Chapter III: The Uncreated Divine Light

In the previous chapter, we made an attempt to expound the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas about the Divinity in His incomprehensible and inaccessible superessence and revelation to the world in His uncreated energies. These energies are innumerable, in them the creature is actually communed with the Divinity Himself, and God is present in creation. One of these revelations of the Divinity to the world, one of His energies, is, according to the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, the uncreated Divine Light. He is not created like any other Divine energy, but at the same time he is not the Divinity Himself in His superessence, or, as St. Gregory Palamas puts it, "God is called Light, but not in essence, but in energy." Therefore, everything that we wrote in the previous chapter about essence and energy and their mutual relationship to God also applies to the Divine Light. Such, in brief, is the theological-philosophical formulation of the question of the uncreated Light in St. Gregory Palamas. Mystically, he touches on the same subject when he describes the highest spiritual states, during which those who have attained them "mingle inexpressibly with the Light that surpasses the mind and feeling." The doctrine of the uncreated Light, however, has such an essential significance both in the ascetic-dogmatic system of St. Gregory Palamas and in the polemics directed against it, that it seems necessary for us to dwell on it in more detail.

It seems that there is no special need to prove that the teaching about the Divine Light (in whatever sense we understand this expression) is not something new, first expressed by the Athonite hesychasts of the fourteenth century. Already in the Holy Scriptures of both the Old and New Testaments we encounter many places where the Divine Light is spoken. Thus, even in the Old Testament we read in the Psalms: "In Thy light we shall see the light" (Psalm 35:10). "Then shall thy light be revealed like the dawn, cries out the prophet Isaiah, ... and the glory of the Lord shall follow thee" (Ch. 58:8). "Then shall thy light shine in the darkness, and thy darkness shall be as noonday" (Ch. 58:10). "The Sun of Righteousness" is what the prophet Malachi calls the coming Messiah (Mal. 6:2). In the New Testament, Christ Himself says that "the righteous shall shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father" (Matt. 13:43), and the Apostle Paul writes about God, "Who dwells in unapproachable light" (1 Timothy 6:16). But we encounter especially vivid and definite expressions in the Gospel of John and in the conciliar epistles of the Apostle John the Theologian: "I am the light of the world" (John 8:12); "I am the light that has come into the world" (John 12:46); "God is light" (1 John 1:5); "In Him was life, and life was the light of men" (John 1:4); "There was a true Light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into the world" (John 1:9), etc. In the Apocalypse we find prophetic visions of the heavenly city as the Kingdom of Divine Light: "And the city has no need of the sun or the moon to illuminate it; for the glory of God has shone upon him, and the Lamb is his lamp" (Rev. 21:23). "And the night shall not be there, neither shall he have need of a lamp, nor of the light of the sun: for the Lord God gives them light" (Rev. 22:5). Expressions about the Divine Light are saturated with liturgical hymns and texts of the Orthodox Church (let us recall, for example, the naming of the Savior with the words "O Gentle Light" or "True Light," etc.). The Symbol of Faith confesses the faith of the Church in the second Hypostasis, as in the "Light of Light". The same can be traced throughout the patristic and ascetic writings of the Eastern Church, and the expressions describing Light are used here both to designate God Himself (the object of vision) and the inner state experienced by the one who knows Him (we will see later that in a certain sense they are one and the same). In the latter meaning of the mystical state, ascetic writers of the Orthodox Church often use the expression "Divine illumination." This mystical term is very fond of St. Maximus the Confessor (580662). But with special power and his inherent writing talent, St. Symeon the New Theologian (9491022) describes the vision of Light, both in his teachings and, even more, in his amazing verses. It can even be said without exaggeration that none of the Orthodox mystics, either before or after St. Symeon the New Theologian, expressed with such vividness, frankness, and detail the visions of the Divine Light that he experienced as he did. On the other hand, thoughts about the nature of this Divine Light, about its incomparability and distinction from all created things, about its uncreated nature are found (though in an unsystematic form and without theological foundation) in many church writers much earlier than St. Gregory Palamas. Without setting ourselves the task of exhausting in this article the entire "pre-hesychast" period of the teaching about the uncreated Light (this could serve as the subject of a special study, very interesting and important for understanding the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas), we will now limit ourselves to only a few examples. St. Macarius of Egypt (4th century) writes in his sixth Sermon that "the crowns and diadems that Christians will receive are not creatures." Bl. Theodoret in his "History of the God-Lovers" describes one ascetic who "looked out" of the window of his cell and saw "a light not of a lamp or made with hands, but of God and shining with the highest grace." Abandoning the numerous visions of Light that are spoken of in the lives of saints (as, for example, St. Paul of Latra in the tenth century), let us dwell again on St. Symeon the New Theologian. In his works, the word "uncreated" occurs especially often when describing the phenomena of inner illumination, and not in the form of some kind of theoretical reasoning, but as a direct datum of mystical experience (it is understandable, therefore, why Combefis calls St. Symeon the New Theologian "fons omnis Palamis erroris"). Thus, in his first hymn, St. Symeon the New Theologian speaks of the fire descending upon the heart of a person who seeks the Lord, and calls it "uncreated." In another hymn, he speaks of the desire of his mind "to be completely beyond creatures, in order to attain an uncreated and elusive radiance." He goes on to write how this radiance "separated me from the visible and the invisible, and gave me a vision of the uncreated and the joy of separation from all created things... and I was united with the uncreated, the incorruptible and beginningless, and all who are invisible." But, in addition to these indisputable testimonies to the uncreated nature of Divine illumination in general, in ancient patristic writings one can find no less definite indications of the Divinity and uncreated nature of the Light of Christ's Transfiguration, that is, precisely what in the view of many is a specific innovation and even the main content of the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas. Thus, St. Gregory the Theologian (329390) already teaches in his "Homily on Holy Baptism" about the Light of Tabor as a visible manifestation of the Divinity: "Light," he writes, "is the Divinity revealed to the disciples on the mountain." Even more interesting in this respect are the remarkable "Homilies" for the feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord, belonging to St. Andrew of Crete (660740) and St. John of Damascus (+750). The teaching on the Light of Tabor developed in them (especially by St. John of Damascus) is so similar, not only in its content, but even in its verbal formulation, to the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, that it seems to us inexpedient to dwell on it in detail, so as not to be forced to repeat the same thing when we expound the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas himself on the same subject. We will only say that in St. John of Damascus (although in a somewhat less developed and systematic form than in St. Gregory Palamas) we encounter the idea of the Light of the Transfiguration as the "Light of the Divine," "unapproachable," "indescribable," "eternal and timeless," "the Glory of God," "the Kingdom of God," and as "uncreated." The latter is affirmed with all possible certainty by St. John of Damascus in the passage of his "Sermon" where he justifies the involuntary inaccurate comparison of the Light of the Transfiguration with the light of the sun, made by the Evangelists, on the grounds that this inaccuracy is inevitable, "for it is impossible to adequately depict the uncreated in creation."

But if the antiquity of the Orthodox teaching on Divine illumination and the vision of the uncreated Light is beyond doubt, certain questions arise in connection with this teaching that require study: what is the nature of this Light, how does it take place, is it only an inner grace-filled illumination or something else and, probably, greater? All these questions acquire special significance and importance when we pass from the ancient mystics and theologians to the hesychasts of the fourteenth century and, in particular, to St. Gregory Palamas. This is due to the fact that in their works the doctrine of the Divine Light, partly as a result of the natural development of theological thought, partly in the process of repelling the attacks of opponents, acquired an almost central significance and a systematic character. Therefore, let us turn directly to St. Gregory Palamas.

In the works of St. Gregory Palamas we find comparatively many places where he speaks of the Divine Light. Nowhere, however, does he give a precise explanation of what he means by this. This unspoken nature is a natural consequence of the incomprehensible nature of the Divine Light, incomprehensible to the mind and inexpressible in words, its uncreated nature and the impossibility of finding in the created world anything exactly like it. On this inexpressibility of the Divine Light and on the impossibility of comprehending it for those who have not been vouchsafed to see it in reality, St. Gregory Palamas insists a lot. However, for all its inexpressibility and all the differences between the created and the uncreated, there are still phenomena in this created world, albeit pale and imperfect, but still somehow reflecting the Divine Light. These are, first of all, the sun and the created light it spreads. Therefore, St. Gregory Palamas explains, it is said in the Gospel that Christ shone on Mount Tabor, "like the sun." "This," he adds, repeating the thought of St. John of Damascus that we have already quoted, "is only a dull image, but it is impossible to adequately depict the uncreated in the created." "What the sun is in the sensible world, God is in the intellectual world," he writes elsewhere. This assimilation of the Divine Light to the sun, however, should not be understood in the sense that the former, like the latter, is more or less material. The idea of any materiality or sensuality of the uncreated Light is resolutely rejected by St. Gregory Palamas and characterized by him as a gross distortion of his teaching. He constantly calls it "the immaterial Light," says "that there is nothing sensual in the Light that shone on the Apostles on Tabor," and is indignant at the wise men of this age, who, "spreading about what they have not seen, and vainly puffing up with their carnal minds, through incomprehension turn into sensual illuminations that surpass the mind." But, on the other hand, it would be wrong to conceive of this uncreated Light as a purely rational enlightenment, as a mere rational apprehension, thus depriving the word "light" of all real content and turning it into a mere allegory. We think that such an "intellectualization" of the uncreated Light contradicts many of the statements of St. Gregory Palamas and, in general, does not correspond to the general character of his mysticism, as it can be understood from our exposition of his ascetic teaching (see Chapter I). And indeed, in one of the Homilies of St. Gregory Palamas, "Against Akindinus" (not yet fully printed), there is a whole section devoted to the refutation of the idea that knowledge alone is the unerring light. One can rather think that the comparison of the uncreated Light with the created Light is symbolic, but quite real and is based on the thought characteristic of many representatives of Eastern patristics (and in this they agree with the Platonizing philosophical currents), that this lower created world is, as it were, a reflection and likeness of its Divine heavenly prototype, eternally existing in the Divine consciousness, and that, consequently, our terrestrial created light can also be regarded as a kind of reflection and dim likeness of the uncreated Light, infinitely different from it, but at the same time real, though incomprehensibly similar to it. The uncreated Light itself, this prototype of created light, is one of the images of the manifestation and revelation of God in the world, in other words, it is the uncreated in the created, real, and not only allegorically found in it and contemplated by the saints as the ineffable glory and beauty of God. We think that such symbolic realism lies at the basis of the entire teaching of St. Gregory Palamas on the Divine Light, and that only in this way can many peculiar (and at first glance, somewhat strange) points of this teaching be correctly understood.

Be that as it may, the uncreated Light, as supernatural and grace-filled, is decidedly different from both the ordinary sensual and the natural-rational. "A different light, we read in the "Tomos of Svyatogorsk", is characteristic of the mind and another sense: sensual light reveals sensible objects, and the light of the mind is the knowledge contained in thoughts. Therefore it is not proper for sight and intellect to perceive the same light, but each acts according to and within its own nature. But when the worthy receive spiritual and supernatural grace and power, they see with both feeling and mind that which surpasses all feeling and all understanding... as God alone knows, and those who experience such works [of grace]." This state of Divine illumination and vision of the uncreated Light is described by St. Gregory Palamas as follows: "To the God-like One He [i.e., God] is Light and nothing else; and that in the sensual world the sun is God... [a person] who has received a Divine action for a good inheritance... he himself is, as it were, Light and is with the Light, and together with the Light consciously sees that which without such grace is hidden to all, having risen not only above the bodily senses, but also above everything that we know... for God is seen by those who are cleansed in heart... Who, being Light, dwells and reveals Himself to those who love Him and are loved by Him... but He reveals Himself, as in a mirror, to a purified mind. Being invisible in Himself: so is the face in the mirror, which is manifested [in it], but [itself] invisible; and it is so that it is absolutely impossible to see anything in the mirror and at the same time what is reflected in the mirror."

However, this uncreated Divine Light, for all its immaterial and supersensual nature, does not always remain only an inner "Divine illumination, mysteriously and ineffably arising." It may be thought that in some cases, although it does not change in its nature, as it is "manifested outwardly," it becomes an objective phenomenon from inner experience, and even acquires certain properties of visible light. We notice something similar already in Blazh. Theodorite in his description of the "Light not made by hands", when he says that a certain ascetic saw it, "looking out of the window" (see above). We can conclude the same on the basis of some examples cited by St. Gregory Palamas. Thus, he speaks of "the Divine radiance and brightness, of which Adam was a partaker before the transgression, and was not naked as clothed in the true garment of glory... being much more beautiful... now clothed in gold and adorned with crowns of transparent stones." This Light, which is "the good of the age to come," shone on the face of Moses, whose glory the children of Israel could not behold. The radiance of this Light on the face of the First Martyr Stephen was not able to bear the Jews who looked at him. This same uncreated Light shone upon the Apostle Paul on the road to Damascus, and its action, despite its immateriality, was reflected in his bodily eyes, and some of those present saw it. The cave of the Holy Sepulchre was filled with this Light, the "Light of the Resurrection", when Mary Magdalene came there after the Resurrection and "divinely saw" this Light. "It is necessary to consider," writes St. Gregory Palamas, "... how, when there was still darkness, she saw everything accurately and in detail, and when it was outside, she saw what was inside the cave. It was evident that there was darkness outside, for the sensual day had not yet fully dawned, but this cave was filled with the Light of the Resurrection; divinely visible by Mary, it aroused greater love for Christ and gave strength to her eyes to perceive the angelic vision and to be able not only to see, but also to speak with the angels. That's the Light." It is interesting that in this case its double action was especially clearly manifested: on the one hand, it was purely spiritual, internal, which enlightened Mary, aroused in her love for the Lord and made her able to see the angels and enter into conversation with them, on the other hand, it so illuminated, like material light, the interior of the cave that in it it was possible to see "exactly" everything in it, despite the fact that it was still dark outside and "the sensual day has not yet dawned". In short, the "sensual day" emphasizes the "supersensuality" of Light inside the cave. Finally, the most striking example of the uncreated Divine Light is the Light that shone upon the Lord on the Mount of Transfiguration and was seen there by His disciples. This "Light of Tabor," as one of the main objects of the "hesychastic disputes," has become, as it were, a "classic example" of the uncreated Light, so that in the imagination of very many the manifestation of the uncreated Light is identified and limited to the Light of Transfiguration. But, as we have seen, the Divine Light, in addition to the Light of Transfiguration, has many and varied forms of its manifestation in the world.

St. Gregory Palamas talks a lot about the Light of Tabor in his works. He describes it, however, mainly in apophatic terms. This is understandable, since the Light of Transfiguration surpasses, as we have seen, all reason and all feeling... Thus, he calls it "ineffable, uncreated, everlasting, ageless, unapproachable... infinite, unlimited", etc. On the positive side, it is characterized primarily as beauty and as the glory of God, "... the original and unchangeable beauty, the glory of God, the glory of Christ, the glory of the Spirit, the ray of Divinity." It is also important to note that this Light, according to the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, is not something more subjective, arising in our consciousness as some kind of dream and idea in general, or something that arose at a certain moment (the Transfiguration) and soon disappeared. This Light is eternally inherent in God, and on Tabor it was only revealed to the apostles, and even then only partially, (from this we can conclude that this Light exists as an objective reality, that is, independently of our consciousness). In itself it is unchangeable, with the only difference that, being eternally extra-spatial, like the Divinity Itself, from the moment of the Incarnation it was concentrated in the body of Christ, in Whom dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead. And in general, it is not the Light itself that changes (it is unchangeable), but our ability to perceive it in greater or lesser power, the degree of our participation in the Divine. It is even more important to note how St. Gregory Palamas taught about the way of seeing this Light, for in the misunderstanding of this aspect of his teaching lies one of the main causes of misunderstandings that arise in general in connection with the teaching about the uncreated Light. For, as is well known, even Barlaam and his supporters set out in their attacks on St. Gregory Palamas from the assertion attributed to him that the Light of Tabor was seen by the Apostles with bodily eyes, and, consequently (Barlaam concluded) is a sensual, material light, and, as such, created, and not a Divine kind of atmospheric phenomenon, as can be inferred from some of Barlaam's words. In fact, however, St. Gregory Palamas, though not fully rejecting the opinion about the vision of the Light of Tabor with the bodily eyes, explains that the eyes of the Apostles were transfigured by the power of the Holy Spirit, and the vision of the Light itself was not an ordinary process of natural vision, but a supernatural, grace-filled one. In accordance with the whole spirit of the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, corporeality is not rejected here as something incapable of participating in the Divine life (such a view would have appeared to St. Gregory Palamas as a Manichaean desecration of the flesh), but is transformed here on earth by the power of the Holy Spirit and lives the life of the age to come... Here are some texts from the works of St. Gregory Palamas that confirm the above: having refuted the opinions of the heretics that the Light of Tabor is "a ghost, a symbol that arises and disappears, but does not possess true existence," St. Gregory Palamas asserts that "the Light of the Lord's Transfiguration does not arise or disappear, is not described or perceived by the sensual power, although it was visible with bodily eyes... but thanks to the change of feelings, then the mysteries of the Lord passed from the flesh to the Spirit." "Neither this Light is sensual, nor those who have seen it have seen it simply with sensual eyes, but changed by the power of the Divine Spirit." "And thus [Christ] is transfigured, but does not perceive what He was not, or changing into what He was not [before the Transfiguration], but making manifest to His disciples what He was." "They saw, indeed they saw this uncreated and divine illumination, but God remained invisible in His secret superessence."

This Divine illumination, seen by the Apostles on Mount Tabor, is available to people cleansed by the Spirit while still here on earth, although the full revelation of the Divine Light will be given only in the future life, when we see God face to face. That is why St. Gregory Palamas (following St. John of Damascus here) likes to call "the great spectacle of the Light of the Lord's Transfiguration," the "Divine and Ineffable Light," "the mystery of the eighth day," that is, "the age to come," "the vision and delight of the saints in the incomprehensible age." In this sense, the uncreated Light is often called the Kingdom of God, which is fully revealed at the end of time, but is already partially manifested to spirit-bearing people in accordance with their inner perfection and ability to perceive the Divine. "This Divine experience," writes St. Gregory Palamas, "is given in measure and is capable of being greater and smaller, indivisibly divisible in accordance with the dignity of those who perceive it." But even in the age to come, however complete the revelation of the glory of God and its direct contemplation "face to face" in the vision of the uncreated Light may be, the "secret Divine super-essence" will still remain forever invisible and inaccessible to creation, as surpassing in its greatness all created capacity for perception. For this reason, the Council of 1352 emphasized in its decrees that the Light of the Transfiguration is not the "super-essential essence of God" itself, for it remains completely invisible and uninvolved: for no one has ever seen God, that is, as He is in essence, but rather... the natural power of the super-essential essence, inseparably proceeding from it and manifesting itself through God's love for mankind to persons purified by the mind." In his "Homily on the Transfiguration," St. Gregory Palamas rebels against those who "do not call the Light that shone forth at that time" "Divine glory, the Kingdom of God, beauty, grace, brightness," but assert that this is the essence of God, and declares that "it is characteristic of the accursed Messalians to think that they see the essence of God." St. Gregory Palamas sees a certain figurative similarity of this impossibility of seeing the essence of God in the circumstance that, while the disciples of Christ could contemplate the Light of Transfiguration emanating from His face, they fell face down on the ground when a bright cloud overshadowed them. "What kind of light cloud is this? asks St. Gregory Palamas, and how, being bright, did he overshadow them? Is he not that unapproachable Light in which God dwells?.. One and the same thing is here both Light and darkness, overshadowing because of its [all] surpassing light." And although the Light of the Lord's Face was also unapproachable "and unlimited", "but then, shining more palely, it made it possible to see; and later shining much stronger, he became invisible to them because of the superiority of light." In this sense, St. Gregory Palamas interprets the expressions "darkness" and "darkness" found in Holy Scripture and patristic writings to symbolically designate the place of God's dwelling. At the same time, the radiance of Divine glory, His uncreated Light, is not, in accordance with the whole meaning of St. Gregory Palamas' teaching on "essence and energy," something separate from God Himself, but is God Himself in His indivisible and undiminished revelation. Therefore, it would be a mistake to think that St. Gregory Palamas held the opinion that the saints in the future life, instead of seeing God, will confine themselves to the contemplation of some separately existing Light. The inaccessibility of God's essence does not prevent us from contemplating God "face to face" in the coming age.

The teaching of St. Gregory Palamas about the uncreated Divine Light is closely related to his teaching about grace. Such a connection is self-evident, since St. Gregory Palamas always thinks of Divine illumination and vision of Light not as some kind of natural achievement of man, but as a direct action of God's power, internally assimilated by man. This direct action of God, insofar as it manifests itself in man and enlightens him inwardly, is identified by St. Gregory Palamas with Divine grace. He teaches about it as an uncreated and unlimited power of God (energy), which transcends both the mind and the senses, and all created things, truly uniting its owners with God and adoring them (without, however, losing the created character of their nature). "This Divine brightness and divinely created energy," writes St. Gregory Palamas, "those who partake of it are adored, is a kind of Divine grace, but not the nature of God; not because it was absent... for everywhere [is] the nature of God, but as inaccessible to anyone, for there is no one created... who is able to partake of it; The divine energy and grace of the Spirit, being everywhere present and inseparable from Him, is not participatory, as if absent [to persons] who are incapable of communion because of impurity." "Divine and divinely created illumination and grace," writes Gregory Palamas in another place, "are not the essence, but the energy of God." St. Gregory Palamas writes a lot about the uncreated nature of grace in his works, refuting the opinions of his opponents, who saw in his teaching something heretical and considered heretics those who "call God's God's grace uncreated, unborn, and hypostatic." In accordance with this, self-deification is understood by him not as a natural process of imitation of God and union with Him through the accomplishment of individual virtues or as something inherent in the rational nature of man (in which case man would become God by nature), but as His ineffable gift, as the fruit of the action of His grace (although prepared by virtues). "Thus," writes St. Gregory Palamas, "the grace of deification is higher than nature and virtue; all this is infinitely inferior to her. For all virtue, and our imitation of God as far as possible, makes him who possesses [virtue] capable of Divine unity; grace mysteriously accomplishes the ineffable union itself." "By means of it [grace] all God is contained in the worthy, and the saints are wholly contained in all God." "God's gift is deification," "deification takes the adored out of its nature." For this reason, the partakers of Divine grace can be called by it beginningless and infinite, as St. Gregory Palamas writes in his third "Discourse against Akindinus," which has the subtitle: "The testimonies of the saints, showing that those who have become partakers of Divine grace become by it [grace] beginningless and infinite." Defining more precisely the relationship between uncreated Light and grace in the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, we can say that for him uncreated Light and grace are essentially identical. Rather, both are the actions of God. St. Gregory Palamas speaks of this directly when he calls the Light of Tabor "uncreated and natural grace," writes about the "Light of Divine Grace" and refutes the opinion of those who call "the idolizing grace of God a property of the intellectual nature, arising from a single imitation, and not a supernatural and ineffable radiance and Divine action, invisibly visible and incomprehensibly comprehended by the worthy." It seems to us, therefore, that the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas would most accurately express the thought that the uncreated Light and its vision are not so much the consequence of the action of God's grace upon us, as the revelation of this grace. And this uncreated Light, which is identical with grace, has, as we have already seen, in St. Gregory Palamas many forms of its manifestation, from a purely inner illumination, mysteriously experienced by the heart, to a radiance that seems to be outside of us, partly similar in its actions to earthly light, but at the same time inwardly enlightening and contemplating it. One can even think that in the highest spiritual states, the grace of God, while still remaining invisible and "super-intelligent," is at the same time revealed as an ineffable "supersensible" Light, incomprehensibly contemplated in oneself or externally by those who have been vouchsafed such a state. Nowhere, however, in the works of St. Gregory Palamas do we find an indication that such a "supersensible luminosity" is necessarily inherent in grace at its highest stages, and that, remaining only "super-intelligent," it is thereby still defective and incomplete. It can be thought that, in accordance with the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, the types of God's grace-filled action are manifold and diverse, and that there can be no universally binding law here.

Such, in general terms, is the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas about the uncreated Divine Light. This teaching has always been a "stumbling block" for rationalist theological thought, which rejected it as allegedly inconsistent with the concept of God as a pure and simple Spirit and ascribed to Him a certain materiality. It seems to us that such an assessment of the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas is explained by the difficulty of thinking (especially for persons brought up in the spirit of Catholic mysticism) of the existence of immaterial Light and its involuntary replacement by material light. But if we succeed in overcoming this difficulty, the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas will be revealed to us in its deepest mystical and theological sense. Mystically, its significance lies in the fact that it affirms and substantiates the authenticity of our spiritual experience, in which the Divine and the uncreated are directly given to us. We do not contemplate some created product of a Divine cause inaccessible to us, not some light different from the Light of the uncreated, but the Divine itself in Its original. In this possibility of direct contemplation of the Divine and union with it, in the possibility of our grace-filled overcoming of our created limitations and going beyond the limits of natural being, is the meaning and justification of man's mystical path. On the other hand, in the manifestation of the uncreated Light, God reveals Himself to the world in the form of imperishable and immaterial beauty, the pale reflection of which is our earthly light and the created beauty of the created world. God, according to the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, is not something comprehended by man's rational faculty alone, as the representatives of one-sided theological intellectualism would wish, He is the source and prototype of true beauty, and as such He reveals Himself to the world in the imperishable radiance of His Divine glory. "The unapproachable Light, the incomprehensible outpouring of Divine radiance" is what the Council of 1352 calls the Light of Tabor, "the ineffable glory and the super-perfect and pre-eternal glory of the Godhead, the ageless glory of the Son and the Kingdom of God, the true and longed-for beauty around the Divine and blessed nature, the natural glory of God, the Divinity of the Father and the Spirit, reflected in the Only-begotten Son." This contemplation of the uncreated Divine Light as "true and desired beauty" seems to us to be one of the most profound and valuable insights of St. Gregory Palamas into the mystery of the Divine life of the Triune Divinity, in His relation to the created world.

Chapter IV: Conclusion. The Significance of St. Gregory Palamas in Orthodox Theology