Grgoire Palamas

Gregory Palamas

Gregory Palamas ( 1296 - + 1359 ), saint for the Orthodox Church recognized by the Catholic Church (celebrated on November 14 ), developed in his mind the saying of the Fathers, that God became It summarizes a long tradition on this subject, to which he is faithful and that affects the most fundamental question of Christianity, that of salvation or the deification of man.

Life and work

The life of Gregory Palamas is known to us through his writings, but also by the Praise of Palamas composed shortly after his death by his disciple and friend Philothea Kokkinos , who was patriarch of Constantinople.

His childhood and the beginning of his vocation

Gregory Palamas was born in Constantinople in 1296. His parents were nobles of Asia Minor who, because of the invasion of the Turks, took refuge in Constantinople. His father, Constantine Palamas, was a senator and was part of the entourage of the Emperor Andronicus II Palaeologus. He died shortly after the birth of Gregory. Then the emperor, who took over his education and classical studies at Imperial College until the age of twenty years. Gregory chooses, probably before the end of its cycle of studies that was destined to serve the state, to become a monk and then abandon science Hellenic. The young man had been prepared by his monastic vocation of family piety. His parents knew the prayer of the heart, they went to Athos monks and had entrusted the spiritual education of their children. Thus Gregory enjoyed the spiritual paternity of a reputed master of prayer of the heart, Tholepte Philadelphia.

His departure to Mount Athos

Maybe it under his advice Palamas retired, to 1316, at Mount Athos. He was followed by his two brothers. As for his mother and two sisters, they also led a monastic life, but to Constantinople. Mount Athos, Gregory became the disciple for three years of Nicodemus, a monk hesychast who introduced him to a hermit's life. Following the death of the latter, Palamas decided to join the community of Great Lavra , founded by St. Athanasius of Athos. He remained there as a singer for three years, then he opted again for the solitary life. It took Gregory the Sinai spiritual father and went to stay among the hermitage hesychasts glossier. Around 1325, he was forced to flee due to incursions by Turkish pirates. Then in Thessaloniki he lived for several months with the disciples of Gregory of Sinai, who included two future patriarchs of Constantinople , Isidore (Bukhara) and Callisto. In Thessaloniki, he was ordained priest in 1326. Then Gregory went, accompanied by ten monks to found a hermitage Berrhe , where he followed the style of life adopted by hesychasts, devoting five days of the week to pure prayer in solitude and Saturday and Sunday services Liturgical with other monks at the hermitage. Around 1331, he had to flee again because of raids, Serbs this time. Gregory returned to the Holy Mountain , the hermitage of Saint Sabbas. There he began writing his first books. A little later, he accepted the position of abbot or superior to Esphigmenou Monastery.

The quarrel of the Filioque

Around 1335 , returning to the hermitage Sabbas St. Gregory Palamas wrote on the occasion of church union talks, its apodictic Treaty on the procession of the Holy Spirit, a book on the Trinity intended to repel any attempt doctrinal compromise with the Latins on the theme of the procession of the Spirit. In doing so, Gregory does not really refused the union of the Churches, he wanted above all to avoid a common doctrinal dummy, whose real issue was not theological but political. Indeed, some of his contemporaries were willing to sacrifice for the Orthodox faith to unite the Latin West and benefit from its military support to repel the invading Turks.

The theological controversy with Barlaam

From one thousand three hundred thirty-six - in 1337 , he came into conflict with the ideas of Italian philosopher and a monk named Barlaam the Calabrian. The latter was a professor at Imperial College and a specialist in Pseudo-Dionysius. His fame was great in Constantinople and many consulted in different fields of knowledge. Palamas wrote, between 1336-1337 and 1341 , a few letters, the Triads to defend the holy hesychasts and a Tome Hagiorite, works that reflect the controversy with Barlaam.

The conflict involved the question of knowing God can we know God other than through a demonstration, other than by reason alone from what God has created and maintains its footprint? For Barlaam, there was no better approach than this to know God, which in itself is absolutely unknowable, as Denys said. The study of the Scriptures in his eyes was of lesser importance. He began to violently criticize the practices of monks hesychasts practices, on which he had assumed that informed and another form of knowledge of God, a more intimate and personal, through the intervention of an uncreated grace of mind. For Barlaam, these practices indicate an ignorance on the part of hesychasts and he did not know about him without irony. The monks then asked Palamas to be their voice in this conflict where their spirituality was reduced to nil. Gregory knew Barlaam, he maintained a correspondence with him. He developed, from a careful reading of the Greek Fathers, a distinction in God between essence and energies imparticipable participating distinction stressing that God is really unknowable in itself, in its essence, as recalled by Barlaam, but that man is not forced so far to ignorance, because God in His goodness is revealed to him as in his energy where it is fully present and active. Barlaam did not accept this distinction. He tried to refute it with all the intelligence he was capable. The issue was finally discussed publicly June 10, 1341, during a council chaired by the emperor Andronicus III and the Patriarch of Constantinople, John Caleca. The council condemned Barlaam, who left Byzantium to return to Italy. However, the conciliar document was not signed by the Emperor, because of his death five days after the council.

The opposition to the theology of Palamas was not over. The relay was taken by Gregory Akindynos, which was perhaps a disciple of Palamas, in any case his friend and mediator in the early days of the controversy with Barlaam. For his part, he accepted hesychast spirituality while rejecting the radical distinction in God between essence and energies. The new regent, John Cantacuzino, who was in the service of the deceased emperor Andronicus III, a second council met while attending the same question in August 1341. Akindynos was condemned in its turn. The Tome Synod was officially released, but the patriarch John Caleca, who fiercely contested political authority of John Cantacuzino, agreed to sign the document while preventing new regent, but also the minor son of the emperor, namely, John V. , to do the same. This document does not yet contrasted the question definitively.

Conflict with Gregory Akindynos

This conflict over the regency while Constantinople led to a civil war from 1341 to 1347, which opposed John Cantacuzino a government nominally headed by Anne of Savoy, the widow of the emperor Andronicus III. During this period, the patriarch John Caleca Palamas persecuted because of his political sympathy for Jean Cantacuzino, and gave his support to Gregory Akindynos, which hastened to refute the theology in his Palamite Antirrhtiques. Palamas was imprisoned for his political positions in 1342 and excommunicated for his religious ideas in 1344. In captivity, he wrote several letters and his Seven Antirrhtiques Akindynos cons. Akindynos Gregory, meanwhile, was, despite his conviction in 1341 and the opposition of the empress Anne of Savoy and the imperial court, ordained by the patriarch John Caleca, whose ambition was to appoint a bishop, and in order to consolidate his authority over the followers of John Palamite Cantacuzino.

This period of religious and political crisis was resolved in 1347. Indeed, on February 2 this year, the Empress, aware that the Patriarch John Gregory Caleca Akindynos used for purely political, summoned a council comprising representatives of both parties in conflict. Patriarch John Caleca was condemned and deposed, and the Synodal Tome of 1341 it was confirmed. Accordingly, John Cantacuzino became co-emperor with the young John V, and until the majority of the latter, and monks hesychasts again received the support of the Church. Another council, chaired by John Cantacuzino and Empress, once again condemned the deposed patriarch John Caleca, Gregory excommunicated Akindynos and did publish another volume, which confirmed that of 1341. These two volumes were again confirmed by a third council held at St. Sophia a few weeks later.

Gregory Palamas, Metropolitan of Thessaloniki

It Isidore Bukhari, a friend of Gregory Palamas, who became patriarch of Constantinople. Gregory was then consecrated Metropolitan of Thessaloniki in May 1347. He could not however go into his episcopal city before 1350, because of its occupation by zealots who refused the imperial authority of John Cantacuzino. It's probably at this time that he wrote his 150 chapters physical, theological, ethical and practical form, with the Triads hesychasts Saints defense, his major work. Barely settled in Thessaloniki, Gregory was again confronted with a controversy with Nicephorus Gregoras , always on the same issues.

A new council, convened in June 1351 by Cantacuzino and Patriarch Callistus, who recently succeeded the late Isidore, approved again theology of Gregory Palamas and the distinction between essence and divine energies.

A second council did the same a few days later. The Tome Synod published August 15, 1351 endorsed these decisions now and excommunicated all those who did not accept the doctrine defended by Gregory Palamas.

Gregory Palamas was then able to devote himself to his job as bishop while remaining available to the emperor for mediation missions. In 1354 , while sailing to Constantinople to accomplish any of these missions, he was taken prisoner by the Turks and had to stay another year in Asia Minor busy. There was an opportunity to visit various Christian communities, but also conduct various debates with Muslims and Jews converted to Islam.

His ransom had been paid to the Turks, he returned in 1355 in Constantinople, where he met the papal legate Innocent VI , Paul of Smyrna , which came during talks with union of churches had been particularly reluctant to against theology Palamite. There was then, in the presence of the emperor John V and the papal legate, a new debate between Gregory Palamas and Nicephorus Gregoras. During this debate, the Byzantine authorities sought to show that the doctrine Palamite, according to the Fathers, was not an obstacle to the union of churches. After this debate, Gregory returned to Thessaloniki. Here he occupied himself mainly to preaching, but he also wrote between 1356 and 1358 his Four treated Gregoras cons.

A disease since 1352, Gregory died November 14, 1359 and was following a popular veneration constant, canonized in 1368. The cult of the saint's relics of the Byzantine Church has lasted until today in Thessaloniki. And Orthodoxy, a liturgy commemorates him on the second Sunday of Lent.

The Mystical Theology

Gregory was not looking as a writer religious beauty of style, but the expression of the truths he believed firmly (Triad 3, 1, 2). Generally, when addressing religious ideas to defend, he does so exhaustively, he returns repeatedly in different parts of his work, according to the arguments against its opponents and the biblical and patristic sources that confirm their opinions. This approach greatly enriches his writing, but is confusing to the modern reader, who constantly risk losing the thread of thought of Palamas in the profusion of conflicting arguments and references.

According to Palamas himself, the starting point of his doctrine, or rather the deepening of a doctrine he himself has received, is the fact that there are people, like Barlaam, who, Because of their inexperience of grace and their disbelief in those who show such an experiment, the saints of the Bible, the Fathers, and the hesychasts, reject the nature uncreated energies provided by the Spirit Saint (Volume Hagiorite). In other words, if a person like Barlaam rejects the possibility of a supernatural knowledge of God through communication of the uncreated energy because he has not himself experienced (3 Triads , 3, 3) and he does not trust most to those who have made it. But for Palamas, this experience of grace is the best proof of the existence of God and theological insights he defends (Triads 2, 3, 38).

Grace is an experience

Gregory insists on this aspect of the experimental result. His theology is to defend those who are now of divine energies, energies that words do not prove, but which remain visible in the works of Christ, but also those of the saints in its wake (Vol. Hagiorite). Palamas explains that despite the need for the controversy, it's hard to write on the theme of deification of man, precisely because it is above all an experience with God and, of an experience that exceeds everything so that intelligence can understand and be understood through words alone or the only reasoning (Triad 3, 1, 32).

Participation of man to divinity

The spiritual approach of Palamas is inscribed in the history of the Judeo-Christian revelation. It shows, in fact, that God has revealed and is even a way to progessive humanity. Indeed, Palamas compares the journey from the Old Testament to the New Testament to the current path leading from the New Testament to its fulfillment in the afterlife. He said the same as before only the prophets and those who heard them, saw the mysteries in the Spirit of the Law of Moses, the preexistence of the Word and the Spirit of God, before they are manifested in the revelation of the Trinity, while the others stopped their ears, well, now, only the saints and those who listen are the mysteries in the Spirit of the Gospel before they become fully evident in the afterlife, while some Christians do not want to hear about it.

But what are these mysteries evangelical seen by the saints and all those around them? The mysteries are those in which the Fathers speak, as the Pseudo-Dionysius, Maximus the Confessor and Pseudo-Macarius, authors Gregory appreciates strongly and consistently cited. They explain that God transcends surpasses, is beyond the deifying gift he made to man, divinity communicates to those who are worthy. It exceeds the deifying gift because it is the original source, the eternal cause. This is deifying grace, like God, uncreated and eternal. Unlike living beings and the world, the creatures and creation, this grace has no beginning in time. It has always existed in God. For the Fathers, we learn through deifying this is a light, which radiates around God, angels, but saints. It occurs to men who are worthy men who are most often at length prepared to receive it, but they receive no one can say that this predisposition, as meritorious as it is, is somehow the cause their enlightenment. The human being has no automatic way to get and let him shine in this light from God. Therefore it is always a grace, a favor from God to man, without the latter does not know the time of its manifestation. The Fathers teach us that even light spread joy in man, a spiritual joy, deep, ineffable, which is one of the clearest signs of the presence of God in man (Triad 3, 1, 36 ). In addition, this light is the beauty of the coming century, the Kingdom of God, eternal life. We reach here the performance of the mysteries of the Gospel was talking about Gregory, namely the final event and full of glory uncreated, the eternal light. That is the sign of the presence of God in all beings which he gave life. This is the transfiguration of all creation. The saint in this eschatological perspective is one that captures the spirit already, here and now, but not completely, this future reality. And all those who start listening and following his advice are also the beneficiaries (Volume Hagiorite).

God inaccessible in its essence but expressed

We have here the basis for this distinction in God who posed many problems to Gregory or rather to his opponents: God has revealed himself as Trinity, Father, Son and Spirit, but also, paradoxically, as an inaccessible God in itself, yet always and everywhere available in the gift to us of himself, his own life. This paradox is the foundation of the theology of Palamas, the distinction in God between essence and energy imparticipable participating from what God is in himself, from the beginning, not the beings created by him, and what God is for the creation and creatures, the universe and living beings, especially men, with whom he has always want to get in touch.

We must pause a moment on this theology, which is one of the best reflections of the human mind to justify the deification of man. For Palamas, there is actually a triple distinction in God: the Trinity, the essence and energy (Chapter 75), but these distinctions do not affect his unit because he is one triune God, living and acting in essence as in its energy. This threefold distinction is explained by the fact that the essence of God does not identified the three hypostasis or divine persons, Father, Son and Spirit, who share while maintaining existential rule over her (Triad 3, 2, 12), or energy, because it is the transcendent cause. The essence of God as a transcendent cause of energy features, summarizes and unifies in itself a multitude of energy, she is able to multiply without being divided into as many realities as there are participating participants (Triad 3, 2, 24-25), whether to create the world in all its diversity (Triad 3, 2, 26) or to deify men predisposed to the reception of grace (Triad 3, 2, 13 ). The uncreated energy, as an activity of God outside of himself, is absolutely inseparable from the essence, it carries and has no existence independent of it (Triad 3, 1, 24). Since God is indivisible, it is fully present in each of its energies. The smallest atom of energy gives us access to all of God and allows us to know and name (Triad 3, 2, 10-11). As the divine essence, it comes and it shows us, energy is omnipresent (Triad 3, 1, 34), therefore there is no one place in the universe where no one can find it and God himself. Finally, this energy will be fully revealed only at the end of time, as radiation of God in all things. The divine energy is the substance of the communication of God himself, so that other beings, created beings, humans in particular, can exist and enjoy life in abundance. In this sense, energy is an uncreated eternal purpose of God's goodness towards us (Triad 3, 2, 24).

The synergy between the will of God and man in salvation

This development begs a question, that of how, in the words of Palamas, be worthy of such grace. Or rephrased: what are the means that may predispose us to the reception deifying energy conscious? There are various ways that go together and which are constitutive of the Christian life. But before listing them, we must emphasize that this is never the means implemented by human activity. But man, by itself, is unable to deify. He needs God's activity, its repeated interventions in history as reflected in Scripture, the incarnation of the Son and communication power of the Spirit. On the contrary, God's saving activity is not sufficient either, because the man was set free and God refuses to compel even hello, this is quite freely that he must consent. But if neither human nor divine activity are insufficient for salvation, how to break the deadlock? In a joint activity of man and God that man should want to be saved and that God wants to save him, we must man synergy of business and that of God through the gift Standing of grace, energy, the Spirit poured out in him. Only through this collaboration, human and divine that the various means become beneficial to humans.

The alteration of the image of God in man

Among these means, it should first and before all the mysteries or sacraments of the Church, mainly baptism and the Eucharist, which Gregory said that our whole salvation depends on it (Homily 62). To understand this assertion, we must make a detour by the doctrine of the corruption of human nature by sin and its renewal by the Incarnation of the Word of God. This doctrine is based on the story of Genesis and the work of Christ after the New Testament. The sin of Adam, as original biblical figure and the human being, is the first demonstration of disobedience to God. It is for Palamas cause a corruption of humanity, in both senses of the word psychic and physical. By its eruption, sin causes death of the soul before the body, a mental disorder and a deprivation of the body. Indeed, Palamas consider sin as a distortion of the image of God in man, alteration by which man becomes incapable of being in the likeness of his Creator, to participate in the life of God (Chapter 39 ). However, this alteration of the divine image in man is actually a distortion of his intelligence, understood as the highest spiritual faculty of the soul faculty which enables man to know, to freely choice and guide throughout his life accordingly. This distortion has the effect of depriving the rights of a faculty that was his cause, that of seeing God (Triad 1, 1, 3) and then to join him. If by sin man lost this likeness, the divine life, and the visual capacity of the intelligence which united to God, it is provided by abandoned to its fate. There are of course all the divine intervention in the biblical story, but there is also and above the announced arrival of Jesus Christ. For Palamas, is precisely the opportunity for man to regain its original state and still more by the deification that the Word of God became flesh (Triad 1, 1, 22). Indeed, the hypostatic or personal union of the Son of God in human nature, this new and fully participates in the divine life (Triads 2, 3, 21). Taking flesh, becoming a full human, the Son was able to unite our fallen humanity to his divine person and restore himself by communicating his own divinity. What is prefigured in the Transfiguration and fulfilled in the Resurrection. We find in the Person of Christ the divine and human cooperation for the hello. According to the image of St. Paul, Christ the new Adam, that is to say the new man, nor one that transmits sin and death, but the very life of God because he is God itself. How does he do that? Precisely the mysteries or sacraments of the Church, mainly baptism and the Eucharist, which allow incorporation and a real communion in the Body and deified deifying Christ's Body, which contains the fullness of deity and, according to Palamas, is the source of the uncreated light that flows into the heart of the believer (Triad 1, 3, 38) and illuminates his mind again, again opens the eyes of the soul (Triad 1, 3, 33) to contemplate God, if man has faith in him (Triads 2, 3, 40). The mysteries or sacraments, the energy of the Spirit works in us, if we believe and want, what the Son has accomplished once and for all by himself, in his own flesh for us. In this perspective, the Church, the Body of Christ, is nothing short of a community of men animated by faith in Jesus Christ and in the process of deification by grace and energy of the Spirit.

The restoration of control of the intellect over the passions

The mysteries and sacraments are not the only means of deification, even if they remain fundamental and essential to Christianity. The doctrine of corruption of the divine image in man, intelligence, and the possibility for man to regain the likeness of God by grace also leads to an ethical perspective. Sin is perceived by Palamas as a disruption of the functioning of natural and original powers of the soul, which is upset by the more reasonable part of the soul (the faculties of knowledge, decision and reasoning) which governs Part passion (desire and anger), but the reverse. In this way, the man turns away from the well, God himself, and is guided by his passions, like greed, ambition and vanity, etc.. To remedy this disorder and mental body, the monk hesychast research impassivity that does not mean by insensitivity or a killing of the passionate part of the soul, which in itself is good, but the recovery forces psychic in their primary functions, those before the fall caused by sin in the soul.

This reversal takes place under the direction of intelligence in synergy with the grace and allows man to embrace the virtues and blessed passions, learn new and better provisions. Par l'attention de l'intelligence maintenue au-dedans du corps (selon la mthode hsychaste, dcrite ci-dessous), "nous donnons chaque puissance de l'me sa loi et chacun des membres du corps ce qui lui convient" :

- la comme rgulation des sens (nous leur "donnons ce qu'ils doivent percevoir et dans quelle mesure")

- est suscit comme l'tat le meilleur de la partie passionne de l'me

- la (nepsis) pour "renvoyer tout ce qui empche la pense (dianoia) de s'lever Dieu".

"Celui qui par la temprance (enkratia) a purifi son corps, qui par l'amour divin a fait de l'ardeur et du dsir une occasion de vertu, qui par la prire a men devant Dieu une intelligence dpouille, acquiert et voit en lui-mme la grce promise aux coeurs purs."

Ce retournement offre la possibilit l'homme d'accomplir progressivement les commandements vangliques dans l'amour du prochain et de Dieu. Lorsque l'homme parvient cet amour, il parvient selon Grgoire un tat proprement divin (Triades 2, 2, 19 et 1, 2, 2).

L'oraison hsychaste : faire l'exprience de Dieu

Si la grce reue par les mystres ou sacrements de l'glise ouvre la vie chrtienne sur une perspective thique qui culmine dans la capacit d'aimer comme Dieu aime, elle offre encore une autre possibilit en cette vie, celle de Dieu.

Il ne saurait s'agir d'une connaissance extrieure. Il n'est pas question ici, par exemple, de la contemplation naturelle, par laquelle l'intelligence humaine parvient dceler la marque de Dieu dans ce monde, c'est--dire apprhender la raison des tres crs par Dieu, la trace intelligible laisse par Dieu en chaque chose et qui permet de le reconnatre comme crateur de l'univers. Cette contemplation naturelle est certes une forme de connaissance de Dieu qui n'est pas sans valeur, mais ce n'est pas l encore une connaissance de Dieu. Il en va de mme de tout ce que l'on peut apprendre sur Dieu par les critures, les dogmes ou les confessions de foi (Triades 1, 3, 48 et 2, 3, 18 et 40). Toutes ces connaissances sont bonnes, mais elles restent extrieures Celui dont elles parlent. La thologie, au sens tymologique de discours sur Dieu, n'est pas encore la vision de Dieu. Dire quelque chose sur Dieu, ce n'est pas encore faire l'exprience intime et personnelle de Dieu (Triades 1, 3, 42), exprience laquelle l'homme peut se prdisposer par la prire pure ou mthode d'oraison hsychaste.

Le mot , qui est l'origine du terme hsychasme , signifie tranquillit, calme, repos, et qualifie tout la fois un tat de vie du moine hsychaste, la rclusion dans la solitude d'une cellule, et un tat correspondant de l'me, le silence obtenu lorsque l'activit des sens, de l'imagination et de l'intelligence s'apaise pour faire place l'activit de l'Esprit Saint.

Description de la mthode

La mthode d'oraison hsychaste suppose pour sa mise en pratique un lieu tranquille, solitaire, l'cart de toute agitation, la position assise et les yeux ferms. Mais on peut aussi garder les yeux ouverts et fixer son regard sur la poitrine ou sur le nombril comme sur un point d'appui. Elle implique en outre un apprentissage la matrise du souffle. Il s'agit en fait de recueillir et d'apaiser l'intelligence au rythme de l'inspiration et de l'expiration. Dans un premier temps, l'intelligence doit suivre le mouvement de l'inspiration qui descend jusqu'au cur et y tre retenue en mme temps que le souffle. Si l'on a les yeux ouverts, la fixation du regard sur la poitrine est une aide supplmentaire pour faire descendre l'intelligence dans le cur. Quant la fixation du regard sur le nombril, elle vise plutt la lutte contre les passions de l'me (Triades 1, 2, 7-8). Dans un second moment, l'expiration permet un certain relchement de l'attention jusqu' la reprise du souffle. Cet exercice respiratoire s'accompagne d'une invocation, de la rcitation mentale et continue d'une formule, telle que Seigneur Jsus-Christ, Fils de Dieu, aie piti de moi ou sous une forme brve Seigneur, aie piti. Il faut un certain temps pour que cette invocation devienne tout fait spontane.

Le but de cette oraison

Quel est le but de cette mthode assez simple dans sa description ? Il s'agit pour le moine hsychaste de purifier l'intelligence, de lui faire trouver le repos, l'hsychie, en la dtournant de toutes sensations, images ou conceptions mentales (Triades 2, 2, 15), ce qui la prdispose la participation aux nergies divines (Triades 2, 1, 30). Pourquoi faire descendre l'intelligence dans le cur en suivant le mouvement du souffle inspir ? Parce que le cur, dj dans la Bible, est le sige, le lieu propre, de l'intelligence (Triades 1, 2, 3), le lieu o la grce du Christ se manifeste (Triades 1, 3, 38) et o elle peut son contact se surpasser elle-mme dans l'extase, l'union Dieu (Triades 1, 2, 5). Pourquoi enfin invoquer continuellement Jsus-Christ en le suppliant d'avoir piti ? D'une certaine faon, c'est toute l'histoire judo-chrtienne de la rdemption qui se trouve rcapitule dans cette formule dont se souvient continuellement l'hsychaste en prsence du Christ. Son intelligence acquiert dans un effort soutenu une prise de conscience ininterrompue la fois de l'imperfection de sa nature et de la misricorde divine, de la promesse de la grce communique par le Fils dans l'Esprit. Tout ce qui vient le dtourner de cette ralit salvifique est cart par le souvenir de cette ralit qui sans cesse revient la conscience jusqu' ce que l'nergie de l'Esprit fasse une irruption soudaine dans le cur et accomplisse effectivement ce qu'il avait en mmoire. Il s'agit l d'une dmarche de foi, o l'intelligence, convaincue de sa faiblesse se rassemble et se tourne vers le Christ, en attendant de lui le salut comme accomplissement d'une promesse faite l'humanit. Ce faisant, l'intelligence ne le contraint pas agir, mais se dtourne consciemment de tout ce qui pourrait l'empcher d'agir. Libre alors l'Esprit d'intervenir dans ce cur purifi, prpar sa venue, c'est--dire digne de lui.

Lorsque Dieu rpond cet appel, lorsque l'nergie divine apparat dans le cur, l'intelligence purifie devient son contact spirituelle et lumineuse, les facults cres se transforment et la grce est transmise de l'me au corps, qui lui aussi participe au salut. Les hommes difis parviennent alors voir avec les sens et l'intelligence ce qui les dpasse (Triades 3, 3, 10). Il se produit paradoxalement et une intellection dpassant l'intellection (Triades 3, 1, 35-36). C'est pour le saint la vision ou contemplation de Dieu. L'intelligence retrouve cette capacit originelle de voir son Crateur.

Le corps comme demeure de l'Esprit

Il ya, dans cette mthode, par son attention porte au corps, une rupture radicale avec l'hellenisme no-platonicien qui enseignait que l'intelligence devait s'chapper du corps. Cette conception du corps comme une entrave de l'esprit, Palamas dit que c'est la plus grave erreur des philosophes Grecs.

Palamas insiste, dans son trait , sur le fait que l'on ne doit pas chercher faire sortir notre intelligence du corps, mais au contraire s'efforcer de maintenir, avec vigilance, notre intelligence notre corps. Le corps n'est pas mauvais : ce sont "les hrtiques qui disent que le corps est mauvais et qu'il est l'ouvrage du malin". Il faut faire sortir la loi du pch du corps, et y faire "demeurer l'attention de l'intelligence". Il cite ce propos la parole de Saint Paul (I Cor 6, 19) : "Nos corps sont le temple de l'Esprit Saint qui est en nous". Notre corps est donc appel devenir "naturellement la demeure de Dieu".

Grgoire Palamas fonde la spitualit hsychaste dans l'Incarnation du Verbe, dont le but tait de permettre la dification de l'homme :

"Car si l'homme n'est pas capable de contenir l'incorporel au-dedans du corps, comment pourra-t-il porter en lui-mme Celui qui s'est uni au corps, et qui avance, comme une forme naturelle, travers toute la matire organise, dont l'extriorit et la division ne saurait correspondre l'essence de l'intelligence (nos), si la fin cette matire ne se mettait vivre aprs avoir suscit en elle une forme de vie accorde l'union."

Nous pourrions dire que "le Verbe s'est fait chair" pour que l'homme entier - corps et me - soit difi :

"...portant toujours avec nous dans notre corps la mort de Jsus, . Car nous qui vivons, nous sommes sans cesse livrs la mort cause de Jsus, ." (Saint Paul, Eptre aux Corinthiens, II, 4, 10-11.)

L'union de l'homme Dieu

Le don difiant accord par l'Esprit constitue pour le voyant la fois l'organe et l'objet de sa vision lumineuse (Triades 3, 2, 14). Il est ce qui permet de voir et ce qui est vu, la lumire incre de Dieu. Palamas dira que le voyant contemple ce qui est semblable son mode de contemplation (Triades 2, 3, 31), qu'il connat Dieu en Dieu (Triades 2, 3, 68) ou, en sens inverse, que c'est Dieu lui-mme qui se contemple travers l'me et le corps transforms (Triades 1, 3, 37). Ce qu'il veut dire chaque fois, c'est que seule la lumire, l'nergie ou la grce, parce qu'elle vient de Dieu et qu'elle est Dieu lui-mme, peut nous faire connatre Dieu. Cette vision de la lumire par la lumire ralise l'union de l'homme Dieu (Triades 2, 3, 36) et lui permet de retrouver la ressemblance qui existait entre eux l'origine. La progression dans cette contemplation de Dieu est infinie, mme dans la vie future, non seulement parce que le dsir de l'homme est sans limites son gard, mais aussi parce que Dieu qui se laisse contempler est lui-mme infini (Triades 2, 2, 11). C'est une faon d'expliquer que l'homme est mis en prsence d'une plnitude. Tout ce que l'homme recherche de meilleur en cette vie ou est jamais capable de dsirer dans l'autre vie s'y trouve en abondance.

Il faut savoir toutefois que, pour Palamas, si l'nergie de l'Esprit est effectivement une plnitude qui nous est offerte ds prsent, personne en dehors du Christ n'est en mesure de la contenir totalement. La participation cette nergie omniprsente par une intelligence purifie, semblable un combustible pour le feu divin, est toujours partielle et varie (Triades 3, 1, 34). Cette nergie de l'Esprit se manifeste indivisiblement en autant d'clats qu'il yad'hommes dignes de la recevoir et se laisse participer en fonction de la capacit rceptive de chacun d'entre eux. La mme et unique nergie de l'Esprit est communique des hommes diffrents, qui ne sont pas en mesure d'en bnficier entirement, mais bien en fonction la fois de leur personnalit et de leur activit propres. Ce qui signifie que l'nergie divine ne supprime pas ce qui fait la singularit d'un homme, lorsqu'elle le difie, elle s'y adapte sous la forme notamment des charismes de l'Esprit dont parle saint Paul(1 Co 12, 4-11 ; Triades 3, 2, 13).

Dieu vient tout entier habiter dans l'homme tout entier

Si l'homme ne peut participer la totalit de l'nergie de l'Esprit, il n'en reste pas moins vrai qu'il s'agit d'un don par lequel Dieu tout entier vient demeurer en l'homme tout entier (Triades 3, 1, 27). Comment comprendre cette inhabitation de Dieu en l'homme ? Pour l'expliquer, Palamas se sert d'un terme emprunt la christologie. Ce terme est l'enhypostasie, qui dsigne le fait d'inclure dans l'hypostase, d'intgrer en sa personne mme. En s'incarnant, le Verbe de Dieu a assum la nature humaine en sa Personne divine, il l'a enhypostasie. En sens inverse et grce cette incarnation de Dieu, la personne humaine peut assumer non pas la nature de Dieu qui est imparticipable, mais son nergie. La dification est une enhypostasie de l'nergie de l'Esprit, nergie qui est envoye dans l'hypostase de l'homme pour y tre contemple (Triades 3, 1, 9) en permanence (Triades 3, 1, 18). Par ce don difiant permanent, la sagesse et la vie ternelle sont en l'homme sans tre spares de Dieu (Triades 3, 1, 35-36 et 38). Le saint acquiert par grce un nouveau mode d'existence, par lequel sa personne est dsormais compose d'un nouvel lment permanent qui vient s'ajouter l'me et au corps et qui est l'nergie incre de l'Esprit (Triades 1, 3, 43). Si bien qu'on peut dire de lui, en raison de la prsence de l'Esprit, qu'il est incr par la grce (Triades 3, 1, 31), qu'il est sans commencement ni fin (Triades 3, 3, 8). L'intgration de ce nouvel lment, devenu constitutif de la personne humaine dans la dification, n'a pas pour effet la suppression de notre humanit. En devenant Dieu, nous ne cessons pas d'tre homme, psychique et corporel. Au contraire, pour Palamas, en devenant Dieu, nous devenons pleinement homme. Par la grce divine, notre nature humaine est mene progressivement sa perfection : l'me peut ds prsent voir Dieu, tre anime par sa sagesse et sa bont, et le corps reoit le gage de son incorruptibilit future, un avant-got de la Rsurrection.

Au terme de ce parcours, le saint hsychaste acquiert donc un nouveau mode de vie caractris par la prsence permanente de l'nergie de l'Esprit en lui. Cette exprie nce is for him an introduction to the mysteries of the Gospel. But this introduction is not given to himself. The holy hesychast be respected, he will receive the trust and affection of other men, all who come to him to be initiated into these mysteries turn, until the experience of those mysteries themselves is for their initiation (Volume Hagiorite). The spiritual fatherhood, in which a saint is able to transmit what he has himself received, including through (Chapter 121), other men who follow his guidance and teaching, is crucial in this context. It was through her that Palamas in this chain of spiritual transmission, the spiritual son of the masters of Byzantine hesychasm, like the Fathers before them and all the saints of biblical literature.

Some quotes

Gasoline imparticipable and vigorous participation

"Since there are three characteristics of God, gasoline, energy, the divine hypostasis of the Trinity, who have been made worthy to be united with God to be with him one Spirit, as the great Paul said: "He who seeks the Lord is one spirit with him" (1 Cor 6, 17), as it has been shown above that are worthy of those who do not unite to God in his essence, and all theologians attest that God is not involved in its essence. The union according to hypostasis happens to be the result of only Word, the God-Man. Those who were worthy to be united with God thus came together in energy. And the Spirit whereby he who is joined to God is one with God, and is called uncreated energy of the Spirit, but not God's essence, even if this displeases those who think otherwise. For God has prophesied by the Prophet: it is not my Spirit, but "my spirit, I will pour upon those who believe" (Joel 3, 1) (trans. J. Touraille, Chapter 75).

On the Incarnation, Eucharistic communion and illumination of the heart

"Since the Son of God, in His incomparable love for mankind, did not merely unite his Hypostasis our divine nature, by assuming a living body and a soul endowed with intelligence, to appear on earth and live with men, but since it is united, oh miracle of unparalleled abundance, human hypostasis themselves by confusing himself with each of the faithful with holy communion in his body, because it becomes one body with us and made us a temple of the Godhead as a whole, because in the Body of Christ dwells all the fullness of the Godhead, how to illuminate it not those who share the dignity of his divine ray body which is within us, illuminating their soul as it flashed the same body of disciples on Mount Tabor? For then the body, source of light of grace, was not yet united with our bodies: he lit out of those who approached with dignity and sent the enlightenment to the soul through the sensitive eyes, but Today, being confused with us and we are in, it just illuminates the soul from within "(trans. J. Meyendorff, Triad 1, 3, 38).

On the vision of the uncreated light and union with God

"The contemplation of this light is a union, although it does not last among imperfect. But the union with the light is anything other than a vision? And since it is accomplished with the shutdown of intellectual activity, how it would be accomplished except by the Spirit? For it is in the light and it appears the light in a similar light that is the visual faculty; since this option has no way to act, having left all other beings is it becomes itself a whole light and imitates what she sees, she unites them unmixed, being light. If she looks at herself, she sees the light, if she looks at the object of his vision is too light and if it looks the way it uses to see, this is still light, this is common: all this to be one, so that he can not distinguish which sees neither the means nor the purpose or the substance, but he only aware of be light and see a light separate from any creature "(trans. J. Meyendorff, Triad 2, 3, 36).

The vision of God as real proof of its existence and purpose of prayer pure

"This intellectual activities beyond contemplation is the only way, the clearest way, the perfect way to show the actual existence of God and that it transcends being. How, indeed, the essence of God it not exist, because the glory of this divine nature is to see men who have excelled in prayer all that pure in the light itself, is sensible and intelligible? "(Trans. J. Meyendorff, Triad 2, 3, 38).

References

Selected Bibliography

Selected works translated into French

• Gregory Palamas, Defense hesychasts saints, introduction, critical text, translation and notes by J. Meyendorff, et al. "Spicilegium sacrum Lovaniense Studies and Documents", Volumes 30-31, Leuven, 1973 (probably the most important work, which is largely based development above).
• Gregory Palamas, On the deification of man, translated by MJ and J. Monsaingeon Paramelle, et al. "Sophia," L'Age d'Homme, Lausanne, 1990, p. 13-41 (contents: From the divine and deifying participation or the supernatural and divine simplicity).
• Gregory Palamas, Twelve sermons for holidays, introduction and translation of Jerome Cler al. "Jacob's Ladder", Paris, EYE / YMCA-PRESS, 1987.
• Gregory Palamas, apodictic Treaty on the procession of the Holy Spirit, introduction by Jean-Claude Larchet, translation and notes by Emmanuel Ponsoye, et al. "The Tree of Jesse," The Anchor Publishing, Paris-Suresnes, 1995.
• Joy of the Transfiguration from the Fathers of the East, al. "Eastern Spirituality" 39, Abbaye de Bellefontaine, 1985, p. 237-256 (content: Two sermons on the Transfiguration of the Lord).
• Philokalia Father Neptiques. In the mystical school of interior prayer, Volume B, Volume 3: Gregory Palamas to Callistus and Ignatius Xanthopouloi, notes and translation by Jacques Touraille, Abbaye de Bellefontaine, 2005, p. 435-541 (contents: Letter to the nun Xne, Decalogue, Of the Holy hesychasts, on prayer and purity of heart, 150 chapters physical, theological, ethical and practical, Volume Hagiorite hesychasts the saints).

Some important studies

• Larchet, J.-Cl., "Introduction", in Saint Gregory Palamas, apodictic Treaty on the procession of the Holy Spirit, coll. "The Tree of Jesse," Paris-Suresnes, Anchor Publishing, 1995, p. 9-104 (the question of the Filioque studied closely).
• Lison, J., The Spirit poured out. Pneumatology of Gregory Palamas, foreword by JMR Tillard, et al. "Heritage: Orthodoxy, Paris, Editions du Cerf, 1994 (a comprehensive study of excavated the thought of Palamas, in terms of pneumatology).
• Mantzaridis, GI, "The doctrine of St. Gregory Palamas on the deification of human beings", translated by MJ Monsaingeon in Saint Gregory Palamas. The deification of the human being, al. "Sophia," L'Age d'homme, Lausanne, 1990, p. 43-160 (Well Developing a central theme in Palamas).
• Meyendorff, J., Introduction to the Study of Gregory Palamas al. "Patristica sorbonensia" 3, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1959 (a presentation already old, but detailed life and major themes of the theology of Palamas)
• Meyendorff, J., "Palamas (Gregory)," Dictionary of Spirituality 12, Paris, Beauchesne, 1984, col. 81-107.
• Meyendorff, J., St. Gregory Palamas and Orthodox mystic, al. "Points Wisdoms" 168, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 2002 (a simpler presentation of Palamas and spiritual tradition in which it operates. Well for starters).
• Staniloae, D., "The life and teaching of Saint Gregory Palamas", Sibiu 1938. The first modern book on theology Palamite. The monograph dedicated to Gregory Meyendorff come 20 years later.

• Christians of the East Portal

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