes shape in reaction to the contentions of Barlaam and later Akindynos. Palamas’s Triads form an excellent source in this regard and will be looked at closely. Earlier in the chapter, three elements of Barlaam’s thought were highlighted that are

⁵⁸ Gregory Akindynos, Letters 62.71–4 (ed. and trans. Hero, 254–5; modified). ⁵⁹ This despite the valiant efforts of Nadal Cañellas to demonstrate otherwise: see my comments in Torrance (2018), pp. 132–3.

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repeatedly attacked by Palamas in the Triads: (1) Barlaam’s particular view of apophaticism; (2) the idea of the unicity of truth; and (3) a notion of dispassion that prioritizes the healing of intellectual ignorance through knowledge and the killing of the lower, passionate part of the soul. There are other bones of contention, of course, but these that recur will help us in framing the discussion of Palamas’s approach to deification. These three issues are linked together in Palamas’s mind as problems of epistemology: what constitutes the knowledge of God, and by extension how do we speak of the fulfillment of the human being through acquisition of this knowledge? From the first treatise of the Triads, Palamas engages with the problem by displaying a strong reticence about speaking in terms of a knowledge/ignorance dichotomy at all when treating the matter. Although he is aware of the long patristic tradition of associating knowledge of God with the concept of communion with God, he is far more concerned with the usurpation of this language of knowledge versus ignorance to justify an intellectualist approach to Christian perfection and the spiritual life more broadly. In an effort to protect and uphold an understanding of the human ideal exemplified by often unlettered Hesychast monks, Palamas makes the case that perfection as a category must be detached from any straightforward notion of ‘knowledge’ such that we can speak of ‘blameless ignorance’ and ‘blameworthy knowledge’. It is hard not to see an antiEvagrian (and anti-Platonic) thrust to the rhetoric, even if his immediate task is to counter Barlaam himself. A characteristic passage on this issue is worth citing at length: And now, as you have said, certain people despise the goal proposed to Christians, namely the ineffable good things of the age to come that are promised us, as something too modest, and receiving science as [true] knowledge, they introduce it to the Church of those who philosophize according to Christ. They declare those who do not know the advanced sciences [τὰς μαθηματικὰς ἐπιστήμας] ignorant and imperfect: all must cling tightly to the lessons of the Greeks, neglecting the teachings of the Gospel (for from these is never brought about the removal of ignorance of their sciences) and, as being altogether unacquainted with these sciences, must withdraw with mockeries from him who says, ‘be ye perfect’ (Matt. 5:48); ‘if anyone is in Christ he is perfect’ (cf. 2 Cor. 5:17 and Col. 1:28); ‘we ourselves speak among the perfect’ (1 Cor. 2:6). I thus do not propose a removal of ignorance when I speak of salvific purity, for I know that there is a blameless ignorance and a blameworthy knowledge. It is not by removing this [scientific] ignorance, but by removing ignorance with regard to God and the divine dogmas, an ignorance forbidden to us by the theologians, and by improving all your conduct according to their precepts, that you will be filled with the wisdom of God, becoming a true image and likeness of God, being made perfect through the keeping of the Gospel commandments alone. The interpreter of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, Dionysius, also clearly explains this: ‘The assimilation to

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and union with God, as the divine words teach us, is only perfected through the holy work and love of the most venerable commandments’.⁶⁰

To speak of human progress in terms of the acquisition of knowledge and the removal of ignorance is at best, for Palamas, misleading, and at worst completely contrary to the Christian understanding of human perfection. Together with Dionysius, he marshals the Cappadocian Fathers to his cause, citing their ambivalence towards worldly knowledge and even their respective regrets at having busied themselves excessively with the pursuit of such knowledge in their youth.⁶¹ Not only does it involve the glorification of what Paul clearly describes as a ‘wisdom made foolish’, but it tends to intellectualize the spiritual life to the exclusion of the body. Palamas attacks Barlaam for advising his listeners to keep their mind outside the body during prayer as characteristic of his intellectualist bent but inimical to Christian teaching that is, after all, founded on the Incarnation. Citing a line from Climacus’s Ladder of Divine Ascent, Palamas insists that the goal of prayer is to ‘circumscribe the incorporeal [i.e. the soul] in the body . . . for if the heyschast does not circumscribe it in the body, how will he who bound himself to the body [i.e. Christ] be made to dwell within him?’.⁶² The goal of the ascetic life is, for Palamas, the indwelling of Christ, and the logic of the Incarnation would insist that this involves the participation of the whole person, soul and body. Barlaam could also, of course, speak of communion with God in terms of the Son abiding in the believer. But Palamas confronts him for interpreting this in an intellectualist or gnoseological manner: for Barlaam, he says, the Father and the Son take up their abode in the one who knows the principles of the nature of the world. Knowledge of beings yields a stable foundation in God and ‘he who possesses the knowledge of beings is in God and God in him’, and thus knows the truth.⁶³ For Palamas, this leads to a dangerous fiction, whereby knowledge about something, even divine truth, necessarily implies a strong notion of participation in God as the source of all knowledge. He takes as an illustration of this fiction the demonic exclamation in Mark 1:24, where the one possessed cries out ‘I know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God’. Did the devil who exclaimed this, asks Palamas rhetorically, ‘possess Christ in himself by virtue of this knowledge?’, before asking in a similar vein: ‘he who ⁶⁰ Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.1.4 (ed. Meyendorff 1:15), citing Dionysius the Areopagite, Ecclesiastical Hierarchy 2 (PG 3:392A). ⁶¹ See especially Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.1.6, 8 (ed. Meyendorff 1:21, 25–7) (for Gregory the Theologian and Basil), Triads 2.1.15–17 (ed. Meyendorff, 1:255–61) (for Gregory of Nyssa), and Triads 2.1.44 (ed. Meyendorff 1:317). ⁶² Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.2.6 (ed. Meyendorff 1:87), citing John Climacus, Ladder of Divine Ascent 27 (PG 88:1097B). ⁶³ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.76 (ed. Meyendorff 2:545–7). It should be noted that Palamas is clearly caricaturing Barlaam on this point, even if he is also extrapolating the caricature from Barlaam’s own positions.

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knows but does not accomplish the will of God, does he possess God stably established within himself?’.⁶⁴ The framework for having Christ abiding within is not knowledge, he insists, but the keeping of the commandments. We have made some headway in looking at Palamas’s reaction to Barlaam which in turn is vital for understanding his approach to deification. We have not yet made mention, however, of the essence–energies distinction and its role in his thought. This is not simply by design, but because the distinction itself first emerges as a supporting rather than a central argument in Palamas’s attempts to deal with Barlaam’s thought. It is, as will be shown, in attempting to expound his Christocentric vision of human perfection that the essence– energies distinction begins to be clearly articulated by Palamas. To get there, we must examine Palamas’s concern with human knowledge and its relationship to the human ideal of deification, particularly his preoccupation with disavowing Barlaam’s understanding of the unicity of truth, that is, that all truth is one. This aspect of Palamas’s thought may not be the most fashionable, but it is critical for getting to grips with his theology of deification. We have already seen that Palamas makes it axiomatic in his first treatises of the Triads that union with God is incommensurable with any natural, created knowledge or experience. This is why he develops a distinct distaste for the term ‘knowledge’ or gnosis to describe the Christian goal. It has been far too tainted in the case of Barlaam by a certain intellectualism that on the one hand denies or completely relativizes the importance of the body to the spiritual life, and on the other places the knowledge of beings acquired through rational activity on a continuum with (to the point of being seen as a form of) divine illumination, the indwelling of Christ in the believer. In Palamas’s reaction, the radical disjuncture between created knowledge, wisdom, or truth and uncreated knowledge, wisdom, or truth is affirmed. This position is most systematically laid out in the first treatise of Palamas’s second triad, although it is a concern throughout the treatises.⁶⁵ In this treatise (in which Barlaam is cited quite liberally), Palamas is at pains to make the case for distinguishing what Barlaam has made functionally indistinguishable, namely created or natural gifts of God and his spiritual or supernatural gifts. Barlaam had compared the acquisition of wisdom to good health: since one and the same good health can be obtained directly from the healing power of God or via the art of medicine, so too the same wisdom can be obtained from the divine oracles of Scripture but also from pagan philosophy. The singleness or unicity of truth is strongly presupposed for Barlaam as conveyed by Palamas: there is ‘one form [εἶδος] of wisdom’ shared by the

⁶⁴ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.76 (ed. Meyendorff 2:547). ⁶⁵ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1 (ed. Meyendorff 1:225–317).

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sacred and the profane.⁶⁶ In this way, human perfection is conceived as an integral acquisition of all knowledge.⁶⁷ This, however, need not imply Barlaam’s endorsement of one or another particular pagan thinker and their specific works, since it is ultimately the ‘idea of knowledge itself ’ over and above particular thinkers that is sought, found, and embraced through the study of their texts.⁶⁸ In the name of universal truth, the one who truly desires dispassion—understood in Barlaam as both ascetic purification of passion and the healing of intellectual ignorance—will strive all his life to study any and every master who claims some knowledge, so that the mind/intellect might gradually ‘be adapted to the truth of all things in a stable union’.⁶⁹ To dismantle Barlaam’s beguiling vision of the common goal and end of all knowledge and wisdom, Palamas must tread carefully. In his first treatise of the first triad, Palamas’s comments on the vanity of worldly knowledge and wisdom had evidently been received by many as rather heavy-handed, if not almost dualistic, since now in the first treatise of the second triad, Palamas repeatedly refers defensively to the arguments of the former treatise while also elaborating and clarifying his position.⁷⁰ What he repeatedly emphasizes is that just because something is itself a good gift of God (like knowledge of the world), this does not make it equivalent or even necessarily comparable to the highest spiritual gifts for which the believer, and particularly the Hesychast monk, strives. Taking the example of good health, he is amazed that Barlaam cannot see that his analogy itself barely works, since God heals the incurable and even raises the dead—something medicine cannot achieve.⁷¹ He returns to the analogy later and exclaims: ‘how can we say that God and medicine yield one and the same health except to affirm their identity in a certain negligible sense? For . . . these human discoveries bring relatively insignificant healing only to the body, becoming ineffective as soon as the body is dissolved by death’.⁷² Medicine has its place, according to Palamas, but it cannot truly heal or save, since its purview is limited to the created order, and even then only really to the body. To make the ‘good health’ obtained through medicine and the ‘good health’ offered by the Gospel equivalents is to undermine the meaning and purpose of Christ’s coming. What is easy to miss in the midst of Palamas’s unremitting insistence on firmly distinguishing the pursuit of worldly wisdom from the pursuit of divine wisdom is the fact that Palamas is addressing Barlaam as a monk in defence of ⁶⁶ See Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.6 (ed. Meyendorff 1:239). ⁶⁷ See Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.20 (ed. Meyendorff 1:267). ⁶⁸ See Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.21–2 (ed. Meyendorff 1:267–71). Palamas is quick to call out Barlaam on this point for its unequivocal Platonism. ⁶⁹ See Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.37 (ed. Meyendorff 1:303), citing Barlaam extensively. ⁷⁰ See especially Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.23 (ed. Meyendorff 1:273). ⁷¹ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.4 (ed. Meyendorff 1:233–5). ⁷² Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.10 (ed. Meyendorff 1:245–7).

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a monastic way of life. This in part accounts for the strident tone of his remarks. He has heard that Barlaam is wearing the monastic garb and gathering youths around him as disciples, and is appalled that he might be training them in what he perceives to be a way of life that is contrary to the monastic calling. He pleads with Barlaam to come to his senses, to reject ‘the misuse, abuse, and exaggerated veneration of learning’ and ‘not to grow old’ in the pursuit of the wisdom of this world.⁷³ Later he becomes more explicit in linking this rejection with monasticism: How will the inner man become a monk in conformity to the unique superior life, if he does not transcend the created world and all human studies, straining towards God with all his strength in a single and monastic manner? . . . But the Lord did not expressly forbid the study of letters. Neither did he forbid marriage, the consumption of meat, nor living among married folk. . . . Many things are practised by the Christian polity without incurring condemnation, all while being strictly forbidden to monks because of their withdrawn way of life.⁷⁴

It is not, in other words, about rejecting created knowledge as such for Palamas, but about maintaining distinctions between a variety of ‘goods’ that, when uncritically equated, wreak havoc on the understanding of the purpose of Christian life, which is neither knowledge, nor marriage, nor foods, but union with God through the gift of deification.⁷⁵ This is what monastic life prioritizes in a special way, thus involving the exclusion of other created ‘goods’ in an effort to seek ‘the one thing needful’ (Luke 10:42). Palamas goes on to claim that those who pursue this path are in fact not ‘deprived’ of anything in rejecting worldly learning since they receive in prayer the fulfillment of their every desire, the God who transcends all learning.⁷⁶ There are many further layers to Palamas’s argumentation in this treatise and elsewhere in the Triads on the issue of the ‘two wisdoms’ that cannot all be dealt with. He lays much emphasis, for instance, on the fickleness or changeability of the knowledge of beings, and even on the ultimate incomprehensibility of such knowledge (drawing on Job 38–41), which itself ought to direct the weary soul away from the endless pursuit of scientific study and towards the underlying meaning and purpose of all things in the immutable will and providence of God for his creation.⁷⁷ Palamas’s epistemology is rich and varied but little studied. Enough has been said, however, to give a sense of its importance and to convey more of the context in which Palamas articulates ⁷³ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.27 (ed. Meyendorff 1:279). ⁷⁴ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.35 (ed. Meyendorff 1:295–7). ⁷⁵ He makes this point in another way elsewhere when he writes that union with God raises the believer up above not only what is ‘vain’, but also what is ‘useful’: see Gregory Palamas Triads 2.2.8 (ed. Meyendorff 1:333–5). ⁷⁶ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.35 (ed. Meyendorff 1:297). ⁷⁷ See, for instance, Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.1.41 (ed. Meyendorff 1:309–11).

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his understanding of deification by uncreated divine energy. For if we can understand that Palamas frames much of his disagreement with Barlaam around a rather stark and incommensurable distinction—between created, natural (and naturally obtainable) knowledge that can at best only point distantly and by analogy towards its divine source (and at worst, through misuse can deceive, if it were possible, even the elect) on the one hand, and the spiritual and supernatural knowledge of God by which the human being is truly healed and exalted on the other—then we can perhaps begin to see the rationale and use for the concept of uncreated, divine, and deifying energy that is ontologically separate from, and intrinsically unattainable by, the created human being (or any created reality). It is indeed in the context of obtaining this true knowledge and communion with God over against any created, mutable knowledge obtainable by natural means that the notion of divine and uncreated energy, power, or grace is introduced. Thus in the third treatise of the first triad, Palamas writes that those who think that the light of God can only be contemplated by reason are like blind people ‘who receive only the warmth of the sun but do not believe those who also see its brightness’.⁷⁸ Instead, knowledge of God is properly given through ‘his super-essential and undivided power’, a power, knowledge, and light that is ‘noetic, or rather spiritual’ (νοερόν, μᾶλλον δὲ πνευματικόν), bestowed from on high, acquired ‘not from imitation nor from an increase of understanding, but by the revelation and grace of the Spirit’.⁷⁹ We can clearly see that God’s uncreated power and grace is solving for Palamas a riddle of epistemology, showing how the mutable, limited creature can be understood to truly attain the immutable and illimited by a divine act of condescension. Later, in the third treatise of the second triad, once again a positive sense is given to knowledge of God properly understood: it is ‘a knowledge beyond conception [ὑπὲρ ἔννοιαν γνῶσις] common to all who have believed in Christ’.⁸⁰ Such Christocentric divine knowledge finds its telos through ‘the keeping of the commandments’, not through knowledge of created beings, and ultimately ‘from the uncreated light which is the glory of God, of Christ God, and of those who have attained the portion of being conformed to Christ [χριστοειδοῦς]’.⁸¹ He goes on in the same passage to elaborate on the fulfillment of the knowledge of God in the age to come through the glory of Christ, who is the ‘father’ of all the children of the resurrection, and its accessibility even now as a pledge in the life of the saints.

⁷⁸ Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.10 (ed. Meyendorff 1:129). ⁷⁹ Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.10 (ed. Meyendorff 1:131). ⁸⁰ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.66 (ed. Meyendorff 2:525). ⁸¹ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.66 (ed. Meyendorff 2:525). Although not noted by Meyendorff here, Palamas language of the portion/lot of being conformed to Christ is a reference to a text from Dionysius’s Divine Names 1.4 (PG 3:592BC). He often cites this text.

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What is worth underscoring is Palamas’s framework here: knowledge of God through uncreated divine energy is a thoroughly Christ-centred affair. It is belief in the coming of Christ that unlocks the knowledge of God, and the real encounter with this knowledge is none other than the experience of the glory of Christ and the process of being conformed to him, a process in turn inseparable from keeping Christ’s commandments. The deployment of divine energy as a concept is in this sense rather narrow, and certainly not conceivable by Palamas as a ‘substitute’ for Christ, or as an alternative cosmological, epistemological, or metaphysical framework to what has come before him. However, his debate with Barlaam does stimulate a great deal of reflection and amplification on the issue of divine knowledge and communion that should not be ignored. The case for the importance of Christ to Palamas’s broader understanding of sanctification, deification, and the essence–energies distinction has been made in a preliminary way but requires closer scrutiny, especially given the widespread opinion among detractors of Palamas, summed up by Clucas, that ‘whatever its attempt to repeatedly emphasize the person of Christ as the agent of deification’, Palamas’s thought remains essentially non-Christian.⁸² To do so, we will turn first to Palamas’s approach to apophaticism in the Triads before broadening out the enquiry to Palamas’s later works. Apophaticism is intimately connected with the theory of knowledge, in this case knowledge through ‘unknowing’ or negation. Apophaticism has strongly shaped Orthodox theological self-identity in the modern period, particularly through the work of Lossky and Yannaras. As has briefly been discussed, apophaticism, or at least a form of it, likewise strongly shaped Barlaam’s arguments against Palamas. In countering the intellectualist form of apophaticism espoused by Barlaam, Palamas shows a reticence towards the importance of the concept in general, just as he showed reticence towards the ‘knowledge/ ignorance’ dichotomy to appropriately explain the goal of human life. Properly speaking, apophatic or negative theology is ‘suffered’ or ‘undergone’ by the saints in their supra-rational contemplation of God, ‘not conceived’ (πάσχοντες . . . ἀλλ᾽οὐ διανοούμενοι): ‘just as to suffer and behold the divine things is other than, and superior to, cataphatic theology’, he continues, ‘so too to suffer negation in the spiritual vision, a negation connected to the transcendence of that which is beheld, is other than, and superior to, negative theology’.⁸³ If apophaticism is not understood in this way, then its significance is negligible.

⁸² Clucas (1975), p. 568. ⁸³ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.26 (ed. Meyendorff 1:439). This approach to apophatic theology as something experientially ‘suffered’ is also characteristic of Lossky and especially Yannaras: see Yannaras (2007a).

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Apophatic theology as an intellectual knowledge of God can be obtained, according to Palamas, simply by observing the world, its harmony and order, being raised thereby from this contemplation to a certain understanding of God as the Creator who is beyond all his creatures. He presents this knowledge as obtainable by ‘natural law’ but rarely in fact acquired before the coming of Christ, outside the confines of the people of Israel.⁸⁴ For our purposes, what is interesting about his treatment of this form of negative theology is the emphasis he lays on Christ’s coming for its general and even universal propagation in the world: ‘apophatic theology is accessible to all who venerate God and now, after the coming in the flesh of the Master, is available to every human being’.⁸⁵ Palamas shows an interest in defending a measure of theological sophistication even among ‘the barbarians’ (probably with Muslims in mind): ‘we see today that all the barbarians recognize one single God, creator of the universe, and apophatic theology necessarily issues from this recognition’.⁸⁶ He explicitly connects this phenomenon to Christ’s coming: Who now does not know, even if he is not a Christian but a Scythian, Persian, or Indian, that God is not to be identified with any creature, nor with any sensible thing? For . . . in our time, after his first coming on earth, even if not all have submitted to the gospel of Christ, yet everyone together, transformed unconsciously by the abundance of the grace that came, confesses one uncreated God, Creator of all.⁸⁷

It might be tempting to impute a generous theology of ‘world religions’ to Palamas on this score, and certainly a positive extrapolation can be made, yet the context offers some caution. Palamas’s argument against Barlaam is essentially this: you say that we should look to the pagan philosophers for theological enlightenment because they occasionally intimated a kind of apophatic theology, but I have shown that since Christ’s coming everyone on earth embraces that kind of apophatic theology, whereas these pagans for the most part did not even get that far but worshipped creatures and sensible realities as gods. In other words, it is an argument more against Barlaam’s love of the ancients than in favour of other religions. It is, moreover, an argument inflected Christologically: all peoples on earth are in a better starting position to theologize than their forbears precisely because Christ came. His coming infuses the world in Palamas’s mind with a leaven of grace that even ‘unconsciously’ (ἀνεπιγνώστως) has positive effects. These effects, however, are relatively insignificant when compared to the high calling of deification. True, for Palamas all nations are now informed with a basic and correct

⁸⁴ ⁸⁵ ⁸⁶ ⁸⁷

See Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.44 (ed. Meyendorff 2:477–9). Gregory Palamas Triads 2.3.52 (ed. Meyendorff 2:491). Gregory Palamas Triads 2.3.67 (ed. Meyendorff 2:527). Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.4 (ed. Meyendorff 2:393).

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apophatic stance when approaching God, but as an intellectual exercise, the value of this is rather limited. Apophatic theology, while necessary as a preliminary, ‘cannot transform the soul towards angelic dignity: it may separate the mind from all other things, but alone it is unable to effect union with that which is transcendent’.⁸⁸ Apophaticism understood intellectually can, like knowledge of the world, be seen by Palamas in a positive light, but only in a qualified sense that must not equate itself with, nor in any way undermine, the union with God experienced by the saints. Importantly, the widespread presence of apophatic or negative theology in this weak sense of seeing God as the transcendent Creator of all things is understood by Palamas to be directly attributable to Christ’s Incarnation and the consequent grace it shed abroad across the earth. But what of apophatic theology in the strong sense, as the experiential ‘suffering’ of the divine transcendence through the darkness of mystical vision? Here too, we can detect in Palamas a strong Christological concern, which comes in his discussion of the example of Moses’s ascent of Mount Sinai and consequent entrance into the ‘divine darkness’. Palamas mocks Barlaam’s concept of apophaticism as upholding an ideal of divine contemplation in which properly speaking nothing is seen and nothing is known.⁸⁹ This is not what Moses and the other saints experienced: ‘the union and vision that occur in the darkness differs and is far superior to such [apophatic] theology’.⁹⁰ Palamas asks in disbelief: ‘Can it be that Moses, after leaving behind all visible things and things that see, every reality and every concept, and having surpassed the place of God and entered the darkness, saw nothing there?’.⁹¹ He did indeed see something, retorts Palamas (following Gregory of Nyssa’s exegesis in The Life of Moses), namely the ‘immaterial tabernacle’. He continues: According to the writings of the saints, this tabernacle is Christ, the power of God and the hypostatic wisdom of God [cf. 1 Cor. 1:24], immaterial and uncreated in his nature, but showing beforehand through the Mosaic tabernacle that he would one day also accept to be made a tabernacle, that the superessential and formless Word would come with a form and essence, he the tabernacle that transcends, surpasses, and encompasses all things, in whom all that is visible and invisible was created and established, that he would take a body and sacrifice it for us, he who is the high priest before the ages, that in these latter times he might make use of his own self as a sacrificial victim for us.⁹²

Whether it is apophatic theology in its modest sense or the heights of divine vision in the ‘darkness where God dwells’, in both cases Palamas relates the ⁸⁸ ⁸⁹ ⁹⁰ ⁹¹ ⁹²

Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.21 (ed. Meyendorff 1:153). See Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.53 (ed. Meyendorff 2:493). Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.54 (ed. Meyendorff 2:501). Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.55 (ed. Meyendorff 2:501). Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.55 (ed. Meyendorff 2:501).

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meaning to Christ. From beginning to end, to know and experience God in divine vision is to know and experience Christ. The notion of divine light and energy is a corollary to this concern, not its supplanting. We can see the connections between these two—Christ and knowledge of God by divine energy—play out further in Palamas’s theology when we turn more directly to his concept of deification.

The human ideal in Palamas: deification through the radiance of the body of Christ We have seen how Palamas’s first real foray into the discussion of divine energy or power is intimately connected to the question of the knowledge of God. But we have also seen that Palamas is ambivalent regarding the language of ‘knowledge’ to adequately describe the purpose of human life. He sums up his position in the third treatise of the second triad (which we have been exploring) in an exegesis of John 14:21–3 on loving Christ through the commandments and thereby receiving the divine indwelling: If we refuse to call this contemplation [of God by the saints] ‘knowledge’, it is because of its transcendence, just as we also say that God is not, for we believe in him as that which surpasses beings . . . . Not only must one not consider it ‘knowledge’, but one must consider it in the first instance superior to all knowledge and all contemplation that depends on knowledge, since nothing surpasses the abiding and appearance of God in us, nothing is equal to it or even comes close. But we know also that the keeping of the commandments of God gives a knowledge and a true knowledge at that . . . for how could the rational soul find health if her faculty of knowledge were sick? We thus believe that the commandments of God do produce knowledge, however not knowledge alone, but also deification.⁹³

To speak of the ideal in terms of knowledge or gnosis (as Barlaam tends to do) risks obscuring the true aim of the human being, which is deification. It is not until the first treatise of the third triad that Palamas fully spells out his doctrine of deification (in reaction to a treatise by Barlaam variously titled Against the Messalians and On Deification). But in the earlier treatises it is still very much on his mind. Thus in the third treatise of the first triad, deification is discussed especially in terms of paradox, as conveying a state above or beyond nature without eliminating the nature of the deified person. The deified might be ⁹³ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.17 (ed. Meyendorff 2:421–3). A similar sentiment is expressed in Triads 1.3.14 (ed. Meyendorff 1:139): ‘why do we consider knowledge to be the goal [τέλος] of all our activities? . . . The promises of God of the good things to come are the goal [τέλος]: the adoption of sons, deification, the revelation of heavenly treasures and their possession and enjoyment.’

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understood to possess a certain divine ‘comprehension’, yet they possess it ‘in an incomprehensible manner’ (ἀκαταλήπτως ἔχουσι) because such comprehension is altogether other and non-contiguous with human comprehension. Deification is not produced in the believer through some cause or analogy within the intellect, Palamas explains, since in the state of deification natural intellectual activity ‘ceases’: the intellect puts off its activity only to be clothed with divine light from on high.⁹⁴ Contrary to popular misconception, the theology of divine energies in Palamas has not so much to do with an attempt to argue for an ‘immanentist’ view of God permeating the world (though this becomes part of the discussion), but with the concern to separate all natural and created forms of knowledge and activity achievable by human beings from the supernatural and uncreated gift of human deification that transcends these other forms of knowledge and activity in an absolute sense.⁹⁵ It is this ‘set apart’ or exceptional character of the role of deifying grace in Palamas’s thought that furthermore points firmly towards its Christological moorings. The whole structure of deification as constituting the human ideal is not built on a theory of omnipresent divine energy as such, but on the person of Christ, the one set apart, the Holy One in whom alone human perfection can be obtained. Palamas certainly connects deification to divine energy or activity, but not before he has connected it to Christ.

⁹⁴ Gregory Palamas Triads 1.3.17 (ed. Meyendorff 1:145–7). Palamas is drawing here on a passage in Dionysius’s Divine Names 1.5 (PG 3:593C), but see also for the same theme Triads 1.3.37 (ed. Meyendorff 1:191), this time making his point by citing at length from Maximus the Confessor’s Chapters on Theology and Economy 2.88 (PG 90:1168A). Incidentally, this emphasis on the passivity of the eschatological state sits awkwardly with the suggestion in Russell (2019), p. 191 that Palamas distinguishes between ‘passive participation in God (God as causal principle) and active participation in him (sharing in divine energy)’. The situation is more complex, and there must be room to account for the state of rest from human activity in the experience of deification. ⁹⁵ At this point it would be worth noting Russell’s repeated argument that Palamas is compatible with Thomas Aquinas on the issue of the grace of beatitude as ‘created’, since in his Letter to Athanasios of Kyzikos he distinguishes between ‘the act of giving as a free gift’ and ‘the gift itself as freely given’: see Russell (2019), pp. 16, 190–3 and 215, drawing on Marshall (1995). On this view, deification could potentially be viewed in a Thomisitc fashion as ‘uncreated’ from God’s perspective (as his uncreated activity), and yet somehow ‘created’ as a gift received by the saints. However, as Palamas himself says in the course of his description of different understandings and uses of the term ‘grace’, in its proper sense ‘grace is neither the gift given nor the act of giving’, it is ‘the brightness of God’ common to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: Gregory Palamas, Letter to Athanasios of Kyzikos 32 (ed. Chrestou 2:442). The grace or energy of deification—which is none other than communion with this divine brightness—cannot, in other words, easily be interpreted to have a created dimension in Palamas’s mind without doing considerable violence to his thought: deification does not manifest itself through one or many created effects. Other forms of grace are open to the Thomistic framework, but not the grace of deification. This pillar of Palamas’s thought can only be spirited away with tremendous difficulty. That is not to say, however, that a rapprochement between Thomistic theology and Palamas is an a priori impossibility, but that it is perhaps best not attempted on this basis.

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We see this repeatedly brought out across Palamas’s oeuvre. We have seen some evidence of it in the Triads, but more both from this text and others deserves to be marshalled to the cause. It is well known that much of the dogmatic conflict in the Hesychast Controversy centred around the event of the Transfiguration on Mount Tabor and the nature of the light that shone on the disciples there. For Palamas and the Palamites, this is, of course, the uncreated light of divinity itself, whereas for the anti-Palamites, as discussed, the light could be viewed in a variety of ways, ranging from a created symbol to an undivided divine–human light reflective of Christ’s two natures, but never simply the uncreated light of the Godhead. It is less emphasized, however, that the unmistakable importance not simply of Christ but of Christ’s body as the locus of divine light on Mount Tabor was both recognized and thoroughly developed in Palamas’s theology. In the third treatise of the first triad, Palamas offers a rich if not all-encompassing view of the significance of the incarnate Christ not simply for the deification of human beings, but for the angelic ranks also. The angelic orders are, he says, ‘initiated’ by ‘the light of Jesus’, which is the ‘deifying light’ that shone at the Transfiguration.⁹⁶ We shall return to this idea (taken up in several parts of the Triads) presently. First it is necessary to establish with greater clarity the centrality of Christ, specifically the body of Christ, for Palamas’s understanding of deification. We have seen that, even prior to the Incarnation, Palamas could place emphasis on the content of divine visions, specifically Moses’s vision on Mount Sinai, as being none other than Christ himself. It is in fact only with Christ’s coming that we can speak of access to deification. This is because deification, as that which bestows upon and anoints the human being with the uncreated fire of divinity, is completely inaccessible apart from his coming. This is a critical point that heavily qualifies the idea taken on a popular level as one of the core axioms of Palamite thought, namely that God’s uncreated energy (including the grace of deification) is ‘participable’ while his essence is ‘imparticipable’. True, the essence or nature of God is utterly transcendent and absolutely imparticipable for Palamas, but his energy—which is, after all, undividedly divided from the divine essence—is not thereby straightforwardly or naturally ‘participable’ for creation. The ontological gap between God’s uncreated energies or activities and all created realities with their respective created energies or activities still remains in Palamas’s mind. As source of all creation, of course, there is a connection between God the Creator and the creature, rooted in the divine principles (ἀρχαί), powers, and predeterminations of all things within the divine intellect.⁹⁷ On this basis, there is a certain ⁹⁶ Gregory Palamas Triads 1.3.5 (ed. Meyendorff 1:117). ⁹⁷ For this extremely interesting discussion of the notion of what is ‘in-between’ God’s essence and his creation, see Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.2.23–7 (ed. Meyendorff 2:683–93). Palamas’s discussion on this matter is strongly reminiscent of Maximus’s doctrine of the logoi and is where

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participation of all things in God, who is transcendently ‘the essence of beings, the life of the living, the wisdom of the wise’.⁹⁸ But one must distinguish, according to Palamas, different forms and degrees of participation in God through his uncreated activity. When we speak of deification—the goal and end of the human being—we are not speaking of a form of divine participation that is either simply a given within the contingent created order (and without which there would be no created existence at all) or something to be tapped into through the development and perfection of created human faculties. It entails an ontological change that must come from without, a rebirth from on high. This leads us directly to the person of Christ. Palamas makes this point regarding the necessity of Christ for deification several times, perhaps most clearly when in the first treatise of the third triad he attacks Barlaam’s contention that ‘the deifying gift is a perfected state of rational nature’. This alluring statement does nothing less than make deification a natural and naturally obtainable state for the human being, something that flies in the face not simply of the patristic concept of sanctification, but of the whole of Christ’s economy. Such a view ‘is manifestly opposed to the Gospel of Christ’ since it implies that the deification of the saints does not involve the transcendence of human nature, but is simply the putting into action of an energy available to them by nature.⁹⁹ The saints are then ‘no longer “born of God” [John 1:13], nor “Spirit, because born of the Spirit” [cf. John 3:6], and by his coming, Christ did not then “give authority to become children of God only to those who believe on his name” [cf. John 1:12]’.¹⁰⁰ Faith in Christ is the sine qua non for deification, since deification is a birth ‘from above’—a birth bestowed by Christ in the Holy Spirit that transcends nature—and as such is inaccessible to the natural efforts or development of the creature.¹⁰¹ he comes closest to associating the ‘divine energies’ with the ‘divine wills’, even if he depends more directly on Dionysius at this point than Maximus. That said, Palamas is not unaware of Maximus’s doctrine of the logoi, as he cites two representative passages from Maximus on the issue in Triads 3.3.10 (ed. Meyendorff 2:713). However, he does not develop the connection. ⁹⁸ Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.2.25 (ed. Meyendorff 2:689). Palamas makes frequent recourse to the triad of ‘being–life–wisdom’ to delineate what might be called three degrees of participation in the divine. ⁹⁹ Gregory Palamas Triads 3.1.30 (ed. Meyendorff 2:613). ¹⁰⁰ Gregory Palamas Triads 3.1.30 (ed. Meyendorff 2:613–15) (emphasis added). Palamas adds ‘only’ (μόνοις) to the text from John. ¹⁰¹ As he puts it at the end of this section, when natural capacities are developed and perfected by human beings, this ‘might certainly bring about their fulfillment as rational [creatures], but not as gods’: Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.1.30 (ed. Meyendorff 2:615). It would be worth exploring the possible connection between this and the Thomist defence of two orders and two ends for the human being (natural and supernatural), but space forbids it here. The major stumbling block for such a comparison is, of course, the created rather than uncreated nature of the ‘supernatural’ for Thomas, but the similarities are not negligible. Ultimately, the mature position of Henri de Lubac is possibly the closest analogue to Palamas on this matter, though Juan González Arintero

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A little later in the same treatise, Palamas elaborates on the Christocentrism of his understanding of deification. He speaks again about the necessity for any rational creature, angelic or human, to ‘go out of itself and acquire a superior state’ if it is to be deified. He then gives the reason, drawing on Gregory the Theologian, in a passage worth citing at length: For there is only one intellect [νοῦς] and one body united to it in which, according to hypostasis, the divinity is and is made visible, as we believe, even if this is not according to their own proper nature [i.e. Christ’s human intellect and body are not naturally divine]. Only those [united to this hypostasis] are deified ‘by the presence of him who wholly anoints’ them, and have received an energy identical to the deifying essence, possessing it in all its fullness and disclosing it through themselves. For according to the Apostle, ‘in Christ all the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily’ [Col. 2:9]. This is why some saints, after the coming of God in the flesh, saw this light paradoxically like a sea without limit pouring forth from a single sun, that is to say the worshipped body [τοῦ προσκυνητοῦ σώματος], just as the Apostles saw him on the mountain. This, then, is how the ‘firstfruits’ [1 Cor. 15:20, 23] of our mixture [i.e. intellect and body] are deified.¹⁰²

Certainly, deification is a divine energy for Palamas, but as we see here it is one indissolubly united to the person and work of Christ. The attaining of the human ideal is, moreover, bound up not simply with Christ in an abstract sense, but with ‘his worshipped body’ as its locus. If this statement by Palamas were a one-off, drowned out by talk of ‘energies’ rather than Christ elsewhere, then perhaps it could be explained away. But his interest in this idea is enduring, right down to the terminology of ‘the worshipped body’ of Christ. Palamas’s use of this phrase is elsewhere connected by him to a passage in Basil of Caesarea that was left unidentified by Meyendorff.¹⁰³ It is in fact from the end of Basil’s homily On the Holy Birth of Christ, although there it is ‘through the human body’ (διὰ τοῦ ἀνθρωπίνου σώματος) of Christ rather than through his ‘worshipped body’ that the divine light and power shines forth.¹⁰⁴ In any event, as might be expected, the preoccupation with Tabor and the is an important yet neglected backdrop: see the discussion of de Lubac (with some treatment of Arintero) in Cooper (2014), esp. pp. 151–216. ¹⁰² Gregory Palamas Triads 3.1.33 (ed. Meyendorff 2:621). Regarding the anointing of human nature by Christ the Anointed One, he makes direct reference to Gregory the Theologian, Oration 30.21 (SC 250:272). He likewise makes reference to Christians as those who bear the name of him ‘who lovingly anoints us’ in Gregory Palamas, To the Nun Xenia 40 (ed. Chrestou 5:214). ¹⁰³ See Gregory Palamas Triads 1.3.29 (ed. Meyendorff 1:173). There are many such uses of the phrase ‘worshipped body’ in Palamas’s works. Another representative example from the Triads, for instance, states that the divine light of Tabor ‘brightly flashed forth from nowhere else but the worshipped face and body’: Triads 3.1.17 (ed. Meyendorff 2:591). See also Triads 1.3.43 (ed. Meyendorff 1:207), where the light of Tabor ‘flashed forth from the worshipped body as from a sun/paten [δίσκος]’: the Eucharistic overtones here are unmistakable. ¹⁰⁴ See Basil of Caesarea, On the Holy Birth of Christ (PG 31:1473D).

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divine light emanating through Christ’s body was intimately connected by Palamas to ecclesiology, specifically the sacraments. Thus in a defence of the mystical experiences of the Hesychasts, Palamas writes: Do you not hear, O man, that man ate the bread of angels? . . . What is the bread of angels? Is it not the divine and supracelestial light? . . . God prefigured the illumination [ἔλλαμψιν] of men with this light when he sent down manna from heaven for forty years, but Christ fulfilled it by implanting the illumination [φωτισμὸν] of the Spirit and setting forth his illuminating body [τὸ φωτιστικόν αὐτοῦ σῶμα] as food for those who firmly believe in him and who show their faith by their works. This [food] is a pledge [ἀρραβών] of the ineffable communion with Jesus that is to come.¹⁰⁵

A little later, when discussing the nature of the divine light that shone from Christ as ineffable, unapproachable, non-temporal, and properly speaking ‘inaccessible to the senses’, he returns to the same language of ‘pledge’ (ἀρραβών) to describe its effect among the saints here below. That is to say, while it might be tempting to see Palamas as using the sacraments as a first step to transcendence through contemplation of divine light, he in fact sees them as equivalents. Both the Eucharist and the vision of divine light are essentially the same thing: they communicate the divine radiance through the worshipped body of Christ as a pledge of the age to come, which consists in ‘ineffable communion with Jesus’.¹⁰⁶ Furthermore, in the course of an argument on the co-participation of the body and soul in divine vision, Palamas meditates on God’s condescension that nourishes even the body with the divinity through the Eucharistic gifts. In doing so, he places the Eucharist higher than the experience on Tabor. The passage is worth citing at length: Since the Son of God—what wondrous love for humanity!—did not simply unite his divine person [hypostasis] to our nature, taking an animated body and a rational soul . . . but—O surpassing miracle that none can surmount!—he unites himself to human persons [hypostases] themselves, mingling with each of the faithful through participation in his holy body, and he becomes one body with us [σύσσωμος ἡμῖν γίνεται] and makes of us a temple of the whole divinity, for in the body of Christ itself ‘dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily’ [Col. 2:9]. How then will he not cause illumination through the divine ray of his body that is within us by also shining in the souls of those who partake worthily, like he illumined the bodies of the disciples on Tabor? For at that time this body, which is

¹⁰⁵ Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.25 (ed. Meyendorff 1:165). ¹⁰⁶ It is perhaps significant in this context that among the issues that made Palamas particularly suspicious of Barlaam was the fact that since arriving from southern Italy ‘no one has seen him partake of the most holy Eucharist’: Triads 3.1.5 (ed. Meyendorff 2:567). The issue of frequency of communion at this point in Byzantine religious history is hard to discern, but in the case of Palamas there at least appears to be an assumption of regular Eucharistic communion.

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the source of light and of grace, was not yet mixed with [lit. ‘kneaded with’] our bodies: he illumined from without those who worthily drew near and through the eyes of the senses he sent illumination into the soul. But now, since he permeates us and exists in us, the soul is fittingly illumined from within.¹⁰⁷

The passage speaks for itself. The illumination of the human being, the attainment of the human ideal, is intimately tied to being ‘kneaded’ together with Christ’s body, thereby allowing the divinity to irradiate the deepest recesses of the body and soul, not (as at Tabor) from without, but from within. Beyond his strong Eucharistic piety, what perhaps shows Palamas’s devotion to the centrality of the Incarnate Christ most strikingly is his repeated insistence on interpreting the ascending and descending hierarchies of Dionysius, with their related emphasis on the angelic mediation of divine visions, in a Christological key. He concedes to Barlaam that Dionysius does indeed show that many visions come from angelic intermediaries, but by no means all. He does not, for instance, say that the glory of God that illumined the shepherds came by angelic mediation. True, the announcement to the Mother of God of the conception of Christ was by an angel, but the actual conception came directly by the Holy Spirit, not via an angel. When the faithful are united directly to the light shining from Christ, they are deemed worthy of a ‘supraangelic knowledge’.¹⁰⁸ Palamas goes on to cite a tradition whereby of all the angelic hosts, only the lowly Archangel Gabriel was entrusted with knowledge of the Incarnation (the rank of ‘archangel’ coming second to last in the classic ninefold hierarchy of angelic orders elaborated in Dionysius’s Celestial Hierarchy). All creation is made new through the Incarnation, such that the lower ranks of angels illumine the higher ranks with the knowledge of Christ as he ascends.¹⁰⁹ In fact, the Church herself ‘reveals to principalities and powers the wisdom of God’ (citing Eph. 3:10) since with the coming of Christ the order of things is overturned, ‘and by grace the greatest is perfected by the least’.¹¹⁰ This

¹⁰⁷ Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.38 (ed. Meyendorff, 1:193). ¹⁰⁸ See Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.28 (ed. Meyendorff 2:443), citing Dionysius, Divine Names 1.5 (PG 3:593B). ¹⁰⁹ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.29 (ed. Meyendorff 2:445). ¹¹⁰ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.29 (ed. Meyendorff 2:445–7). Later, in the 150 Chapters, Palamas reformulates this argument somewhat by arguing that human beings, as composites of intelligible and sensible reality, are actually higher than the angels in their constitution, being ‘more in the image of God’, and that as such they rank immediately after God and before the angels, even if, because of disobedience, they fall far short of the ‘likeness’ to God and dignity enjoyed by the good angels: see for instance Gregory Palamas, 150 Chapters 43, 61–4 (ed. Sinkewicz 132, 154–8), and also Gregory Palamas, Homily 16.19 (ed. Chrestou 9:448), where ‘unlike the rest of creation’ the human being is made in the image of God, which in turn makes the coming of Christ (the hypostatic union) a possibility. This theme is reminiscent of Symeon’s meditations on surpassing the angels discussed in the previous chapter, but the dependency, textually at least, is not direct.

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approach has often been dubbed as part of a larger ‘Christological corrective’ offered by Palamas to the reading of Dionysius. This may be the case, but I resist espousing the term here, leaning instead on the insights of Alexander Golitzin, who insists that a Christological reading of Dionysius need not be construed as a ‘corrective’ but a legitimate interpretation of Dionysius’s own theological intentions.¹¹¹ In any case, what is certainly true for Palamas is that the importance of Christ to his understanding of deification is such that he makes not only human illumination but even angelic illumination dependent upon Christ. As he writes in the first treatise of the third triad, elucidating the fact that the divine light that shone on Tabor is permanently associated with the person of Christ, whose glory is the same before, now, and in the age to come: Still now he is seated ‘at the right hand of the majesty on high’ [Heb. 1:3] in the same splendour . . . . The angelic orders are not simply partakers and contemplators of the glory of the Trinity, but of the illumination of Jesus, for being made worthy of this contemplation they are become its initiates, he [Jesus] being deifying light [θεουργὸν φῶς].¹¹²

Palamas’s point is not to conceive of the glory of the Trinity as one thing and the glory of Christ as another. His point is that since the Incarnation, access to the Trinitarian divine glory is mediated—even for the angelic orders—through the Incarnate One, through the humanity of Christ enthroned at the right hand of the Father. The coming of Christ inaugurates for all created reality, from the lowest to the highest, a marvellous and enduring fulfillment, a new creation. It is truly something which even ‘the angels desire to look into’ (1 Pet. 1:12). Interestingly, by the same token it also makes the angelic mediation of divine vision a somewhat relative phenomenon for the attainment of the human ideal in Palamas’s vision, since Christ the perfecter of all creation took to himself the nature not of an angel, but of a human being: his humanity is the centrepiece of divine revelation in the world. We have been looking almost exclusively so far at Palamas’s Triads in order to sketch out the baseline of his thought on deification. In two recent publications, Russell and Plested have lamented the fact that so much of Anglophone scholarship on Palamas has depended heavily on the Triads (as well as the One Hundred and Fifty Chapters), though they have in mind the limited

¹¹¹ See Golitzin (2007) as well as Mainoldi (2018). ¹¹² Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.1.16 (ed. Meyendorff 2:589). It might be worth noting that for Palamas it is important that even for the angels, despite their incorporeal nature, the divine light surpasses this nature and thus participation in it is not a ‘natural’ phenomenon for them. As created, they too transcend themselves and behold the light—which is the light of Jesus—‘by grace’ rather than via any created intellectual faculty they possess, even if their created faculties, like those of deified human beings, are taken up into, and participate in, the vision: Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.2.15–16 (ed. Meyendorff 2:671–3).

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(and sometimes non-sequential) selections from the Triads translated by Gendle.¹¹³ Certainly, more of Palamas’s copious output should be brought in to the discussion, but the Triads are nevertheless an unparalleled source, representing his early, sustained, and fundamental treatment of the theology of sanctification and deification: Palamas’s subsequent theology is very much forged in the crucible of the Triads.¹¹⁴ Furthermore, I have also tried to show in the foregoing that this series of treatises is richer and more wide-ranging in content than many assume, especially in terms of its deeply Christocentric presuppositions. It is time, however, to draw on a number of Palamas’s later writings in order to demonstrate that the concerns on display in the Triads and outlined above are threaded and further clarified throughout his work. Attention given to this material—from Palamas’s dogmatic orations of 1341–2 to his treatises Against Gregoras of 1355–7—will admittedly be brief, but enough to underscore what we find in the Triads as representative of, and consistent with, his overall thought. In the dogmatic oration Dialogue between an Orthodox and a Barlaamite (1341), Palamas’s purpose is to refute the charge that his essence–energies distinction unfailingly leads to polytheism. Among his main lines of defence (already present in the Triads) is that the divine energies such as wisdom and power are not ‘self-subsistent’ but only exist ‘in’ the persons of the Trinity: they are ‘enhypostatic’ and as such are not independent realities or ‘hypostases’ within the Godhead. In the course of his argument (in the form of a dialogue), the Orthodox interlocutor brings in the light of divinity that shone on Tabor. He compares and contrasts the manner in which the Incarnate Christ possesses this divine light (common to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) with the manner in which human beings can participate in it. He writes: The divine [John] Damascene says, ‘the glory that proceeded naturally from the divinity is common also to the body through the identity of hypostasis’. That outer garment [πρόσλημμα, i.e. the body] possessed this glory completely and did

¹¹³ See Russell (2019), p. 182 n 106, pp. 211–12; Plested (2019), p. 510. ¹¹⁴ While it is true that, as Russell argues, ‘the treatises and letters written after the Triads provide important clarifications’ to Palamas’s thought (Russell (2019), p. 212), this should not give licence to ignore or neglect what is there. Thus in his treatment of Palamas’s theology of the symbol, Russell claims that Palamas develops the distinction between natural and non-natural symbols some time after the composition of the Triads in his Antirrhetics against Akindynos (1343–4): see Russell (2019), pp. 201–2. In fact, Palamas offers an extended examination of the ‘three kinds of symbol’ (one natural, two non-natural) in Triads 3.1.13–20 (ed. Meyendorff 2:583–97). Plested makes a somewhat similar assumption regarding the concept of divine simplicity, but while the Triads do not devote a great deal of attention to this concept, Palamas explicitly articulates his basic and abiding understanding of it in Triads 3.2.7 (ed. Meyendorff 2:657) and especially Triads 3.2.21 (ed. Meyendorff 2.679–81), where he cites Barlaam’s charge that he has made God composite and attempts to refute the charge by defining and upholding divine simplicity.

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not obscurely participate in it. But for others, the participation is like drawing from a cistern, since ‘of his fullness have all we received’ he says [John 1:16].¹¹⁵

The glory of God that belongs equally to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is, in other words, now inseparable from the body of Christ via the hypostatic union. For human beings to experience that glory (which does not belong to them by hypostatic union), they must draw it like water from the cistern, that is, from the humanity of Christ. The use of John 1:16 is worth pausing over as it reflects a larger concern in Palamas’s theory of sanctification. In the Triads, Palamas offers a distinction between the state of the deified and the state of Christ on the basis of this text in combination with Colossians 2:9 (‘in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily’). While Christ is himself the fullness of God in the flesh, even the deified remain distinct insofar as their deification is utterly and forever contingent upon the person of Christ: they receive ‘of his fullness’ and never become ‘the fullness’ itself.¹¹⁶ This in turn lends itself to a theory of epektasis or perpetual progress of the saints in the age to come. Palamas offers such a theory most explicitly in the second and third treatises of his second triad, arguing that the saints will progress (προκόψουσιν) infinitely in the contemplation of God even in the age to come, adding grace to grace through an ‘untiring ascent’ (ἀκάματον ἄνοδον).¹¹⁷ Offering a detailed comparison between Palamas and Maximus on this matter is beyond the remit of this work. Nevertheless, certain points can be made. In context, Palamas is eager to refute Barlaam’s contention that human beings can achieve an integral and complete perfection in this life, even questioning why this would be desirable: ‘we know of nobody, neither have we heard of any throughout the ages that, having gained the happy possession of this [contemplation] on earth, did not still long for one more perfect’.¹¹⁸ Not only is the idea of a complete perfection here below a strange fiction, he says, but it cannot even be applied in this way to the eschatological state, where the saints always remain dependent upon receiving ‘of the fullness’ of Christ. The insistence on the notion of progress is, in part at least, a rhetorical strategy to show the ridiculousness of Barlaam’s concept of perfection. It is also an argument against the notion of a self-sufficient perfection. It cannot be pushed too far, however, without risking some damage to Palamas’s statements elsewhere. In other contexts, Palamas is comfortable speaking of the saints

¹¹⁵ Gregory Palamas, Dialogue between an Orthodox and a Barlaamite 8 (ed. Chrestou, 2:170), citing John of Damascus, On the Orthodox Faith 59 [3.15] (ed. Kotter 150). ¹¹⁶ See Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.1.34 (ed. Meyendorff, 2:625). ¹¹⁷ ‘Do the saints not progress to infinity in divine contemplation in the age to come?’: Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.2.11 (ed. Meyendorff 1:341); see also 2.3.31 (ed. Meyendorff 2:451), 2.3.35 (ed. Meyendorff 2:459), and 2.3.56 (ed. Meyendorff 2:505). ¹¹⁸ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.2.11 (ed. Meyendorff 1:341).

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as ‘possessing in all its fullness’ the divinity they receive through Christ, and he cites Maximus’s discussion in Ambiguum 7 several times regarding the single energy/activity of God and the saints in the eschaton.¹¹⁹ In Homily 16, he discusses the stages of renewal and adoption in Christ as children, consisting of a starting point (baptism), an intermediate stage (life according to the Gospel), and finally perfection (the resurrection of life in the age to come), without however deploying the language of progress to describe final perfection.¹²⁰ Similarly, when discussing the eschaton in his ascetic exhortation to the nun Xenia, he states in a rather maximalist manner that the saints who are in Christ ‘will be made sharers not only in the resurrection, but also in the Lord’s ascension and all the divine form of life [καὶ πάσης τῆς θεοειδοῦς ζωῆς]’.¹²¹ In short, an epektatic element in Palamas’s eschatology is certainly present, but it is not the only element at work, and thus any easy association of his eschatology with popular versions of epektasis must be treated with caution.¹²² In another dogmatic oration entitled On Divine and Deifying Participation (and written shortly after the Dialogue between an Orthodox and a Barlaamite in 1341–2), Palamas addresses the topic of deification head-on, also touching on the notion of divine simplicity. Among Palamas’s chief concerns here is to distinguish the true participation in God of the saints (deification) from the relative participation in God’s creative and sustaining activity common to all things. The treatise provides at once a clarification of his doctrine of the divine energies and a reinforcement of his Christ-centred presuppositions. Several passages are worth exploring in this regard. On distinguishing the deifying participation in God from other kinds of participation, he writes: But if grace is in the saints just like it is in all creatures, and if God, according to his wise purposes, creates holiness in the saints just like he creates in other creatures whatever is proper [to their nature], what need is there of Christ and his coming? What need is there of his baptism, and of the authority and power given to us from him? What need is there for the Spirit to be breathed forth afresh, sent, and made to indwell? For since he is in everything, he is already in us.

¹¹⁹ Gregory Palamas, Triads 3.1.33 (ed. Meyendorff 2:621); for the citation from Maximus, see Gregory Palamas, On Diving and Deifying Participation 21 (ed. Chrestou 2:155) and Letter to John Gabras 29 (ed. Chrestou 2:357). See also Triads 2.3.31 (ed. Meyendorff 2:451) which, in the same breath as positing a form of perpetual progress, also speaks of the saints’ cessation of all activity of the soul and body, their ‘natural properties being overcome’ (τῶν φυσικῶν γνωρισμάτων . . . νικηθέντων) by the superabundance of divine glory. Not, in other words, a definition of ‘progress’ most would readily recognize. ¹²⁰ Gregory Palamas, Homily 16.34 (ed, Chrestou 9:404). ¹²¹ Gregory Palamas, To the Nun Xenia 15 (ed. Chrestou 5:200). ¹²² For more on Palamas’s eschatology, see Georgi (2010), and see also Plested (2018) for a few tentative remarks. Overall, I find Maximus’s language to be a little more subtle than that of Palamas on eschatology, but the overarching understanding is rather similar (unsurprisingly given Palamas’s frequent dependence on the Maximian corpus).

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If this is so, it will be the case that God creates and deifies in the same way. However, Basil the Great states clearly, ‘If God creates and begets in the same way, then Christ is both our Creator and Father in the same way; for he is God, and has no need of [giving] adoption through the Holy Spirit’.¹²³

The distinction between God’s creative activity/energy and his deifying activity/energy is crucial for Palamas precisely because without this distinction Christ avails nothing. It is in order to safeguard the central mystery of the Incarnation—its purpose and import—that Palamas insists on distinguishing not only essence from energy, but also one divine activity or energy (creating) from another (deifying). To collapse God’s energies vis-à-vis the world—thus making his creative activity identical to his deifying activity—would make the Incarnation pointless and the pursuit of divine adoption through Christ a waste of time. He continues this line of thought by elaborating on the sacramental basis of deification: I say that there also needs to be a becoming-like, arising from vigilance and practice of God’s precepts, but this is not simply accomplished through natural imitation, but through the power of the Spirit, which descends from above at the time of our holy regeneration and adheres to the baptised in an ineffable way. Through this grace, those born not of blood, nor of the will of man, nor of the will of the flesh, but of God [John 1:13], like newborn babes, are able to arrive at the measure of the fullness of Christ [Eph. 4:13]. For, Dionysius says, ‘No one could know what is divinely delivered, nor indeed would anyone be able to practise it, who does not have a divine beginning.’¹²⁴

Because deification is not ‘natural’ to a human being, it must be imparted from above rather than achieved by natural means.¹²⁵ This supernatural impartation is precisely the role of the Church as the extension of Christ’s Body, which mediates the divine energy of deification or adoption through the sacraments. We saw elsewhere the importance of the Eucharist in this regard, whereas here the emphasis is placed on baptism.¹²⁶ While the question of divine energies and participation in them is what is primarily at stake in this treatise,

¹²³ Gregory Palamas, On Divine and Deifying Participation 3 (ed. Chrestou 2:139), trans. Anderson (2018), p. 10. The citation is from Pseudo-Basil, Against Eunomius 4 (PG 29:692A). ¹²⁴ Gregory Palamas, On Divine and Deifying Participation 7 (ed. Chrestou 2:142–3), trans. Anderson (2018), p. 12. The citation is from Dionysius, Ecclesiastical Hierarchy 2.1 (PG 3:392B). ¹²⁵ Palamas’s insistence on the supernatural (and thus uncreated) character of deification should not be confused with an ‘anti-natural’ stance vis-à-vis human nature whereby human nature is somehow ‘left behind’ or totally superseded in the process of sanctification. As he writes, the action of God’s ‘transcendently radiant light’ is one which moves the powers of the soul and body ‘according to nature’ (κατὰ φύσιν), all while introducing a union that is ‘supernatural’ and thus transcends human nature: Gregory Palamas, Triads 1.3.15 (ed. Meyendorff 1:141–3). ¹²⁶ Later in the treatise the Eucharist is also discussed: Gregory Palamas, On Divine and Deifying Participation 20 (ed. Chrestou 2:154–5), trans. Anderson (2018), p. 20.

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Palamas’s theology is such that the issue cannot but be inflected Christologically. A final quote from the treatise will serve to solidify this point: Do you see how, even if the Divine is in all things, and is participated by all things, yet is in the saints alone, and is participated in the proper sense by them alone? And so this is certain and true: although many are divine and are called such, there is one true ‘God’ for us. Just as many are sons of God and are called such, yet there is proclaimed among us one true ‘Son of God’, since he is the only-begotten; so also, of the many—or rather of all—who participate in God, only the saints are called ‘partakers of God’ and ‘partakers of Christ’ . . . . The Lord has promised to come and to make his abode with them where he was not previously present or residing.¹²⁷

Tracing Palamas’s mode of argumentation in this way demonstrates that, if anything, his theology of deification through divine energy, activity, or grace is intended as a doctrinal bulwark that surrounds rather than displaces the person of Christ. It is part of his hermeneutic of the Incarnation and its meaning, not a competing vision. Near the end of the treatise, he succinctly expresses this when he attacks any opponent who would treat the grace of deification as a creature or created reality (and thus accessible to us by nature), saying, ‘do not treat it as useless that the Son of God became like us’.¹²⁸ By defending deification through uncreated grace, Palamas sees himself thereby as a defender, above all, of Christ, the one who took our form in order to clothe us with the form of God via his ‘worshipped body’. Palamas’s approach does not abate in this regard over the course of his career. Soon after the dogmatic orations, he composed a set of seven lengthy rebuttals of Akindynos (1343–4). Similar concerns are on display there, but we shall keep to just one representative text taken from near the very end of his seventh and last oration.¹²⁹ There he discusses Akindynos’s contention that since the dove at the baptism of Christ is a ‘symbol’ of the Holy Spirit, the light that came from Christ’s body on Tabor should be understood in a similar way as a detached ‘symbol’. Palamas responds that while the dove is indeed symbolic (especially of the Spirit’s meekness), the Holy Spirit did not take on flesh, whereas the Son did. This changes things radically. Unlike the dove, ‘the body of Christ is truly the body of God, and not a symbol’, and thus those who went up with Jesus on the mountain saw . . . through the body that most divine light, not as though through the symbol of the body, but as the flashing forth from him of the divine splendour hidden within the body and

¹²⁷ Gregory Palamas, On Divine and Deifying Participation 10 (ed. Chrestou 2:146), trans. Anderson (2018), p. 12. ¹²⁸ Gregory Palamas, On Divine and Deifying Participation 27 (ed. Chrestou 2:160), trans. Anderson (2018), p. 23. ¹²⁹ Gregory Palamas, Antirrhetics against Akindynos 7.15.54–7 (ed. Chrestou 3:502–4).

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demonstrating that this light was truly united by hypostasis with the life-giving nature.¹³⁰

Palamas’s sustained interest here in focusing on the significance of Christ’s body as the real, non-symbolic repository and locus of divine light is striking. We have briefly touched on one of Palamas’s ascetic orations above (to the nun Xenia) which dates from 1345/6. Among Palamas’s homiletic material, his Homily 16 on Christ’s dispensation, which is dated by Sinkewicz to 1347/9, is particularly worth highlighting. There Palamas provides a rich account of salvation history, emphasizing the necessity of Christ’s coming for human access to the divine, ‘not just for those alive at the time and those to come, but even more for those born from the beginning of the human race’.¹³¹ Although more pastoral than dogmatic in nature, the homily nevertheless touches on dogmatic themes. In particular, Palamas makes the following provocative statement: If the Word of God had not been made flesh, the Father would not have been shown to be truly Father, nor the Son to be truly Son, nor would the Holy Spirit have been shown to shine forth from the Father. God would not have been shown to be essence and hypostases, but would have seemed to be merely some sort of energy observed in creatures, as was said by the foolish sages of old, and now by those who think like Barlaam and Akindynos.¹³²

What is interesting about this passage is the fact that instead of appealing to and bolstering a theology of divine energy, Palamas attributes to his opponents an impoverished view of God as ‘energy’. While it might be tempting to see Palamas’s concept of divine energies as leading to a theory of God as a sort of vapour floating around the cosmos, he himself clearly rejected anything of the sort, going so far as to impute such a theory to his adversaries. Again, it is the Incarnation that is central, whereby the Trinitarian mystery is revealed and the human ideal of deification is disclosed and given.¹³³ The concept of divine energy plays a critical yet supporting role in this vision, not the determinative one. We have occasionally brought in Palamas’s work One Hundred and Fifty Chapters (1347/50) above, and it has been relatively well trodden and discussed in Anglophone scholarship on him.¹³⁴ Considered a mature treatise outlining his views on divine energy, the work is a synthetic and rather ¹³⁰ Gregory Palamas, Antirrhetics against Akindynos 7.15.57 (ed. Chrestou 3:504). ¹³¹ Gregory Palamas, Homily 16.21 (ed. Chrestou 9:452), trans. Veniamin (2009), p. 124 (modified). The significance of this homily is discussed in Harper (2015). ¹³² Gregory Palamas, Homily 16.19 (ed. Chrestou 9:448–50), trans. Veniamin (2009), p. 123. ¹³³ The Trinitarian theology of Palamas cannot be analysed in this chapter, but is examined in detail in Radović (2012). His doctrine of the Holy Spirit is treated in Lison (1994). ¹³⁴ Thanks in large part to the edition, translation, and detailed introduction by Sinkewicz (1988).

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philosophical account of cosmology, created natures, the divine nature and the imago Dei, and then divine energies (to which more than half the work is dedicated). Certain passages are culled from Palamas’s earlier works, including two passages from Homily 16 which emphasize the importance of Christ.¹³⁵ The final text I would like to bring in, however, comes from Palamas’s last major theological work, the treatises Against Gregoras written in 1355–7 (shortly before his death in 1357). In the third oration, he touches on the age to come, leaning on the Apocalypse of John to underscore that it is Jesus Christ himself who will be the light of the servants of God, and so no other light will be necessary (cf. Rev. 21:23 and 22:5). He continues as follows: Christ, the mediator [ὁ μεσίτης] between what is above the heavens and what is of the earth, through his life-giving flesh as through a lantern is well-pleased to make manifest the vision that is ineffable and above the heavens to those who through works show their faith in him.¹³⁶

Here we have, in sum, Palamas’s understanding of deification. It is the illumination of the human being by divine light or energy, yes, but it is strictly mediated through the life-giving flesh of Christ ‘as through a lantern’. This is Palamas’s consistent position on the matter: early, middle, and late. He is not paying mere lip service to traditional Christocentric language in order to trick his contemporaries into accidentally adopting any number of heresies or pagan systems of thought (polytheism, ditheism, Neoplatonism, and so on). Nor is he too unsophisticated or ‘unsystematic’ a thinker to see the alleged dangers of his understanding of divine energies and their threat to the primacy of Christ and the Trinitarian God. A more careful and close reading of his corpus reveals a rare breadth and depth of theological vision that, while developing creative modes of expression for the reality of the human ideal via the energy of deification, remains steadfast in its orbit around the worshipped body of Christ.

Conclusion: Christ as ‘Father’ Gregory Palamas is not an isolated theologian in late Byzantium. He was part of a large network of ascetic, ecclesiastical, and civil figures in the fourteenth century. While our understanding of this network is growing, a thorough

¹³⁵ These passages (on the divine illumination of Adam before his fall and the role of Christ in robing human nature anew with divine glory) occur in Gregory Palamas, 150 Chapters 66–7 (ed. and trans. Sinkewicz 160–3). They are taken from Homily 16.39 (ed. Chrestou 9:478), trans. Veniamin (2009), p. 132–3. ¹³⁶ Gregory Palamas, Against Gregoras 3.28 (ed. Chrestou 4:337).

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historical and theological examination of it has yet to be written.¹³⁷ While it would be desirable to introduce other Palamite thinkers into this discussion, this must be left for another study. It is perhaps enough, however, to have examined Palamas himself more closely than is often the case. Moreover, by bringing out the fundamental role of Christ in his understanding of deification, other potential contributions tacitly emerge. For instance, a scholarly debate is ongoing regarding the degree to which Palamas’s younger contemporary Nicholas Cabasilas (1322–c.1392) is a disciple of the former.¹³⁸ In a way, this debate is largely conditioned by attempts to see whether or not Cabasilas’s seminal text The Life in Christ clearly discusses or defends the theology of divine energies. But if we work from the other end, analysing Palamas’s own Christological and highly sacramental view of deification by uncreated grace, then the apparent problem of a Palamite Cabasilas is certainly softened if not largely solved. When Palamas thinks through the theology of divine energy or activity, he does so initially by addressing epistemological concerns surrounding the knowledge of God, which he in turn sees in its most proper sense as indicating communion with God and thus deification. But knowledge of God and communion with him are themselves viewed in an inescapably Christological manner by Palamas: humanity and even creation as a whole owes any true and abiding communion with God to the coming of Christ. The concept of divine energy, and the essence–energy distinction that goes with it, helps support and account for the mystery of Jesus Christ as the supreme, or rather the single locus of human encounter with God, of deification. The theology of divine energy is not there to challenge, let alone supplant, this axis of his thought. One could argue that this might be so in theory, but functionally speaking it remains wishful thinking. To that challenge, however, one might respond by asking for good supporting evidence from his works; and more than that, as a theologian, one might ask for viable alternatives as well, a vision of the human ideal divested of the theology of deification by uncreated grace. Without that ideal, what then is the final existential meaning and relevance of Christ as perfect God and perfect man, uniting humanity to his divine hypostasis without confusion, separation, or division? What becomes the new end of human life? If it is still to be called to divine adoption, becoming ‘co-heirs’ with Christ in his ascended and enthroned glory, how does the anti-Palamite explain such adoption into the divine life? Ultimately, I would argue, the burden now falls historically and theologically on the opponents of Palamas ¹³⁷ Russell (2019) provides a significant step forward, but not a conclusive one. For many useful preliminary remarks on this network—dubbed the ‘Palamite School’—and the need for its detailed study, see Pino (2018). ¹³⁸ In the vanguard of those who see Cabasilas as ‘anti-Palamite’ is Ioannis Polemis: see Polemis (2013). For recent responses from the pro-Palamite side, see Pino (2018), pp. 33–6 and Congourdeau (2018), pp. 123–4.

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both to confront the question of Christ’s centrality in his understanding of deification and, if they are so inclined, to offer a different positive Christocentric account of the human ideal as an alternative.¹³⁹ Many of the anti-Palamite charges, at least those connected to divine energies as apparent ‘mediators’, fade away when his deeply Christological view of deification is brought to the fore. But let us end by returning to Palamas himself. In order to demonstrate the importance of the person of Christ to his vision of the human ideal, several elements of his thought in this regard were highlighted that are not simple repetitions of patristic or Byzantine tropes, but reveal his personal theological signature on the matter: the devotion to Jesus Christ’s ‘worshipped body’, for instance, or his insistence on a thoroughly Christological reading of angelic illumination in Dionysius. One could also add the tacit argument that the Hesychastic preoccupation with the unceasing repetition of the ‘Jesus Prayer’ (‘Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy upon me’) likewise bolsters Palamas’s Christocentrism, although this is largely an argument from silence, since while he has much to say on prayer, and unceasing prayer at that, Palamas does not directly discuss this specific prayer and its theological importance in his extant corpus.¹⁴⁰ Another interesting emphasis, however, that likewise betrays the Christcentredness of his approach, comes with his focus on the ‘fatherhood’ of Jesus Christ for all who wish to attain the human ideal. He already alludes to this notion in his first letter to Barlaam, in which he refers to Christ’s high priestly prayer in John 17 for the unity of the disciples, that they may in truth be one as the Father and Son are one. He describes this as a prayer that was offered for us ‘to his own Father by our common Father’ (τὴν πρὸς τὸν ἴδιον πατέρα τοῦ κοινοῦ πατρὸς ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν εὐχήν).¹⁴¹ He repeats and amplifies this statement in the Triads, calling it a ‘most mystical and ineffable prayer’.¹⁴² In the same passage, the second coming is described as follows: ‘it is in the glory of the ¹³⁹ While most scholars who take issue with Palamas’s theology do so as consciously Christian theologians (e.g. Williams, von Ivanka, LaCugna, Hart, etc.), some do not. Take, for instance, a statement from John Demetracopoulos, one of the main contemporary champions of the antiPalamite cause: ‘Of course, I do not imply that the doctrine of God’s absolute simplicity belongs to the essential core of Christian theology . . . . In the final analysis, from the historical point of view, such a core includes very few things, if any’, Demetracopoulos (2011), p. 276 n 33. It is admittedly rather hard to engage in much theological discussion on such terms. ¹⁴⁰ The Jesus Prayer is mentioned in the condemnation of Barlaam in the Synodal Tome of 1341 (PG 152:1249D–1250A) and is referred to in passing by Gregory Palamas (citing a letter of John Kalekas) in Refutation of Kalekas (ed. Chrestou 2:602). This is not to say that it is unimportant, but that it does not figure prominently in Palamas’s dogmatic works on deification. For a little more on the matter, see Mantzaridis (1984), pp. 93–5. ¹⁴¹ Gregory Palamas, First Letter to Barlaam 43 (ed. Chrestou 1:250). The scriptural background for this notion of the fatherhood of Jesus Christ can be discerned, for instance, in the text: ‘Behold, I and the children which God hath given me’ (Isa. 8:18//Heb. 2:13). ¹⁴² Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.66 (ed. Meyendorff 2:525).

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Father that Christ will come, and it is in the glory of their Father, Christ, that “the just will shine like the sun” [Matt. 13:43]’.¹⁴³ Earlier in the same treatise, he refers to Jesus Christ as ‘our only God and Father’ (τοῦ μόνου Θεοῦ Πατρὸς ἡμων ᾽Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ), not in the sense of a Christomonism that replaces the person of the Father with the person of the Son, but in terms of Christ as the sole source and thus ‘father’ of divine illumination for the human being.¹⁴⁴ It is just another way to express, for Palamas, the non-negotiable centrality of Christ in his vision of human deification. Without Christ and his worshipped body, there would be no access for Palamas to the human ideal. We would still be groping in the dark, at best hankering through analogies and symbols to know and experience something of the divine, but being bereft, in the final analysis, of that communion with the uncreated light of divinity which alone can satisfy the deepest thirst of the human heart, and which alone is received through the ‘one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus’ (1 Tim. 2:5).

¹⁴³ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.66 (ed. Meyendorff 2:525). ¹⁴⁴ Gregory Palamas, Triads 2.3.18 (ed. Meyendorff 2:425). For the same sentiment, see also Gregory Palamas, Homily 56.11 (ed. Chrestou 11:410) where Jesus ‘is become our Father because of divine baptism’.

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Conclusion That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life. 1 John 1:1

A BYZANTINE CHRISTOLOGICAL SYNTHESIS: SUMMARY OF FINDINGS THROUGH A TWELFTH-CENTURY LENS In 1166 the emperor Manuel I Komnenos (reigned 1143–80) installed four large marble slabs on the left (north) wall of the nave of the cathedral of Agia Sophia in Constantinople. These slabs—together measuring just over 4 metres high by 4.5 metres wide—bore a running inscription laying out the doctrinal decisions which had recently been taken that same year at a council convened by Manuel in order to resolve a dispute about the interpretation of Christ’s words, ‘my Father is greater than I’ (John 14:28). This unusual act caused a stir, and two successive emperors (Andronikos I and Isaac II) were pressured by certain officials to take them down. When Isaac II apparently came close to doing so, the threat of an uprising from the clergy and people led to a change of heart, and instead of removing them he flanked the slabs with images of Peter and Paul. The lapidary inscription remained in place for 400 years, removed only in 1567 when the slabs were repurposed for the building of Suleiman I’s mausoleum. Mercifully, the inscription itself was largely preserved.¹ What was the significance of this monumental inscription and the doctrinal debate it accompanied? Most historians and theologians pay it little attention, ¹ For this description, and for the transcription of the contents of the slabs (which is also preserved in other documentary sources), see Mango (1963). Human Perfection in Byzantine Theology: Attaining the Fullness of Christ. Alexis Torrance, Oxford University Press (2020). © Alexis Torrance. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198845294.001.0001

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putting the whole controversy down to Manuel’s own political, theological, and personal predilections and ambitions rather than any substantial matter worthy of close analysis.² Without becoming too embroiled in the complex history of Byzantine theology in the twelfth century (a history that still needs much scholarly attention), I wish to show how this particular controversy demonstrates and links together many of the major findings of the preceding chapters, centred on the salvific significance of the humanity of Christ. The text, ‘my Father is greater than I’, had received multiple interpretations in the patristic period that the Byzantine Church deemed satisfactory.³ There is a tendency in some secondary sources to describe Manuel and the council as privileging one particular interpretation to the exclusion of all others, but this is misleading.⁴ On the whole, the major acceptable readings of this text had to do either with the Only-Begotten Son’s dependence on the Unbegotten Father as cause (which was a relative inferiority that did not compromise their absolute equality of essence or nature) or with the person of the Son considered in his assumed or ‘enhypostasized’ humanity that remains forever and essentially ‘less’ than the Father (even if this humanity is equal with God by virtue of the hypostatic union). It was the latter issue of the applicability of the verse to the humanity of the Son that was at stake in the controversy of 1166, and which was to return again in 1170. As part of an insistence on the validity and even necessity of interpreting the verse to include the humanity of the Son, in the inscription installed on the north wall of Agia Sophia Manuel I declared the following: I assent to the holy patriarchs and the divine and sacred council [of 1166], and I say that the flesh of the Lord was supremely exalted by the union and is placed highest of all in honour, such that from this highest union it is made equal to God [ὁμόθεος] without variation, without alteration, without confusion, and without change. Because of the hypostatic union [the flesh] remains inseparable and unbroken in the Divine Word that assumed it. Honour and worship are offered with equal renown to him with the same worship, he being installed on the royal and divine throne at the right hand of the Father, richly possessing the splendours of the Godhead, preserving [or ‘saving’] the properties of the natures [σωζομένων τῶν ἰδιοτήτων τῶν φύσεων].⁵

² See the comments, for instance, in Magdalino (2002), pp. 287–9, Hussey (2010), pp. 152–3, and Gouillard (1967), pp. 216–25. Gouillard refers approvingly to the eyewitness account by Hugh Etherianos who had called the controversy a ‘useless scandal’ (p. 216). Meyendorff (1983), p. 40 touches helpfully on the matter, but very briefly. ³ For further discussion of this, see Alfeyev (2000), pp. 143–50 and Louth (2012), pp. 259–64. Incidentally, while most NT scholars agree that the original text reads ‘the Father is greater than I’, the Byzantine text (as well as the Textus Receptus) has ‘my Father’. ⁴ Together with Magdalino and Hussey, see especially Angold (1995), pp. 83–6. ⁵ Conciliar Edict of 1166 edited in Mango (1963), pp. 324–30, here at p. 328.

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On first impressions, the emphasis in this declaration appears to be on the absolute equality of honour shared by the humanity of Christ with the whole of the Godhead, such that it is homotheos, equal with God. In that case, how is this addressing the conundrum posed by the verse ‘my Father is greater than I’? The answer lies in the use of Chalcedonian language whereby the flesh or humanity of the Word remains exactly that after the union, equal with God without variation, alteration, confusion, or change, the Son of God ‘preserving’ or ‘saving’ the properties or characteristics that belong to his humanity. In this context, then, ‘my Father is greater than I’ very much applies to the Word of God in his humanity, where the full integrity of Christ’s human nature is preserved, united ‘without confusion’ to the divinity and thus remaining forever ‘less than’ the divine nature qua nature, even if it is still homotheos by virtue of the hypostatic union. We are seeing, however, that despite the importance to the controversy of rightly interpreting the verse ‘my Father is greater than I’, this facet serves mainly as a launchpad for more wide-ranging and sustained dogmatic scrutiny of Christ’s humanity. Specifically, what is at stake is the continuing and permanent concrete humanity of Christ, complete with all its natural properties, without which the very hope of deification would be called into question. We see this play out further in the anathemas and commemorations issued on the matter by the synod in 1166 and 1170, and appended to the Synodikon of Orthodoxy (which had originally been promulgated in 843 at the restoration of the icons and was to receive a number of additions over the centuries).⁶ The text begins with a general acclamation of Manuel I, as well as a general anathema against those who misinterpret or falsify the divine statements of the holy teachers of the Church, and a positive commemoration of those who apply the verse in question to Christ’s humanity.⁷ Then a more targeted anathema is introduced that is worth citing in full: To those who think and proclaim that the deification [τὴν θέωσιν] of what was assumed is a transformation of the human nature into divinity, and who do not think that from the union itself the Body of the Lord shares in the divine dignity and majesty and is worshipped with the same worship in God the Word who assumed it, being the same in honour, the same in glory, lifegiving, of equal renown and on the same throne with God the Father and the All-Holy Spirit without thereby becoming consubstantial with God, in which case the natural properties of creaturehood, of circumscription, and the other properties contemplated in the human nature of Christ would be abandoned and transformed into the nature of divinity, in turn leading either to the position that the Incarnation and Passion of the Lord took place in the imagination [φαντασίᾳ] and not in

⁶ The text of the Synodikon of Orthodoxy as a whole is edited in Gouillard (1967), pp. 45–107; the texts from 1166 and 1170 are found at pp. 75–81. ⁷ Synodikon of Orthodoxy, lines 472–87 in Gouillard (1967), p. 75.

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truth, or that the Only-Begotten suffered in his divinity: [to those who say such things] anathema.⁸

The two dangers the anathema warns against at the end are quite conventional: docetism—where Christ only appeared to be human and was not really such—on theone hand, and theopaschitism—where the divinity itself of Christ can suffer—on the other. However, what leads up to these is, I would argue, a rich presentation of the dogmatic basis for theological anthropology as such. The anathema turns on the definition and understanding of deification (θέωσις), emphasizing strongly the need to affirm both the full integrity of the humanity assumed and deified by the person of the Word with all its natural properties, and the absolute equality of honour, glory, and ‘throne’ that this deified humanity shares with the Father and the Holy Spirit by virtue of the hypostatic union. This is precisely the theological basis for the approach to deification we find articulated in Maximus, Theodore, Symeon, and Gregory Palamas. In the anathema’s emphasis on Christ’s humanity as forever ‘circumscribed’, as well as its admonition regarding the Incarnation not taking place ‘in the imagination’, we hear strong echoes of the thought of both Theodore and Symeon discussed in Chapters 3 and 4 respectively. The preoccupation with Christ’s abiding human properties would intensify in the decisions of 1170 when the controversy re-emerged. Constantine of Corfu was accused of muddying the waters on the matter by arguing that the ‘humanity’ which the Father was greater than was not the specific and particular humanity of Christ, but humanity understood only conceptually or abstractly (κατὰ ψιλὴν ἐπίνοιαν), that is, detached from Christ and considered in itself. The logic was that since Christ’s humanity belonged to the divine hypostasis of the Word, it could in no way be considered ‘lower’ than the Father, so while we could indeed say that the verse applied to the humanity, it was a humanity conceptually distinguished from the particular humanity of Christ assumed at the Incarnation and now enthroned eternally in the heavens. It was not, in other words, the actual humanity of Christ. The council, however, saw in this a specious and dangerous fiction, one that put Christ at an essential remove from us and posited a union of divinity and humanity in Christ that destroyed the integrity of his natural human properties, thereby severing his connection with our humanity and annulling our deification and salvation. We see the council insisting on this point in its first anathema in which, after again upholding the diversity of acceptable interpretations of the verse in question, emphasis is placed on the natural properties of the flesh assumed by him and enhypostasized in his divinity, that is to say the properties of creaturehood [τὸ κτιστόν], ⁸ Synodikon of Orthodoxy, lines 488–97 in Gouillard (1967), p. 77.

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circumscription [τὸ περιγραπτόν], mortality [τὸ θνητὸν] and the other natural and blameless passions on account of which the Lord said that the Father was greater than he.⁹

There can be no doubt, the text is saying, that the humanity of Christ does not lose any of its properties in his divine person, even if, by the same token, that humanity or ‘flesh’ is ‘equal with God [ὁμόθεον] and equal in honour [ὁμότιμον]’ with the divinity because of the hypostatic union.¹⁰ The deep concern to maintain simultaneously the inviolability of Christ’s humanity and its total and complete deification is on full display here. One of the further and related questions, however, that is raised in the anathemas of 1170 and that should be addressed briefly, has to do with the issue of positing an apparent or conceptual (κατ᾽ ἐπίνοιαν) distinction. In dealing with Constantine of Corfu (and, soon after, John Eirenikos), the synod notes and rejects his deployment of a conceptual distinction between Christ’s humanity taken in itself and Christ’s humanity as it is concretely found and expressed (‘enhypostasized’) in his person.¹¹ When doing so, a text from John of Damascus is brought in that had been deployed by the council’s opponents and which demanded further exegesis. The Damascene had said that one can consider Christ’s humanity as ‘slave’ (δουλεία) and ‘ignorant’ (ἄγνοια) on a merely apparent or conceptual basis (κατ᾽ ἐπίνοιαν) but not strictly speaking, since in his person his humanity was neither ignorant nor a slave.¹² The council, of course, upheld John of Damascus’ point of view, but underlined that his position on these human properties of Christ had to do with properties that were not in fact real or substantial (περὶ τῶν ἀνυποστάτων καὶ ψευδῶν) rather than with Christ’s natural human properties that were in fact real and ‘enhypostatic’.¹³ Constantine had abused the Damascene for his ⁹ Synodikon of Orthodoxy, lines 520–3 in Gouillard (1967), p. 79. The mention of ‘natural and blameless passions’ is an allusion to John of Damascus, On the Orthodox Faith 64 (3.20) (ed. Kotter 162–3 and PG 94:1081B–1084A). ¹⁰ Synodikon of Orthodoxy, lines 527–8 in Gouillard (1967), p. 79. ¹¹ For a recent and helpful discussion of the ‘conceptual distinction’ question in Byzantine theology, with special reference to the Palamite controversy, see Bradshaw (2019). It should be noted that some authors see the conceptual distinction argument in this controversy as being deployed to distinguish the Son from the Father, but this is not the case: e.g. Alfeyev (2000), p. 147. ¹² See John of Damascus, On the Orthodox Faith 65 (3.21) (ed. Kotter 163–4 and PG 94:1084B–1085C). Indeed, according to the Damascene, to call Christ ‘slave’ in the sense not just of a relative title abstracted from his human nature but as truly applicable to his humanity, is to fall into the heresy of Nestorius (dividing the one hypostasis and positing two, one a divine master and the other a human slave). The importance of Christ becoming a slave and being ignorant of the last day as these are articulated in the New Testament is not necessarily thereby diminished: it is simply to say that neither slavery nor ignorance are permanent properties of his humanity (or ours). Christ takes on slavery, ignorance, and even ‘sin’, but precisely in order to annihilate all three, not to deify and enthrone them at the right hand of the Father. ¹³ Synodikon of Orthodoxy, lines 529–32 in Gouillard (1967), p. 79.

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own ends by taking a limited conceptual distinction, whereby Christ is called ‘slave’ and ‘ignorant’ only in an apparent rather than true sense, and applying it to all of the true and real human properties of Christ. The Damascene had indeed been careful to underscore this point, emphasizing that at least in the case of ‘slave’ (and by extension, it appears, ‘ignorance’) we are dealing with a ‘relation’ (between slave and master, ignorance and knowledge) rather than an ‘essence’. It is not an essential property of human beings to be a slave or to be ignorant as it is for human beings to be created, circumscribed, and mortal. The collapse of this important distinction between ‘false’ or ‘non-substantial’ human properties and true or ‘enhypostatic’ ones paves the way for Constantine’s position and his subsequent condemnation.¹⁴ All this may strike the reader as rather theoretical, perhaps even tiresome, but it lays out a dogmatic framework for human deification that is crucial and has wide-ranging implications. If nothing else, it demonstrates the fierce attention that the Byzantine theological tradition consistently paid to questions surrounding the humanity of Christ in relation to ecclesiastical dogma and practice. The slabs of Manuel in particular are a monumental witness to this concern which should not be neatly explained away as the personal whim of a despot. But more importantly, this debate provides a succinct commentary on what is to be included and what is to be excluded from the doctrine of human perfection and deification, providing a particular vocabulary and tools to distinguish one from the other. This in turn is none other than a commentary on what it means to be a human being and what it is to attain the human ideal. In terms of what is to be included, the deification of humanity in Christ must retain all natural human properties and characteristics. What this means more precisely is not articulated in the documents of the controversy itself, but is seen as a point of extensive theological meditation in the figures we have examined, whether Maximus (human will and activity), Theodore (our physical, ‘depictable’ properties), Symeon (our consciousness and all bodily members), or Gregory Palamas (the whole of our intellect, soul, and body). Meditating on the preservation and salvation of our whole humanity in the

¹⁴ See also the following anathema which reiterates the point just made: Synodikon of Orthodoxy, lines 537–58 in Gouillard (1967), pp. 79–81. The same logic was deployed to take care of a view at the opposite end of the Christological spectrum earlier in the twelfth century. The views of Eustratius of Nicaea, a disciple of John Italos, were condemned in 1117 for positing Christ’s humanity as an eternal slave of his divinity, since slavery is not an ‘essential and irremovable [οὐσιώδη καὶ ἀναπόβλητον]’ aspect of humanity: see Synodikon of Orthodoxy, lines 391–4 in Gouillard (1967), pp. 69–71. Tellingly, Gouillard expresses his disappointment at the apparent closed-mindedness of the Byzantines for their condemnation of what he sees as Eustratius’ ‘philosophical rigour’ and its helpful implications for ‘the psychology of Christ’: Gouillard (1967), p. 210. But following John of Damascus, for the later Byzantines such a position on Christ as truly and forever ‘slave’ in his humanity could only end in a two-person or Nestorian Christology.

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state of deification is constitutive, in fact, of the Byzantine doctrine of human perfection. But this note on inclusivity must receive its qualification. The doctrinal decisions of 1170 make this qualification by underscoring the issue of apparent human properties and characteristics that are in fact ‘false’ and non-existent (anhypostatic). The two that are singled out are ‘ignorance’ and ‘slavery’, but these themselves could be analysed in more depth and the list could doubtless be expanded. Just as our chosen authors could meditate on the positive implications of retaining one’s humanity in deification (as Christ retains his), so too could they meditate on the negation of those properties which, while often embraced by many as truly human, turn out to be false and delusory props that serve as stumbling blocks to deified life in Christ. These are the deceptive yet pervasive characteristics so often tied to sin that demand nothing less than to be sloughed off and rejected for the sake of the kingdom. Thus Maximus could speak of the absence or surrender of gnomē in Christ and the deified; Theodore would rail against disobedience and self-will as inimical to the path of Christ; Symeon turns in general against self-justification and any ‘human’ excuse we might make to ignore Christ’s high calling for us; and Gregory Palamas warns of the dangers that come with idolizing the scholarly pursuit of knowledge as a self-sufficient way of healing human ignorance in the quest for truth. The framework sketched out in the councils of 1166 and 1170 is just that: a kind of scaffold upon which to build an Orthodox understanding of anthropology. It is not a final word, but provides scope for development; it is an invitation to elaborate further the meaning and definition of what is truly human and what is falsely so from an Orthodox theological perspective. The gauge that is offered for bringing these two facets of the human ideal together and discerning their specific content (whether the included human properties or the excluded falsities we so easily cherish) is first and foremost the person and work of Christ incarnate and ascended in glory. By conceiving the purpose of human life as the orientation of the human being with all its natural properties towards the supranatural goal of deification in Christ, the Byzantine theological tradition underlines the preciousness of humanity but also the seriousness and even intrinsic unattainability of its goal. According to this tradition, to be perfected necessarily means that our human characteristics (natural and hypostatic/personal) are retained in their integrity, and thus have a permanent value and worth. But that permanence is only truly enacted when those same characteristics are also ‘clothed upon’ from on high: natural human mortality must be robed with immortality, our circumscribed humanity must feed on the uncircumscribable, and our creatureliness must be suffused with the uncreated God, daringly expressed in the sources as occurring even, in some sense, to the point of equality.

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In the case of Christ, the union of divine and human occurs in his very person, but as we saw especially in Maximus and Symeon, this union is repeated to the extent of ‘fullness’ in the deified by grace. Using scriptural imagery, we might say that the distinction between Christ and the saints is like that between a head and its bodily members, or a vine and its branches. The saints can only ever receive the gift of their perfection and deification: they cannot manufacture, let alone bestow, it themselves. But the true distinction between the giver and the receiver should not be amplified into a distinction of lives or inheritance. The uncreated divine life bestowed upon the saints from the Father in the Holy Spirit is one, and it comes to us solely through the humanity of the Son. That humanity, then, must not be forgotten in any Christian theological endeavour, not least for the articulation of a theological anthropology. For modern Orthodox thought, as intimated in Chapter 1, this principle is under threat, even if it has consistently had its champions. The desire among some Orthodox theologians (and some non-Orthodox partly under their inspiration) to emphasize the human ideal primarily through the lens of the apophatic, or on the basis of a personalism crudely emanating from Trinitarian doctrine with only passing reference to Christ, or via the theology of divine energies, or the concept of Sophia/Godmanhood, or again through a fixation on epektasis, risks in each case falsifying the core tenets of the doctrine of human perfection and deification espoused and developed in the Byzantine theological tradition. There should be no such thing as a Christian approach to theological anthropology that is alienated, in however slight a manner, from the doctrine of Christ. This should especially be the case for the Orthodox, some of whose rich heritage on this matter in the Byzantine period I have tried to elaborate. Happily, there are several Orthodox theologians (some of whom were discussed in Chapter 1) who take seriously the question of carefully starting with the doctrine of Christ in order to develop a doctrine of the human being and human perfection. In the contemporary Western theological academy, perhaps the chief representative of this approach is the patrologist and theologian John Behr. For the final section of this Conclusion I will therefore engage with Behr’s thought, finding points of harmony but also points of tension with the findings of this study.

THEOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY IN CONTEMPORARY ORTHODOXY: THE CASE OF F R J OHN BEHR Since the turn of the twenty-first century, Fr John Behr has developed a sustained and remarkably consistent vision of theology and anthropology

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that turns wholly upon the Passion of Christ understood ‘in accordance with scripture’.¹⁵ It is also a vision which does not identify with (and indeed resists) the label of ‘personalism’. Behr’s theology thus serves as a fitting dialogue partner for this study, not only because of its Christocentrism, but also because it represents a consciously different approach from modern Orthodox personalist theology to similar questions. While this study is by no means an attack on the many fruits of Orthodox personalist theology, it has also proposed a critical distance that both acknowledges the complex lineage and diversity of Orthodox personalism, and calls for a return to the cornerstone of Christology for the work of theological anthropology. As such, it is especially worth highlighting and discussing some of the salient features of Behr’s particular vision of Christocentric theological anthropology, examining them here in light of the findings in the preceding chapters. For Behr, leaning particularly on Irenaeus, the human being is created as a divine project, God’s work begun in Genesis 1 but only completed on the Cross with Christ’s declaration ‘It is finished’ (John 19:30) and his subsequent death.¹⁶ In this way, Christ can be understood as the ‘first true human being in history’, known as such only through the Passion.¹⁷ When Behr uses the word ‘Passion’, he tells us, ‘I refer, as do early Christians, to the whole (singular) event of death–resurrection–ascension’.¹⁸ Indeed, the Passion of Christ that occurs through his death on the Cross is conceived as ‘the pure white light’ through which all the prior and subsequent events of Christ’s life and identity are ‘refracted’ in the narrative of the Gospels and the development of the Christian liturgical cycle.¹⁹ This light of the Passion, which is identified by Behr with the Lord’s Pascha, marks the entry into theology and anthropology. As such, there is a strong resistance in his thought to approaching theology with metaphysical formulas (even accepted doctrinal Trinitarian formulas, for example) or prior hypothetical speculations about the nature of God or the human being that do not exclusively meditate on these questions through the refracted ‘pure white light’ of the Passion of Jesus Christ.²⁰

¹⁵ The two most succinct expressions of Behr’s theology/theological anthropology are currently found in Behr (2006 and 2013b), though similar insights extend across a broad corpus of patristic and scriptural studies, most recently an extensive work on the Gospel of John: Behr (2019). ¹⁶ See, for instance, Behr (2013b), pp. 31–5 and the longer meditation on this theme through the prism of Johannine theology in Behr (2019), pp. 137–270. ¹⁷ Behr (2013b), p. 35. ¹⁸ Behr (2018a), p. 117 n 1. ¹⁹ See Behr (2006), p. 32 and Behr (2019), pp. 243, 345. ²⁰ He singles out, for instance, various theories regarding the ‘triadic image of God’ in the human being and the desire to posit ‘persons in communion’ as wrongheaded and ill-fated approaches to theology and anthropology because of their rejection of the key first principle of the Passion: Behr (2006), p. 176. See also his critique of Zizioulas along similar lines (with reference to ecclesiology) in Behr (2003), pp. 67–9.

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Behr’s approach is unmistakably Christocentric and it yields much positive fruit. It allows him to retrieve and reread a host of scriptural and patristic material with an impressive combination of creativity and fidelity, awakening the reader to nuances and interpretations often hidden in plain sight, veiled only because they have failed to be read in light of the Passion. He argues for the need not so much to search for the ‘original meaning’ of this or that text in a historical critical sense, especially texts of scripture (by which he means the Law and the Prophets), but for the correct ‘hypothesis’ of the text, again following Irenaeus, which is none other than the apostolic proclamation of the crucified Lord.²¹ With this lens and first principle—which he tells us must be accepted by faith—what it means to be divine and what it means to be human is disclosed. For our purposes, this revelation or ‘apocalypse’ involves, in particular, a disclosure that all humanity is ‘under sin’, but simultaneously that all can become (and can only become) true human beings through participation in Christ’s Passion, that is, through death. Indeed, as Behr sees it, the ‘heart of the theology defended by the councils’ is that ‘[Christ] enables all men and women also to use their own mortality to come to life in him’.²² The accent in Behr’s approach falls squarely and repeatedly on death; both the death of Christ and our own. He speaks eloquently of the existential dilemma of death and the modern world’s tendency to try to ignore, numb, or medicate its way out of the dilemma.²³ Yet death is necessary in order for God’s ‘work’ of creating a human being to be completed, as proved for Behr in the Passion itself. This death is anticipated in baptism, ‘dying in Christ’, but it is completed only at physical death: ‘until I actually die and lie in the grave, I’m caught in the first-person singular’.²⁴ The entrapment of the ‘I’ needs a release to make self-giving complete since before physical death ‘it is still I who am doing this, dying to myself ’.²⁵ Through death the ‘I’ can ‘stop working’, knowing its total weakness, ‘becoming clay in the hands of God to be fashioned into living flesh’.²⁶ On the issue of ‘flesh’, Behr moves between at least two distinct uses. On theone hand, he discusses the focal point for the revelation of the Word of God as ‘the becoming Word of the flesh’.²⁷ Here, his usage reminds us of an ‘exchange formula’ for deification, whereby the Word was made flesh in order to make the flesh Word, the term ‘flesh’ bearing in this context the

²¹ See Behr (2006), pp. 54–63. ²² Behr (2013b), pp. 22–3. ²³ See, for instance, Behr (2013b), pp. 38–69. Ironically perhaps, his comments are somewhat reminiscent of Zizioulas’s discussion of death in Being as Communion, down to Behr’s understanding of human existence apart from the death of Christ (where we are just ‘male and female’ rather than ‘living human beings’), which despite a difference in form, posits something similar to Zizioulas’s opposition between the ‘biological hypostasis’ and the ‘ecclesial hypostasis’: see Zizioulas (1985), pp. 48–63. ²⁴ Behr (2013b), p. 67. ²⁵ Behr (2013b), p. 68 (emphasis in original). ²⁶ Behr (2013b), p. 68. ²⁷ Behr (2006), pp. 38–9.

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sense of our given humanity that must undergo change. On the other hand, and more usually, Behr speaks in the terms just mentioned, namely that flesh in its true sense is in fact ‘formed’ in and through death. In a discussion of the French phenomenologist Michel Henry (with whom he finds many points of contact), Behr writes: If the Word reveals God to us through the flesh, then in turn our relationship with God must also take place through the flesh. . . . The ‘flesh’ that the Word, Jesus, becomes through the Passion, is the life-giving flesh of Christ offered in the Eucharist, which to be received as life-giving requires sharing in his Passion, to be born into life as a living human being, the glory of God. The Incarnate Word of God is heard, not seen, and received as life-giving flesh in those who live in his pathos [i.e. ‘Passion’].²⁸

To baptism, then, we must add the Eucharist, the ‘breaking of the bread’ and participation in Christ’s ‘life-giving flesh’, which, together with the ‘opening of the Scriptures’, forms the heart and soul of life in the Christian community. These activities, and in particular the Eucharist, reveal the community as the ‘body of Christ’, training its members towards the consummate participation in Christ’s Passion constituted by their physical death, which simultaneously becomes their birth into life. Behr’s supreme model for the Church’s existence in via is the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13–35). Generally, Behr devotes little attention to post-Resurrection narratives in the Gospels beyond privileging ‘the empty tomb’ and Emmaus verses. The key text in Behr’s hermeneutic of the Emmaus story is verse 31 in which, upon breaking the bread and being recognized by Luke and Cleopas, Jesus ‘disappears out of their sight’.²⁹ Paradoxically, the disappearance of Christ serves as a crucial element in Behr’s conception of the Church and of Christian anthropology: the ‘historical man’ Jesus ‘vanishes’ and must vanish because, deploying another popular verse in Behr’s arsenal, we no longer know Christ ‘after the flesh’ (cf. 2 Cor. 5:16), flesh here connoting for Behr Jesus’s historical existence as a man.³⁰ Christ perpetually disappears in order to reveal that the community and individual Christians have themselves become the true life-giving flesh of Christ. This occurs through proleptic participation in his Passion offered in the Eucharist, not hampered by the anxieties of historicity that come with seeking to know

²⁸ Behr (2018a), p. 117. For further analysis of Behr’s ‘phenomology of life in flesh’, see Part 3 of his monograph on the Gospel of John: Behr (2019), pp. 273–322. The language of ‘not seeing’ the Incarnate Word is characteristic of Behr, but quite different from the emphasis on vision that we have explored in Theodore, Symeon, and Gregory Palamas. ²⁹ It is difficult to overestimate the importance of the disappearing Christ of the Emmaus narrative for Behr’s overall vision. See, for instance, Behr (2006), pp. 17, 28, 176 and Behr (2013b), pp. 10, 15, 28. ³⁰ Behr (2006), p. 35, Behr (2013b), p. 102, Behr (2016), p. 45 are three examples among many. See also Behr (2011), p. 19, cited in what follows.

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Christ ‘after the flesh’, ‘for in fact those who take up the cross are now His body’.³¹ Behr’s vision is more wide-ranging than this, and certain of its other features will be touched on in due course, but here we come up against an issue that demands some attention. Besides his more popular works The Mystery of Christ (2006) and Becoming Human (2013), his position on this matter is succinctly laid out elsewhere too. In his important and even groundbreaking study and translation of the extant texts of Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia (targets for condemnation as ‘Nestorian’ at the Second Council of Constantinople in 553), Behr articulates it as follows: The one Lord Jesus Christ confessed by the Christian faith exists eternally, one and the same both before and after the economy. ‘The man’, on the other hand, exists neither before nor after, but only during the period of the economy. This is not simply some kind of crypto-monophysitism in which the humanity is lost in the divinity, but a reflection of the fact that, as Paul says, we no longer know Christ after the flesh [2 Cor. 5:16]. The flesh of Christ no longer exists in its particular properties, but as the flesh of Christ, possessing his divine properties. . . . ‘Incarnation’ is not so much about a divine person becoming human as it is about the man becoming that which as God he always is, the Word of God, who now takes flesh in Christ’s disciples.³²

Interestingly, Behr is brushing up against the central issue that was perceived by the Byzantine Church to be at stake in the ‘Father is greater than I’ controversy discussed earlier, namely, conceptually abstracting ‘the man’ Jesus and speaking of him as having only existed ‘during the period of the economy’, and specifically that his flesh ‘no longer exists in its particular properties’.³³ This move on Behr’s part is integrally tied to his frequent ³¹ Behr (2016), p. 45. ³² Behr (2011), p. 19 (emphasis in original). ³³ Behr depends for his position here and elsewhere on an interpretation of Gregory of Nyssa’s Against Eunomius 3 [5]: see also Behr (2006), pp. 34–40 and Behr (2019), pp. 24–9. Space forbids detailed examination of his interpretation here, but Gregory does not argue in this passage that Jesus Christ no longer exists in his particular human properties, only that the ‘commixture’ with the Divine at the Incarnation renders the flesh no longer bound by its natural limitations or properties. However, as Gregory puts it, ‘the contemplation of the properties of the flesh and of the Godhead remains without confusion’ (διαμένει δὲ ἀσύγχυτος τῶν τε τῆς σαρκὸς καὶ τῶν τῆς θεότητος ἰδιωμάτων ἡ θεωρία—Against Eunomius 3.3.63), i.e. the human properties do abide in some sense. Similarly, Behr places an emphasis on Jesus being ‘made’ Lord and Christ exclusively through the Passion in his interpretation of this text by Gregory (which is an exegesis of Acts 2:36), but Gregory lays primary emphasis on the commixture of divinity and humanity itself making Jesus ‘Lord and Christ’, not the Passion as such. Behr has also pointed out (Behr (2019), pp. 24–9) that elsewhere, in Nyssen’s Antirrhetics against Apollinarius, there is a more direct and striking denial of Christ ‘the man’ after the ascension (citing 2 Cor. 5:16), which indeed merits further discussion, but this text must be analysed in conjunction with Gregory’s particular understanding of the full divinization of Christ’s humanity. In this (pre-Chalcedonian) understanding, the humanity is not technically annihilated but is completely overwhelmed, using the famous image of a drop of vinegar in the ocean of divinity: a strong image, to be sure, but crucially one which still allows for the properties of each nature to coexist without confusion.

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negative juxtaposition of theology and history, whereby theology understood as disclosed through the Passion of Christ reshapes our understanding of history and frees it somehow from the shackles of the modern preoccupation with finding out the truth of things ‘as they really were’ or as they ‘really happened’.³⁴ True theology and thus true history only becomes ‘known retrospectively from the Cross’.³⁵ This in turn gives an inescapably relative value to the human Jesus and his history conceived in itself apart from the Passion. For Behr, this does not matter precisely because it is the Passion— that is, the death of Christ—that is the only decisive ‘event’ of salvation. Behr acknowledges the virgin birth, resurrection, ascension, and [second] coming of Christ, but not as discrete ‘historical events’: they are uncurled backwards and forwards from the Cross. Behr can thus say that the ‘coming’ of Jesus (not, he says emphatically, the ‘second’ coming), ‘coincides with his passage, his transitus, his exodus—leaving us a trace of his presence and igniting a desire for him’.³⁶ Through the apparent dissolution and collapse of the historical life and even fleshly properties of the man Christ Jesus in Behr’s vision, historically confined as his vision is to a single point (the ‘pure white light’ of the death on the Cross), Behr comes across as being in marked tension with the decisions taken by the Byzantine Church during the ‘Father is greater than I’ controversy. Any Christology that calls into question the permanence of the natural human properties held by Christ during his earthly sojourn was strongly censured at the councils of 1166 and 1170. In a similar vein, Behr’s approach likewise seems incongruous with the theology of Theodore the Studite discussed in Chapter 3. The text from Paul in 2 Cor. 5:16 about not knowing Christ ‘after the flesh’ is understandably a favourite of the iconoclasts for reasons very similar to Behr’s: since Christ is no longer known ‘after the flesh’, that is, without the natural properties of flesh and blood, how on earth can he be depicted? Theodore reacted vigorously to this reading of the text: following Gregory of Nazianzus’s exegesis, he insisted that what was at stake for Paul was not the disappearance of the ‘human properties’ of Jesus but ‘flesh’ as it refers to our passions and sin.³⁷ To say otherwise would be to deny the continuing humanity of Christ, the locus of salvation. Any threat to the natural, even physical, continuity of Christ’s humanity with its constitutive properties before and after the discrete yet interconnected events of the Crucifixion, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension would threaten the whole Gospel in Theodore’s mind—not because he was ‘dividing’ the man Jesus from the Word, but precisely because the humanity of the Word is secured to his

³⁴ See Behr (2006), pp. 47–8 for repeated attacks on the desire to know ‘what really happened’. ³⁵ Behr (2006), p. 142. ³⁶ Behr (2013b), pp. 12–13 (emphasis in original). ³⁷ See Chapter 3, Section 1: ‘Christ’s human nature’.

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divine person ‘without confusion, without change, without division, without separation’. Behr can also make use of the Chalcedonian formula,³⁸ and he insists that his position does not entail that the Crucified and Risen Christ is any less human.³⁹ His definition of what constitutes Christ’s humanity (if it no longer exists with its historical human properties) remains, however, at best opaque. The reader’s attention is instead diverted to the possibility for our own formation as human beings in the likeness of Christ. Rather than think about the Incarnation historically, it should rather be understood as a ‘possibility that is to be lived as an ever-contemporary reality, here and now in those who respond to him’.⁴⁰ The content of that reality, however, is not explained at any length, leaving the reader with a rather Heideggerian sense of ‘being towards death’, of life not ‘after’ or even ‘through’, but more properly ‘in’ death.⁴¹ Such a trajectory of Christian life, while certainly Christocentric in its way, comes across as rather different in its particulars from what has confronted us in the previous chapters here. Part of this disconnection stems from the anthropological conclusions drawn by Behr, but part also from the selfimposed constraints that accompany his theological vision. It would be worth exploring both further. In terms of the conclusions drawn, we have already mentioned possibly the most serious question, that of the rending of Christ’s historical human properties from his status as a full or true ‘human being’ as this is enacted in his death on the Cross. This is a rending that is passed on to all of humanity, whose members can only be formed as true human beings in the act of their physical death. As mentioned, this is certainly not an anthropology that would be recognizable to Theodore or the defenders of images more broadly, nor to the authors of the decisions of 1166 and 1170, nor indeed to Paul, for whom our physical death is less certain than our resurrection (‘we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed’—1 Cor. 15:51). Another key anthropological dimension of Behr’s thought, however, goes in a seemingly opposite direction, bound up with the ‘embrace’ and ‘inscription’ of all human weakness, apostasy, and sin into God’s economy. The importance of this idea for Behr is hard to overestimate. In continuity with his resistance to positing any ‘event’ other than the Passion, the theological category of the ‘Fall’ or ‘apostasy’ from God is simply something else known retroactively through the Cross. It, like everything else, is seized by the embrace of God’s single economy of the Cross. Repeatedly, then, Behr elides the terms ‘weakness’ and ‘death’ with ‘apostasy’, ‘sin’, ‘disobedience’, and ‘darkness’.⁴² That there is often a strong connection ³⁸ ⁴⁰ ⁴¹ ⁴²

See, for instance, Behr (2013b), p. 24. ³⁹ Behr (2006), p. 35. Behr (2013b), p. 104. Cf. the title of Behr’s 2006 work, The Mystery of Christ: Life in Death. See, for instance, Behr (2006), pp. 34, 78–93; Behr (2016), pp. 45–50; Behr (2018b), p. 23.

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between these categories in the patristic and Byzantine tradition is hard to deny: death, after all is understood by Paul to be the ‘wages of sin’ (Rom. 6:23). But that they should be treated in every case as virtually identical is a different matter, and it is this latter position that seems to be taken by Behr. Behr notes that while truly catastrophic, death, sin, disobedience, and apostasy are also pedagogic: whether we approach them one way or the other is ‘but a matter of perspective’.⁴³ This may not be problematic, but it becomes so when the subtle yet important difference between ascribing pedagogical value to the fruits or consequences of sin (such as death)—a common patristic, Byzantine, and even scriptural trope (cf. Gen. 50:20)— and ascribing a pedagogical and thus positive quality directly to voluntary sin itself, is left unacknowledged. At one point Behr’s position leads him to conclude that voluntary sin, disobedience, and apostasy have in themselves a positive place in God’s economy and in ‘salvation history’. Behr generally resists the term ‘salvation history’ or Heilsgeschichte, pointing to its recent origin in nineteenth-century theology and the ‘historicist’ concerns that usually go along with it.⁴⁴ However, he repurposes the term in the context of his vision of God’s embrace of human weakness, sin, and apostasy, writing that through the encounter with Christ, we are invited to see our own past retold as our own ‘salvation history’. In this, nothing is forgotten or left aside, as being somehow worthy only of being left behind, something that we would prefer to forget as too shameful or painful, but which even as ‘forgotten’ continues to work negatively in our present. Rather, everything is encompassed within his economy.⁴⁵

The inclusion of sin, apostasy, and disobedience within the divine economy is a means for Behr of ratifying God’s presence and work in every human story. It is a compelling and pastoral approach that deserves serious theological reflection. Our apostasy and sin now become ‘the arena in which God works’.⁴⁶ To be successful, however, this idea must surely incorporate the deep and inescapable theology of repentance (μετάνοια) that characterizes the Biblical and patristic witness. Repentance is in fact a theme that is rarely addressed in Behr’s work, and it does not play any explicit role in his approach to this question, although his notion of ‘the practice of death’ could perhaps be inflected in terms of repentance. The idea of the inscription of sin and apostasy

⁴³ Behr (2016), p. 55. ⁴⁴ See Behr (2006), pp. 142–4. ⁴⁵ Behr (2006), p. 143. This trope in Behr’s thought is connected with his rejection of any ‘Plan A/Plan B model’ in approaching God’s economy: the Cross of Christ is Plan A, there was never a Plan B, and indeed even thinking in these terms is inadmissible. See Behr (2018b), pp. 21, 27–8. This strong affirmation of the foreordained necessity of God’s single economy of the Cross which encompasses all of history makes it easier to see why for Behr all of human sin must also ultimately be seen as part of the one ‘plan’ of the divine economy of salvation. ⁴⁶ Behr (2006), p. 89.

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into the divine economy is, however, even pushed so far as to be given an eschatological colouring: the ‘eschatological point’ is described as that at which the work of God completed on the Cross (which itself is the eschata for Behr) is extended by Christians (the ‘wounded healers’) to the whole world, ‘from which the whole of the world, and all the histories that are asserted in it, can be seen as encompassed within his economic providence’.⁴⁷ There is a curious tension between Behr’s insistence on the ‘disappearance’ of Christ’s (and our) human properties in the act of ‘becoming human’ through death on theone hand, and the enfolding of apostasy, sin, and disobedience into the divine economy of our own individual ‘salvation history’ on the other. Behr taps into the ascetic impulse of the patristic and Byzantine tradition to speak of becoming ever more aware of our sinfulness through the ‘practice of death’ as one way to explain what he means.⁴⁸ But the language of sin and apostasy being themselves inscribed within, and embraced or encompassed by God’s salvific economy, even in an eschatological sense, is rather foreign to this tradition. It relies in part on the equation of the language of ‘weakness’ with the language of ‘sin’, and indeed, one of Behr’s chief scriptural supports for his idea is 2 Corinthians 12:9–10, where Christ’s strength ‘is made perfect in weakness’ and where Paul declares ‘when I am weak, then am I strong’. But the patristic and Byzantine theological tradition taken as a whole, ascetic or otherwise, while recognizing a connection between weakness and sin, is always likewise insistent on distinguishing them. Indeed, Paul himself lists the weaknesses he has in mind in this passage (infirmities, reproaches, necessities, persecutions, and distresses for Christ’s sake), none of which is itself ‘sinful’ or ‘apostate’. Are these qualities or characteristics that Behr sees as enfolded and inscribed into God’s economy not instances precisely of the false and ‘anhypostatic’ properties that should in no way be truly attributed either to Christ’s humanity or, by extension, the humanity of the deified? In a strange way, this aspect of Behr’s thought also appears to clash with the decisions elaborated by the Byzantines in 1166 and 1170. In the end, his particular elision of weakness and sin has more of a Lutheran or Reformed than a patristic or Byzantine ring to it.⁴⁹

⁴⁷ Behr (2006), p. 144. ⁴⁸ See Behr (2006), p. 143–4. ⁴⁹ Take for instance Luther’s characteristic statement that ‘if it is not absurd to confess and believe that Christ was crucified among thieves, then it is not absurd to say as well that He was a curse and a sinner of sinners’, thereby making the weakness of the crucifixion equivalent to saying that Christ is ‘sinner of sinners’ and indeed, for Luther, ‘the only sinner’: Martin Luther, 1535 Galatians Commentary 3.13. We find a similar concern in Calvin’s Institutes, e.g. 3.15.5: We experience such participation in him [Christ] that, although we are still foolish in ourselves, he is our wisdom before God; while we are sinners, he is our righteousness; while we are unclean, he is our purity; while we are weak, while we are unarmed and exposed to Satan, yet ours is that power which has been given him in heaven and on earth to crush Satan for us and shatter the gates of hell.

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Of the preceding chapters, Chapter 4 on Symeon the New Theologian provides a strong counterpoint to what we find in Behr on this issue. Symeon’s lifelong concern with what was termed the ‘heresy of mediocrity’ involves resistance to exactly this theme, so prevalent in Behr’s understanding of human salvation: for Symeon, the tyrannies of sin and apostasy were never to be considered acceptable elements of human identity and were irreconcilable to the human ideal. Moreover, the emphasis on physical death as the only means to truly ‘enter life’ is in marked tension with Symeon’s at times aggressive insistence on the attainability of human perfection in this life, even as a precondition for attaining it hereafter. Connected to this, Symeon’s devotion to the sanctification of every human faculty and property—including all the bodily members—after the pattern of, and through participation in, the ever-present and living humanity of Christ, contrasts strongly with Behr’s apparent unconcern for our natural human properties in their encounter, on our own way to Emmaus, with the ever-vanishing Christ. In terms of the constraints Behr places upon his project, further tensions appear. By frequently enforcing a sharp dichotomy between the ‘modern’ view of history as ‘what really happened’ and the possibilities of a ‘postmodern’ retrieval of a premodern approach, something important may well be gained through creative rereadings of the text. However, something is also inevitably lost, for the simple reason that ‘premoderns’, including early Christians, did in fact believe in more than one historical ‘event’ in the life of Jesus as well as the ultimate significance of these events, even if their understanding of ‘historicity’ may well have been somewhat different from a straightforwardly modern view.⁵⁰ By his univocal focus on the event of the Passion, Behr confines the possibilities of theology and anthropology to a relatively small space, and swiftly dismisses what does not accord with this space. On this model, the work of theology and anthropology risks becoming a purely literary exercise, one developed out of the scriptural witness to the single historical event and insight of the Cross (ingeniously combining one text with another), yet always ‘entombed’ by the constraints of Behr’s first principle. To reiterate, Behr’s exhilarating recovery of the centrality of Christ and his Passion in the earliest Christian sources for the work of theology and

In each case there is an equation of two categories (sin and weakness) that does not reflect either the scriptural text or early Christian exegesis. Even other important passages that might be marshalled in support of Behr’s cause, such as ‘he was made sin who knew no sin’ (2 Cor. 5:21) are consistently interpreted in the patristic tradition in terms of bringing about the end of sin, abolishing or wiping it out, not (as Behr appears to argue) inscribing it into the divine economy and into eschatological reality. ⁵⁰ Behr at one point describes the distinction, following S. Brock, in terms of ‘dynamic’ and ‘static’ views of history when discussing the figure of Mary, dismissing the latter (who Mary historically ‘really was’) in favour of the former (Mary understood in the light of Christ’s work): Behr (2006), pp. 130 and 139–40n23.

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anthropology is an impressive feat full of creativity and flair. His work on anthropology can be seen as a large-scale rendering of Paul’s striking desire to know nothing except ‘Jesus Christ and him crucified’ (1 Cor. 2:2). But Behr’s consistency in bypassing questions of historicity through an absolute concentration on the event and significance of Christ’s death (at the expense of all other events) leaves him with essentially only one tool for the work of theology and anthropology: literary analysis.⁵¹ To be sure, it is a literary analysis ordered around the Cross and Scripture’s proclamation of Christ Crucified (especially as this is recorded in the New Testament and the first Christian centuries), but the resulting content remains distinctly literary precisely because ‘history’ and any ‘sequence of events’ in Christ’s life or ours is sidelined or redefined beyond recognition. As a consequence, the definition of true and perfect humanity as articulated in Byzantine theology (and centred on the person and work of Christ also before and after the climactic event of his Passion) is called into question. If Christian existence prior to death is positively made up only of the ‘practice of death’, and if becoming a human being in the eschatological sense completely coincides with physical death, then we are faced with a rather different concept of human perfection than that which has been unearthed in the preceding chapters here. Confronted with the thought of Maximus, Theodore, Symeon, and Gregory Palamas, we are certainly not faced with a homogenous monolith. Their thought also does not offer us an obvious or ready-made personalism to take as a point of departure for theological discourse. But the in-depth studies of their approach to questions of human perfection through the humanity of Christ have at least demonstrated an elegant harmony that taken together should lay to rest any suspicions or reservations regarding the Byzantine theological tradition as somehow taken up with a cloudy mysticism that forgets its Christological roots and bearings. Human perfection, the human ideal, is always configured Christocentrically in these authors, towards the acquisition of ‘the stature of the fullness of Christ’ (Eph. 4:13). The concept of ‘fullness’ contains several radical affirmations: first, from the chapter on Maximus, the reception by the deified of the fullness of God (to the point of calling into question the standard ‘epektatic’ narrative of Byzantine and Orthodox spirituality); second, from the chapter on Theodore, in that reception, the safeguarding and fulfilment of created human identity (down to the continuity of all natural human properties no longer subject to corruption); third, from the chapter on Symeon, the potential to participate proleptically but truly (‘in knowledge, action, and contemplation’) in this gift here and now in the life of the Church; and fourth, from the chapter on Gregory Palamas, the

⁵¹ I am grateful to the late Fr Matthew Baker who first alerted me to the strongly ‘literary’ approach to theology in the work of Behr.

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immutable centrality of Christ’s ‘worshipped body’ as the locus of divine life and energy for all, both now and forever. To proceed, Orthodox theological anthropology must hold fast to this vision of Christ’s fullness, the abiding icon of the God-man, made known and imparted to us by the goodwill of the Father and the descent of the Holy Spirit. This does not mean a wholesale discarding or discrediting of the many creative and influential contributions made to Orthodox theological anthropology over the past century—not least the efforts of Orthodox theologians of the stature of Lossky, Florovsky, and Zizioulas. But it represents a call to keep the attention of such work going forward carefully and unapologetically on the person of Jesus Christ as the living author, anchor, and finisher of the faith. As Sakharov put it, ‘I cannot know myself if I do not have before me his holy image’, that is, the image of the fullness of Christ.⁵² To realize one’s humanity involves (as Behr rightly insists) self-denial, dying daily before the image of perfection that Christ has depicted for us in the frailty of our nature. If his image is distorted, set aside, or somehow superseded in Orthodox discourse on human perfection, then the path that Orthodox theological anthropology takes might indeed progress ad infinitum, but it will be a progression that leads nowhere. If the yearning of the human heart and mind for divine and ineffable rest is not a hopeless fiction, and if the desire to taste a repose ‘not of this world’ yet experienced in this world (and even in this body) is not a simple flight of the imagination, then the fulfilment of this yearning and desire, according to the Byzantine theological tradition, lies solely in and through the humanity of the Son of God, to whose blessed estate all are summoned, receiving the divine glory by becoming ‘members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones’ (Eph. 5:30).

⁵² Sophrony (1988), p. 117.

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Scriptural Index For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages.

Genesis 30 91n.33 Leviticus 16:31 63 23:32 63 Joshua 10:12 61–2 2 Samuel 21 74–5 Job 38–41 174–5 Psalms [LXX] 26:7 ix 35:9 152 43:10 142 44:3 105–6 59 55 81:6 125 139:14 138 140:4 149 Proverbs 22:28 60 23:10 60 Isaiah 8:18 195n.141 61:2 72 Matthew 5:48 170–1 8:17 99–100 12:50 142 13:43 195–6 22:1–14 140–1 22:30 124–5 Mark 1:24 171–2 3:35 142 12:25 124–5 Luke 1:28 143–4 2:52 46 4:19 72 8:21 142–3 10:42 174 11:28 142 14:13–35 207–8 20:36 124–5 24:39 82, 90–1 John 1:10 165–6 1:12 182 1:13 182, 190 1:16 187–8 3:6 182 6:38 106 6:57 103 8:31–32 13

10:10 74n.118 10:35 125 14:8 197 14:20 124 14:21–3 179 17 195–6 17:22 12–13 19:30 46, 205 Acts 2:36 208n.33 2:44 106 5:31 55 17:21 60 Romans 5:1–5 167–8 6:23 210–11 8:17 104 1 Corinthians 1:24 178 2:2 213–14 2:6 170–1 2:9 50 2:9–10 79 10:11 55, 79 13:9 79 13:12 81 15:20, 23 183 15:28 50 15:48–50 82 15:51 210–11 2 Corinthians 5:16 90–1, 207–8, 208n.33, 209–10 5:17 170–1 5:21 99–100 8:9 14 12:2 76–7 12:9–10 212 Galatians 2:20 65, 167–8 Ephesians 2:1 8 3:6 104 3:10 185–6 4:12 96–7 4:13 vii, 7, 70, 79, 81, 190, 214–15 5:30 215 Philippians 3:13 49, 51 Colossians 1:15 134 1:28 170–1 2:9 46, 183–5, 188 3:3 149–50

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236 1 Timothy 2:5 91–2, 195–6 2 Timothy 3:12 55 Titus 2:12 55 Hebrews 1:3 186 2:5 124–5 2:10 37 2:11 104 2:13 195n.141 4:9 45 7:3 77–8

Scriptural Index 10:14 1 12:28 48 1 Peter 1:9–11 73–4 1:12 128, 186 2:22 99–100 1 John 1:1 197 3:2 49, 110 Revelation 1:8 39 21:23 192–3 22:5 192–3

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Index of Names and Subjects For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages. Akindynos, Gregory (see Gregory Akindynos) anti-Palamite thought 154–69 apokatastasis (see universal salvation) apophaticism 2, 15, 25, 155–6, 176–9 Apollinarius of Laodicea 94–5 ascension 46, 100–1, 188–9, 203, 205, 208–10 asceticism 19, 25–6, 55–6, 57n.50, 62–3, 102, 104, 117–18, 133, 157–8, 162–3, 171, 212 baptism 65n.90, 101, 189–91, 206 Barlaam of Calabria 154–60 Behr, John 4–5, 9–10, 29, 50n.27, 204–15 Bengtsson, Jan Olaf 16–17 Berdyaev, Nikolai 22–3 Blowers, Paul 54–7, 68n.99, 77–8 body (see also human properties, persistence of, and Eucharist) 48–9, 55–6, 62, 65, 71, 81n.141, 82–3, 90–1, 121–2, 125–6, 130–2, 137–8, 148, 167, 171 Body of Christ (see also Eucharist) 15, 137–8, 179–93, 207–8, 214–15 Bowne, Borden Parker 19–20 Bulgakov, Sergius 23–5, 35–6, 46n.18 Christocentrism 8–11, 205–6, 210, 214–15 Christology anhypostatic properties 212 applied to anthropology 134–8 Chalcedonian 198, 209–10 enhypostatic properties 200–2 hypostatic and natural properties 86–92 Climacus, John (see John Climacus) Constantine V 86 Constantine of Corfu 200–2 conceptual distinction (κατ᾽ ἐπίνοιαν) 200–2 Constas, Maximos 57n.54, 68, 78n.133, 80n.140, 156n.15 corruption 214–15 Creator–creature distinction 172–5, 203 Daley, Brian 54–6 Daniélou, Jean 43 death 206–11, 213–14 deification (see also grace) 198–200, 202–4, 206–7, 212, 214–15 as beginning now 116–20, 213–15

as Christocentric doctrine 31–4, 58–61 as distinct from the hypostatic union 33–4, 187–9 and immutability 58–64 as in tension with epektasis 46–7 as ‘literal’ 33–4 as supernatural 64–70, 179–93 as surpassing angelic state 124–8, 185–6 and the retention of natural properties 64–8, 119 desire (see passions and emotions, and epektasis) Dionysius the Areopagite 47, 155–6, 161–2, 170–1, 175n.81, 180n.94, 181n.97, 185–6 Dostoevsky, F. 18–19, 23–4 emotions (see passions and emotions) energies, divine (see essence–energies distinction) epektasis 42–4, 127n.57, 188–9, 214–15 epinoia (see also conceptual distinction) 118 epistemology 169–79 eschatology 64–76, 147–9 essence–energies distinction 152–3, 172–6, 180–2, 187, 189–91 Eucharist 101–4, 124–7, 134–7, 141–4, 183–5, 207–8 Evagrian spirituality (see Origenism) ever-moving rest 70–6 ‘Father is greater than I’ controversy 197–203, 208–10 flesh 206–10 Florovsky, Georges 3–9, 10n.23, 22–3, 25–6 215 freedom (see also gnomic will (γνώμη)), 13, 22–3, 29–30, 66, 68 fundamentalism 6–7 gender (see also human properties, persistence of) 94, 206n.23 Gallaher, Brandon 13n.29 Gavrilyuk, Paul 5–6 Gillet, Lev 24–5 gnomic will (γνώμη) 61n.69, 66, 69–70 Godmanhood 34–9

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Index of Names and Subjects

grace 66–8, 73, 76–8, 149–50 as uncreated 175, 180n.95, 189–90 Gregoras, Nikephoros 160 Gregory Akindynos 159–64 Gregory of Nazianzus (the Theologian) 10n.21, 31–2, 60, 61n.71, 64, 71, 76–7, 90–1, 129n.58, 209–10 Gregory of Nyssa 178 and epektasis 47–9, 51–2 on human nature 88, 208n.33 Gregory Palamas (see Palamas, Gregory) Griffiths, Paul 44–5 Harper, Demetrios 80n.140, 192n.131 Henry, Michel 206–7 Hesychasm and Hesychast Controversy 154–61 history and historicity 22–3, 208–11, 213–14 Holy Spirit 31–2, 115, 118, 128, 133–5, 140, 150–1, 154–5, 191 human nature 85–92 human properties, persistence of (see also ‘Father is greater than I’ controversy) 73, 87–8, 90–2, 119, 131–2, 137–8, 198–200, 207–11, 213 hypostasis 11–16, 86–92 icons and iconoclasm 82–4, 86–92, 209–10 Illingworth, J. R. 21–2 image of God (imago Dei) 128–34 images (see icons and iconoclasm) imagination (φαντασία) 91, 120–2, 199–200 imitation of Christ 9, 18, 106–7, 143–4 Incarnation (see also Body of Christ) 199–200 intellect (see nous) intellectualist spirituality 87, 107, 114–15, 155–7, 170–5 Irenaeus of Lyons 49–50, 205–6 isochristoi 58n.58 John Climacus 52–3 John of Damascus 201–2 Kierkegaard, S. 18 Knudson, Albert 19–20 LaCugna, Catherine 164 Larchet, Jean-Claude 28 Leontius of Byzantium 87–8 logoi, doctrine of 60, 71n.106, 181n.97 Lossky, Vladimir 165–6, 215 Loudovikos, Nicholas 57n.50 Louth, Andrew 18–19 love 80, 133–4, 146–7

Mantzaridis, George 9–10 Manuel I Komnenos 197–9 Mary, Virgin (see Theotokos) Maximus the Confessor 53–81, 203, 214–15 and apokatastasis 54–7 on eschatological deification 64–76 and ever-moving rest 70–6 and liturgy 56–7 on the Sabbath and eighth day 61–4 on the three births 65n.90 mediocrity 213 Messalianism 120, 122–3 methodology 3–8 Meyendorff, John 6, 154 mimesis (see imitation of Christ) monasticism 104–9 mortality 200–3, 206 mutability 59–61 natural and supernatural 35–6, 73, 156–7, 172–5 Nellas, Panayiotis 9–10 neo-patristic synthesis 3–8 Niketas Stethatos 112–13, 124 nous 61–3, 131–3, 166–7, 183 Nyssa, Gregory of (see Gregory of Nyssa) Origen of Alexandria 50–1 Origenism 36–7, 50–3, 58n.58, 69–71, 80n.140, 87, 127n.57, 170 original sin 97–101 Palamas, Gregory 203, 214–15 life of 154 on apophaticism 176–9 on deification (including divine light) 179–93 on epistemology and essence–energies distinction 169–79 Palamite Controversy 154–61 Papanikolaou, Aristotle 4–5 participation 50–1, 187–91 passions and emotions 62–3, 115, 120–2, 157–8, 200–1, 209–10 Passion of Christ 199–200, 204–9, 213–14 Pelikan, Jaroslav 6 person and personhood (see hypostasis, personalism) personalism 11–16, 89–90, 144–9, 204–5, 214–15 Philokalia 18–19 Plested, Marcus 3n.1, 163n.34, 186–7 Popović, Justin 26–7, 36 Pringle-Pattison, Andrew Seth 21 problem of evil 211–12

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Index of Names and Subjects reason (see intellectualist spirituality and nous) repentance 60 rest 61–4, 70–6 resurrection 55–6, 65n.90, 90–1, 96, 205, 207–10 Romanides, John 6 Russell, Norman 33–4, 154n.4, 166, 180, 186–7 Russian religious philosophy 22–3 Sabbath rest 61–4 sacraments (see baptism, body, and Eucharist) Sakharov, Sophrony 45–6, 81, 215 satiety (κόρος) (see Origenism) second coming of Christ 208–9 sin 56n.48, 97–100, 151, 201n.12, 203, 206, 210–13 Slavophile thought 18–19, 23–4 Solovyov, Vladimir 34–5 Steenberg, Matthew (Irenei) 10n.21 supernatural (see natural and supernatural) Symeon the New Theologian 203, 213–15 life of 111–13 on angelic versus Christocentric ideal 124–8 on conscious experience 118–24 on eschatology 147–9 on the Eucharist 124–7, 134–7, 141–4 on the image of God 128–34 on Mary 138–44 on mediocrity 116–20 and Messalianism 120, 122–3 on relating dogma and anthropology 134–8

239

Symeon the Pious 111–13 Synodikon of Orthodoxy 199 theodicy (see problem of evil) Theodore the Studite 203, 209–10, 214–15 life of 83–5 on deification 103–4 on the Eucharist 101–4 on human nature 85–97 on Mary 92–7 on monasticism 104–9 on original sin 97–101 on sanctification 101–4 theosis (see deification) Theotokos 92–7, 138–44 Thomas Aquinas 180n.95 trinitarian theology 2–3, 9–10, 12–14, 18–21, 131–3, 164–6, 186–7 tripartite soul and image of God 131–2 universal salvation 36, 52–7, 64, 100–1 virgin birth 208–9 will (see freedom and gnomic will (γνώμη)) Ware, Kallistos 42 Yannaras, Christos 10n.21, 11–12, 14, 18–19, 28, 42–3, 165–6 Zizioulas, John 9–13, 27–31, 89–90, 146, 165–6, 215