Saint Gregory Palamas on Dionysius

Saint Gregory Palamas (c. 1296-1359) stands as the greatest defender and interpreter of Dionysian mystical theology in the Orthodox tradition. As Archbishop of Thessalonica and champion of hesychasm, Palamas developed the essence-energies distinction building on Dionysian foundations, establishing the theological framework that became Orthodox dogma and providing the systematic foundation for Orthodox mystical theology.

Table of Contents

1. Historical Context
2. The Hesychast Controversy
3. Essence-Energies Distinction
4. Divine Light and Mystical Experience
5. Palamas's Reading of Dionysius
6. Orthodox Mystical Theology
7. Legacy and Influence

Historical Context

Life and Times

Gregory Palamas was born in Constantinople around 1296 to a noble Anatolian family. Around 1318 A.D., he and his two brothers went to Mount Athos and became monks. However, with the Turks encroaching upon Greece, he fled to Thessalonica, where he entered the priesthood in 1326 A.D.¹

A monk of Mount Athos (modern Greece) and later archbishop of Thessalonica, he is famous for his defense of hesychast spirituality, the uncreated character of the light of the Transfiguration, and the distinction between God's essence and energies (i.e., the divine will, divine grace, etc.).²

The 14th-Century Byzantine Context

Political Climate: In A.D. 1347, Palamas became Archbishop of Thessalonica, but the political climate made it impossible for him to take up his see until A.D. 1350. During a voyage to Constantinople, he was captured by Turks and held in captivity for over a year. He died in A.D. 1359, and the Eastern Orthodox Church glorified him a mere 9 years later.

Intellectual Environment: The hesychast controversy was a theological dispute in the Byzantine Empire during the 14th century between supporters and opponents of Gregory Palamas. While not a primary driver of the Byzantine Civil War of 1341, it influenced and was influenced by the political forces in play during that war.

State of Dionysian Studies

By Palamas's time, Dionysian theology had achieved canonical status in Orthodox thought. However, the interpretation of the Areopagite became a central battleground in the 14th century: Andrew Louth writes that "the controversy between St Gregory Palamas and Barlaam the Calabrian is now seen by some scholars as less a conflict between Western influences (represented by Barlaam) and authentic Orthodox spirituality, as a conflict within Greek Christianity about the true meaning of Dionysian language about the nature of God."³

The Hesychast Controversy

Hesychast Practice

The Tradition: Hesychasm is a form of constant purposeful prayer or experiential prayer that, from at latest the 13th century, took the form of "a particular psychosomatic technique in combination with the Jesus Prayer". The hesychasts stated that at higher stages of their prayer practice they reached the actual contemplation-union with the Tabor Light, i.e., Uncreated Divine Light or photomos seen by the apostles in the event of the Transfiguration of Christ and Saint Paul while on the road to Damascus.⁴

Athonite Background: As an Athonite monk, Palamas had learned to practice Hesychasm. Although he had written about Hesychasm, it was not until Barlaam attacked it and Palamas as its chief proponent, that Palamas was driven to defend it in a full exposition which became a central component of Eastern Orthodox theology.

Barlaam's Challenge

Arrival in Constantinople: Around 1330, Barlaam of Seminara came to Constantinople from Calabria in southern Italy, where he had grown up as a member of the Greek-speaking community there. He worked for a time on commentaries on Dionysius the Areopagite under the patronage of John VI Kantakouzenos.⁵

Rationalist Position: Barlaam claimed that the monks wasted their time in fruitless prayer when they could instead come to truly know God through their intellect. In other words, he believed the highest knowledge of God came only from rational means or through the created world. We could not, according to Barlaam, have a direct and unmediated communion with God.

Orthodox Response

Conciliar Resolution: The dispute concluded with the victory of the Palamists and the inclusion of Palamite doctrine as part of the dogma of the Eastern Orthodox Church as well as the canonization of Palamas. A series of six patriarchal councils were held in Constantinople on 10 June 1341, August 1341, 4 November 1344, 1 February 1347, 8 February 1347, and 28 May 1351 to consider the issues.

The Assembly of 1341: The assembly, influenced by the veneration in which the writings of Dionysius were held in the Eastern Church, condemned Barlaam, who recanted. The ecumenical patriarch insisted that all of Barlaam's writings be destroyed, and thus, no complete copies of Barlaam's treatise "Against Messalianism" have survived.

Essence-Energies Distinction

Theological Foundation

Core Doctrine: The central idea of the Palamite theology is a distinction between the divine essence and the divine energies that is not a merely conceptual distinction. Palamism is a central element of Eastern Orthodox theology, being made into dogma in the Eastern Orthodox Church by the Hesychast councils.⁶

Dionysian Basis: Among the holy fathers before St Gregory Palamas, the doctrine of the divine energies was not formalized, and some related questions remained unresolved. The main provisions formulated by St Gregory can be reduced to seven points:⁷

Participable Grace

Real Participation: As St John Damascene states in Chapter 4 of An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, "all that we say positively of God manifests not his nature but the things about his nature." It is the energies of God that enable us to experience something of the Divine, at first through sensory perception and then later intuitively or noetically.⁸

Distinction from Western Theology: According to Fr. John Romanides, Palamas considers the distinction between God's essence and his energies to be a "real distinction", as distinguished from the Thomistic "virtual distinction" and the Scotist "formal distinction".⁹

Divine Transcendence and Immanence

Beyond Being: The theology of the Superessential should not be construed as a merely apophatic construction, defining God in terms of what He is not. Palamas quotes Dionysius: God possesses the superessential in a superessential manner, taking this to mean that God is beyond even the transcendence of being, i.e., non-being.¹⁰

Participable Divinity: In a number of his works, St Gregory Palamas teaches that even today one can see the divine energies in the world. Yes, the time will come when the Lord will visibly reveal himself to all. But only a few ascetics are rewarded with being able to see His Grace incessantly.¹¹

Divine Light and Mystical Experience

The Tabor Light

Theological Doctrine: As a theological doctrine, the uncreated nature of the Light of Tabor was formulated in the 14th century by Gregory Palamas, an Athonite monk, defending the mystical practices of Hesychasm against accusations of heresy by Barlaam of Calabria.¹²

Orthodox Teaching: Gregory further asserted that when Peter, James and John witnessed the Transfiguration of Jesus on Mount Tabor, that they were in fact seeing the uncreated light of God; and that it is possible for others to be granted to see that same uncreated light of God with the help of certain spiritual disciplines and contemplative prayer, although not in any automatic or mechanistic fashion.¹³

Mystical Vision

Theoria and Theosis: According to the Hesychast mystic tradition of Eastern Orthodox spirituality, a completely purified saint who has attained divine union experiences the vision of divine radiance that is the same 'light' that was manifested to Jesus' disciples on Mount Tabor at the Transfiguration. This experience is referred to as theoria.¹⁴

Grace and Experience: The grace of God appears to them visibly in the form of light. This uncreated light of God is the same light that the apostles saw on Mount Tabor. One who sees this light joins God directly, that is, he is in the highest degree of holiness, known as theosis.

Apophatic and Experiential Knowledge

Beyond Conceptual Knowledge: Only in this sense does apophasis lead to mystical union. Apophasis only prepares us for mystical union; it does not suffice to effect it. Thus Palamas denies that the saintly visions refer to the "ascent through the negative way," which is within human powers and does not transform the soul.¹⁵

Divine Illumination: Palamas will take pains to show that divine illumination, though it is beyond sensation and intellection, can nonetheless reveal itself to our bodily vision as well as our intelligence.

Palamas's Reading of Dionysius

Extensive Use of the Corpus

Frequent Citations: Citations of the Corpus Dionysiacum are exceedingly frequent in the works of Gregory Palamas. Much, indeed, of the latter's Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts is devoted to interpretation of the Areopagite, most often in counter argument to the reading of Dionysius insisted on by Palamas' opponent throughout the Triads, Barlaam the Calabrian.¹⁶

Authoritative Source: Palamas would not express such a devotion for Dionysius' authority only on the basis of his mere authoritativeness if in the writings that bore the name of the convert from the Areopagus there was not a "theological minimum," which would give legitimacy to their incorporation into christian tradition.¹⁷

Orthodox Interpretation vs. Barlaam

The Scholarly Debate: The late Father John Meyendorff was clearly troubled by this Dionysian ubiquity in the Doctor of Hesychasm, particularly since Meyendorff accepted the prevailing scholarly view of Dionysius as, at best, a dubious Christian. In response to this "problem", Meyendorff insisted that Gregory supplied a "Christological corrective" to the Areopagite.¹⁸

Counter-Argument: This article argues that, to the contrary, Gregory's was a much better reading of the Areopagite than that of either Barlaam or of more modern scholars, and that the key to his insight lies in the ascetical and mystical tradition of the Christian East common to both.

Faithful to Patristic Tradition

Orthodox Continuity: Some few scholars, notably Vladimir Lossky, Fr. John Romanides, and Andrew Louth, read Dionysius instead as fundamentally faithful to prior currents of patristic thought and a significant contributor to those who came after him, such as SS Maximus Confessor, Symeon New Theologian, Nicetas Stethatos, and Gregory Palamas.¹⁹

Liturgical Understanding: Palamas' combination of liturgical sources for his logical arguments on behalf of the apodeictic syllogism within an Aristotelian typology will be explored. This study highlights more unusual cases where Byzantine liturgical sources, such as in the Menaion and homiletic material of Fathers, are essential to understand certain notions of Palamas' theoptic and epoptic ideas.²⁰

Orthodox Mystical Theology

Integration of Apophatic and Kataphatic

Balanced Approach: In both Aquinas and Dionysius, we find that hierarchic and thearchic illuminations are mediated by intellectual light or something beyond intellectual light, but not by sensible light. Palamas will take pains to show that divine illumination, though it is beyond sensation and intellection, can nonetheless reveal itself to our bodily vision as well as our intelligence.²¹

Mystical Realism: The mysticism of Dionysius the Areopagite does not seem to provide a promising basis for hesychasm. True, Dionysius emphasizes negation and the apophatic way, though not to the exclusion of kataphatic theology, and he describes divine contemplation as a stillness beyond knowing.

Theological Synthesis

Systematic Presentation: The tome provides a systematic presentation of Palamas' teaching and became the fundamental textbook for Byzantine mysticism. Sometime between 1344 and 1350, Palamas wrote the Capita 150 ("One hundred and fifty chapters"). Robert E. Sinkewicz describes this work as an attempt to "recapture the larger vision that had become obscured by the minutiae of the debates."²²

Comprehensive Framework: In a broader sense, another intention emerges from the studied works of Gregory, namely the desire to present the mystical experiences of his confreres using the systematic language of theology, one which was drawn from the rich legacy of the Cappadocian Fathers, Maximus the Confessor, Dionysius, John of Damascus, Macarius of Egypt, and Evagrius Ponticus.²³

Prayer and Contemplation

Hesychast Method: Based on Christ's injunction in the Gospel of Matthew to "go into your closet to pray", hesychasm in tradition has been the process of retiring inward by ceasing to register the senses, in order to achieve an experiential knowledge of God (see theoria).²⁴

Divine Grace: While Palamas repeatedly insists that contemplation can be granted only by divine grace, not any human effort, hesychasm on its face appears to prescribe a positive method for attaining union with God.

Legacy and Influence

Dogmatic Status

Orthodox Doctrine: Palamism has been described as representing "the deepest assimilation of the monastic and dogmatic traditions, combined with a repudiation of the philosophical notion of the exterior wisdom." Historically, Western Christianity has tended to reject Palamism, especially the Essence-Energies distinction.²⁵

Ecumenical Recognition: Collectively, these councils are accepted as having ecumenical status by Orthodox Christians, some of whom call them the Fifth Council of Constantinople and the Ninth Ecumenical Council.

Modern Orthodox Theology

Contemporary Influence: According to Aristeides Papadakis, "all (modern) Orthodox scholars who have written on Palamas — Lossky, Krivosheine, Papamichael, Meyendorff, Christou — assume his voice to be a legitimate expression of Orthodox tradition."²⁶

Theological Authority: In Eastern Orthodoxy, theology is not treated as an academic pursuit; instead, it is based on revelation (see gnosiology), meaning that Orthodox theology and its theologians are validated by ascetic pursuits, rather than academic degrees (i.e. scholasticism).

Western Reception

Catholic Reevaluation: According to Meyendorff, the later twentieth century saw a change in the attitude of Roman Catholic theologians to Palamas, a "rehabilitation" of him that has led to increased interest in his theology.²⁷

Ecumenical Significance: In 1966, Nicholas Wiseman characterized Gregory Palamas as "the only major Orthodox spokesman since the schism with Rome" and asserted that a positive reassessment of his theology "would surely benefit the cause of unity."

Contemporary Relevance

Philosophical Theology: For J. Meyendorff, Gregory Palamas has perfected the patristic and conciliar heritage, against the secularizing tide that heralds the Renaissance and the Reformation, by correcting its Platonizing excesses along biblical and personalist lines.²⁸

Living Tradition: Palamitism, which is impossible to compress into a system, is then viewed as the apophatic expression of a mystical existentialism. Accepted by the Orthodox world (with the exception of Romanides), this thesis justifies the Palamite character of contemporary research.

Conclusion

Saint Gregory Palamas achieved the definitive synthesis of Dionysian mystical theology with Orthodox systematic doctrine. Through his defense of hesychasm and development of the essence-energies distinction, Palamas demonstrated how the profound mystical insights of Dionysius the Areopagite provide the theological foundation for authentic Christian spiritual experience.

Key Contributions:

Palamas's Achievement: The central idea of the Palamite theology is a distinction between the divine essence and the divine energies that is not a merely conceptual distinction. This distinction, firmly grounded in Dionysian theology, enables Orthodox Christianity to maintain both divine transcendence and the possibility of real participation in divine life through theosis.

Enduring Significance: Palamas taught that the truth is a person, Jesus Christ, a form of objective reality. In order for a Christian to be authentic, he or she must experience the Truth (i.e. Christ) as a real person. This experiential understanding of Christian faith, rooted in Dionysian mystical theology, continues to define Orthodox spiritual life and theological method.

Through his careful scholarship and spiritual insight, Gregory Palamas ensured that Dionysian mystical theology would remain the living heart of Orthodox Christianity, providing both the theological framework and practical guidance for the Church's ultimate goal: the deification of humanity through participation in divine grace.

Bibliography

Primary Sources:

• Gregory Palamas. The Triads. Edited by John Meyendorff. New York: Paulist Press, 1983.
• Gregory Palamas. The Homilies of Saint Gregory Palamas. Translated by Christopher Veniamin. South Canaan, PA: Saint Tikhon's Seminary Press, 2002.

Secondary Sources:

• Meyendorff, John. A Study of Gregory Palamas. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1998.
• Golitzin, Alexander. "Dionysius Areopagites in the Works of Saint Gregory Palamas: On the Question of a 'Christological Corrective' and Related Matters." Saint Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 46 (2002): 163-90.
• Louth, Andrew. Denys the Areopagite. London: Chapman, 1989.

Digital Resources:

• Pappas Patristic Institute: https://www.pappaspatristicinstitute.com/post/what-are-the-divine-energies
• Saint John the Evangelist Orthodox Church: https://www.saintjohnchurch.org/saint-gregory-palamas-essence-energies-distinction/

Footnotes