help with St. Gregory Palamas

[jckstraw72]

somewhere St. Gregory Palamas writes that there are 3 kinds of theologians:

1. the Saints who have direct vision of God
2. those who do not have vision, but trust the Saints
3. those who do not have vision and do not trust the Saints - the bad theologians

does anyone know what work he writes this in? thanks.

 

[Wesley1982]

I think when we focus too much on St. Gregory Palamas it makes you a Palamite.

 

[Dewi Sant]

I have spent the previous half hour using all my research skill to find the source, but to no avail.
No-one references it :O

The closest I can find is a reference in Vladimir Losky's "In the Image and Likeness of God". Alas, Google Books does not allow me to read the reference chart so I am unable to decode it any further, it should be easily available at any good Orthodox theological library.

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=...experience saints theologians palamas&f=false
I cannot be certain even that the saying is the same:
"These mysteries [divine light] cannot be fully known, (or, rather, experienced) except by the saints - by those who live in perfect union with God."

P.G. 150, cols. 1225-1227.

It is a long shot.

Alternatively, it appears in Patriarch Bartholemew's work "Speaking the Truth in Love", P. 362.

Speaking the Truth in Love: Theological and Spiritual Exhortations of ... - Bartholomew I (Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople) - Google Books



All I can really do further is to look through the periodical and journal catalogues in the hope that someone actually referenced its source.
It is fortunate for you that I am a research post-grad in Eastern Patristics and it doesn't take much to get my geek hat on (also I personally want to know where it comes from now...judging from my searches thus far, not the Triads, likely the 'Philokalia'...though that isn't much help either.)


edit: make that forty minutes

edit again: I'll be in Thessaloniki for Pascha...I'll ask him personally for you

 

[jckstraw72]

thank you for your effort! it led me to a work that gives this teaching of St. Gregory and cites this as its source:

Kallistos Ware, “Tradition and Personal Experience in Later Byzantine Theology,” Eastern Churches Review, Vol. 3, 1970, p. 139.

im assuming we have this in our library here at St. Tikhon's. Hopefully it will provide the source from St. Gregory.

 

[truefiction1]

I just looked for it in "The 150 Chapters" by Gregory Palamas and couldn't find any such explicit sayings in it. These ideas are implicit, however, in his attitudes regarding good Theology as being inseparable from the vision of God's uncreated energy, which is perceived by the eyes of the spirit as ineffable light.

Please let us know where you found it, if successful. Thanks.

 

[ma2000]

Through the prayers of Saint Gregory, I have found the citation You have to thank him yourself. I know I will
Here is the citation:

When you hear speak of the deifying energy of God and the theurgic grace of the
Spirit, do not busy yourself or seek to know why it is this or that and not something else;
for without it you cannot be united to God, according to those Fathers who have spoken
about it. Attend rather to those works which will allow you to attain to it, for thus you
will know it according to your capacities; for, as St. Basil tells us, he alone knows the
energies of the Spirit who has learnt of them through experience. As for the man who
seeks knowledge before works, if he trusts in those who have had the experience, he
obtains a certain image of the truth. But if he tries to conceive of it by himself, he finds
himself deprived even of the image of truth. He then puffs himself up with pride as if he
had discovered it, and breathes forth his anger against the men of experience as if they
were in error. Do not be overcurious, therefore, but follow the men of experience in your
works, or at least in your words, remaining content with the exterior manifestations of
grace.

Gregory Palamas
The Triads
EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
JOHN MEYENDORFF
TRANSLATION BY
NICHOLAS GENDLE
PREFACE BY
JAROSLAV PELIKAN
PAULIST PRESS
1983
page 87
http://www.scribd.com/doc/81124558/Gregory-Palamas-The-Triads

Saint Gregoy Palamas, pray for us!

edit again: I'll be in Thessaloniki for Pascha...I'll ask him personally for you

I'll be there a month ahead of you

Edit:
Metropolitan Kalistos Ware cites See A. M. Allchin, ‘The Appeal to Experience in the Triads of St Gregory Palamas’, Studia Patristica viii (Berlin 1966), pp. 323-8. And from there I looked for the original source in the Triads.
http://www.bogoslov.ru/en/text/2350887.html

 

[jckstraw72]

see, this is why I love Romania(ns). Thank you so much!

 

[Dewi Sant]

Excellent.

And enjoy your time in Thess.

 

[ma2000]

Well, thank Saint Gregory
Thank you, Dewi Sant! May you have a most pleasant and useful time there also!

 

[Wesley1982]

I think St. Gregory Palamas made the essence/energies distinction in reference to the Holy Trinity on the Sunday of Orthodoxy.