Here are some examples:
Deification - The Uncreated Light Deification is an enhypostatic* and direct illumination which has no beginning but appears in those worthy as something exceeding their comprehension. It is indeed a mystical union with God, beyond mind and reason in the age when creatures will no longer know corruption. - Saint Maximus the ConfessorDeification is most often expressed as involving the "Uncreated Light."
Fr. Sophrony says,
This Light penetrates us with the power of God, we we become 'without beginning'––not through our origin but by the gift of Grace: life without beginning is communicated to us. And there is no limit to the outpouring of the Father's love: man becomes identical with God––the same by content, no by primordial Self-Being. God will eternally be GOD for the reasonable being." (We Shall See Him as He Is, p172.)It is though our participation in this uncreated light that we become deified, become like Christ. We do not become a god in essence but by Grace and adoption. We are taught that we can never behold, or know the Divine Essence, but when we are filled with this Divine Light we experience His Uncreated Energies. This is a personal communion with God, face to face. Our identity is not assumed into the Divine Essence. And, it is much more than an experience of Light.
Here is how Saint Symeon the New Theologian expresses it in one of his hymns,
He Himself is discovered within me, resplendent inside my wretched heart, enlightening me from all sides with His immortal splendor, shining on all of my members with His rays. Entirely intertwined with me, He embraces me entirely. He gives Himself totally to me, the unworthy one, and I am filled with His love and beauty. I am sated with pleasure and Divine tenderness. I share in the Light. I participate also in the glory. My face shines like that of my beloved and all my members become bearers of Light.
Quote:
One afternoon, I went to see Father Paisios. During these days, I was possessed by a certain haughtiness which was derived from the lack of warmth in my poor prayer life. When I began to control my unrestrained mind, I started seeing things more lucidly. However, as I did not have a humble attitude, I thought I had reached a certain spiritual state and I was bragging about it.
I went to see the Elder to confide in him my thoughts, which were imbued by the sense of haughtiness I just described. Father Paisios listened to me and without saying anything in specific, started telling me the following story:
-Yesterday, a monk visited me and told me something which made me recall the incident I am about to tell you.
One night, I was in my cell at Katounakia saying the Jesus prayer and gradually I was possessed by a heavenly joy. Simultaneously, my cell, whose darkness was interrupted only by the trembling flame of a candle, was filled with a beautiful white-blue light. At the beginning, the light was very strong. I felt that my eyes were also “getting stronger” in order to withstand the glow. It was the Uncreated Light! I stayed in my cell for many hours, losing sense of all earthy things and living in a spiritual world, very different from this one.
While being in this state of the Uncreated Light and heavenly experiences, I lost all sense of time.
At one point the Uncreated Light started fading away and I was back to my old state of being. I began to feel hungry, so I took a piece of bread to eat. Then, I was thirsty and had some water to drink. I was getting tired and I needed to sit down and get some rest. I felt like an animal and I deplored myself for it. The change from one situation back to the other gave birth to a natural humbleness. Having experienced the difference between the spiritual state I was found in and my earthly needs, there was nothing left for me but to despise and blame myself for it.
Further down from my cell, another monk was residing. I looked outside and had the impression it was still night with a full moon. I went out and asked him:
-What time is it? It seems that dawn hasn’t broken yet this morning.
The monk looked astonished and asked me:
- What did you say, Father Paisios? I didn’t understand.
Only then, I realized what had happened. It was ten in the morning and the “full moon” I thought I had seen was the sun. The Uncreated Light was so strong that it made daylight and the sun look like a night with a full moon. The difference between the light of the sun and the Uncreated Light was like the one between night and day.
When the Elder finished his story, he told me to go, as there were other people waiting to see him. I made my way back to my cell only slightly realized my beastly state of being.
