Palamian Theology go beyond his predecessors?

[mardukm]

Dear brother East and West,
"East and West:

mardukm:

This rhetoric of “the logical conclusion is…” is not very smart. What is the “logical conclusion” of the teaching that “the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God”? Is it that Christians are polytheists?

No because they are all “one in essence”. But the essence energies distinctions actualy creates a being separate from God that is not one with his essence.

You have actually proven the point of my criticism. You can only rebut the charge of polytheism by appealing to the TOTALITY of the teaching on the Trinity, not the little snippet of the teaching that non-Christians utilize.

Likewise, for you to properly understand the Eastern position that “Essence IS God/Energy IS God,” you need to go beyond the little snippet of that phrase, but give heed to the TOTALITY of the teaching on the matter. I will attempt to that for you below.

No. The members of the Trinity are one in “essence” and not separated from it like the supposed “energies” are.

I am not an Eastern, but an Oriental, so I don’t particularly accept the Eastern language of “Essence IS God/Energy IS God.” However, I have tried to understand it, and I believe it is a legitimate and orthodox development within Eastern Christianity and perfectly in the spirit of patristic Catholic Christianity.

First, you have to understand the purpose of the Essence/Energies distinction. It is the Eastern/Oriental attempt to understand the idea that God is wholly seperate from Creation, yet somehow we are able (or have been permitted by Grace) to participate in divinity. As the Fathers who use the distinction have attested, the distinction is merely a mental aid for the weak human mind to grasp the utter Mystery of salvation (i.e., divinization). The Fathers do not say that there is an ACTUAL distinction WITHIN the Godhead, but only that the human mind makes the distinction as an aid to understanding the mystery.

The common understanding between Easterns and Orientals on the Essence/Energies distinction diverged ever so slightly in the high middle-ages. The present position of Eastern Christendom (Catholic and Orthodox) developed out of Palamas’ debate with Barlaam of Calabria in the 14th century. Barlaam (in opposition to both Catholic and Orthodox teaching) proposed that God cannot be experienced at all by the believer. To combat that heresy, Palamas taught that believers REALLY DO experience God, but only in His Energies. From here, the language of “Essence IS God/Energy IS God” started coming into vogue in Eastern Christendom, as a way to insist that the believer DOES actually experience God Himself. As far as I can see, at this point, there is still no attempt to actually impose the distinction as a REAL distinction WITHIN the Godhead. The distinction is still explained very much in terms of what HUMANS experience, in perfect accord with the teaching of the Fathers.

However, in modern Eastern Orthodoxy (not Eastern Catholicism), I have noticed an even further development regarding the Essence/Energies distinction. I have seen the Essence/Energies distinction actually utilized in the debates against filioque. As far as I know, even (St.) Gregory Palamas himself did not go this far (though I have read somewhere - don’t know if it’s true - that the Eastern synod that dogmatized his teachings attempted to do so). The argument goes that what proceeded through the Son was merely the Energies of God, and not his Essence. When I had read this from some EO apologists in this forum, I thought to myself, “WHOAAA!!! That is going too far. You’re actually proposing that the distinction ACTUALLY exists WITHIN the Godhead.”

Anyway, from my fallible understanding, you cannot accuse (St.) Palamas, nor Palamite theology, of imposing an ACTUAL distinction WITHIN the Godhead. You simply cannot do that if you consider ALL the points of Palamite theology. However, I would be all over anyone who uses the Essence/Energies distinction in the debate on filioque, and would charge those particular people with the same accusation you have wrongly and indiscriminately proposed against Eastern Christianity in general.

My Eastern Catholic brethren. if I have misrepresented the Eastern teaching in any way, please correct my (mis)understanding.

Blessings,
Marduk

 

[Badaliyyah]

Dear brother East and West,
…

I am not an Eastern, but an Oriental, so I don’t particularly accept the Eastern language of “Essence IS God/Energy IS God.” However, I have tried to understand it, and I believe it is a legitimate and orthodox development within Eastern Christianity and perfectly in the spirit of patristic Catholic Christianity.

First, you have to understand the purpose of the Essence/Energies distinction. It is the Eastern/Oriental attempt to understand the idea that God is wholly seperate from Creation, yet somehow we are able (or have been permitted by Grace) to participate in divinity. As the Fathers who use the distinction have attested, the distinction is merely a mental aid for the weak human mind to grasp the utter Mystery of salvation (i.e., divinization). The Fathers do not say that there is an ACTUAL distinction WITHIN the Godhead, but only that the human mind makes the distinction as an aid to understanding the mystery.

The common understanding between Easterns and Orientals on the Essence/Energies distinction diverged ever so slightly in the high middle-ages. The present position of Eastern Christendom (Catholic and Orthodox) developed out of Palamas’ debate with Barlaam of Calabria in the 14th century. Barlaam (in opposition to both Catholic and Orthodox teaching) proposed that God cannot be experienced at all by the believer. To combat that heresy, Palamas taught that believers REALLY DO experience God, but only in His Energies. From here, the language of “Essence IS God/Energy IS God” started coming into vogue in Eastern Christendom, as a way to insist that the believer DOES actually experience God Himself. As far as I can see, at this point, there is still no attempt to actually impose the distinction as a REAL distinction WITHIN the Godhead. The distinction is still explained very much in terms of what HUMANS experience, in perfect accord with the teaching of the Fathers.

…

Blessings,
Marduk

I want to make a couple of notes here…

First I think we should take a look at a couple of different ways in which we make distinctions in God. One the one hand, we might say that God is Mercy and God is Justice (recalling the Anselm discussion on another thread). Here we are talking about divine attributes, and it is generally understood, in Anselm (e.g.,) among others that when one makes these distinctions, the distinctions themselves are entirely conceptual and subjective because Justice in God and Mercy in God are one and the same thing.

Then we make distinctions like that between the 3 persons or between persons and essence in God. Here we understand the distinctions to be not only subjective but also, somehow, objective.

I would say the essence/energy distinction is closer to the second than the first. (And, thus, I believe I am disagreeing with Marduk, if I understand him correctly).

Now part of the problem here is that Palamas’ use of the word essence, and the Byzantine usage more broadly, does not map onto Latin usages of essentia very well. We see this in the way E&W is using the term for instance: for E&W any distinction between essence and energies means something separate from God’s being because essence defines ‘what-it-is’. That is not exactly how the term is being used here.

The ‘what-it-is’ for Palamas is Godhead, or Divinity. This Divinity, for Palamas, has two modes: its energies, in which it gives itself towards creation as revelation-divinization, and its essence, in which it remains in the inner stillness which transcends all knowing. This is analogous to the 6 days of creation which then culminates in the rest of God. God’s activity and God’s stillness. God’s immanence and God’s transcendence. God’s revelation and God’s Unknowability.

It is, of course, the case that both are God. God is essence and energy. This is what it is to be Divinity.

Now while we do make a distinction between the Divinity (the Divine Nature) and the Persons, the Divine Nature only exists hypostatically. So ultimately the essence/energies distinction is going to need to play out there in order to be meaningful. That being the case, the F is the unseen essence of God and the S and HS are the revelation of the F (energies). [While the Cappadocians do not always share the precise language, this does map on well to Cappadocian accounts of the Trinity, especially with regards to the F.]

Finally, for most of the Byzantine tradition, divinization takes place through our participation in Divinity (i.e., in the Divine Nature). [A notable modern exception, and good clarifying contrast, is Zizioulas who argues that we are divinized through our participation in Person, and in particular in the Person of the Logos, not through the Divinity.] Divinization is the personification of Divinity in a finite being: God became anthropos so that anthropos might become God. This is possible because God does not remain in the Unknowable stillness but flows out, as the energies, and creates and divinizes the creation. The way in which we encounter Divinity, of necessity, is in the energies. [The famous examples here, of course, are the Transfiguration and the overshadowing of Solomon’s Temple.]

I hope that is as clear as mud.

salaam.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

I am glad E&W made this thread. I am still struggling with the Essence/Energies issue, AS I UNDERSTAND IT it doesn’t sit well with how I understand the Catholic Church’s teaching on God.

First I think we should take a look at a couple of different ways in which we make distinctions in God. One the one hand, we might say that God is Mercy and God is Justice (recalling the Anselm discussion on another thread). Here we are talking about divine attributes, and it is generally understood, in Anselm (e.g.,) among others that when one makes these distinctions, the distinctions themselves are entirely conceptual and subjective because Justice in God and Mercy in God are one and the same thing.

While I would agree with this claim, the last sentence would not fit the Essence/Energies model as I understand it. The Essence and Energies are not one in the same thing, that is precisely why this distinction was made.

Then we make distinctions like that between the 3 persons or between persons and essence in God. Here we understand the distinctions to be not only subjective but also, somehow, objective.

True, but I would say this still doesn’t compare to the Essence/Energies distinction.

I would say the essence/energy distinction is closer to the second than the first. (And, thus, I believe I am disagreeing with Marduk, if I understand him correctly).

I don’t think you can say “closer to” because those examples don’t compare. In fact I would say the first example is closer to the Essence Energies distinction.

Now part of the problem here is that Palamas’ use of the word essence, and the Byzantine usage more broadly, does not map onto Latin usages of essentia very well. We see this in the way E&W is using the term for instance: for E&W any distinction between essence and energies means something separate from God’s being because essence defines ‘what-it-is’. That is not exactly how the term is being used here.

This is interesting because I understand it it as E&W does. If that is NOT the way it is being used, then I don’t think there is a real problem in the first place.

The ‘what-it-is’ for Palamas is Godhead, or Divinity. This Divinity, for Palamas, has two modes: its energies, in which it gives itself towards creation as revelation-divinization, and its essence, in which it remains in the inner stillness which transcends all knowing. This is analogous to the 6 days of creation which then culminates in the rest of God. God’s activity and God’s stillness. God’s immanence and God’s transcendence. God’s revelation and God’s Unknowability.

It is, of course, the case that both are God. God is essence and energy. This is what it is to be Divinity.

This is also interesting because you seem to have introduced a third factor here. I understood the Essence to be Divinity (Divine Nature), yet here you say Divinity is expressed as Essence and Energies.

You mention the term “Unknowability,” and that is where I think the problem rests. The Essence for EO (as I understand it) is something that can NEVER be known by man, it is impossible. For Catholics (as I understand it) God is unknowable only in so far as He has not revealed all and that our finite minds can only grasp a very limited amount. For EO it would be like asking a blind man to see the sun, for Catholics the man is squinting at the sun and can only take in a finite amount.

Now while we do make a distinction between the Divinity (the Divine Nature) and the Persons, the Divine Nature only exists hypostatically. So ultimately the essence/energies distinction is going to need to play out there in order to be meaningful. That being the case, the F is the unseen essence of God and the S and HS are the revelation of the F (energies). [While the Cappadocians do not always share the precise language, this does map on well to Cappadocian accounts of the Trinity, especially with regards to the F.]

I don’t think this works, it puts the Father in one class and the Son and Holy Spirit in another class. The Father shouldn’t be known at all, which is problematic (eg the Theophanies, Jn 12:28ff).

Finally, for most of the Byzantine tradition, divinization takes place through our participation in Divinity (i.e., in the Divine Nature). A notable modern exception, and good clarifying contrast, is Zizioulas who argues that we are divinized through our participation in Person, and in particular in the Person of the Logos, not through the Divinity.] Divinization is the personification of Divinity in a finite being: God became anthropos so that anthropos might become God. This is possible because God does not remain in the Unknowable stillness but flows out, as the energies, and creates and divinizes the creation. The way in which we encounter Divinity, of necessity, is in the energies. [The famous examples here, of course, are the Transfiguration and the overshadowing of Solomon’s Temple.]

This seems very heretical to me on many levels. Your ‘exception’ above is slightly different than what you propose at the end. IF I AM reading this correctly, you are in essence (no pun intended) saying man is divinzed through participation of only Son and Holy Spirit with the Father being unknowable.

I don’t think East & West misunderstood the main concept behind the Essence/Energies distinction, and I don’t think I did either. What I never realized until now (and I don’t feel comfortable with it at all)-and I wonder how official this is-is how you placed the Father in the Essence class and the Son and Holy Spirit in the Energies class.

 

[Badaliyyah]

You mention the term “Unknowability,” and that is where I think the problem rests. The Essence for EO (as I understand it) is something that can NEVER be known by man, it is impossible. For Catholics (as I understand it) God is unknowable only in so far as He has not revealed all and that our finite minds can only grasp a very limited amount. For EO it would be like asking a blind man to see the sun, for Catholics the man is squinting at the sun and can only take in a finite amount.

The issue of unknowability in the West is largely mediated through the work of Ps.Dionysius.

1. While Thomas is of course famous for making Intellectus the highest faculty and thus Knowability a perfection of Being, Thomas is not the only Latin theologian. But even if we stay with Thomas for a moment, one must still keep in mind that there is a distinction between Intellectus and Ratio, and we only ever know God by Ratio in this life: i.e., through finite things, distinctions and discursion. Intellectus would involve an intuition of essence. We do not have this of God and while Thomas seems to think we have it of a few objects, it is not many and it is debateable whether even this claim is consistent with Thomas’s epistemology (see, e.g., Rousselot’s Intellectualism in Thomas Aquinas. Ultimately though, in the Beatific Vision we do in fact have this intellectual intuition. Still keep in mind, human beings cannot rationally know God. Rationality can only produce analogy. Thomas’s position, in the end, has little actually in common with PsDionysius despite frequent citation and knowledge of the corpus.
2. There are then a class of thinkers who don’t fair well in the Latin tradition who think that Knowing is the pinnacle of how we achieve a relationship with something, BUT then goes on to say that even this must be surpassed. Though nothing human can do so. Eckhart and Eriugena fair worst, both having propositions from their writings condemned posthumously (Eckhart’s would have been humous (sic) if he had just lived a little longer). Nicholas of Cusa though is very close to these thinkers and not only is not condemned but thrived in his little idiosyncratic world (ultimately being named a Cardinal) and then was largely ignored by the centuries. *
3. Another group, taking their lead from Augustine and Anselm, deny that God is ultimately knowable to human beings, but say that God is loveable. Thus God is NEVER known, but God is loved and we are united to God through Love. Bonaventure would be the sanest version of this insofar as knowledge retains a crucial role, only being surpassed at the very end of the ascent of the soul to God. Up until that point knowledge is raises us higher and higher towards God, finally burning out and falling away before the glory of the Divine. Obviously Bonaventure’s system is one of the crown jewels of Latin Medieval thought.

A similar but different tradition runs from Augustine through Bernard and the Victorines. Here knowledge has very little positive role. The tradition is largely anti-intellectual, and knowledge is negated culminated in the “Cloud of Unknowing” (a title taken from one of PsD’s works) where we love God. The anonymous author of the Cloud and Denys the Carthusian are the most notable proponents of this tradition.

[It is interesting that it is really ONLY this group that avoids trouble with the powers that be in the Middle Ages.]

In any case there is a variety of ways to say, in Latin, that God is absolutely Unknowable (the most popular being that we don’t know God, but we do love God).

salaam.*

 

[Badaliyyah]

The Essence and Energies are not one in the same thing, that is precisely why this distinction was made.

Now part of the problem here is that Palamas’ use of the word essence, and the Byzantine usage more broadly, does not map onto Latin usages of essentia very well. We see this in the way E&W is using the term for instance: for E&W any distinction between essence and energies means something separate from God’s being because essence defines ‘what-it-is’. That is not exactly how the term is being used here.

I am not sure how to reconcile your last statement that you don’t think you misunderstood the issue, when you say earlier that you had understood Divinity to be entirely synonymous with essence in Palamas and yet it is not.

In any case, I think this is the crucial issue and the one that Latins most often stumble over. For Palamas, there is a primary distinction with secondary distinctions occurring within those:

1. Divinity ] -a. essence
   -b. energies
2. Person ] -a. Father
   -b. Son
   -c. HS

Notice the word essence is not being used as a constrast term to Person. Thus, the essence and the energies are both God.

salaam.

 

[DoxRox]

I’m probably going to kick myself later but for now…

I had the essence/energy distinction explained pretty simply to me: that we became by grace (the energies of God) what He is by nature (the essence of God). In other words, we “partake of the divine nature.”

To be quite honest, I don’t find myself thinking like this, but of course God works the way He works whether I acknowledge it or not.

However, in modern Eastern Orthodoxy (not Eastern Catholicism), I have noticed an even further development regarding the Essence/Energies distinction. I have seen the Essence/Energies distinction actually utilized in the debates against filioque. As far as I know, even (St.) Gregory Palamas himself did not go this far (though I have read somewhere - don’t know if it’s true - that the Eastern synod that dogmatized his teachings attempted to do so). The argument goes that what proceeded through the Son was merely the Energies of God, and not his Essence. When I had read this from some EO apologists in this forum, I thought to myself, “WHOAAA!!! That is going too far. You’re actually proposing that the distinction ACTUALLY exists WITHIN the Godhead.”

I have never ever heard of this. Ever. I don’t normally check out places where EO apologists would be on this forum, but I’d imagine I would have the same reaction.

What we they preferring to? His Transfiguration? Certainly, not the Holy Spirit.

 

[Badaliyyah]

I ran out of time and probably just should have waited to make the original post…instead I must add the following as a clarification and an attempt to anticipate objections.

I am not sure how to reconcile your last statement that you don’t think you misunderstood the issue, when you say earlier that you had understood Divinity to be entirely synonymous with essence in Palamas and yet it is not.

In any case, I think this is the crucial issue and the one that Latins most often stumble over. For Palamas, there is a primary distinction with secondary distinctions occurring within those:

1. Divinity ] -a. essence
   -b. energies
2. Person ] -a. Father
   -b. Son
   -c. HS

Notice the word essence is not being used as a constrast term to Person. Thus, the essence and the energies are both God.

Also, notice that essence/energies have a different relationship to Divinity than F,S and HS do to the category of Person. Divinity is essence and energy. Divinity is the primary term and essence and energies are the modes of Divinity as transcendence and revelatory-divinization.

On the other hand, there are 3 Persons: F, S and HS. They are the list of persons and there is no “personality” that is prior.

In other words there are not two Gods analogous to the manner in which there are three persons. There is one God (which is essence and energy) in three persons (F, S, HS).

salaam.

 

[East_and_West]

I ran out of time and probably just should have waited to make the original post…instead I must add the following as a clarification and an attempt to anticipate objections.

Also, notice that essence/energies have a different relationship to Divinity than F,S and HS do to the category of Person. Divinity is essence and energy. Divinity is the primary term and essence and energies are the modes of Divinity as transcendence and revelatory-divinization.

On the other hand, there are 3 Persons: F, S and HS. They are the list of persons and there is no “personality” that is prior.

In other words there are not two Gods analogous to the manner in which there are three persons. There is one God (which is essence and energy) in three persons (F, S, HS).

salaam.

So the essence energies are just “modes” of existing and are not really things?

 

[Badaliyyah]

…
I don’t think this works, it puts the Father in one class and the Son and Holy Spirit in another class. The Father shouldn’t be known at all, which is problematic (eg the Theophanies, Jn 12:28ff).

Finally, for most of the Byzantine tradition, divinization takes place through our participation in Divinity (i.e., in the Divine Nature). Divinization is the personification of Divinity in a finite being: God became anthropos so that anthropos might become God. This is possible because God does not remain in the Unknowable stillness but flows out, as the energies, and creates and divinizes the creation. The way in which we encounter Divinity, of necessity, is in the energies.

 

[Badaliyyah]

So the essence/]energies are just “modes” of existing and are not really things?

That’s right. It is a way of talking about the fact that one and the same God, in no way violating the unity of God’s “Godness” (Divinity), is at once revealed and beyond knowing; transcendent and immanent, etc., i.e., essence and energy. They are not two independent realities (i.e., things) or a multiplication of divinities. Deity (to play on the Latin Deitas) is essence/energies.

salaam.

[While it is NOT exactly the same idea, think of how perfect rest and pure act are one and the same in Thomas (via Aristotle): Actus Purus. God is at once that which is most fully active and at the same time, perfectly at rest.]

 

[Catholic_Dude]

In any case there is a variety of ways to say, in Latin, that God is absolutely Unknowable (the most popular being that we don’t know God, but we do love God).
salaam.

I don’t think this is correct. In Catholic theology God is not “absolutely unknowable” in Essence, otherwise the Beatific Vision is meaningless.

I am not sure how to reconcile your last statement that you don’t think you misunderstood the issue, when you say earlier that you had understood Divinity to be entirely synonymous with essence in Palamas and yet it is not.

I was responding to your paragraphs as I read them. At first you made it sound like something in which there would be no problem at all, but by the time I got to the end I realized that that E&W and I were originally not so far off the main concepts behind the Es/En.

You ‘introduced’ a third category (Divine Nature- consisting of Essence and Energies) but the main concept remained the same. (How the Divine Nature can be “made up of” two distinct modes is a new issue to deal with)

In any case, I think this is the crucial issue and the one that Latins most often stumble over. For Palamas, there is a primary distinction with secondary distinctions occurring within those:

1. Divinity ]
   -a. essence
   -b. energies

1. Person ]
   -a. Father
   -b. Son
   -c. HS

Notice the word essence is not being used as a constrast term to Person. Thus, the essence and the energies are both God.

What got me confused on this specific point was when YOU said:
**the F is the unseen essence of God and the S and HS are the revelation of the F (energies)
**This was a new twist I had never heard before. And I think it is erroneous as well.

I ran out of time and probably just should have waited to make the original post…instead I must add the following as a clarification and an attempt to anticipate objections.

Also, notice that essence/energies have a different relationship to Divinity than F,S and HS do to the category of Person. Divinity is essence and energy. Divinity is the primary term and essence and energies are the modes of Divinity as transcendence and revelatory-divinization.

On the other hand, there are 3 Persons: F, S and HS. They are the list of persons and there is no “personality” that is prior.

In other words there are not two Gods analogous to the manner in which there are three persons. There is one God (which is essence and energy) in three persons (F, S, HS).

salaam.

So what did you mean in that quote of the F, S and HS?
Here you appear to be saying the Father, Son and Holy Spirit each fully possess the “modes” of Essence/Energies.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

That’s right. It is a way of talking about the fact that one and the same God, in no way violating the unity of God’s “Godness” (Divinity), is at once revealed and beyond knowing; transcendent and immanent, etc., i.e., essence and energy. They are not two independent realities (i.e., things) or a multiplication of divinities. Deity (to play on the Latin Deitas) is essence/energies.

salaam.

If they are not two independent realities then how does the distinction exist in the first place? I guess I don’t know what you mean by “mode.”

When Catholics say ‘unknowable’ we mean, being finite, we can never fully grasp God, even in the very presence of the Beatific Vision. When EO say “unknowable” I get the impression the Energies act like a buffer or fence between creation and Essence, we can never see behind the Energies.

The Essence/Energies distinction, to me, is like holding up a visible curtain to hide something unknown and invisible.

While it is NOT exactly the same idea, think of how perfect rest and pure act are one and the same in Thomas (via Aristotle): Actus Purus. God is at once that which is most fully active and at the same time, perfectly at rest.

I’m not up on this issue, but I don’t think we can think of the terms “act” and “rest” in the human sense (eg God is outside of time).

 

[Badaliyyah]

I don’t think this is correct. In Catholic theology God is not “absolutely unknowable” in Essence, otherwise the Beatific Vision is meaningless.

I can assure you that St.Bonaventure thinks that the Beatific Vision is a union with the divine essence in Love and that it surpasses all knowledge. You can find it in the Mind’s Ascent to God, The Triple Way and many other texts. It became a staple of Franciscan theology and has predecessors in much of Augustinian theology. For example, Anselm argues that it is a perfection for God to be unknowable by reason of exceeding all knowledge because this is greater than being knowable. Knowledge implies a kind of comprehension and containment.

So what did you mean in that quote of the F, S and HS?
Here you appear to be saying the Father, Son and Holy Spirit each fully possess the “modes” of Essence/Energies.

What I mean by that is that Divinity is hypostasized as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. All three Persons are God. Now the manner in which divinity is hypostasized is a further question. Here I would say that there is a correlation between F and Essence and the S and HS (as the activity of the F) and the energies for reasons mentioned in a bit more detail in earlier posts. That said, Essence and Energy is (sic!) Divinity. It is not as if two different Gods are being hypostasized in the F on the one and the S/HS on the other. To beat a dead horse, one has to say that, at the very least, Palamas finds a solid platform from which to engage in further exploration, in the Trinitarian thought of the Cappadocians.
p.s. CatholicDude: I am not always clear what you mean when you say “I don’t think this is right”. Are you saying you don’t think it is a correct interpretation of Palamas, or that it is theologically mistaken. Those would obviously require two different kinds of responses. Thanks for your comments.*

 

[Badaliyyah]

If they are not two independent realities then how does the distinction exist in the first place? I guess I don’t know what you mean by “mode.”

When Catholics say ‘unknowable’ we mean, being finite, we can never fully grasp God, even in the very presence of the Beatific Vision. When EO say “unknowable” I get the impression the Energies act like a buffer or fence between creation and Essence, we can never see behind the Energies.

The Essence/Energies distinction, to me, is like holding up a visible curtain to hide something unknown and invisible.

I’m not up on this issue, but I don’t think we can think of the terms “act” and “rest” in the human sense (eg God is outside of time).

I would say that the creation vs. essence contrast is the wrong one to make. The contrast should be between creation and God (Divinity). When that is understood to be the fundamental contrast, then one can see that what Palamas is saying is that we do indeed participate in the life of God through the activity (energies) of God. The Unknowable God is Known and, in its Revelation (which is God), it remains Unknowable.

[As for your point about act and rest, you are absolutely correct. I was merely hoping to bring a similar logic to the distinction between essence and energies.]

salaam.

p.s. please stay tuned for my soon to be published book on Palamas. A few more posts and I think I’m there!

 

[East_and_West]

First, I have to say that I am glad to hear that the essence/energies are not really things but ideas that help Byzantine Christians understand God.

However, I have to agree with Catholic Dude when it comes to his objections to the essence/energies distinction.

1. It destroys the Catholic doctrine of the Beatific Vision, by creating a buffer between God’s essence and us.
2. The idea that the Father is the essence and that Son and the Holy Spirit are energies seems extremely dangerous. It tends towards an idea that the Holy Spirit and the Son are nothing more than demiurges (neo-platonism).
3. And I will add an extra objection. It appears that we are working backwards when we create this distinction. Rather than starting from the Creator and working towards creation, creations imposes the necessity of “energies” on God.
4. It contradicts the scriptures that state that “We shall see him face to face” and that “we shall see him as he is.”

 

[Badaliyyah]

First, I have to say that I am glad to hear that the essence/energies are not really things but ideas that help Byzantine Christians understand God.

However, I have to agree with Catholic Dude when it comes to his objections to the essence/energies distinction.

1. It destroys the Catholic doctrine of the Beatific Vision, by creating a buffer between God’s essence and us.
2. The idea that the Father is the essence and that Son and the Holy Spirit are energies seems extremely dangerous. It tends towards an idea that the Holy Spirit and the Son are nothing more than demiurges (neo-platonism).
3. And I will add an extra objection. It appears that we are working backwards when we create this distinction. Rather than starting from the Creator and working towards creation, creations imposes the necessity of “energies” on God.
4. It contradicts the scriptures that state that “We shall see him face to face” and that “we shall see him as he is.”

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1. see the post immediately above this one, where this is specifically addressed. Post #34
2. I said they were correlated. There is a need to be careful here and I apologize if my language has been sloppy. The F, S, and HS are Persons. With the energies, you are talking about the Divinity. Now of course the Divinity is always hypostasized, but we still make a distinction between Divinity and Person. The S and HS are not the energies (i.e., they are not the Divine Nature), they are two Persons in which Divine Nature is hypostasized.

Second, Divinization is about the Divine Nature being hypostasized in us and in all creation IN A FINITE WAY. This is the place where one sees the language of energies most often used: we participate in the energies - i.e., God’s activity towards creation. Of course it is through the personal activity of the S and HS that we are able to participate in Divinity.

In any case, such a correlation should not lead to the issue you describe (subordinationism) unless you somehow lose sight of the truth we have been hammering here: Divinity is essence/energies. The S and HS are hypostases of the same Divinity as the F.

1. I am not sure I understand this objection. Insofar as I understand it: no matter where you start methodologically, you are going to have to deal with the aporia of the Unmoved Creator, the Revelation of the Unknown God and so on.
2. This objection should pretty much be covered under point 1. No one is denying that you encounter the fullness of Divinity.

Moreover, to switch over to a Trinitarian vein, even in the Latin world this passage is NOT interpreted to mean that we see the F directly. The S is the ETERNAL mediator of the F. Human beings always need this mediation. They do NOT know the F directly and immediately. To return to Thomas, the Beatific Vision entails an intuition by the intellectus of Divinity, but it does not mean that you surpass the Trinitarian mediation of the S in relation to the F. The Son still mediates that relationship (along with the HS of course).

salaam.

 

[East_and_West]

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1. see the post immediately above this one, where this is specifically addressed. Post #34
2. I said they were correlated. There is a need to be careful here and I apologize if my language has been sloppy. The F, S, and HS are Persons. With the energies, you are talking about the Divinity. Now of course the Divinity is always hypostasized, but we still make a distinction between Divinity and Person. The S and HS are not the energies (i.e., they are not the Divine Nature), they are two Persons in which Divine Nature is hypostasized.

Second, Divinization is about the Divine Nature being hypostasized in us and in all creation IN A FINITE WAY. This is the place where one sees the language of energies most often used: we participate in the energies - i.e., God’s activity towards creation. Of course it is through the personal activity of the S and HS that we are able to participate in Divinity.

In any case, such a correlation should not lead to the issue you describe (subordinationism) unless you somehow lose sight of the truth we have been hammering here: Divinity is essence/energies. The S and HS are hypostases of the same Divinity as the F.

1. I am not sure I understand this objection. Insofar as I understand it: no matter where you start methodologically, you are going to have to deal with the aporia of the Unmoved Creator, the Revelation of the Unknown God and so on.
2. This objection should pretty much be covered under point 1. No one is denying that you encounter the fullness of Divinity.

Moreover, to switch over to a Trinitarian vein, even in the Latin world this passage is NOT interpreted to mean that we see the F directly. The S is the ETERNAL mediator of the F. Human beings always need this mediation. They do NOT know the F directly and immediately. To return to Thomas, the Beatific Vision entails an intuition by the intellectus of Divinity, but it does not mean that you surpass the Trinitarian mediation of the S in relation to the F. The Son still mediates that relationship (along with the HS of course).

salaam.

Thanks for the response. I have two more concerns.
First,
It appears that the essence is superior to the energies becasue the essence is God as he is and the energies is just God’s interaction with the world. It seems contradictory to claim that both are God (i.e. equal) when the definition of esence makes it superior to the energies.
Second,
I think that the essence/energies distinction introduces so many complications and possible contradictions into the divnity that need not be.
The Thomistic model works much better. In the Thomistic model, God is just God, which makes much more sense with regard to infinite nature. And man can participate in God but never becomes God by nature because we are finite and, thus, can never participate in all of God at once. We don’t run into all of the problems that the essence/energies distinction create.

 

[Badaliyyah]

I have two more concerns.

[Fifth],
It appears that the essence is superior to the energies becasue the essence is God as he is and the energies is just God’s interaction with the world. It seems contradictory to claim that both are God (i.e. equal) when the definition of esence makes it superior to the energies.

[Sixth],
I think that the essence/energies distinction introduces so many complications and possible contradictions into the divnity that need not be.
The Thomistic model works much better. In the Thomistic model, God is just God, which makes much more sense with regard to infinite nature. And man can participate in God but never becomes God by nature because we are finite and, thus, can never participate in all of God at once. We don’t run into all of the problems that the essence/energies distinction create.

1. I think we dealt with the issue of subordinationism in #2 above.

As regards the definition of essence in Palamas, I refer you back here.

Now that we have narcissistic self-citation out of the way, I will repeat that Divinity is essence/energies. One of the things the Byzantines are trying to do is avoid the claim that some how God is only God in se. God is also God-in-act. God’s revelation is just as much God as God at rest in the stillness of Being. God is God in being and act. The actions of God are not external to Divinity. God, for instance, really is Creator. Being Creator is not other to Divinity. So the whole point of the distinction is to avoid the implication that you are drawing.

1. This brings us to the fact that the Latin tradition fails to do this and one of the reasons this is the case is that they equate divinity with God in se. All the relations of God to creation are “ad extra” and do not touch the Divinity (i.e, the Divine Nature). They are accidental. I do not wish to engage in a detailed discussion of Thomas; I merely want to point out that these are not needless complications from the Byzantine standpoint and that there are, from the Byzantine standpoint, things that are lost by Latin theology.

Finally with regards to divinization I think it is fair to say that divinisation is a long standing and very traditional interpretation of salvation and was the most obvious implication of the Incarnation to Greek theology. I can understand that some Latins are uncomfortable with it. And theologians such as Zizioulas have shown that you can talk about divinization in ways other than Palamas’s. But Palamas’s manner of addressing the issue certainly has very deep roots in the Greek patristics, and his attempt to talk about how we participate in the divine nature is the great achievement of medieval Byzantine theology.

salaam.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

I can assure you that St.Bonaventure thinks that the Beatific Vision is a union with the divine essence in Love and that it surpasses all knowledge. You can find it in the Mind’s Ascent to God, The Triple Way and many other texts. It became a staple of Franciscan theology and has predecessors in much of Augustinian theology. For example, Anselm argues that it is a perfection for God to be unknowable by reason of exceeding all knowledge because this is greater than being knowable. Knowledge implies a kind of comprehension and containment.

We might be talking past eachother here. By the term “unknowable” I do not restrict this to “head knowledge,” partaking the Beatific Vision is a “knowing” of God in an active and intimate way which we cannot imagine at this point in our life – the Beatific Vision obviously does surpass intellectual knowledge.

Knowable means we will somehow experience God to the maximum extent our finiteness will allow. For Catholics this means experiencing the essence of God. For EO God’s Essence cannot be experienced by us at all, God’s Essence for the EO is unknowable in every conceivable way. God’s Essence technically cannot even be termed “Essence” for that implies some comprehensibility. The Energies, as great as they may be, are inferior to the Essence, because these Energies are knowable.

What I mean by that is that Divinity is hypostasized as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. All three Persons are God. Now the manner in which divinity is hypostasized is a further question. Here I would say that there is a correlation between F and Essence and the S and HS (as the activity of the F) and the energies for reasons mentioned in a bit more detail in earlier posts. That said, Essence and Energy is (sic!) Divinity. It is not as if two different Gods are being hypostasized in the F on the one and the S/HS on the other. To beat a dead horse, one has to say that, at the very least, Palamas finds a solid platform from which to engage in further exploration, in the Trinitarian thought of the Cappadocians.

I guess it is just confusing to me when you carry any correlation of the Essence/Energies over to the Persons themselves. It gives the impression the Father is unknowable while the Son and Holy Spirit are knowable. The fact Jesus taught us to call God “Father” goes against the idea of correlating the Father with the unknowable Essence.

I am curious how other Byzantines read this. I am not deeply attached to Lossky. So I am kinda curious if the Lossky crowd has a different reading of Palamas than the one I am presenting.

I only know Lossky from this article, and what it presents is a clear distinction between Essence and Energies and how it plays out in the Christian life:
christianorder.com/features.html

p.s. CatholicDude: I am not always clear what you mean when you say “I don’t think this is right”. Are you saying you don’t think it is a correct interpretation of Palamas, or that it is theologically mistaken. Those would obviously require two different kinds of responses. Thanks for your comments.

I have said that for multiple issues. What I mean is that what I am reading regarding any given topic does not seem to be a correct description by you based on how I understand the topic.

I would say that the creation vs. essence contrast is the wrong one to make. The contrast should be between creation and God (Divinity). When that is understood to be the fundamental contrast, then one can see that what Palamas is saying is that we do indeed participate in the life of God through the activity (energies) of God. The Unknowable God is Known and, in its Revelation (which is God), it remains Unknowable.

I don’t see how you changed the issue in any relevant sense, the fundamental contrast remains with the Essence/Energies distinction, and the fact it is a real distinction. The Energies is all we ever know, while the Essence cannot be known, the two cannot be confused. Like I said in my example, the Energies act like a visible curtain (indicating there is something ‘behind’ it), but what is behind it is invisible and unfathomable. The visible known compared to the invisible unknown are as different as night and day.

As for your point about act and rest, you are absolutely correct. I was merely hoping to bring a similar logic to the distinction between essence and energies.

The problem with bringing up other examples in this discussion is that the Essence of God is not even an abstract concept, it is an ‘unfathomable concept’ (if there is such a thing ). When we speak of rest and act in a enviroment without time that is speaking in an abstract manner.
(I don’t know if ‘abstract’ is the proper theological term)

p.s. please stay tuned for my soon to be published book on Palamas. A few more posts and I think I’m there!

I’ll see if my scraps can be considered a pamphlet on Barlaam.

 

[Badaliyyah]

Knowable means we will somehow experience God to the maximum extent our finiteness will allow. For Catholics this means experiencing the essence of God. For EO God’s Essence cannot be experienced by us at all, God’s Essence for the EO is unknowable in every conceivable way. God’s Essence technically cannot even be termed “Essence” for that implies some comprehensibility. The Energies, as great as they may be, are inferior to the Essence, because these Energies are knowable.

The energies are in no way inferior to the essence. What you are attempting to say would be equivalent to saying that Divinity is inferior to Divinity, or God is inferior to God. God’s activity is in no way inferior to God, but is in fact God: the Revelatory power of God is God (God reveals God); the Divinizing power of God is God.

Second, Byzantine theology in no way denies that we will have a living knowledge of the Divine Nature. You would be helped by using the term Divine Nature. When you refer to the Latin Beatific Vision and the intuition of essence that Thomas promises for instance, and then contrast it with what Palamas says about essence, you are not talking about the same thing. Palamas affirms, just as much as Thomas, that we “know” (pick a term) the Divine Nature (God, Divinity, Deitas, etc.). When Palamas says essence it is not strictly equivalent with Divine Nature because the Divine Nature is essence and energy.

Divinity is hypostasized as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. All three Persons are God. Now the manner in which divinity is hypostasized is a further question. Here I would say that there is a correlation between F and Essence and the S and HS (as the activity of the F) and the energies for reasons mentioned in a bit more detail in earlier posts. That said, Essence and Energy is (sic!) Divinity. It is not as if two different Gods are being hypostasized in the F on the one and the S/HS on the other. To beat a dead horse, one has to say that, at the very least, Palamas finds a solid platform from which to engage in further exploration, in the Trinitarian thought of the Cappadocians.

I guess it is just confusing to me when you carry any correlation of the Essence/Energies over to the Persons themselves. It gives the impression the Father is unknowable while the Son and Holy Spirit are knowable. The fact Jesus taught us to call God “Father” goes against the idea of correlating the Father with the unknowable Essence.

The correlation must be carried over somehow since Divinity does not exist on its own. It only exists in hypostasis. The only place we encounter Divinity is in some hypostatic reality.

Moreover, the idea that the F is unknown is not uniquely Byzantine. Returning to Thomas again, we do not and cannot know the Father directly. All knowledge of the Father is mediated by the Son. We are eternally dependent on the Logos for knowledge; the Logos is the knowledge of God; etc. (always in the power of the HS of course). The point here is that there is no direct and immediate knowledge of the F for creatures. We know the F through the Logos in the HS.

Thus, if we are to have an intellectual intuition of Divinity we have to have it in our encounter with the Logos. The Beatific Vision does not negate the mediation of the Logos. The intuition of the Divine Nature is not the same as direct knowledge of the F. The Logos is an eternal mediator before the F.

If I were a Byzantine (oh…wait), I would say Thomas is groping after some sort of distinction like that between energy and essence to talk about where and how we encounter the Divine Nature. This suspicion that Thomas could desperately use such a distinction would be reinforced when I started reading Thomas on creation and found him struggling to articulate how the activity of God towards creatures pertains to the Divine Nature (i.e., it doesn’t, because it does not belong to who God is in Godself). His concepts are just strained the breaking point here.

I would say that the creation vs. essence contrast is the wrong one to make. The contrast should be between creation and God (Divinity). When that is understood to be the fundamental contrast, then one can see that what Palamas is saying is that we do indeed participate in the life of God through the activity (energies) of God. The Unknowable God is Known and, in its Revelation (which is God), it remains Unknowable.

I don’t see how you changed the issue in any relevant sense, the fundamental contrast remains with the Essence/Energies distinction, and the fact it is a real distinction. The Energies is all we ever know, while the Essence cannot be known, the two cannot be confused. Like I said in my example, the Energies act like a visible curtain (indicating there is something ‘behind’ it), but what is behind it is invisible and unfathomable. The visible known compared to the invisible unknown are as different as night and day.

It changes it because it makes clear that the Divine Nature is known in the activity of God. The concern is that Byzantines are denying knowledge of the Divine Nature. They are not.