Apophatic Patristics … Theosis

18. WHAT IS THE FUNDAMENTAL DOCTRINE OF THE PATRISTIC TRADITION?

Today, some people view what is called apophatic theology, as a philosophy influenced by Neoplatonists.48 There is no question that the terminology of the Neoplatonists is similar to that of the Church Fathers. The Neoplatonists also have their own apophatic theology, but there is one crucial difference – Neoplatonism is characterized by ecstasy, an experience that the Church Fathers view as demonic. During an ecstatic experience, the human mind or reason [logistikon] leaves the boundaries of time and space, loses any train of thought and is supposedly united with unchanging reality. In other words, Neoplatonists claim to transcend time and the world of change. In this process, the body, as far as they are concerned, is bad or negative. At any rate, the body does not participate in the Neoplatonic experience of ecstasy. For them, apophatic theology in its entirety is simply the purging of human thought by the removal of all the defects inherent in its limited nature. This release from the defects of human thought is the source of Neoplatonic apophatic theology. However, they are not making an effort to be freed from the created universe, but from the world of change, because Neoplatonic philosophy and metaphysics do not have principles or concepts such as creation ex nihilo or uncreated existence. They do not make the distinction between the created and the uncreated. In contrast, the basic category of Christian thought is the clear distinction between the created and the uncreated together with the teaching that between the created and the uncreated there is absolutely no similarity. This is not only the fundamental doctrine of the Patristic tradition, but also of the Hebraic tradition until today.

19. WHAT IS THE EXPERIENCE OF THEOSIS ?

Notwithstanding the importance of the distinction between created and uncreated reality in Patristic theology, medieval scholastic theology in the West would confuse these categories with the categories for changeable and unchangeable reality. In scholastic theology, which was really a mixture of Aristotelianism and Platonism, both sets of terms became interchangeable.

Aristotle speaks about an unmoved mover. He claims that there are about forty-nine unmoved entities that are in a state of pure actuality. Although they themselves do not move, they do cause motion in others. Like a magnet, they move other beings by attraction. The presence of entelechy, the self-actualizing fulfillment of a thing’s distinctive nature, is what drives motion to completion. Through entelechy, something in a potential state achieves its active or actual state. For example, a seed from a tree is a potential tree. When it falls to the ground and finds conditions appropriate for growth, it sprouts and becomes an actual tree. While it is still a potential tree, it has not yet been perfected, because its inherent entelechy has not completed the course of its development. For a seed, perfection is attained when it becomes a tree.

But according to Aristotle, there are also unmoved movers that do not possess this inherent potential, but are in a state of pure actuality or are completely active by nature. He maintains that they were always in existence, that they will always exist, and that they move all things by attraction. Whatever undergoes this transformation from a potential state to an actualized state progresses towards its perfection, and the attractive force that guides it towards this perfection originates in the unmoved movers. That is Aristotle’s teaching in a few words.

Now we encounter the same ideas on this topic in the Neoplatonists that we encountered in Aristotle. Plato, on the other hand, did not deal with this subject as far as we know. But when we turn to the Church Fathers, we encounter a certain St. Dionysius the Areopagite who is accused of Platonizing and Neoplatonizing, even though he clearly tells us that God is not solely an unmoved mover. He is also moved. In other words, God not only moves all things, but He Himself is also moved. There is in God an aspect that is capable of suffering or undergoing change. Naturally, St. Dionysius is writing this in opposition to Aristotle and the Neoplatonists. But it is also irrefutable proof that St. Dionysius the Areopagite was by no means in league with Neoplatonists, even though he used their language.

The suggestion that God is not only an unmoved mover, but also moved, is heresy to Neoplatonists and Aristotelians. It is an idea that does not withstand the test of reason and that consequently indicates that the Fathers did not practice philosophy. When the Fathers say that God is both an unmoved mover and also moved, they show us that we cannot apply any human categories to God. If we do try to apply them, then we will run into logical contradictions at every turn. This truth about God, however, is not derived from philosophy, but from the experience of theosis. By experience, the Fathers know that our concepts about God lose all value when we gaze directly at God Himself and behold that reality, which is none other than God Himself.

Thus, our concepts about God are used only as a means for helping someone to see God. When that person beholds God, then faith and hope pass away, and only love remains. These are St. Paul’s words and they are unequivocal.49 When you behold God Who is Love, then faith in God and all the concepts related to faith, together with hope in God and all the concepts related to hope, are set aside. The concepts are taken away, because they are replaced by the vision of the Beloved Himself. During an experience of theosis or glorification, this Love is the vision of God. Then a person is glorified. He sees Christ in glory and partakes of the glory of Christ. He experiences participation in God.

People usually relate to their fellow man on the basis of their impression of him that they have already formed. But when man gazes directly at Christ during an experience of theosis, in which Christ reveals Himself to him in His glorified theanthropic nature, man is unable to keep in mind any human concept or previous opinion that he had presumably formed about Christ, because absolutely nothing within creation, material or immaterial, with the exception of Christ’s human body, resembles the uncreated reality and glory of the glorified Christ, Whom he now beholds. Man simply accepts Christ as he sees Him. Man cannot describe Him. He cannot speak objectively about Him, because human words are not capable of describing Christ’s uncreated reality or His divine nature. And this is the case because there is no similarity between the created and the uncreated.

At this point, we must stress that in the Christian tradition, the experience of theosis is not at all related to any form of ecstasy. Theosis is not an ecstasy. It is not something that only the human rational faculty experiences. During the experience of theosis, the entire man participates in this experience. Even the body participates with all its senses in normal working order. When someone sees Christ in glory, that person is completely alert. So this person does not merely see something in his mind. He sees with his body as well.

If you read the book of Job, you will see that it refers to the fact that Job’s flesh saw God.50 In other words; Job’s body also participated in the vision of the glory of God. This is Hebraic tradition at its very best. Throughout the duration of this experience of glorification or theosis, man’s body does not lose contact with its surroundings. But this presupposes that a person has grown accustomed to seeing the glory of God, because he has previously had comparable experiences. A person is disoriented only in the beginning when he first experiences theosis. He can even be temporarily blinded by the excessive brilliance of the uncreated Light, but he does not lose his mental faculties. His mind functions normally. He can think just like everyone else, but his sense perceptions may be impaired, since he is not yet accustomed to the uncreated Light. He may be temporarily blinded like St. Paul was blinded the first time that he saw the glorified Christ on the road to Damascus. When we say that St. Paul was blinded, it does not mean that his eyes were damaged, but that he was temporarily blinded by the overwhelming brilliance of the light of Christ’s glory. Then the Apostle’s senses were no longer overpowered, he could again see normally. It is not that some miracle took place and he regained his sight. He simply did not see for a period of time, because his eyes were overwhelmed.

When the uncreated Light becomes visible, it is much more luminous and intense than the light of the sun, and yet it is by nature different from sunlight. It is the very Light of the Transfiguration. In fact, this Light is not even light as we understand it and are familiar with it. Why not? Because the Uncreated Light transcends light.

When the vision of Light comes to an end for someone in this state of glorification, that person continues to have normal relations with other people in his life during the entire period in which the energy of theosis still affects him. We see this clearly in the lives of the saints. Although the saint is in a supra-natural state during an experience of theosis, he continues to mix with those around him as before. The only difference is that he does not eat, sleep, or relieve himself for the duration of this state, since his condition is above nature and his life is sustained solely by the grace of the Holy Spirit. If this state lasts for forty days and forty nights, as it did with Moses on Mount Sinai,51 the person in this state does not sleep, does not grow tired, does not eat, does not drink, and so forth for so many days and so many nights. In other words, he is free from the body’s blameless passions or the natural passions of the body. These phenomena occur because the functioning of the digestive system and the requirements for sleep are suspended. Then man becomes an earthly angel. But apart from this difference, he behaves just like everyone else. He walks around, he talks with others, he interacts socially, he teaches, and so forth, and at the same time he still remains in this state.

Some of today’s academic theologians look down their noses at these descriptions from folk tradition and make fun of them. They do not realize that when it comes to such matters folk tradition falls well within the scope of the experience of illumination and theosis, which is backed up by an entire tradition of Patristic thought that provides us with theological interpretations for these phenomena.

Folk tradition from the villages in Asia Minor, especially in the old days of the Turkish domination, preserves accounts of a village priest in such a state for the duration of the Divine Liturgy. Nevertheless, he continued to read, chant, make exclamations, read the prayers, and finish the service. How are we to explain this? Although it is true that unceasing noetic prayer of the heart is discontinued during an experience of theosis that does not mean that reasonable worship necessarily has to stop. The mind or intellect can continue to pray using texts, especially since it does so for the instruction of others. Of course, the priest who experiences theosis during the Divine Liturgy does not need to pray using texts for his own benefit, but he does so for the benefit of those who are following the Liturgy and need to hear him. So, the priest continues to celebrate the Divine Liturgy until the end.52

So it is clear that we cannot identify these phenomena with the ecstasies of the Neoplatonists, or even with the ecstasies of the Middle Platonic School if we take into account the writings of St. Justin Martyr the Philosopher and use them as a key for interpreting the teaching of that school. I mention the Middle Platonic School because some historians of philosophy claim that Platonism was not a religion, but became a religion in the form of Neoplatonism starting with Plotinus and his disciples.

But in the first part of Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho, St. Justin describes how he personally became an adherent of Platonic philosophy, how he found a platonic philosopher who assumed the responsibility of teaching him, and how he expected to see God at any moment. This means that Justin Martyr, who lived a considerable time before the appearance of Neoplatonic philosophy, spent his time doing spiritual gymnastics or spiritual exercises. He believed that in this way he would suffer an ecstasy at any moment, and see God.

This also means that his teacher was not merely a philosopher, but rather a type of spiritual father, an instructor or guru as we would say today, who guided him to religious experiences, which for us are just demonic experiences. The hesychast theologians discuss these issues at length. For example, St. Gregory Palamas denounced the ecstatic experiences of the Platonists as demonic. Today, since such language does not strike some people very well, since they do not like the sound of the word ‘demonic,’ they will replace this word with contemporary psychological or parapsychological jargon and call these experiences hallucinations or parapsychological phenomena. And indeed, those who seek ecstasies really suffer from these hallucinations. Neverthe1ess, as far as the Church Fathers are concerned, all these phenomena are still clearly demonic.

NOTES:

49 1st Corinthians 13:13.

50 Cf. Job 19:26: “And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.”
Also, Job 42:5: “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee.”

51 Cf. Exodus 34: 28-31.

52 This also took place with St. Seraphim of Sarov during the Divine Liturgy. In his case, however, on account of the excessive glory and the newness of the state of theosis, it appeared as though his contact with his surroundings was interrupted. By the time of his famous conversation with Motovilov, however, he was accustomed to the state of theosis and no longer disoriented by the brightness of the Light. See the life of the Saint. – TRANS.

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