Palamian Theology go beyond his predecessors?

[Ghosty]

It seems to me that a lot of this is a problem of not understanding the terms and how their meanings differ between the traditions.

Taking the Latin tradition, and Thomism in particular (which I’m very familiar with), there is still an infinite, unbridgable gap between “God as God knows and Loves Himself”, and our Knowledge and Love of God which we have by Divine Participation. In this system, God’s Essence can be known, but not comprehended, and “Divine Essence” basically means “Divinity itself”.

So while we have a real knowledge of the Divine Essence, the mode of our knowledge is fundamentally different than God’s own mode; we love and know God, but not as God does in Himself. We are participants in Divinity, but we never ARE Divinity, and that makes for a very significant difference.

Now, when it comes to the Essence/Energy distinction we’re dealing with Divinity and two different modes of being. The Essence is fundamental, infinite, unparticipated; it corresponds to the “infinite comprehension” of Divinity that, in Thomistic theology, only God has. The Divine Energies are God “expressed”, and can be received and participated in; they correspond to the mode of participation found in Thomistic theology. Our participation can be full, and we can be said to “see God face to face”, but we never exhaust or comprehend God, and we never know God in the eternal, infinite, and comprehensive way that God has Himself.

It’s important to recognize that the term “Divine Essence” in Latin theology, or at least Thomistic theology, largely encompasses both Essence and Energies in Palamite theology, since it is used to refer to both the participatable and the unparticipatable of God. Thomistic theology avoids confusion and heresy (saying neither that in participating in the Divine Essence that we become as the Divine Persons themselves, nor that we don’t truly participate in Divinity at all) by explicitely using the language of modality and comprehension.

Basically, both traditions developed their own language and expression to deal with the same nominalist errors and difficulties. Hopefully Badaliyyah will correct me on any errors in representing Palamas.

Peace and God bless!

P.S. Does anyone know where I could find the complete Triads in English? Does it even exist?

 

[Badaliyyah]

P.S. Does anyone know where I could find the complete Triads in English? Does it even exist?

I agree that much of this is a language problem, though as also you point out there are some real theological issues going on as well.

As for the Triads…to my knowledge they are not yet available in a full English translation despite the fact that Meyendorff’s critical edition is decades old now.

salaam.

 

[Ghosty]

I agree that much of this is a language problem, though as also you point out there are some real theological issues going on as well.

As for the Triads…to my knowledge they are not yet available in a full English translation despite the fact that Meyendorff’s critical edition is decades old now.

salaam.

There’s definitely a difference in theological approach. When I say “developed different languages”, I usually mean in the broad sense of theological schools of thought, and a system of terms to go with them, and not merely semantics. Comes from my time as an English tutor for ESL students, and learning that “languages” are more than words, but are actually different processes of thought. Sorry for any confusion, and I hope that clears up what I meant.

I do think in this particular discussion so far, however, that the terminological problem is a big factor in the misunderstandings.

That’s a bummer on the Triads. Guess I’ll have to go with the “Palamite Digest” versions for now. I just hate relying on such things; when I read the Summa, for example, I read the complete version with reference to the Latin text.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Catholic_Dude]

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.

A few issues here:
How can what is knowable not be inferior to what is unknowable? God can’t be unknowable and knowable at the same time, which is the reason for the distinction in the first place.

You say God’s activity is God, but at that point you have no room for a distinction if ‘who God is’ and ‘what God does’ are the same. This is the Catholic notion of Divine Simplicity.

Lastly, you say the Revelatory power is God and the Divinizing power is God…arent those the same thing anyway (Energies)?

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.

This is what I cannot wrap my head around. Even if you ‘know’ the Divine Nature you only really are knowing the Energies.
And how can Palamas affirm “just as much as Thomas” about knowing the Divine Nature when they mean two different things by that phrase? There are two definitions of “Divine Nature” here.

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.

But this can be understood two different ways.
(1)The Father is unknown Essence and the Son and Holy Spirit are known Energies.
(2)The Father, Son and Holy Spirit each fully possess both attributes.

The first option sounds illogical and almost heretical to me (eg the unknowable Essence is described as “Father”), thus only the second option will work.

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.

I honestly don’t know if this is orthodox Catholic theology or not. My gut intuition tells me we can know the Father just as directly as the Son and Holy Spirit, that is what the Beatific Vision is about. I’d like someone to step in here if they could on that with some Church documents.
But that isn’t even the main issue, if the Father corresponds to unknowable Essence then the idea of knowing the Father at all (even ‘indirectly’) is out of the question. Directing our thoughts at the Father and Praying directly to the Father is impossible at that point.

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.

My gut tells me this is not orthodox Catholic teaching. And, not to sound like a broken record, the Son cannot be a “mediator” in any relevant sense if the Father is unknowable. The way I see it (maybe I just don’t get it) is as if a curtain were used to cover an invisible object. The curtain “mediates” in so far as we could say “something” was behind it, but what is behind it never to be seen/known.

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.

To quote Obama’s words from last night: “This issue is out of my pay grade.” I am not informed enough on this specific point to respond in much detail. What I would say is that if God is Pure Act then who God is and what God does are identical.

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.

But the Divine Nature is only known in one aspect because only one aspect is knowable. It would be like saying you know that the box in front of you is a computer but you have no idea what is going on inside the box. You “know” the computer (Divine Nature), but you only really know the outside shell.

 

[mardukm]

Dear brother Catholic Dude,

Just a quickie. The very term “Beatific Vision” contains an inherent notion that is akin to the Eastern/Oriental distinction between essence and energies. As I understand it, the very word “Vision” was utilized for the very specific reason that though we can experience God in some way (according to Latin theology), it is still not DIRECT - a soul experiencing the Beatific Vision is still quite a ways off from having a full experience of the Divine that the Easterns/Orientals describe as God’s essence.

It is fine that the word “Essence” is defined differently among the Westerns and the Easterns/Orientals. Look at it this way:
That part (of the Western understanding) of God’s Essence that the soul can experience in the Beatific Vision would be analogous to the Eastern/Oriental understanding of God’s Energy. That part (of the Western understanding) of God’s Essence that the soul CANNOT experience in the Beatific Vision would be analogous to the Eastern/Oriental understanding of God’s Essence.

IMHO, we are all saying the same thing, but in different language.

Blessings,
Marduk

 

[Catholic_Dude]

It seems to me that a lot of this is a problem of not understanding the terms and how their meanings differ between the traditions.

Taking the Latin tradition, and Thomism in particular (which I’m very familiar with), there is still an infinite, unbridgable gap between “God as God knows and Loves Himself”, and our Knowledge and Love of God which we have by Divine Participation. In this system, God’s Essence can be known, but not comprehended, and “Divine Essence” basically means “Divinity itself”.

So while we have a real knowledge of the Divine Essence, the mode of our knowledge is fundamentally different than God’s own mode; we love and know God, but not as God does in Himself. We are participants in Divinity, but we never ARE Divinity, and that makes for a very significant difference.

Now, when it comes to the Essence/Energy distinction we’re dealing with Divinity and two different modes of being. The Essence is fundamental, infinite, unparticipated; it corresponds to the “infinite comprehension” of Divinity that, in Thomistic theology, only God has. The Divine Energies are God “expressed”, and can be received and participated in; they correspond to the mode of participation found in Thomistic theology. Our participation can be full, and we can be said to “see God face to face”, but we never exhaust or comprehend God, and we never know God in the eternal, infinite, and comprehensive way that God has Himself.

It’s important to recognize that the term “Divine Essence” in Latin theology, or at least Thomistic theology, largely encompasses both Essence and Energies in Palamite theology, since it is used to refer to both the participatable and the unparticipatable of God. Thomistic theology avoids confusion and heresy (saying neither that in participating in the Divine Essence that we become as the Divine Persons themselves, nor that we don’t truly participate in Divinity at all) by explicitely using the language of modality and comprehension.

Basically, both traditions developed their own language and expression to deal with the same nominalist errors and difficulties. Hopefully Badaliyyah will correct me on any errors in representing Palamas.

Peace and God bless!

I think I understand what you are saying, but I don’t think it corresponds to the EO notion of Essence/Energies.

The way I see you describing the Thomist position is as follows: When it comes to me ‘knowing’ you, all I can go by is your appearance/actions but I cannot know your intimate thoughts directly as you know them. However, you CAN convey your intimate thoughts (Catholic Essence) to me in a very real way through your actions (Catholic Energies). Your actions give me a genuine understanding of your intimate thoughts. Your intimate thoughts are knowable, even if it isn’t exhaustive nor exactly as you know them. How you act IS who you are.

The Palamite model says what is going on in your mind cannot even begin to be known by me and thus your intimate thoughts will remain secret. Your outward actions (Energies) can be objectively nice, polite, hand shake, etc but these actions do not correspond to nor reveal your intimate thoughts (Essence). How you act and who you ARE NOT identical.

On that Christian Order article he mentions the “Names” of God. In Catholicism these names (eg God is good) correspond to a reality of the Essence. In Eastern Orthodoxy the Names can only describe the Energies and cannot describe the unknowable indescribable Essence.

P.S. Does anyone know where I could find the complete Triads in English? Does it even exist?

There is one on Amazon, but I’m thinking about getting it from my local library.

 

[Ghosty]

Catholic Dude: It’s not the intimate thoughts that would represent the Essence, but the comprehension of them, the “being” those thoughts. You can know my thoughts, but you can’t have my thoughts as I do; we have a fundamental difference in mode of knowledge regarding those thoughts.

You can know my mind, but not in the manner that I can. On the other hand, I can know my mind in both ways (I can directly think/be that mind, and I can also capture the ideas on paper and read them back). I can’t convey my mind to you as it is in itself without you becoming me.

So it’s not that the inimate thoughts are “the unknowable”, but the mode of those thoughts, the being of those thoughts as a mind, my mind, that is “unknowable” to anyone aside from myself. I can comprehend myself, but nobody else can comprehend me (God obviously can, but we’re speaking on the level of creatures). You can participate in my thoughts when I share them with you, and we collaborate, and you gain insight into my mind, even intimate insight, but there will always be something about my mind that you can never truly know.

BTW, that book is the one we’ve been mentioning which is actually a collection of excerpts.

Peace and God bless!

 

[anthony022071]

I am not surprised that Marduk and others originally thought that the essence/energies distinction implied some sort of division in God. This seems to be the usual rhetoric against Palamas. But as Marduk pointed out, this is in fact, once one comes to read Palamas, the exact opposite of the role it actually plays in Palamas. The point is the unity of God in God’s revelation AND transcendence.

The essence-energies distinction does not make for unity of God’s revelation and transcendence. It makes for a division between God’s revelation and his transcendence. There is no reason to think that we can only know God through his energies or that there is such a distinction with God. God’s power and light are not distinct from who he is,or his essence. If God does not have such a distinction within him,then there is no reason to think that we cannot know his essence. God can communicate his essence to man if he pleases.

The light of Mount Tabor was a revelation of God’s essence as light,through light. Christ is “God from God,light from light”.

Christ told his apostles to remain in him,by keeping his commandments,so that he would remain in them. He was talking about a personal knowledge of God,a knowledge of communion with God’s being,not merely knowledge of God through energies.

If anyone says that we cannot know the essence of God,he is putting a limit on God’s ability to communicate himself to man.

 

[Aramis]

Until we experience the Beatific Vision, sometimes called the Rapture, we can not experience the totality of God’s existence.

We can experience God, directly, indirectly, inferentially, but never in totality. We can see parts of the “Essence” of God… but not the totality. The term “energy” is a misnomer; it’s really those limited perceptions of God that we get due to our limited nature.

Essence of God: the Totality which we hope to eventually attain.
Energies of God: those parts of God whose action we notice. They are not the totality of God, but we perceive them due to the Actions of God.

 

[East_and_West]

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.

And we Latins would agree that God is both God in se and God in act. However, because God is not composed as you and I are, but is supremely simple (his infinite nature demands such), then we argue that God in se and God in act are one and the same. He is pure act or Pure Actuality. In God there is not potential that need be reduced to Act because he is fully actualized.
.

 

[Badaliyyah]

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.

---

I don’t know what you are looking for in terms of Church documents. I have used VERY mainstream Latin theologians as examples in all cases. I suggest you look at Thomas on the Trinity (which occurs fairly early in the Summa), Thomas’s Christology, which includes includes his account of Christ’s knowledge of God (which is of course unique) (this occurs towards the end of the Tertia Pars) and probably his treatment of the knowledge of God in angels (since this is where he treats the intellectus in most detail).

I have also given examples from Bonaventure and Anselm who deny that beatitude can be fulfilled in the intellectus, in contrast to Thomas.

If Thomas is not Catholic enough for you, and you don’t like the positions of Bonaventure or Anselm (which are by no means identical), I don’t know who else to point you to that would be relevant.

It might also be helpful to take a sec and see what it is that the Latins are working with. For most medievals, including Thomas, types of knowledge can be broken down into more or less 3 kinds…

1. sensory knowledge: our experience of material things through the senses. For Thomas this is the necessary starting point for all knowledge in this life. This is not true for Anselm at all (who has very little time for sensation), and true in a modified way in Bonaventure. In any case you still need to do something with sensation to make it meaningful, and that is where ratio comes in.
2. ratio: this is discursive knowledge. This is what human beings actually use to reason about most things, though it is found in animals in a lesser degree (a squirrel problem solving about how to get food out of your bird feeder for instance). Discursive knowledge relies on distinctions and contrasts, division and definition, etc. It provides us with knowledge about an object, but it is not, in reality, full knowledge.
3. intellectus: human beings have intellect, but it is weak and mostly thwarted in its desire for fulfillment in this life according to Thomas. Intellect provides an immediate intuition of the essence of an object. We do not have intuitions of essences in most cases and certainly do not have it of God in this life. For Thomas this is the highest of human faculties and an intuition of essence is analogous to the way in which humans experience sensation. It is immediate, direct and lived. We do not know about red, we have a lived sensation of red. So also intuition would provide a lived sensation of the essence (it is thus probably not surprising that one of the few intellections that Thomas does think we have is of “human being”).

…

now the medievals contrast this understanding of the hierarchy of knowledge with the will. The will is the faculty of desire and act. For Bonaventure , the will is the highest human faculty because it is that by which we love.

…

For Thomas beatitude is given in the intellectus. That is to say, Thomas thinks we have knowledge of the Divine Nature in a full and meaningful sense. For Bonaventure, beatitude is a matter of the will: our relationship with Divinity is fulfilled in the ecstasy of Love, which is beyond any form of knowledge.

Just as a side note, Barlaam does not seem to rise up to the level of either of these. Barlaam’s thought seems stuck at the level of ratio. This is not surprising at the time and suggests the degree nominalism’s emergence in the 14th c. If there is no such thing as an essence then one does not need an intellectus in order to know it. On the other hand, many nominalists were influenced by Franciscan thought so the highest faculty in both God in humans was the will and human life was still fulfilled in love and act. Barlaam does not go that way either, trying to hold on to a form of rationalism (as opposed to intellectualism, which would be Thomas). And so he ends up with something repugnant to everyone. This is my understanding of Barlaam, but obviously I do not know his stuff first hand, though you see pieces of it in Palamas’s response.

salaam.

 

[Ghosty]

One thing to keep in mind is that St. Thomas didn’t leave Love out of the equation. On the contrary, Love (charity) is what unites us to God, and is itself a supernatural, formal participation in Divine Love. The main difference that St. Thomas had with folks like St. Bonaventure is that St. Thomas had an important role for the intellect in our union with God.

In this I actually tend to agree with St. Thomas; I believe it’s fundamentally impossible to love what you don’t know. St. Thomas’ position is also supported by Scripture:

From 1 John 3:

2] Beloved, we are God’s children now; it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.

and from 1 Corinthians 13

9] For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect;
10] but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away.
11] When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways.
12] For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood.
13] So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

This second passage is interesting because it shows the interplay between the intellect and the will, knowledge and love. It also compares our knowledge now with the knowledge that is to come, which will be perfect.

The first passage is very explicit in saying that we shall know God, IMO, as “seeing Him as He is” is very much the classical language of knowing a subject.

This is one area where I think the extremely apophatic theologians miss out, and I think it has to do with to strong an emphasis on the kind of knowledge we have now in this life, and not being able to step beyond those limitations to consider what “pure knowledge” would be. I think that in the next life, there will hardly be a gap between perfect knowledge and perfect love; they will practically be one and the same thing, especially with regard to God, who is pure knowledge and pure love.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Badaliyyah]

A few issues here:
How can what is knowable not be inferior to what is unknowable? God can’t be unknowable and knowable at the same time, which is the reason for the distinction in the first place.
…
This is what I cannot wrap my head around. Even if you ‘know’ the Divine Nature you only really are knowing the Energies.
And how can Palamas affirm “just as much as Thomas” about knowing the Divine Nature when they mean two different things by that phrase? There are two definitions of “Divine Nature” here.
…
But the Divine Nature is only known in one aspect because only one aspect is knowable. It would be like saying you know that the box in front of you is a computer but you have no idea what is going on inside the box. You “know” the computer (Divine Nature), but you only really know the outside shell.

In fact God [Divinity] is Unknowable and Knowable at the same time which is why God is essence/energy. This goes right along with the affirmation that God is transcendent and immanent, hidden and revealed…essence and energy. The essence/energy distinction is not a way of avoiding this, its a way of affirming it.

As for the claim that what is Unknown must be higher than what is Known that is your issue, it does not belong to Palamas. Palamas is very clear that the revelations and divinizations of God are just as much God as God in the Unknowable stillness. Divinity is both.

God is known because God reveals Godself. We know God because God is dynamic. If God remained solely in the stillness, not only would we not know God, we would not be here to know God. God is known because God gives Godself to be known. The Unmoved stillness is not and cannot be given; what is given are the energies. If the Stillness of God were given to us, it would not be the stillness of God any longer. But, again, God is just as much God in the capacity for revealing and divinizing as God is in the stillness.

salaam.

 

[juliamajor]

This is an interesting discussion about theology. But being Latin rite I’m out of the loop- can anyone recommend a primer or introduction to Eastern theology that explains Eastern terms and ideas in user friendly ways ? Thanks

 

[Badaliyyah]

This is an interesting discussion about theology. But being Latin rite I’m out of the loop- can anyone recommend a primer or introduction to Eastern theology that explains Eastern terms and ideas in user friendly ways ? Thanks

I would recommend

Kallistos (Timothy) Ware,
-The Orthodox Church (isbn: 978-0140146561)
and
-The Orthodox Way (isbn: 978-0913836583)

as well as
Sergius Bulgakov
-The Orthodox Church (isbn:978-0881410518)

and for an overview of the history of theology

Vladimir Lossky
-The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (isbn: 978-0913836316)

salaam.

 

[anthony022071]

In fact God [Divinity] is Unknowable and Knowable at the same time which is why God is essence/energy. This goes right along with the affirmation that God is transcendent and immanent, hidden and revealed…essence and energy. The essence/energy distinction is not a way of avoiding this, its a way of affirming it.

Immanence and transcendence does not equate to a real distinction within God. It only means that God,being eternal spirit and the ground of all being,is present everywhere,and that he transcends our comprehension. But even though we cannot comprehend God,we can know his essence,because he has communicated it to us through his Word and he still communicates it through his Spirit.

As for the claim that what is Unknown must be higher than what is Known that is your issue, it does not belong to Palamas. Palamas is very clear that the revelations and divinizations of God are just as much God as God in the Unknowable stillness. Divinity is both.

If God’s essence is unknown,then nobody can say that it is stillness. Nor can anybody say that it is distinct from energies. You can’t define the boundary of something that you have no knowledge of.

God is known because God reveals Godself. We know God because God is dynamic. If God remained solely in the stillness, not only would we not know God, we would not be here to know God.

How do you know that the essence is still? Anything which is alive has movement within.

God is known because God gives Godself to be known. The Unmoved stillness is not and cannot be given; what is given are the energies.

God cannot give his essence? Is God limited in his ability to give something good?

If the Stillness of God were given to us, it would not be the stillness of God any longer. But, again, God is just as much God in the capacity for revealing and divinizing as God is in the stillness.

The essence of God still remains itself when it is given to man,because it does not cease to be God when it is given. When God gives himself,he does not detatch from himself.

See post 48.

 

[Badaliyyah]

God cannot give his essence?

If it is given, its revealed, at which point you are no longer talking about the Unknown, but the Known; no longer talking about God’s transcendence, but about the immanence; no longer talking about the essence, but the energies. Of course in all these cases you are talking about one and the same Divinity [Divine Nature].

This is not a particularly hard concept. We say the Logos is the revelation/Mind/Word of the F and we do NOT mean by that that the Logos is the F. We know the F in and through the Logos by the power of the HS.

We reveal ourselves in word and action, but the self, the “I”, remains unseen and unseeable. We know it (rather indirectly) in the revelation.

Please refer to earlier posts on the relation of the essence/energy distinction to the Divine Nature.

salaam

 

[anthony022071]

If it is given, its revealed, at which point you are no longer talking about the Unknown, but the Known; no longer talking about God’s transcendence, but about the immanence; no longer talking about the essence, but the energies. Of course in all these cases you are talking about one and the same Divinity [Divine Nature].

If God reveals his essence,it does not cease to be transcendent.
It remains transcendent simply because it is eternal and we are limited. Transcendence is not the same thing as the unknown. We are not neo-Platonists who believe in a God that does not communicate himself to man. God is one and is spirit which is everywhere,so there is no dichotomy between immanence and transcendence. The transcendent is revealed to us and yet remains beyond our comprehension,like the atmosphere we breathe remains beyond what we can take in.

This is not a particularly hard concept. We say the Logos is the revelation/Mind/Word of the F and we do NOT mean by that that the Logos is the F. We know the F in and through the Logos by the power of the HS.

The Logos is one in being with the Father. Jesus expected the apostles to know that the Father was in himself.

John 14:
5
Thomas said to him, “Master, we do not know where you are going; how can we know the way?”
6
Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
7
If you know me, then you will also know my Father. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”
8
Philip said to him, “Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.”
9
Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you for so long a time and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?

We reveal ourselves in word and action, but the self, the “I”, remains unseen and unseeable.

That statement is contradictory. If we reveal ourselves in word and action,then our self can be seen.

Jesus said that the apostles had known and seen the Father.
Jesus does not suggest that there is an essence of the Father distinct from the Father who can be seen.

We know it (rather indirectly) in the revelation.

The Incarnation was a direct revelation,and infused grace,in the form of the Holy Spirit,can give direct knowledge.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

Catholic Dude: It’s not the intimate thoughts that would represent the Essence, but the comprehension of them, the “being” those thoughts. You can know my thoughts, but you can’t have my thoughts as I do; we have a fundamental difference in mode of knowledge regarding those thoughts.

You can know my mind, but not in the manner that I can. On the other hand, I can know my mind in both ways (I can directly think/be that mind, and I can also capture the ideas on paper and read them back). I can’t convey my mind to you as it is in itself without you becoming me.

So it’s not that the inimate thoughts are “the unknowable”, but the mode of those thoughts, the being of those thoughts as a mind, my mind, that is “unknowable” to anyone aside from myself. I can comprehend myself, but nobody else can comprehend me (God obviously can, but we’re speaking on the level of creatures). You can participate in my thoughts when I share them with you, and we collaborate, and you gain insight into my mind, even intimate insight, but there will always be something about my mind that you can never truly know.

I’m not disputing that God knows Himself in a way we don’t know Him (God is a separate being than us), but that is not the same as not knowing at all and not fully knowing. What I am questioning is whether your description is what the Palamite model is saying.

If God cannot fully be known in the sense that we are finite and can only comprehend a finite amount, then I believe that fits fine. However, if it means an aspect of God cannot be known at all, as if there was a fence we could see but not what was behind it, I don’t believe that fits the notion “we shall see God as He is”.

This goes back to the “Names” of God. That link I keep mentioning gives this quote as an example:
9. “But He Who is beyond every name is not identical with what He is named; for the essence and energy of God are not identical.” (Gregory Palamas, TheTriads, p. 97)
The means that any Names we give to God (as imperfect as they are) never correspond to His Essence. Calling God anything only applies to the Energies while the Essence is beyond description.
11. “Now this union with the illuminations [which is the divinizing experience of the “saints”] – what is it, if not a vision? The rays are consequently visible to those worthy, although the divine essence is absolutely invisible, and these unoriginate and endless rays are a light without beginning or end. There exists, then an eternal light, other than the divine essence; it is not itself an essence – far from it! – but an energy of the Superessential.” (Gregory Palamas p. 100)
This is similar to that fence analogy I gave. We know “something” is behind the fence, but that’s about it. This is not “seeing Him as He is.”

BTW, that book is the one we’ve been mentioning which is actually a collection of excerpts.

That’s terrible, why do they do that. Just give the complete text if it is already in English.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

I’m busy the rest of the night and maybe even tomorrow, so I will try to get back on here asap and read the rest of the posts.