In the 51st hymn, St. Simeon gives a complete picture of the saving action of Christ and the Holy Spirit. Christ, crucified and glorified, sends us the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit deifies us and unites us with the glorified Christ: "He, having endured the cross and also death, having risen in the Spirit, ascended in glory, and renewed the way to heaven to all who believe in Him by undoubted faith, and poured out the All-Holy Spirit abundantly to all who manifest faith by works. And now He abundantly pours Him out as such, and by Him He deifies those with whom He is suddenly united, and from the people with whom they were, He changes them without change, and shows them to be children of God, brothers of the Saviour, co-heirs with Christ, heirs of God, gods who dwell with God in the Holy Spirit, prisoners of the flesh alone, but free in spirit, easily ascending with Christ to heaven, and having all their dwelling there in the contemplation of good things, whom the eyes have not seen" [854]. In another hymn, St. Simeon asserts that the knowledge of God through the grace and illumination of the Spirit is a threefold knowledge. It alone makes it possible to understand the dogmas of the Church and to teach them. "Yes, indeed," he says, "so it happens and so it is done, so the grace of the Spirit is revealed, and, through Him and in Him, the Son is with the Father. (Man) sees Them as far as he can see, and then inexpressibly learns from Them concerning Them, and speaks out, and writes and expounds God-like dogmas to all others, as all the preceding Holy Fathers teach. For in this way they dogmatized the Divine Creed. Having become such, as we have said, they expressed with God and expressed that which is (proper to) God. Who, without becoming such, theologized the Trinitarian Unity or refuted heresies? Or who was called holy without being a partaker of the Holy Spirit? No one, never!" [855] The Holy Spirit, in giving us the knowledge of the divine mysteries, not only inspired the prophets, but also revealed to the apostles and to believers in general what Christ had not told them. To confirm this, Fr. Simeon quotes the words of the Lord: "I have yet many things to say to you, but now you cannot bear it. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all truth." The monk explains: "What Christ did not say to them, the Holy Spirit, Who came upon the Apostles, taught and said" [856].

We would like to say a few more words about prayers to the Holy Spirit in St. Simeon. Generally speaking, prayers directly addressing the Holy Spirit are quite rare in the Orthodox Church. Prayers are usually addressed to the Father, to Christ, or to the Most Holy Trinity. This can be explained by the fact that the Person of the Holy Spirit is the least revealed, the least known. Because if the grace of the Holy Spirit works in us, then His Face remains hidden. Nevertheless, in Orthodox worship and spiritual life there is a prayer of great beauty, to the Heavenly King, addressed to the Holy Spirit, but this is rather an exception. Even the Trinitarian prayers read at Pentecost Vespers do not address themselves to the Holy Spirit, but to the Father and the Son.

The prayer of the Eucharistic epiclesis is also addressed to the Father, so that He would send His Holy Spirit, and not to the Holy Spirit Himself. It is not surprising, therefore, that we find in St. Simeon very few prayers addressed directly to the Holy Spirit. It is possible, however, to mention a prayer of this kind in his 3rd Theological Sermon. However, this is more of a Trinitarian prayer, St. Simeon prays first to the Father and the Son, and then turns to the Holy Spirit. This rather long, rather dogmatic prayer will be abbreviated. It emphasizes the action of the Holy Spirit, especially His adoring action, which reveals to us the heavenly mysteries even in earthly life. "Likewise," writes St. Simeon, turning with prayer to the Father and the Son, "invoking the Holy Spirit, we say: the Holy Spirit, inexpressibly proceeding from the Father and through the Son to us, the faithful, coming (έπιφοιτών), the Spirit of life and reason, the Spirit of holiness and perfection, the good, wise, loving of mankind, sweet, most glorious, nourishing and watering us, merciful, enlightening, strengthening, the Divine Spirit of patience.

For those in whom Thou dwellest have in them in themselves all good" [857].

This chapter can be concluded with another prayer by St. Simeon, which forms the preface to his book of hymns. True, it does not directly say that it is addressed to the Holy Spirit, but if we consider its content, especially the first part, if we pay close attention to the images, special expressions, such as "come" (Ελθέ), and compare them with the corresponding expressions of the church prayer to the Heavenly King, as well as with the prayer just quoted, we can safely conclude that the preface to the Hymns is addressed to the Holy Spirit. although it ends with a doxology to the Most Holy Trinity.

Come, eternal joy, come, unfading wreath, come, purple of our great God and King, come crystalline and covered with stones, come, unapproachable shoes, come, royal scarlet robe and truly autocratic right hand. Come, my wretched soul has longed for Him and desires Him, come, One, to the one, for I am alone, as you see. Come, O thou who hast separated me from all and made me one on earth, come, Thou who hast become in me the very lust and hast created me to lust after Thee, Who art utterly unapproachable. Come, my breath and life, come, the consolation of my soul, come, joy and glory and my constant delight." [858]

4. THE MOST HOLY TRINITY

With all his rejection of bookish theology, devoid of spiritual experience, with all the insistence on asserting that God is unknowable and ineffable, St. Simeon confessed a strictly Orthodox faith with a true teaching about God, faith and teaching about the Most Holy Trinity above all. He based it on Divine revelation, Holy Scripture, the teaching of the Holy Fathers, but at the same time on his own personal experience, on what God Himself revealed to him. Many times he asserted that his theology was in full accord with what the Church had taught since the time of the apostles, although their teaching, like that of the ancient Fathers, was often forgotten by his contemporaries, and it was his task to remind them of them, especially as far as the spiritual life was concerned. Faith in the Holy Trinity and the doctrine of the Triune God are an example of his attachment to the tradition of the Church and, at the same time, an example of his personal and existential approach to the mystery.

One thing is certain and immediately evident from his writings: the God of St. Simeon is the Trinitarian God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Faith in the Trinity is inseparable from apophaticism. "Tell me, then," he says, probably to some theologian of a more intellectual type, whom he could not stand, "you, who are not afraid to investigate that which pertains to the divine nature, do you believe that there is a triune God (τρισυπόστατος), beginningless, uncreated, incomprehensible, unsearchable, invisible, incomprehensible by the intellect, not predicated by a word, and that He was always the same, Who never had the beginning of days, nor seasons, nor ages, but always existing?" [859] He expresses his faith in God thus: "Think and piously confess concerning the Holy, One-in-Essence and Indivisible Trinity, that the Father begets inexpressibly God the Word, Whom He had in the beginning in Himself and has inseparably begotten and above the word, while the Son is begotten, being always inseparable from the begetting Father, co-eternal and in no way separable from Him, but the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, being co-natural and united, of one essence with the Father and the Son, as being worshipped and glorified with Them from every breath... Believe... that Their super-essential essence is one Godhead and the Kingdom of the Triune, so that the three Hypostases merge into one, nor are the naturally united ones divided into three, for in each of them the visible is thought (as belonging) to both in one essence and nature, and glory, and one will. Believe that this is one God, the Creator and Creator of all visible and invisible" [860]. In this confession of the Trinitarian faith, the irreproachable patristic Orthodoxy, faith in the three divine hypostases is expressed by St. Simeon simultaneously with the recognition of the absolute incomprehensibility of the divine essence. Moreover, the knowledge of the Trinity is revealed by God Himself, as we have already pointed out elsewhere [861]. Ave. Symeon often returns to Her unity: "For we do not philosophize that there is another and another and another, of another and another nature, separating the undivided Unity (ένάδα) and the Divinity, unwisely deviating into unnatural othernesses, but we have come to know Them as one God, inseparably divided by the Hypostases and inseparably united by the unity of one essence, all in the Hypostases united, and all in the supersubstantial unit tripling. It must be said that the Same is three Persons and one in the unity of essence, that is, nature" (862).

Ave. Simeon argues that the Holy Trinity can be known using rational concepts or on the basis of analogies with the visible world. Study of the Scriptures alone is not enough for this, although in the absence of charismatic experience one must strictly adhere to what is written, and firmly believe it. "What stupidity, what blindness! he says. "And those who wish to impurely delve into the depths of God, and who hasten to theologize, when they hear of God that just as in the three suns there is one mixture of light, so in the Trinity there is one illumination of the Godhead, immediately imagine in their minds three suns united by light, that is, by essence, separated by hypostases, and foolishly believe that they see this Divinity itself, and thus the holy, consubstantial, and indivisible Trinity is made like an example" [863]. The grace of the Most Holy Trinity alone can reveal it: "For as one Father, one His Only-begotten Son, there is one glory of both, known and revealed to all to whom the Son wills, through the Spirit proceeding from the Father" (864). Ave. Symeon expounds his Trinitarian faith, affirming the unity of God, the coexistence of the Hypostases, the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father, and again rejects the example of the three suns: "These, therefore, know, being moved by the Divine Spirit, the equality and unity of the Son with the Father. Because in the Father they see the Son, and in the Son the Father through the Spirit, as it is written, "I am in the Father, and the Father in Me," that is, that the Spirit dwells with the Father. For if He proceeds from the Father, and the whole Father is in all the Son, the Holy Spirit is also all in Them, and the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, are one God, worshipped with every breath. And how will you be able to call the One three suns? For if you unite Them, They will be united and the three will be one, and if not, then you have broken the unity. But you will not find the Father without the Son and the Spirit, nor the Son without the Father and the Spirit, nor the Holy Spirit alien to unity with Him from Whom He proceeds. Believe in the Father and the Son in the Spirit, and in the Son of the Father and with the Spirit, and in the Father the co-eternal Son, always existing and abiding and having the Holy Spirit shining together. They are one God, and not three, existing in three hypostases, and always existing, and likewise existing, glorified by infinite powers in one co-nature and kingdom and Divinity. And if in each of Them the general natural features of the divine quality are contemplated, but three are one, and each one is three, which cannot be in the suns" [865].

These theological statements, in which special emphasis is placed on the unity of the Godhead and on the impossibility of expressing the Trinitarian mystery by means of images, are, as it were, the foundation or frame of the Trinitarian spirituality of St. Simeon, his experience of seeing the Trinity, the experience of His revelation in the soul of the believer, His vision and dwelling. Because, in accordance with the Holy Scriptures, St. Simeon asserts that the Trinity dwells in us: "He Himself, the Word of God, with the Father and the Spirit, dwells in them. Each of these therefore becomes a temple of God in feeling and knowledge" [866]. Ave. Simeon insists on the conscious nature of this process. "In this way, the Father and the Son in the Holy Spirit, in those to whom They come and in whom they truly make their abode, are visible and comprehended without doubt, unchangeably, in one light... knowable" [867].

The vision of the Trinity sometimes takes the form of a dialogue: "Then he who is in such a state (of God's love)," says St. Simeon, "comprehends and sees, and behold, the light. Light, however, seems to him to have its beginning from above, but when he searches, he finds that it has neither beginning, nor end, nor middles. When he is perplexed by this, there are Three in the same (τρία έν αΰτω): through Whom, and in Whom, and in Whom (δι' οϋ καί έν ω καί εις δν). And seeing this, he asks to know, and hears clearly: "Behold, I am the Spirit, through whom and in whom is the Son," and "Behold, I am the Son, in whom the Father is." When he becomes even more perplexed, "Look, you see," says the Father. "And I," says the Son, "am in the Father." And the Spirit says, "Indeed I am, for through Me he who sees the Father and the Son sees, and when he sees, he pours out of the things that are seen." Where are they? "In that (place) where neither man nor angel knows, except My one unit (ένάδος) and super-essential essence and nature." "And in me," he says, "how?" "All, entirely, for I am completely inseparable and indivisible, having unity even in Hypostases." "And if you are in me, how and where are you, how do you say that no one knows?" "Because you are a man and limited, I am limited and in place, for I became limited by becoming a man and one of you, but by My inherent nature I am completely invisible, indelineated, formless, inviolable, intangible, immovable, always moving, filling all things, and nowhere in general, neither in you nor in any other of the angels or prophets who are approaching (Me) in ancient or now, by whom I was not seen at all, and never am seen" [868]. This mysterious vision, as St. Simeon himself says, is undoubtedly genuine, but perhaps it is too overloaded with theological terms, [870] moreover, in it not only the three Persons of the Most Holy Trinity, but also the very essence of God speaks in the first person, and this clearly shows that for St. Simeon the theological Trinitarian terms were a living reality.

The Trinity is a treasure hidden in us, which preserves us in our life according to God and helps us in difficulties: "This is a treasure," says St. Simeon in the Catechetical Homilies, "the Holy Trinity, which we contain through ... the exact keeping of all the commandments, which by its love for mankind and power and grace keeps us intact and unyielding and unshakable on all sides, and preserving us, whom, as weak and capable of slipping easily, a few insufficient or mistaken, the treasure itself immediately compresses and unites with itself, and sticks to itself, and makes up for our shortcomings, and strengthens us, and makes us more steadfast" [871]. Ave. Simeon speaks here about the spiritual prerequisites, the fulfillment of the commandments necessary for the possession of the treasure of the Most Holy Trinity. In another place he again returns to the conscious character of this possession: "The indwelling of the Triune Godhead in the perfect is cognitive and clearly perceptible" (872). In the Hymns, St. Simeon speaks of visions of the Trinity that he had, while admitting that it is impossible to tell it. Sometimes he sees three Persons, but only Christ reveals to him the understanding of this vision that was in the darkness. "In the very night and in the very darkness I see Christ, terribly opening the heavens to me, and Himself bowing down and seeing me together with the Father and the Spirit, in the thrice-holy light, being one in three and in one three. They are undoubtedly the light and the light of one three, which above the sun illuminates my soul and envelops my mind, which is in darkness... and therefore a miracle strikes me all the more when (Christ) somehow opens the eye of the mind... For He, the light, appears in the light to those who see, and those who see again see Him in the light. For in the light of the Spirit those who see see, and those who see in Him see the Son, but he who is vouchsafed to see the Son sees the Father, and he who sees the Father sees in any case with the Son. Even now, as I have said, this is happening in me" [873].

To know the Most Holy Trinity and to worship Her is a great blessing, for which St. Simeon thanks God: "I thank Thee that Thou hast granted me to live, and to know Thee, and to worship, O my God, for it is life, to know Thee, the one God, the Creator and Creator of all, unbegotten, uncreated, beginningless, one, and Thy Son, begotten of Thee, and the All-Holy Spirit, the All-Sung Trinitarian Unity (Τριαδικήνά Μονάδα), piously worship Whom and revere Her above all other glory, whether you name earthly or heavenly" [874]. However, as St. Simeon adds, there are very few of those "who are in clear contemplation of Them, who were in the beginning before all ages (begotten) of the Father, with the Spirit of the Son, God and the Word, of the Triple Light in One, and of the One in the Three" (875). Ave. Simeon again affirms the unity of God and the reality of His three Hypostases, using a rather unusual way. "For both are one light: the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, indivisible in three Persons, but united to Them by Divine nature, origin, glory, power, and also will. Because the Three are visible to me as two beautiful eyes filled with light on one face. Without a face, how will the eyes see, tell me? And a face without eyes should not be called so at all, for it lacks the most important or, rather, everything" [876]. Probably, with regard to this image, face and eyes, it can be said that it is no more satisfactory than the image of the three suns, rejected by St. Simeon. But here it is the content of the vision (όράται μοί) that the monk is trying to convey. (However, it bears some resemblance to the image of the two hands of God, the Son and the Spirit, in St. Irenaeus of Lyons.)