“Created Essence” and “Divine Essence” in the Spiritual Theology of St. Simeon the New Theologian. Divine Essence in the Essence of Man and Woman

Archbishop Vasily (Krivoshein)
"creature essence" and " divine essence" V spiritual theology Venerable Simeon the New Theologian

Krivocheine B. "Essence créée" et "Essence Divine" dans la théologie spirituelle de St. Syméon le Nouveau Theologien // Studia Patristica. T.XII. Berlin, 1975. P.210-226.

Needless to say, the importance of the concept essence, ουσ?α, about what a huge place it occupies in the theological thought of the Holy Fathers, how diverse their meanings and application of this word are. Open the dictionary of Greek patristics prof. Lampe - this word and its derivatives are given 16 columns of quotations from Greek patristic literature, and 11 columns are occupied by the word ουσ?α itself with its theological, Christological, trinitarian, general, spiritual and even material subsections. And this is only for the period of the first eight centuries of Greek patristics! Indeed, if we take into account the writings of the apologists (for example, Athenagoras), the Hieromartyr Irenaeus, the spiritual theology of Clement of Alexandria or Origen, the defense of μο?σιον by St. Athanasius or the anti-Eunomian polemic of the Cappadocians, the mystical theology of Dionysius the Areopagite, the Christological disputes of the Monophysites and Monothelites, spirituality of Evagrius and Macarius, St. Maximus the Confessor, the iconoclastic crisis and Orthodoxy’s response to it, Photius and Filioque, not to mention St. Gregory Palamas, who belongs to a later era than St. Simeon, we will everywhere find that the problem of ουσ? manifestations, the paradox of a transcendent God and the deification of man occupies an extremely large place in the experience of the Holy Fathers and in their reflections on the mystery of Christianity. It is quite natural that something similar is revealed in St. Simeon the New Theologian, in whom this is expressed with originality inherent in him. Following the Holy Fathers, in particular St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Simeon with the same word ουσ?α designates the essence of God and the essence of created things and always opposes created essences to God the Creator. So, using this word in the plural - α? ο?σ?αι, he means angels when he says that God is "higher than mental beings, for they too are His creation." However, this is patristic terminology, especially characteristic of St. Gregory of Nazianzus and St. Dionysius the Areopagite where they speak of angels. St. Simeon also starts talking about the essence of visible creations, in order to emphasize, as St. Basil did, its unknowability for the human mind: “If you could know the height of the heavens,” he writes in a letter to Stephen of Nicomedia, “or determine what the essence of the sun is, moons, stars." However, more often the term ουσ?α is applied to the creature as such, to created man and his soul, and this term is accompanied by adjectives created, earthly, human and so on. "Oh, what is this thing hidden from all creaturely essence? What is this mental light, invisible to anyone?" - exclaims St. Simeon, opposing everything created to mental light. [Elsewhere] he contrasts the [created] with Divine fire: "For You purify defiled souls, You illuminate the mind and embrace the earthly and material essence." A created entity is not capable of knowing secrets, since "by their nature they are inexpressible, completely ineffable, forbidden to people, incomprehensible to angels, and unknown to any other created entity." Here the concept of "created essence" covers people and angels. It is also attached to the soul and body, and despite its created nature, this essence, like dry firewood and grass, is capable of being ignited by Divine fire: " Strange wonder: my flesh, I am talking about the essence of my soul, yes, yes, and of my body - participates in the Divine glory and is illuminated by the radiance of the Divine ray. not to destroy, not to cause inevitable suffering? ". Or:" The flame that reached heaven and burned inside me with special strength, nevertheless did not burn my essence in my womb, like grass, but lo and behold! turned it all into a flame." However, the ontological gap between God and every earthly essence is not abolished: "For God is uncreated, and we are all created<...>He is the Spirit above every spirit as the Creator of all spirits and their Lord, while we are flesh taken from dust, an earthly essence (γε?δης ουσ?α) ". And again: "Tell me, is it possible to compare a shadow and a genuine thing or service and slave spirit with the Spirit of the Lord, Almighty and God, Who affirms and strengthens every created entity (κτιστ?ν ο?σ?αν) ". So, we can conclude that St. Simeon has the expression essence, ουσ?α, denoting the created world (angels and man, soul and body), is fundamentally different from the Divine essence (it will be discussed below), - differs in that it is created as opposed to God the Creator, in that it - earthly and is not able to comprehend with the mind not only God, but also the essence of other creatures, but at the same time it is able to perceive the Divine fire and ignite it without dying. It can also be said that in these cases the concept of ουσ?α acquires a specific meaning for St. Simeon, which almost coincides with the objects he designates in their deepest sense. Similarly, St. Simeon never considers the created essence speculatively, but always in relation to God and to his own spiritual life.

In our present study of St. Simeon, we are going to speak mainly about the uncreated essence of God, about His ουσ?α. Without trying to give it a theological or philosophical definition, considering it completely impossible, St. Simeon insists that it is a daring thing to investigate it, especially on the part of those who do not have the Holy Spirit in themselves: “I am surprised,” he writes in his “Theological Words," as the majority of people, not having yet had time to be born of God and become His children, without any fear set about theologizing and reasoning about God. state, explain the truths of God and what relates to God Himself (τα περ? του θεο? καν τα κατ" αυτ?ν), not possessing the spirit of reason, I tremble in my mind and, as it were, lose my temper simply from the fact that I reflect and see how incomprehensible the Divine is to anyone, and we, not knowing what is under our feet, not knowing ourselves, hasten to philosophize without the fear of God and with insolence about what is inaccessible to us, and we do all this, not having the Spirit that illuminates this area and reveals it to us: we sin by the very fact that we speak about God. It is not easy for a person to know even himself, and few people succeed in this in a truly philosophical way.<...>Moreover, it is completely contrary to reason and common sense explore the nature and essence of God." And then he continues: "Hey you! Why do you, instead of putting things in order in yourselves, are investigating what concerns God and Divine things? First we must pass from death to life - this is an indispensable condition<...>in order to draw the Spirit within oneself and, by His light, proclaim that which relates to God, as far as possible and as far as we are enlightened by God." These passages are very important for understanding what can be called the epistemology of St. Simeon. As we see, [for him] knowledge of earthly things and even of oneself is already very relative, but as for the knowledge of the essence of God, the very desire to investigate it is absurd. the traditional term for the attributes and actions of God - implies holiness and illumination and is proportional to them within, accessible to man. All this argumentation is very "in the spirit of St. Basil," with the only difference being that St. Simeon, in more detail than St. Basil, reveals the possibility of mystical knowledge.

About the fact that grace is necessary for communion with God, St. Simeon, starting from the opposite, says in the hymn: “How can the soul, full of thorns, passions and sin, withstand the nature of this unbearable flame? being darkness, will merge with impregnable light and will not disappear from His presence?" . As we can see, even in the presence of light, the Divine essence remains absolutely intolerable. St. Simeon calls it "hidden essence" (κρυπτ? ουσ?α): "Oh, immaculate nature, hidden essence, philanthropy, unknown to most people, mercy, invisible to those who live recklessly, the essence is unchanging, indivisible, trisagion". And yet St. Simeon compares it with immaterial and Divine fire: “Listen,” he exclaims, “you who have sinned like me before God, strive and strive in deeds [good], in order to receive and hold the substance of immaterial fire, I said "substance", pointing you to the essence of God, - to kindle the mental lamp of the soul, to become suns that shine in the world ". And once he even identifies [the essence of God] with love: "For love," he says, "is not a name, it is the essence of God."

At the same time, the term ουσ?α does not satisfy Saint Simeon when he starts talking about God. Following the apophatic line of St. Cyril of Alexandria, Dionysius the Areopagite, St. Maximus the Confessor and St. John of Damascus, he declares in some texts that God is above all essence, and prefers to call Him "superessential" (?περο?σιος). Saint Simeon asks himself the question of whether it is possible to call God an essence: “If You are truly completely inexplicable, invisible, impregnable, incomprehensible and incorporeal, impalpable and completely elusive, Savior, then how dare we give You a name, how dare we call You at least some essence of some kind? Indeed, in You, O my God, there is nothing [created]." And he claims that God is transcendent to any essence: “The divine and uncreated superessential nature is called superessential, because it is above the essence of all creations, but it is essential and above any essence of being (?νυπ?στατος) and by nature incomparable with the created hypostasis. indescribable hypostasis?" . The same idea of ​​the complete transcendence of God in relation to every creature is expressed in the following lines: “You fill everything, and everything is outside everything; You are above all things, Master, above all essence, above nature itself, above all ages, above all light, Savior!" . Note that here, as above, St. Simeon addresses the superessential God as the Savior. This is the paradox of Christianity that stands at the center of its spirituality and is fundamentally different from the mysticism of Plotinus. The expression of this paradox is the Incarnation: "Yourself superessential, uncreated before, You took on flesh and became visible to me as created."

This "super-essential essence" is tripartite, and St. Simeon speaks at length about its tripartite aspect: "The Father is light, the Son is light, the Holy Spirit is light.<...>The three are in fact one and the same light, one, indivisible<...>God is all indivisible in His nature and in His essence, truly above all essence.<...>He is all contemplated as simple light<...>three - one essence, one Deity ". In another place, he points to the immutability of the trinity essence: "O Trinity, Creator of the universe, O my only God, Whose nature is indescribable, Whose glory is incomprehensible, deeds are inexplicable, the essence is unchanging ". Sometimes St. Simeon the word “superessential” denotes the inexpressible and incomprehensible nature of the trinitarian relationship: “As for the non-existent being (ανυπ?ρκτου υπ?ρξεως) of God, birth without conception, non-hypostatic hypostasis, superessential existence (?περουσ?ου ο?σι?σεως ) and don't know what more<...>then it is absolutely impossible to state, express and understand the properties of the super-essential Divine nature, and the human mind is not able to comprehend them.

The "essence" of St. Simeon also has a Christological meaning where, in accordance with the dogmas of the Council of Chalcedon, he speaks of the two natures and two essences (ο?σ?αι) of Christ in a single hypostasis: "I am seven God and one perfect man, - Christ speaks of Himself in hymns - the whole, excellent, flesh, soul, mind and mind, fully God, man and God in My two essences, as well as in My two natures, in My two energies, in My two wills in one Hypostases. At the same time God and man, I am One from the Trinity ". Elsewhere, St. Simeon encourages sinners to repent, "in order to become, as it were, gods, containing within themselves all the glory of God in two essences, in two natures, in two energies and in two wills." Deification must therefore be a complete union of our two essences, soul and body, with the two essences of Christ: "and I myself become a god<...>soul and body are<...>one in two entities. And so, those who are one and two, insofar as they partake of Christ and drink His blood, they, united with two essences, and also with the two natures of my God, become a god by their participation.

Insisting, as we see, on the hidden and unchanging nature of the Divine Essence, St. Simeon speaks at the same time about its manifestations. First of all, about the light of her glory: "You shone, You appeared as the light of glory, as the impregnable light of Your essence, O Savior, and enlightened the darkened soul." He distinguishes between essence and Divine power: "I breathed into him a soul not from My essence, but from My power (?σχ?ς)" . But the unity [of essence] is unshakable: "God of all, worshiped in the Trinity of hypostases and the unity of essence." Much more often St. Simeon speaks of the "energies" (?ν?ργειαι) of the Divine Essence, using a term that became classical after St. Basil the Great and even earlier, since it was already used by the apologist Athenagoras, but St. Gregory Palamas made famous. So, St. Simeon says that these energies (or actions - the translation is unable to express all the variety of shades of meaning that are contained in this term) - are unknowable: "How to investigate the nature of the Creator of all kinds? And His energies? How do you suggest that I explain them?" . True, St. Simeon speaks here not of the essence, but of the nature of God, but in another place he identifies both concepts: "They are not divided and not separated in You, but Your nature is Your essence, and Your essence is Your nature" . At the same time, in his most exalted visions, St. Simeon distinguishes between the essence and energies of God: "Let me see Your face, the Word, and enjoy Your unspeakable beauty, contemplate and indulge in the vision of You. To an ineffable and invisible vision, a terrible vision, let me tell at least not about its essence, but about its energies (τας ενεργε? rather between the essence and energies of Divine vision than between the essence and energies of God Himself, however, this discrepancy, apparently, is not so important, since we are talking about the contemplation of the Word Itself. perceives the reflection of Divine glory as a simple light with which it enters into unity: “For You are above nature, all of You are above all essence, You are my God and Creator, but we see the reflection of Your Divine glory: it is a simple light, a pleasant light; like light it opens, like light it, I think, unites all with us, all in its entirety, with Your servants, a light spiritually contemplated in the distance, suddenly acquired within us.

In "Moral Words" St. Simeon goes even further. Thus, speaking of the sacrament of the Resurrection and arguing that this sacrament was realized in every holy person of past times and continues to be carried out until today, he declares: “By receiving the Spirit of our Lord and God, we become partakers of his Divinity and His essence (συμμ?τοχοι α?το? της Θε?τητος και της ουσ?ας γεν?μεθα); and tasting His Most Pure Body, that is, the Divine mysteries, we really become completely united and related to Him. The communion of the Divine essence is associated here with the Eucharist and the gift of the Holy Spirit. However, this statement of the Monk Simeon is just a paraphrase of the words "partakers of the Divine nature" from the Second Epistle of the Apostle Peter, however, in the following lines, the Monk Simeon somewhat limits his scope, indicating that we are talking about similarity with God by grace: "Having come once in such a state, we become like God by grace<...>restored to our original [state], having a renewed soul, having become blameless and alive as risen from the dead, that is, we see Him who deigned to become like us, and He sees us, to whom it was given to become like Him, sees how they see at a distance the face of a friend with whom one speaks, one speaks to and whose voice one hears." Thus, by no means is meant an essential identification with God, but communication "from afar" (μακρ?θεν), although genuine and embracing our whole being.

Before continuing the study of the Divine essence of St. Simeon, we must consider his use of [this word] in the form κατ" ο?σ?αν (by essence) and τη ουσ?α (by means of essence - dative case). The term "by essence" is used first of all in relation to the Holy Trinity and in meaning approaches "having the same substance", "genuine", "real". Thus, it is said about the Father: ", but belongs to His very being. And in order to designate the true equality of the Son with the Father, St. Simeon says: "He is God, equal to the Father both in essence, and in nature, and in power, and in image (κατ? μορφ?ν ) is true both in appearance (κατ "?δ?αν) and in time is never separated from the Father" . Note that a distinction is made here between "by essence" and "by authority" and so on. And here is how he speaks about the true Deity of the Holy Spirit: "He is omniscient, He is omnipresent, for He is God in essence." Or like this: "As you are a radiance, and you see me as a light, and you set fire to matter, being in essence immaterial?" . To this question of St. Simeon, Christ answers: "I am by nature ineffable, limitless, perfect, impregnable, invisible to anyone, incorporeal, impalpable, unchanging in essence (την ο?σ?αν)" . With such a heap of basic apophatic attributes, St. Simeon shows the greatness of the mystery of Christianity, when that same invisible and unchanging God "becomes visible", burns our soul and unites with its essence. His absolute transcendence is once again evidenced by such terms: [Divine Fire] "elusive, uncreated, invisible, beginningless, and immaterial<...>He is beyond all material and immaterial creations, visible and invisible.<...>He is outside all these creations by nature, by essence, and also by power." In another place, St. Simeon says that the creative nature of God, or His Wisdom, is outside of everything and at the same time "in essence" is present everywhere: "The Creator of the whole world, the Divine nature and Wisdom are not a [part] of all things and are not [located] among them (after all, how could this be when it is not one of the things, but the cause of all things?), it is present everywhere and in everything and in general completely fills everything in essence, in nature, and in hypostasis." This paradox of God invisible "by essence" and visible by the saints, St. Simeon explains, using the opposition of the sun and the rays: "He is seen as worthy, but they do not see them completely, they see Him invisibly, as one a ray of the sun, and He is perceptible to them, elusive in essence. We see a ray - the sun, He Himself, rather blinds, and we catch His ray for you. " Finally, the soul, as created in the image of God, also has its properties "in essence": "And my soul is His image. Having a mind and a word, she wears them [in herself] in essence inseparably and inseparably, and thus she is consubstantial." the difference between the non-creature prototype and His created likeness. However, many ancient Fathers acted in exactly the same way when they explained the mystery of the Holy Trinity. In this case, St. Simeon is not interested in the dogma of the Holy Trinity in itself, but in the revelation of the image of God in the soul by the Holy Spirit .

The expression (τη ουσ?α) "by the essence" or "for the essence" (the creative or dative cases) is often found where St. Simeon emphasizes that God is completely invisible and inaccessible, but despite this, paradoxically unites with us: "Let for You are invisible to them by Your essence, inaccessible by nature, for me You are visible and completely mixed with me by the essence of Your nature; after all, they are not separated in You and are not dissected in any way, but nature is Your essence, and essence is nature. Essential union with God puts a person above the angels, and St. Simeon puts the Eucharistic communion at the basis of it: "By partaking of Your Flesh, I partake of Your nature and become a true partaker of Your essence, a communion of the Divine, and moreover, becoming a co-heir [of the Divine] in my flesh, I see myself as the highest incorporeal, the son of God, as You said this not to the angels, but to us, calling us gods: I said: you are gods, and the sons of the Most High are all of you (Ps 81:6)" . IN this text St. Simeon speaks most definitely of communion with the Divine Essence in the [sacrament] of the Eucharist. In other places, as we shall see, St. Simeon, striving to express himself more precisely and as a theologian, significantly narrows this statement. Thus, although he claims that God is with us by essence, he wonders if this term is actually applicable to God, since He is beyond essence: , as some argue, and not only by will and strength, as many think, but also by essence, if one dares to speak and think about essence in You, the One Immortal, Superessential!<...>how dare we call you an essence and of what kind and what kind!". It is obvious that here St. Simeon distinguishes between presence by essence and presence by energy, and rejects presence by energy alone, as well as by essence alone. In another place, St. Simeon speaks of such a unity of the Divine of fire with the very essence of the soul, that the two become one: "Then it merges with it inseparably and unites inexpressibly, essentially with its essence, all with everything perfectly<...>and, I don’t know how to say, the two become one, the soul with the Creator and in the soul - the Creator ". This ineffable unity, merging without merging, which is difficult for St. Simeon to characterize, extends to the body: "A strange miracle: my flesh, I'm talking about the essence of my soul, yes, yes, and of my body - participates in the Divine glory and is illuminated by the radiance of the Divine ray ". Here we are talking about the participation of the body in the glory of God.

In the face of all these indescribable realities, and nevertheless striving to explain the mystery in theological terms, St. Simeon speaks of his perplexity in this way: “Lord our God, Father, Son and Soul, You are formless in appearance, but for contemplation - the most beautiful, with Your inexplicable beauty overshadows everything visible, magnificence You are beyond sight, You surpass all<...>Essence superessential, unknown even to the angels. We know that You exist thanks to Your energies.<...>because you named yourself truly existing God (Ex 3:14), we call it essence, we call it hypostasis, because the non-existent has neither essence nor hypostasis. That is why we boldly call You the essential (?νο?σιον), we say that You are hypostases, You, Whom no one has ever seen, the Trinitarian God, the One Beginning without Beginning. Otherwise, how can we dare to call You an essence or glorify in You three separate Hypostases?" And then he continues, emphasizing the unknowability of God: "And how can a creature think the image of Your being? Or the birth of your Son, God and Word? Or the procession of Thy Divine Spirit, in order to cognize Thy unity and separation and to comprehend and authentically understand the form of Thy essence (ουσ?ας σου το ε?δος). No one has ever seen what I have said here about You. It is impossible for someone else to become God by nature and be able to explore Your nature, the essence, form and image (μορφ?ν), as well as the hypostasis, because only You Yourself in Yourself - the Trinitarian God<...>But Yourself, what are You in essence and what kind, or how You gave birth once and forever give birth<...>[knows] Omniscient and All-Pervading, for He is God in essence<...>And none of the angels has ever seen, none of the people has ever known Your existence (?παρξιν), for You are uncreated ".

And in the first hymn, where the Monk Simeon speaks at length about his mystical experience and his impotence to express it in words, he directly states that it is about vision not in essence, but in participation: “What a terrible sacrament is being performed in me?” he asks. himself first of all - the word is powerless to express it, the hand - to describe<...>And if what is happening now in me, the prodigal son, is inexpressible and inexpressible, then, tell me, can the Giver and Cause of this need praise and glorification on our part?<...>Here my tongue goes numb, and my mind sees what is happening, but cannot explain: it looks and wants to tell, but does not find words, because it looks at the invisible, which has no shape, simple, not composed of anything, infinite in size ". no less reverend Simeon tries to understand: “[the mind] does not see the beginning, does not see the end, does not notice any middle, how will he tell about what he has seen? It is seen, I think, as a whole, but not in essence, but in participation (ου τη ουσ?α π?ντως δε αλλ? τη μετουσ?α) ". Wanting to make this vision more understandable by participation, St. Simeon uses the analogy with material fire: “Here you kindle fire from fire and take the fire as a whole, and it remains indivisible and still not depleted, although the transferred fire is separated from the first and passes into many lamps, for this is material fire. And that [fire] is spiritual, indivisible, completely inseparable, non-insect is not transferred and is not divided into many [fires], but even non-insect it abides in me. "The following is a description of the mystical revelation of the Deity:" Arises in me, inside my miserable heart like the sun or like the disk of the sun, it appears spherical, light-like, because it is like a flame. I don’t know, I’ll repeat again what to say about this and wanted to keep silent (oh if I could!) ".

In Hymn 50, communion with God, not in essence, but in communion, is regarded as a sign of Orthodoxy: "You hear," the Saint says, as if from the face of Christ, "that I am with the saints My whole essence (ουσ?α) perceptibly (αισθητ?ς ), through contemplation and even through participation (μετουσ?α) with My Father and the Divine Spirit, and I clearly rest in them<...>If in knowledge, activity and contemplation God completely became a man, then I completely became a god through communication, became a god in feeling and in knowledge (εν α?σθ?σει κα? γν?σει) not in essence, but in participation it is difficult to be more categorical: whatever his statements in other places, here St. Simeon asserts that deification is accomplished not according to essence, but according to participation. And this statement acquires special importance, since St. Simeon makes it a criterion of Orthodoxy Nevertheless, in the same Hymn, continuing his confession and mystical and theological reflections, St. Simeon admits that the Divine non-material essence is visible inside us and penetrates us through and through: “And then, that is, after you followed Christ along the path of His commandments and sufferings, you will see the most brilliant light that has appeared in the completely enlightened air of the soul; There is no fundamental contradiction between these two passages, because the essence (ουσ?α) flows in the soul in the form of light, that is, as a manifestation, and not as it is in itself, or “in essence,” as St. Simeon would say. This term has a particularly deep meaning for him.

Now, in concluding our study, we must analyze the term derived from ουσ?α, the adverb ουσιωδ?ς "essentially." It is very characteristic of St. Simeon, especially in his Theological and Moral Words, where it occurs very often. In general, we can say that the adverb ουσιωδ?ς St. Simeon seeks to express the fact of the unity of God with man and the way in which it is realized. Thus, he uses it to define our participation in the Divine as the fruit of the Incarnation, which in turn is a manifestation of Divine love: “This love, otherwise called the main thing of all virtues, is Christ God, who descended from heaven and became man, who became a participant in our earthly flesh, to essentially grant us participation in His Divinity (?να μεταδ? της αυτ?ς θε?τητας ουσιωδ?ς ?μ?ν) and, having made us spiritual and completely blameless, raise us to heaven ". In another place, St. Simeon speaks of the Divine fire, which scorches our entire soul and burns our passions like dry firewood: “When all this is finally destroyed and only the essence of the soul, freed from passions, remains, then the Divine and immaterial Fire is essentially united with it. , and it ignites, shines through, and like a furnace participates in this tangible Fire. And so the body becomes a burning coal by participation (κατ? μ?θεξιν) of the Divine and inexpressible light ". Word essentially in these texts, it denotes a genuine and deep participation of the essence of our soul in the Divine, a participation that transforms our entire nature, as St. Simeon himself testifies to this: “It is participation and participation in His Divinity (μετουσ? α?το?) form our union with God". This mystery is great, it amazes St. Simeon: “How is God outside of everything by His essence, nature, power and glory, and how He everywhere and in everything, and especially in [His] saints, dwells and builds an abode in them consciously and essentially ( γνωστ?ς και ουσιωδ?ς), He, completely superessential? . This conscious indwelling of God and His vision are true union with God: “As soon as they are essentially united,” says St. Simeon, “with God Himself and are worthy to see Him and be partakers of Him, they are no longer attracted to themselves either by the image of His creations, or shadow of visible things<...>Since their thought dwells predominantly in supersensible realities, as if immersed in them, clothed in the splendor of Divine nature, their feelings are no longer directed, as before, to objects. visible world". Here unity (ουσιωδ?ς) is connected with the fact that [man] is enveloped in the light of Divine nature.

A number of texts say that "essentially" it is primarily the Holy Spirit that works in us. Thus, in an invective against those “who do not know the sweetness and beauty of complete purification,” St. Simeon declares: “they do not believe and convince themselves that it is impossible for a person to be completely cleansed of passions and quite essentially (?λον ουσιωδ?ς) to take into himself Comforter". It can be said that the word essentially here means the complete and conscious indwelling of the Spirit. Elsewhere, the presence of the Spirit in an “essential way” is identified with His energy, and this suggests that there is no question of indwelling “in essence”: “Love (π?θος) is the energy of the Spirit, or rather, His presence is essential ( ουσιωδ?ς), hypostatically visible within me as a light, and this light is incomparable and completely inexplicable. However, in another place it is emphasized that the Holy Spirit is good in itself and, therefore, all the blessings bestowed by Him are essentially bestowed: “You do not need,” he says in one prayer to the Holy Spirit, “to take from outside what You give us, for You Yourself are exactly that (αυτ? εκε?νο υπ?ρχον) that only good can be; those in whom You dwell possess in themselves all that is good essentially. Here the truth and fullness of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as the reality of their possession, come to the fore. Sometimes unity with the Holy Spirit is considered in the context of the trinity by analogy with the tripartite structure of a person: “Oh miracle!” St. Simeon exclaims, “man is connected with God both spiritually and bodily, for the soul is inseparable from the mind, and the body from the soul, but In essential unity (τη ουσιωδ?ς εν?σει), man, by grace, also becomes trinitarian (τρισυπ?στατος) and one god by position (θ?σει)" .

At the same time, it is the Incarnation that remains the basis of the unity of God with man. It is this that makes possible this union in the Holy Spirit, so that before the coming of Christ, God was not united "essentially" with man. Following in the footsteps of St. Gregory of Nazianzus, St. Simeon declares in his hymns that before the incarnation, God "spoke by His Divine Spirit and worked miracles with His energies, but "essentially" never united with us until Christ and my God became a man. Indeed, having taken on the flesh, He gave His Holy Spirit, and through Him He is essentially united with all the faithful, and this unity becomes indissoluble ". It took place first in the bosom of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, from Whom the God-man Jesus Christ was incarnated and born, and all believers share in him by the Holy Spirit. The divine hypostasis unites with the human essence. God, writes St. Simeon, "having received from the Most Holy Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary the animate flesh<...>united her with His incomprehensible and inaccessible Divinity; or, rather, with our essence (ουσ?α) He essentially (ουσιωδ?ς) unites the entire hypostasis of His Divinity; confusing the first with the last, the human with His own, He built it as a holy temple for Himself; without changes and transformations, the Creator of Adam Himself became a perfect man." The Monk Simeon expressed the reality of this hypostatic unity in the Virgin Mary in the same dialect ουσιωδ?ς: "Mary, the Mother of God, is the first to hear the good news from the angel; She trusts the Providence of God<...>and agrees<...>And then She was the first to receive essentially the Word of God into Herself, which truly redeemed Her soul from the former [condemnation] to eternal death. from her all mortal people, so the God-man Christ would have been born from female flesh, and through Him all people became immortal ". And he concludes:" The Word of God, therefore, took on flesh from the Most Pure Mother of God (αγν?ς Θεοτ?κου) , and in return It gave not flesh, but the essential image of the Holy Spirit. "As we see, in these discussions about the Incarnation, the Monk Simeon, with the same word ουσιωδ?ς, also denotes the reality of the union in Christ of the Divine and the human, the fullness of the descent of the Holy Spirit onto the Virgin Mary , and equally the reality of the birth of the Word in us, although with the fundamental difference that this is not a carnal birth, similar to the Incarnation of the Word: “In reality,” says the Reverend, “we receive Him not bodily, as the Virgin Mother of God received Him, but spiritually and essentially; in our hearts we have the One Whom the Pure Virgin conceived." Here, the word ουσιωδ?ς emphasizes the identity of Christ, born in the flesh by the Virgin Mary and spiritually conceived in us. The authenticity of the fact that Christ was really formed in us is manifested, according to St. Simeon, in awareness of this, and in this it differs from illusory visions.The monk gives an explanatory example: “The light of a lamp is reflected in a mirror; the presence of Christ is not like a similar image, devoid of own basis(ανυποστ?τφ); Christ reveals Himself existentially and essentially (?νυποστ?τως και ουσιωδ?ς), in formless form, in form without appearance, visible invisibly and understood incomprehensibly as ". The unknowability and even inaccessibility of God is paradoxically emphasized by St. clearly ".

Where in question about the Eucharist, St. Simeon in the same dialect essentially denotes the sacrament of our communion with the Body and Blood of the Lord. “You made me worthy,” he writes, “to hold and partake essentially of Your Flesh and to drink Your All-Holy Blood.” St. Simeon evidently wants to reveal here the truth of Eucharistic communion, as well as in the following passage, where he also insists on the authenticity and reality of our deification given to us in the Eucharist: "I am a man by nature," he says, "but God by grace. See what kind of grace I am talking about? About union with Him sensually and mentally, essentially and spiritually. I have already spoken to you about mental union in various ways and in different ways, but "sensual" I call union in the sacraments (μυστηρ?ων) , for having been cleansed by repentance and streams of tears, partaking of the deified Body (Σ?ματος τεθεωμ?νου) as God, I myself become a god through an inexpressible union.<...>partaking of Christ and drinking His blood<...>become a god by participation and are called by the name of the One in whom they essentially participate (Ου ουσιωδ?ς μετ?σχον)" .

Trying to sum up our study of the Divine ουσ?α in the works of St. Simeon the New Theologian, we come to the conclusion that, just as when it comes to created essence, there is no theoretical and systematized teaching about essence and its attributes with all the ensuing problems ( simplicity of God, and so on), there is no theory that St. Simeon would develop for the sake of interest, which it represents from a theological point of view, but rather brief remarks and observations, a little scattered, dictated vital need to give himself an account of his mystical experience, to understand as far as possible the content of this experience, to express the inexpressible. However, in his eyes, any theoretical study of the essence of God would be blasphemy and insolence. A side motive of St. Simeon's theological reasoning about "essence" can be considered the need to protect one's spirituality from attacks by opponents who accused him of heresy. It should also be noted - and this follows from what we have said - that St. Simeon lacks precise and consistent terminology, the logical development of arguments. Moreover, in his statements about essence, one can find contradictions and disagreements that seem, at least at first glance, capable of confusing. Thus, he often speaks in the spirit of absolute apophaticism about the complete unknowability of God, and in other places he declares that God is known in a positive way. Sometimes he speaks of the Divine "essence", while at the same time in other contexts he rejects the applicability of this term to God. He claims that God has no name, but calls Him savior, and His essence is love. God is both visible and invisible. St. Simeon insists that God is simple, identifies His nature with His essence, says that there is no division in God, meanwhile he distinguishes in Him essence and strength, power and, finally, energy. Sometimes he declares the unknowability not only of the essence of God, but also of His energies, which he calls unknowable. However, more often St. Simeon, insisting that the essence is hidden and unknowable, says that God is seen in His energies, that in them we have a partial vision of God, like a vision of the rays of the sun, inaccessible in its brilliance. In some places St. Simeon goes even further and asserts that we are essentially partakers of God and that we become partakers even of His nature and His essence, especially in the sacrament of the Eucharist. On one occasion he even admits that it is possible to have a vision of the Essence of God. In other places, St. Simeon categorically rejects the possibility of union with God in essence, allowing only union in communion (ου τη ουσ?

Needless to say, the importance of the concept essence, oШs…a, about what a huge place it occupies in the theological thought of the Holy Fathers, how diverse their meanings and application of this word are. Open the dictionary of Greek patristics prof. Lampe - this word and its derivatives are given 16 columns of quotations from Greek patristic literature, and 11 columns are occupied by the word oШs ... a itself with its theological, Christological, trinitarian, general, spiritual and even material subsections. And this is only for the period of the first eight centuries of Greek patristics! Indeed, if we take into account the writings of the apologists (for example, Athenagoras), the Hieromartyr Irenaeus, the spiritual theology of Clement of Alexandria or Origen, the defense of Pmosion by St. Athanasius or the anti-Eunomian polemic of the Cappadocians, the mystical theology of Dionysius the Areopagite, the Christological disputes of the Monophysites and Monothelites, the spirituality of Evagrius and Macarius, St. Maximus the Confessor, the iconoclastic crisis and the response of Orthodoxy to it, Photius and Filioque, not to mention St. Gregory Palamas, who belongs to a later era than St. Simeon, then everywhere we find that the problem of oШs…a and its manifestations, a paradox transcendent God and the deification of man occupies an extremely large place in the experience of the Holy Fathers and in their reflections on the mystery of Christianity. It is quite natural that something similar is revealed in St. Simeon the New Theologian, in whom this is expressed with originality inherent in him. Following the Holy Fathers, in particular St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Simeon with the same word oШs…a designates the essence of God and the essence of created things and always opposes created essences to God the Creator. So, using this word in the plural - aѓ oШs…ai, he means angels when he says that God is “above mental entities, for they are His creation” . However, this is patristic terminology, especially characteristic of St. Gregory of Nazianzus and St. Dionysius the Areopagite where they speak of angels. St. Simeon also starts talking about the essence of visible creations, in order to emphasize, as St. Basil did, its unknowability for the human mind: “If you could know the height of the heavens,” he writes in a letter to Stephen of Nicomedia, “or determine what the essence of the sun is, moons, stars." However, more often the term oШs…a is applied to the creature as such, to the created man and his soul, and this term is accompanied by adjectives created, earthly, human and so on. “Oh, what is this thing hidden from all created essence? What kind of mental light, invisible to anyone? - exclaims St. Simeon, opposing everything created to mental light. In another place, he contrasts the created with the Divine fire: “For You purify defiled souls, You illuminate the mind and embrace the earthly and material essence.” A created entity is not capable of knowing secrets, since “they are by their nature inexpressible, completely ineffable, forbidden for people, incomprehensible for angels, and unknown to any other created entity.” Here the concept of "created essence" embraces humans and angels. It is also attached to the soul and body, and despite its created nature, this essence, like dry firewood and grass, is able to ignite from Divine fire: “A strange miracle: my flesh, I am talking about the essence of my soul, yes, yes, and my body - participates in the Divine glory and is illuminated by the radiance of the Divine ray. “When fire has come into contact with an entity like brushwood, how can it not burn it, destroy it, and cause inevitable suffering?” . Or: “The flame that reached the heavens and burned inside me with special strength, nevertheless did not burn my essence in my womb like grass, but lo and behold! turned it all into flames.” However, the ontological gap between God and any earthly essence is not abolished: “For God is uncreated, and we are all created<…>He is the Spirit above every spirit as the Creator of all spirits and their Lord, but we are the flesh taken from the dust, the earthly essence (geиdhj oШs…a)” . And again: “Tell me, is it possible to compare a shadow and a genuine thing or a servant and slave spirit with the Spirit of the Lord, the Almighty and God, Who affirms and strengthens every created essence (ktistѕn oШs…an)” . So, we can conclude that St. Simeon has an expression essence, oШs…a, denoting the created world (angels and man, soul and body), is fundamentally different from the Divine essence (it will be discussed below), - differs in that it is created as opposed to God the Creator, in that it - earthly and is not able to comprehend with the mind not only God, but also the essence of other creatures, but at the same time it is able to perceive the Divine fire and ignite it without dying. It can also be said that in these cases, the concept of oШs…a acquires a specific meaning for St. Simeon, which almost coincides with the objects he designates in their deepest sense. Similarly, St. Simeon never considers the created essence speculatively, but always in relation to God and to his own spiritual life.

In our present study about St. Simeon, we are going to talk mainly about the uncreated essence of God, about His oШs…a. Without trying to give it a theological or philosophical definition, considering it completely impossible, St. Simeon insists that it is a daring thing to investigate it, especially on the part of those who do not have the Holy Spirit in themselves: “I am surprised,” he writes in his “Theological Words”, - like most people, not having yet had time to be born of God and become His children, without any fear they start theologizing and reasoning about God. And therefore, if I hear some of them philosophizing about things Divine and unknowable, theologising in an unpurified state, explaining the truths of God and what pertains to God Himself ( t¦ perˆ toà qeoà kaˆ t¦ kat’ aÙtÒn), not possessing the spirit of reason, I tremble in my mind and, as it were, lose my temper simply from the fact that I think and see how the Divine is incomprehensible to anyone, and we, not knowing what is under our feet, not knowing ourselves ourselves, we hasten to philosophize without the fear of God and with insolence about what is inaccessible to us, and we do all this without having the Spirit, which illuminates this area and reveals it to us: we sin by the very fact that we speak about God. It is not easy for a person to know even himself, and few people succeed in this in a truly philosophical way.<…>Moreover, it is completely contrary to reason and common sense to investigate the nature and essence of God. And then he continues: “Hey you! Why do you, instead of putting things in order in yourselves, are investigating what concerns God and Divine things? First you need to pass from death to life - this is an indispensable condition in order to attract the Spirit within yourself and in His light to proclaim what belongs to God, as far as possible and as far as we are enlightened by God. These places are very important for understanding what can be called the epistemology of St. Simeon. As we see, for him the knowledge of earthly things and even himself is already very relative, as for the knowledge of the essence of God, the very desire to investigate it is absurd. Most important of all, all "theology," that is, the knowledge of "the truths of God and things concerning God" - the traditional term for the attributes and actions of God - presupposes holiness and illumination and is commensurate with them within the limits available to man. All this argumentation is very “in the spirit of St. Basil,” with the only difference being that St. Simeon, in more detail than St. Basil, reveals the possibility of mystical knowledge.

About the fact that grace is necessary for communion with God, St. Simeon, starting from the contrary, says in the hymn: “How can the soul, full of thorns, passions and sin, endure the nature of this unbearable flame? How will it contain an essence that cannot be contained anywhere? How, being darkness, will it merge with impregnable light and not disappear from His presence?” . As we can see, even in the presence of light, the Divine essence remains absolutely intolerable. St. Simeon calls it “hidden essence” (krupt¾ oÙs…a): “Oh, immaculate nature, hidden essence, philanthropy, unknown to most people, mercy, invisible to those who live recklessly, the essence is unchanging, inseparable, tri-holy.” Nevertheless, the Monk Simeon compares it with immaterial and Divine fire: “Listen,” he exclaims, “you who have sinned like me before God, strive and strive in good deeds in order to receive and hold the substance of immaterial fire,” I said “ substance”, pointing you to the essence of God - to kindle the mental lamp of the soul, to become suns shining in the world. And once he even identifies the essence of God with love: “For love,” he says, “is not a name, it is the essence of God.”

At the same time, the term oШs…a does not satisfy St. Simeon when he starts talking about God. Following the apophatic line of St. Cyril of Alexandria, Dionysius the Areopagite, St. Maximus the Confessor and St. John of Damascus, he declares in some texts that God is above all essence, and prefers to call Him “super-essential” (ШperoЪsioj) . The Monk Simeon asks himself the question of whether it is possible to call God an essence: “If You are truly completely inexplicable, invisible, impregnable, incomprehensible and incorporeal, impalpable and completely elusive, Savior, then how dare we give You a name, how dare we call You at least some some sort of entity? Indeed, in You, O my God, there is nothing created.” And he claims that God is transcendent to all essence: “The divine and uncreated superessential nature is called superessential, because it is above the essence of all creations, but it is essential and above all essence, being (™nupÒstatoj ) and by nature incomparable with the created hypostasis. How to call an indescribable hypostasis? . The same idea of ​​the complete transcendence of God in relation to every creature is expressed in the following lines: “You are wholly filling everything, and wholly outside of everything; You are above all things, Lord, above all essence, above nature itself, above all ages, above all light, O Savior!” . Note that here, as above, St. Simeon addresses the superessential God as the Savior. This is the paradox of Christianity that stands at the center of its spirituality and is fundamentally different from the mysticism of Plotinus. The expression of this paradox is the Incarnation: “Yourself superessential, uncreated before, You took on flesh and became visible to me as created.”

This “superessential essence” is tripartite, and St. Simeon speaks at length about its tripartite aspect: “The Father is light, the Son is light, the Holy Spirit is light.<…>The three are in fact one and the same light, one, indivisible<…>God is all indivisible in His nature and in His essence, truly above all essence.<…>He is all contemplated as simple light<…>three - one essence, one Deity”. Elsewhere he points to the immutability of the triple essence: “O Trinity, Creator of the universe, O my only God, Whose nature is indescribable, Whose glory is incomprehensible, deeds are inexplicable, essence is unchanging.” Sometimes the Monk Simeon with the word “superessential” denotes the ineffable and incomprehensible nature of trinity relations: “As for the non-existent being (ўnupЈrktou ШpЈrxewj) of God, birth without conception, non-hypostatic hypostasis, transcendental existence (Шperous…ou oÙsièsewj) and I don’t know what else<…>then it is absolutely impossible to state, express and understand the properties of the super-essential Divine nature, and the human mind is not able to comprehend them.

The “essence” of St. Simeon also has a Christological meaning where, in accordance with the dogmas of the Council of Chalcedon, he speaks of two natures and two essences (oШs ... ai) of Christ in a single hypostasis: “I am one God and a perfect man,” says Christ about Himself in hymns, - whole, excellent, flesh, soul, mind and mind, completely God, man and God in My two essences, as well as in My two natures, in My two energies, in My two wills in one hypostasis. At the same time God and man, I am One from the Trinity. Elsewhere, St. Simeon encourages sinners to repent, “in order to become, as it were, gods, containing within themselves all the glory of God in two essences, in two natures, in two energies and in two wills.” Deification must therefore be a complete union of our two essences, soul and body, with the two essences of Christ: “and I myself become a god<…>soul and body are<…>one in two entities. So, those who are one and two, since they partake of Christ and drink His blood, they, united with two essences, as well as with the two natures of my God, become a god by their participation.

Insisting, as we see, on the hidden and unchanging nature of the Divine Essence, St. Simeon speaks at the same time about its manifestations. First of all, about the light of her glory: “You shone, You appeared as the light of glory, as the impregnable light of Your essence, O Savior, and enlightened the darkened soul.” He distinguishes between essence and Divine power: “I breathed into him a soul not from My essence, but from My power („scЪj)” . But the unity of essence is unshakable: "God of all, worshiped in the Trinity of hypostases and the unity of essence." Much more often, St. Simeon speaks of the “energies” (™nљrgeiai) of the Divine Essence, using a term that became classic after St. Basil the Great and even earlier, since it was already used by the apologist Athenagoras, but St. Gregory Palamas made famous. So, St. Simeon says that these energies (or actions - the translation is unable to express all the variety of shades of meaning that are contained in this term) - are unknowable: “How to investigate the nature of the Creator of all kinds? What about His energies? How do you suggest that I explain them? . True, St. Simeon speaks here not of the essence, but of the nature of God, but in another place he identifies both concepts: “They are not divided and not separated in You, but Your nature is Your essence, and Your essence is Your nature” . At the same time, in his most exalted visions, St. Simeon distinguishes between the essence and energies of God: “Let me see Your Face, the Word, and enjoy Your inexpressible beauty, contemplate and indulge in the vision of You. To an ineffable and invisible vision, a terrible vision, let me tell at least not about its essence, but about its energies ( t¦j ™nerge…aj aШtБj, oШ tѕn oШs…an)” . For the sake of accuracy, we say that here a distinction is made between the essence and energies of Divine vision rather than between the essence and energies of God Himself, but this discrepancy, apparently, is not so important, since it is a question of contemplating the Word Itself. St. Simeon explains the impossibility of seeing the essence by the fact that God is higher than the essence. He perceives the reflection of Divine glory as a simple light with which he enters into unity: “For You are above nature, all of You are above all essence, You are my God and Creator, but we see the reflection of Your Divine glory: it is a simple light, a pleasant light; like light it opens, like light it, I think, unites all with us, all in its entirety, with Your servants, a light spiritually contemplated in the distance, suddenly acquired within us.

In "Moral Words" St. Simeon goes even further. Thus, speaking of the sacrament of the Resurrection and arguing that this sacrament was realized in every holy person of past times and continues to be carried out up to the present day, he declares: “By receiving the Spirit of our Lord and God, we become partakers of his Divinity and His essence ( summštocoi aÙtoà tÁj QeÒthtoj kaˆ tÁj oÙs…aj genÒmeqa); and tasting His Most Pure Body, that is, the Divine mysteries, we really become completely united and related to Him. The communion of the Divine essence is associated here with the Eucharist and the gift of the Holy Spirit. However, this statement of the Monk Simeon is just a paraphrase of the words “partakers of the Divine nature” from the Second Epistle of the Apostle Peter, however, in the following lines, the Monk Simeon somewhat limits his scope, indicating that we are talking about similarity with God by grace: “Having come once in such a state, we become like God by grace<…>restored to our original state, having a renewed soul, having become blameless and alive as risen from the dead, that is, we see Him who deigned to become like us, and He sees us, to whom it was given to become like Him, sees how they see at a distance the face of a friend with whom they talk, to whom they turn and whose voice is heard. Thus, by no means is meant an essential identification with God, but communication “from afar” (makrTqen), although genuine and embracing our whole being.

Before continuing the study of the Divine Essence by St. Simeon, we should consider his use of this word in the form kat’ oШs…an (by essence) and tН oШs… (by means of essence - dative case). The term "in essence" is applied primarily in relation to the Holy Trinity and in meaning approaches "having the same substance", "authentic", "real". Thus, it is said about the Father: “He is unbegotten in essence.” This means that the hypostatic property of the Father is not “accompanying”, but belongs to His very being. And in order to designate the true equality of the Son with the Father, St. Simeon says: “He is God, equal to the Father both in essence, and in nature, and in power, and in image (kat¦ morfsn) truly and in appearance (kat' „dљan ) and in time is never separated from the Father.” Note that a distinction is made here between "by essence" and "by authority" and so on. And here is how he speaks about the true Deity of the Holy Spirit: "He is omniscient, He is omnipresent, for He is God in essence." Or like this: “How can you be a radiance, and see me as a light, and set fire to matter, being in essence immaterial?” . To this question of St. Simeon, Christ answers: “I am by nature indescribable, limitless, perfect, impregnable, invisible to anyone, incorporeal, impalpable, unchanging in essence (tѕn oШs…an)” . With such a heap of basic apophatic attributes, St. Simeon shows the greatness of the mystery of Christianity, when that same invisible and unchanging God “becomes visible”, burns our soul and unites with its essence. Its absolute transcendence is once again evidenced by such terms: the Divine Fire is “elusive, uncreated, invisible, beginningless, and immaterial.<…>He is beyond all material and immaterial creations, visible and invisible.<…>He is outside all these creations by nature, by essence, and also by power. In another place, St. Simeon says that the creative nature of God, or His Wisdom, is outside of everything and at the same time “in essence” is present everywhere: “The Creator of the whole world, the Divine nature and Wisdom is not a part of all things and is not could it be when it is not one of the things, but the cause of all things?), it is present everywhere and in everything and in general completely fills everything with itself in essence, in nature and in hypostasis” . St. Simeon explains this paradox of God, invisible “in essence” and visible by the saints, using the opposition of the sun and the rays: entities. We see a ray - the sun, He Himself, rather blinds, and we catch His ray for you. Finally, the soul, as created in the image of God, also possesses its properties “in essence”: “And my soul is His image. Having a mind and a word, it carries them in itself in essence inseparably and inseparably, and thus it is consubstantial. The expression “in essence” is equally applied here both to the Holy Trinity and to the soul as Its image, and at the same time the fundamental difference between the uncreated prototype and His created likeness is not shaded in any way. However, many ancient Fathers acted in exactly the same way when they explained the mystery of the Holy Trinity. In this case, St. Simeon is not interested in the dogma of the Holy Trinity in itself, but in the revelation of the image of God in the soul by the Holy Spirit.

The expression (tН oШs…v) “by essence” or “for essence” (creative or dative cases) is often found where St. Simeon emphasizes that God is completely invisible and inaccessible, however, despite this, it paradoxically unites with us: “Let for You are invisible to them by Your essence, inaccessible by nature, for me You are visible and completely mixed with me by the essence of Your nature; because they are not separated in You and are not cut in any way, but nature is Your essence, and essence is nature. Essential union with God puts a person above the angels, and the Monk Simeon puts the Eucharistic communion at the basis of it: yourself as the highest incorporeal, the son of God, as You said this not to the angels, but to us, calling the gods: I said: you are gods, and the sons of the Most High are all of you (Ps 81:6)” . In this text, St. Simeon speaks most definitely of communion with the Divine Essence in the sacrament of the Eucharist. In other places, as we shall see, St. Simeon, striving to express himself more precisely and as a theologian, significantly narrows this statement. Thus, although he claims that God is with us by essence, he wonders if this term actually applies to God, since He is beyond essence: , as some argue, and not only by will and strength, as many think, but also by essence, if one dares to speak and think about essence in You, the One Immortal, Superessential!<…>how dare we call you an essence and of what kind and what!” . It is obvious that here St. Simeon distinguishes between presence by essence and presence by energy, and rejects presence by energy alone, as well as by essence alone. In another place, St. Simeon speaks of such a unity of the Divine fire with the very essence of the soul, that the two become one:<…>and, I don’t know how to say, the two become one, the soul with the Creator and in the soul - the Creator. This inexpressible unity, merging without merging, which is difficult for St. Simeon to characterize, also extends to the body: “A strange miracle: my flesh, I am talking about the essence of my soul, yes, yes, and of my body - participates in Divine glory and is illuminated by the radiance of the Divine ray ” . This is about the participation of the body in the glory of God.

In the face of all these indescribable realities, and nevertheless striving to explain the mystery in theological terms, St. Simeon speaks of his perplexity in this way: visible, magnificence You are beyond sight, You surpass all<…>Essence superessential, unknown even to the angels. We know that You exist thanks to Your energies.<…>because you named yourself truly existing God (Ex 3:14), we call it essence, we call it hypostasis, because the non-existent has neither essence nor hypostasis. That is why we boldly call You the essential (™noЪsion), we say that You are hypostatic, You, Whom no one has ever seen, the Trinity God, the One beginningless Beginning. Otherwise, how dare we call You an essence or glorify in You three separate Hypostases?” . And then he continues, emphasizing the unknowability of God: “And how can a creature think the image of Your being? Or the birth of your Son, God and Word? Or the procession of Your Divine Spirit, in order to know Your unity and separation to comprehend and reliably understand the form of Your essence (oШs…aj soа tХ eЌdoj). No one has ever seen what I have said here about You. It is impossible for someone else to become God by nature and be able to explore Your nature, the essence, form and image (morf "n), as well as the hypostasis, because only You Yourself in Yourself - the Trinitarian God<…>But Yourself, what are You in essence and what kind, or how You gave birth once and forever give birth<…>knows the Omniscient and All-Pervading, for He is God in essence<…>And none of the angels has ever seen, none of the people have ever known Your existence (Yparxin), for You are uncreated”.

And in the first hymn, where the Monk Simeon speaks at length about his mystical experience and his impotence to express it in words, he directly states that it is about vision not in essence, but in participation: “What a terrible sacrament is being performed in me? - he asks himself first of all, - the word is powerless to express him, the hand - to describe<…>And if what is happening now in me, the prodigal son, is inexpressible and inexpressible, then, tell me, can the Giver and Cause of this need praise and glorification on our part?<…>Here my tongue goes numb, and my mind sees what is happening, but cannot explain: it looks and wants to tell, but does not find words, because it looks at the invisible, which has no shape, simple, not composed of anything, infinite in size. Nevertheless, St. Simeon tries to understand: “The mind does not see the beginning, does not see the end, does not notice any middle, how will he tell about what he has seen? Seems, I think, a whole-whole, but not in essence, but in participation ( oШ tН oШs…v pЈntwj d ¢ll¦ tÍ metous…v)” . Wishing to make this vision of communion more understandable, St. Simeon uses an analogy with material fire: “Here you kindle fire from fire and take the fire as a whole, and it remains indivisible and still not depleted, although the transferred fire is separated from the first and passes into many lamps. because it is material fire. And that fire is spiritual, indivisible, completely inseparable, non-insect is not transferred and is not divided into many fires, but even not insect it abides in me. The following is a description of the mystical revelation of the Deity: “It arises in me, inside my miserable heart, like the sun, or like the disk of the sun, it appears spherical, light-like, because it is like a flame. I don’t know, I’ll repeat again what to say about this and wanted to keep silent (oh, if only I could!)” .

In Anthem 50, communion with God, not in essence, but in communion, is regarded as a sign of Orthodoxy: ), through contemplation and even through participation (metous…v) with My Father and the Divine Spirit, and I clearly rest in them<…>If in knowledge, activity and contemplation God completely became a man, then I completely became a god through communication, became a god in feeling and in knowledge (™n a "sq" sei kaˆ gnèsei) not in essence, but in participation, this is how one should think Orthodox ” . It is difficult to be more categorical: whatever his statements in other places, here St. Simeon asserts that deification is accomplished not according to essence, but according to participation. And this statement is of particular importance, since St. Simeon makes it the criterion of Orthodoxy. Nevertheless, in the same Hymn, continuing his confession and mystical and theological reflections, St. Simeon admits that the Divine non-material essence is visible inside us and penetrates us through and through: “And then, that is, after you followed Christ along the path of His commandments and sufferings, - you will see the most brilliant light that has appeared in the completely enlightened air of the soul, in an immaterial way you will clearly see an immaterial essence, all really penetrating through everything. There is no fundamental contradiction between these two passages, because the essence (oШs…a) spreads in the soul in the form of light, that is, as a manifestation, and not as it is in itself, or “in essence”, as St. Simeon would say. This term has a particularly deep meaning for him.

Now, in conclusion of our study, we must analyze the term derived from oШs…a, the adverb oШsiwdîj ‘essentially’. It is very characteristic of St. Simeon, especially in his Theological and Moral Words, where it occurs very often. In general, it can be said that with the adverb oШsiwdîj St. Simeon seeks to express the fact of the unity of God with man and the way in which it is realized. Thus, he uses it to define our participation in the Divine as the fruit of the Incarnation, which in turn is a manifestation of Divine love: to essentially grant us participation in His divinity ( †na metadш tБj aШtБj qeТthtoj oЩsiwdоj №m‹n) and, having made us spiritual and completely blameless, raise us to heaven.” In another place, St. Simeon speaks of Divine fire, which scorches our entire soul and burns our passions like dry wood: “When all this is finally destroyed and only the essence of the soul, freed from passions, remains, then the Divine and immaterial Fire is essentially united with it. , and it ignites, shines through, and, like a furnace, participates in this perceptible Fire. This is how the body becomes a burning coal by participation (kat¦ mšqexin) in the Divine and inexpressible light.” Word essentially in these texts, it denotes a genuine and deep participation of the essence of our soul in the Divine, a participation that transforms our whole nature, as St. Simeon himself testifies to this: “It is participation and participation in His Divinity ( metous…a kaˆ mšqexij tÁj qeÒthtoj aÙtoà) form our union with God.” This mystery is great, it amazes St. Simeon: “How is God outside of everything by His essence, nature, power and glory, and how He everywhere and in everything, and especially in His saints, dwells and builds an abode in them consciously and essentially (gnwstîj kaˆ oÙsiwdîj ) Is he completely superessential?” . This conscious indwelling of God and His vision are true union with God: “As soon as they are essentially united,” says St. Simeon, “with God Himself and are worthy to see Him and be partakers of Him, they are no longer attracted to themselves either by the image of His creations, or shadow of visible things<…>Since their thought dwells predominantly in supersensible realities, as if immersed in them, clothed in the splendor of Divine nature, their feelings are no longer directed, as before, to objects of the visible world. Here unity (oШsiwdîj) is connected with the fact that a person is enveloped in the light of Divine nature.

A number of texts say that “essentially” it is the Holy Spirit that primarily works in us. Thus, in an invective against those “who do not know the sweetness and beauty of complete purification”, the Monk Simeon declares: “they do not believe and convince themselves that it is impossible for a person to be completely cleansed of passions and quite essentially (Уlon oЩsiwdîj) to receive the Comforter into himself”. It can be said that the word essentially here means the complete and conscious indwelling of the Spirit. Elsewhere, the presence of the Spirit in an “essential way” is identified with His energy, and this suggests that there is no question of indwelling “in essence”: hypostatically visible within me as a light, and this light is incomparable with anything and completely inexplicable. However, in another place it is emphasized that the Holy Spirit is good in itself and, therefore, all the blessings bestowed by Him are essentially bestowed: “You do not need,” he says in one prayer to the Holy Spirit, “to take from outside what You give us, for You Yourself are exactly that (aШtХ ™ke‹no ШpЈrcon) that can only be good; those in whom You dwell possess in themselves all good things essentially.” Here the truth and fullness of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as the reality of their possession, come to the fore. Sometimes unity with the Holy Spirit is considered in the context of the trinity by analogy with the tripartite structure of a person: “Oh miracle! - exclaims St. Simeon, - a person is united with God both spiritually and bodily, for the soul is inseparable from the mind, and the body from the soul, but in essential unity (tН oЩsiwdîj ˜nèsei) a person, by grace, also becomes trinitarian (trisupТstatoj) and the only god according to position."

At the same time, it is the Incarnation that remains the basis of the unity of God with man. It is this that makes this union in the Holy Spirit possible, so that before the coming of Christ, God was not united with man "essentially." Following in the footsteps of St. Gregory of Nazianzus, St. Simeon declares in his hymns that before the incarnation, God “spoke by His Divine Spirit and worked miracles with His energies, but “essentially” never united with us until Christ and my God became a man. . Indeed, having taken on the flesh, He gave His Holy Spirit, and through Him He is essentially united with all the faithful, and this unity becomes indissoluble. It took place first in the bosom of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, from Whom the God-man Jesus Christ was incarnated and born, and all believers share in him by the Holy Spirit. The divine hypostasis unites with the human essence. God, writes St. Simeon, “having received from the Most Holy Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary the animate flesh<…>united her with His incomprehensible and inaccessible Divinity; or, rather, with our essence (oШs…a) He essentially (oшsiwdîj) connects the entire hypostasis of His Divinity; confusing the first with the last, the human with His own, He built it as a holy temple for Himself; without changes and transformations, the Creator of Adam Himself became a perfect man.” St. Simeon expressed the reality of this hypostatic unity in the Virgin Mary with the same adverb oЩsiwdîj: “Mary, the Mother of God, is the first to hear the good news from the angel; She trusts the Providence of God<…>and agrees<…>And then She was the first to receive into Herself essentially the Word of God, which truly redeemed Her soul from the former condemnation to eternal death. “At the moment of the Annunciation, She “essentially” receives the Spirit of God, so that just as a woman came from the rib of Adam, and from her all mortal people, so the God-Man Christ would be born from female flesh, and through Him all people became immortal. And he concludes: “The Word of God, therefore, took on flesh from the Most Pure Mother of God (¡gnÁj QeotÒkou), and in return It gave not flesh, but the essential image of the Holy Spirit.” As we see, in these discussions about the Incarnation, St. Simeon, by the same word oЩsiwdоj, denotes both the reality of the union in Christ of the Divine and the human, the fullness of the descent of the Holy Spirit onto the Virgin Mary, and equally the reality of the birth of the Word in us, although with the fundamental difference that this is not a carnal birth, like the Incarnation of the Word: “In reality,” says the Reverend, “we receive Him not bodily, as the Virgin Mother of God received Him, but spiritually and essentially; in our hearts we have Him Whom the Pure Virgin conceived.” Here the word oШsiwdîj emphasizes the identity of Christ, born in the flesh of the Virgin Mary and spiritually conceived in us. The authenticity of the fact that Christ was really formed in us, is manifested, according to St. Simeon, in the awareness of this, and in this it differs from illusory visions. The reverend gives an explanatory example: “The light of the lamp is reflected in the mirror; the presence of Christ is not like a similar image, devoid of its own basis (ўnupostЈtJ ); Christ reveals Himself in being and in essence ( ™nupostЈtwj kaˆ oÙsiwdîj), in a formless form, in a form without appearance, visible invisibly and understood incomprehensibly how. The unknowability and even inaccessibility of God are paradoxically emphasized by the Monk Simeon at the same time as participation in Him in an “essential way”.

Where the question is about the Eucharist, St. Simeon in the same dialect essentially denotes the sacrament of our communion with the Body and Blood of the Lord. “You made me worthy,” he writes, “to hold and partake essentially of Your Flesh and to drink Your All-Holy Blood.” St. Simeon evidently wants to reveal the truth of the Eucharistic communion here, as well as in the following passage, where he also insists on the authenticity and reality of our deification given to us in the Eucharist: “I am a man by nature,” he says, “but God by grace. Do you see what kind of grace I'm talking about? About unity with Him sensually and mentally, essentially and spiritually. I have already spoken to you about mental unity in various ways and in different ways, but “sensual” I call unity in the sacraments (musthr ... wn), for having been cleansed by repentance and streams of tears, partaking of the deified Body (Simatoj teqewmšnou) as God, I myself become a god through an unspeakable connection. See what a sacrament is being performed: soul and body<…>communion with Christ and drinking His blood<…>become a god by participation and are called by the name of the One to whom they became essentially involved (oШsiwdîj metšscon)"

Human — Divine Essence and Manifestations New Energy

It is wonderful that people think and try to know the essence of God. In all the comments on this topic of my previous blog there is truth. All of you are old souls who have gone through more than one incarnation on this planet and therefore have a very clear idea of ​​both the Earth and what is hidden behind the scenes. In all of you, the intuition and energy of experience from past incarnations, fixed on crystals on Earth and which is in your DNA, is very developed. Your knowledge or someone's guesses is proof that you are not here for the first time, that that knowledge and your gift of healing or clairvoyance did not come from somewhere, which means you are connected with someone or something. Until now, a person has not been given much to know, only drawing from his human experience, the prevailing foundations, often imposed by religion and politics, people have developed a certain worldview. And this alignment was appropriate before today! People continue to receive relevant information only for them. Everything that could interfere with their development is hidden from them and secrets are not revealed (and now!). But still, a lot of information has already penetrated the planet, since the whole Universe wants, and most importantly, people are ready for WE all and the planet to move to another energy level. All prophecies were accurate and fulfilled until last year. Everything that was predicted by the most famous prophets of the world took place on planet Earth. And only one thing did not happen! It wasn't the end of the world! It has to do with New Energy! The New Energy had already manifested itself before, since the Earth's magnetic grid had been prepared for more than 20 years, but it passed into its full working condition just a couple of years ago. And we ourselves wanted it! We want to develop further and move towards enlightenment. And enlightenment does not mean to understand everything and know about everything. No, enlightenment is a conscious way of life. Where a person is in harmony with himself and with the Universe. Where he understands and feels his intuition, his heart. And it never deceives. So what is happening now in the New Energy period? Hundreds, thousands of people are waking up. If earlier it was necessary to be a balanced person, with developed chakras, in order for the 7th chakra to open. Now, for many, the 7th chakra opens without their participation and effort. What happens to a person if all the other chakras are not balanced, and the 7th has opened? The person begins to search. He is confused and wants to know the world, many become insatiable knowledge. At the moment, old souls are waking up, who in past incarnations were subject to expulsions and executions for their “non-standard” worldview. Often these souls do not accept a new trend, and not because they do not want to, but simply because the “old” experience tells them, the fear of punishment for a radical opinion paralyzes them. Once again, falling under the blow of society does not allow many to think about what is happening on the planet. What happens then? A person is in search, he intuitively feels and is drawn to knowledge, but cannot master it, since the third eye and other chakras are not sufficiently developed and human consciousness does not allow turning off the human brain and trusting God and his manifestation in all spheres and energies on the planet . It has been proven that there have never been so many suicides as in the last 20-10 years, and depression is a disease of the 21st century! It is a fact! And this is understandable!

So who is a person, how does he come here to the planet and why? This information is already available to people. Everything is very simple. Life is a game according to certain rules, knowledge or ignorance of which does not exempt from responsibility. One of the most important rules was, until recently, ignorance of our origins. And if many now think and say, so if this is one of essential rules, why violate it and disclose our origin ?! We have been given permission! Us people! And I'm not the only one who announces it, I'm not alone! There are already many like me on the planet! Many are still small, so it’s not in vain that they say “the mouth of a child speaks the truth!” And so it is! Ask your children, many people remember everything, and many came with a similar goal: NOT TO CHANGE, NOT TO PROVE, BUT TO PROMPT to look at the same situation from a different angle, approach it from a different angle, expand their consciousness and trust the Divinity of the Universe! Indeed it is, there are certain things that a person does not always have influence on. But even they can and should be controlled if you are in harmony with the Universe. We are part of the divine plan, we are part of God. In the process of birth, a person is formed, which consists of a divine principle (this is the divine DNA that can be activated at a high vibration) and duality. Divinity in us is laid down by our SELF, a part of our Higher Divine Self is in us from birth! All our positive emotions, kindness, love, mercy, respect, deep faith, trust, etc. are connected with this part. At birth, we, the Higher Beings, descended from the Divine Higher Beings, are given the second side of the coin - this is our duality, humanity. All our negative qualities, our dark side, which pushes us to anger, deceit, discontent, irritation, and other not very pleasant feelings. With this alignment, plus with certain karmic dependencies, we begin to live on earth. With all this, in the process of birth there is an annulment of our knowledge of our superiority, our Divinity! The rule of the game is that the Divine Essence is born in a limited body, with seemingly limited abilities, our body is not eternal, like the true we, our mind is limited in perception, not like our true one, we would seem not to have telepathy, not like ours real me!!! About our divinity, our human consciousness should not know anything. But our subconscious dictates and has always dictated to us the opposite. Intuitively, we feel our potential, but we see and feel only limitedness and withering! Therefore, almost all people do not unconditionally love themselves, torment and hate themselves for their complexes and shortcomings. Because of this arrangement, a person with early childhood dissatisfied with his situation. Since the early childhood human feelings they can take it up and then only intensive work on oneself can return that purity and love that emanated at birth and come from our VYA, with which we always keep in touch. This is exactly what a game is, the goal of the game is to accept your humanity, to balance humanity and divinity, to be able to control your human qualities. In the initial ignorance and subsequent cognition, a person goes through many lessons, sending energy at different levels. Inherent in a person is more humanity and the feelings associated with it, a person vibrates on low levels. A person knows how to control his human feelings, brings light, positive and love to his inner and surrounding world, surpasses Divinity and the vibrations are already different, higher and purer! Such a person is closer to his truth, closer to his origin, to his Divinity! The processed energy by man is needed by the Universe and its inhabitants, as it serves as an engine in development!

Therefore, there is neither right nor wrong opinion, there is a pattern and consequences!

May there be light and love in your life!

Natalia Licht

Source: ESPAVO

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via Ronna German

Dear masters, the breath of the Creator is the fuel of existence, and you are the flame that fuels it. It is important that you understand that you are developing your personal Sunlight, which is a reflection of your own Divine Essence.

Intellectual thinking process a person must develop, going beyond the limits of language restrictions. A huge amount of information is waiting for people's inspiration. In order to receive the wisdom of the Divine Blueprint for the Age of Aquarius, which is now radiating from our Father/Mother God through the Twelve Galactic Rays and cosmic consciousness, you must develop your intuitive abilities. Wisdom does not come from outside. Wisdom in your own Sacred Mind and Sacred Heart. You must comprehend and understand this, because it will not descend into the miasma of the earthly planes and will not seek you.

Spiritual maturity is not an unconscious experience. You must develop a self-sustaining Divinity whereby you are constantly inhaling the abundant Pranic Breath of Life/Adamantite Particles of Creator Essence, receiving spiritual nourishment from the river of Life through the Eighth Chakra, your Soul Star. The powerful Breath of Infinity opens the paths leading to the multidimensional levels of the Creator's consciousness. You must expand your inner vision by gradually changing the way you think and perceive. The Spirit of the Creator cannot be isolated. The spirit permeates everything in one way or another. You must expand your consciousness to embrace the immensity of the Universe.

Are you really ready to accept the fact that the Heart Center of our Father/Mother God is the focus and foundation of all religions? This is not dogma, superstition, rules and restrictions, but love, power and perfection leading to the ability to create and possess worlds of beauty, balance and harmony. When the Divine mind and heart manifest within you, you become an Aspect of the Collective Messiah. This is the creative realization of your destiny.

You are the Spark of the Creator - the manifested Divine Edge of consciousness - the Motionless Point inside the Universe. You either do better world where you live, or help pollute it. How bright and hot is your Sacred Flame? Does it shine brightly, does it warm the hearts of others? Or is it such a weak flame that it is not even enough to warm your own heart? "Heartlessness" - this term is not suitable for the true Carriers of the Divine Light. You can travel the shadowlands with those who helped create them, or you can walk in rapture in the blaze of Divine Light.

All of you are familiar with the Twelve Rays of Divine Consciousness, which you are currently seeking to integrate and affirm as your own. However, there is very important aspect Universe, which is still hidden from the masses. All manifestations of the Onmuniverse consist of the organized energy of the Heart Center of the Supreme Creator. There is a Core of the Cosmic Consciousness of the Great Creator, containing a part of the Full Spectrum of the Essence of the Supreme Creator.

God the Father/Mother of this universe is endowed with some of the characteristics, qualities and virtues of the Creator. It is the main source of Creator Consciousness within this universe, fully balanced, balanced and harmonious. Before the Divine Rays of our Father/Mother God were sent into the great void, countless powerful Rays of the Supreme Creator were sent into the cosmic void. These Beams of the Creator have become huge areas of space, having different densities of Light and memory cells of the consciousness of time, as well as containing Divine schemes of the infinite possibilities of the material world. There are membranes of Light that create barriers that separate each Sub-Universe. These barriers of light cannot be penetrated or crossed without special Divine permission until your personal Soul Song resonates with the perfect frequencies of Light in harmony with this particular level of Divine Consciousness.

Some of these great Beams of the Creator are much larger than others, they are separated by many thin membranes of Light containing the encodings of the cells of time in the pyramids of Light. In every energy field and every dimension of the Universe there are pyramids of Light/life. The Light of the Creator is pouring from the Treasury of Light of the pyramid to be used by the Elohim and the Form Makers in the new creative projects of our Father/Mother God. Every star in the galaxy is a center of energetic vibrations. In addition, each person functions as a living star, capable of receiving and transmitting harmonic vibrational frequencies in accordance with their level of consciousness. As you now know, these frequencies are called your Soul Song. You are a point of Light, a bright Divine Spark. This universe is made up of one giant Soul Star Song.

From the Heart Center of the Essence of our Father/Mother God, the Essence of the Sons/Daughters of the Co-Creators manifests. These amazing Beings are a reduced refraction of the power and greatness of the Divine Parents, just as our Father/Mother God is a reduced refraction of the Supreme Creator.

From the Essence of the Main Center of Cosmic Consciousness (mentioned above) in the universe as a whole, a certain number of Subuniverses were created, having female and male characteristics, virtues and qualities of the Divine Light in perfect balance and balance. However, when the bulk of the Subuniverses were being created, the predominant forces of the creative process were attributed to either the male or female attributes of the Creator's Consciousness. In half of the Divine Projects (plans) for the Subuniverses, the Father/Son qualities of the Divine will, powers and intentions were emphasized on the mental outer focused qualities of the Creator, while the mother/daughter qualities of compassion, care, intuition, inner focused qualities became supportive.

There are an equal number of Subuniverses in which the qualities and virtues of the Mother/Daughter play a leading role while the qualities of the Father/Son play a secondary role. Didn't we tell you that this universe could be called a universe of great and unique diversity? It was created as a university to educate you, the Star Children of the Omniverse. In fact, the vast diversity and magnitude of Creation was created so that the Creator could experience the boundless variations of ITSELF.

This Sub-Universe, at the time of its creation, was primarily an all-encompassing Father/Son experience. Our Divine Mother and the beautiful qualities of the Goddess were always present, but not in the full manifestation of her power and Essence. It is time for the Mother/Daughter and Father/Son Creator aspects to return to equal partnership. This is an amazing evolutionary process currently taking place throughout this universe and within all of its creations.

You, seekers on the Path, must be initiated into the Pyramidal functions of Light before you can move to the next level of development - the next time cell of consciousness. Created by people is only a small part of a much larger and grandiose creative process. That is why we put so much emphasis on creating your personal Pyramid of Light in the Fifth Dimension. Therefore we, in minute details, have given you guidance on the various pyramids of Light available to you and their important role in the ascension process.

You are called Star Children because you are returning to self-perfection, you are beginning the creation of the Crystal Seeds of Life Memory Codes, a new evolutionary process for the next approaching Golden Galaxy. This process is part of the Wheel within creative process which we will reveal to you in the future. In the meantime, we ask that you study what we have revealed to you and try to see the overall blueprint that we have created in your mind and understand the next phase of the amazing cosmic events unfolding before your very eyes.

My brave ones, we know how much pain, inconvenience and fear exist during these accelerated processes leading to major changes taking place around the world at the present time. Know that together we will overcome all adversity. Our mission is to open the way for any dear Soul who expresses the desire to return to harmony. Know that each of you matters. When you have doubts, you need inspiration or strength, enter your Pyramid of Light and we will give you courage, inspire and inspire you. When you feel alone or unloved, dive into your Sacred Heart and we will wait for you there to fill you with the radiant love of our Mother/Father God.

I am Archangel Michael.

Question: “Some people seem to come into this life with an obvious gift: the ability to heal, psychic abilities, etc. How can the average person know what gift he has, what he can offer humanity, if he sees in himself nothing but strong desire be of benefit along with other Lightworkers?”

Ronna's answer:“Dear hearts, few people know about their creative or spiritual gift from birth. There may be an interest or desire to learn or improve certain abilities; however, everyone I know has had to experience many aspects of life and also go through many trials in order to gradually develop their talents over time. Even though I had some spiritual experiences throughout my life, I didn't have a strong desire to pursue spiritual wisdom until I was in my fifties. The gifts gradually manifest as you seek to balance and harmonize the many Facets of your Being. The facet of your Higher Self is always waiting to connect with you or dwell in your Sacred Heart, and with each download of your Soul Self, more gifts, abilities and wisdom will be available to you.

It takes hard work and dedication; however, I can assure you that the effort is worth it. We are on Earth to be co-creators with our Father/Mother God. The gifts of the Spirit are available to each of us, but we must work and turn within to find them.