Divine essence. Divinity of Jesus

Human — Divine Essence and Manifestations New Energy

It is wonderful that people think and try to understand the essence of God. There is truth in all the comments on this topic in my previous blog. 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”. All of you have a very developed intuition and energy of experience from past incarnations, recorded in crystals on Earth and which is in your DNA. Your knowledge or someone else’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 else, which means you are connected with someone or something. Until now, people have not been given the opportunity to know much; only by drawing from their human experience, established foundations, often imposed by religion and politics, have people developed a certain worldview. And this arrangement was appropriate until today! People continue to receive information that is relevant to them only. Everything that could interfere with their development is hidden from them and secrets are not revealed (even now!). But still, a lot of information has already penetrated the planet, since the entire Universe wants, and most importantly, people are ready, for all of us 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 reached its full working state just a couple of years ago. And we wanted this ourselves! We want to develop further and move towards enlightenment. And enlightenment does not mean understanding everything and knowing everything. No, enlightenment is a conscious way of life. Where a person is harmonious 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 before you had 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 or effort. What happens to a person if all other chakras are unbalanced, but the 7th has opened? A person begins to search. He is confused and wants to know the world, many become insatiable for knowledge. On this moment Old souls are awakening, who in previous incarnations were subject to expulsions and executions for their “non-standard” worldview. Often these souls do not accept the 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. Being hit again by society prevents many from thinking about what is happening on the planet. What happens then? A person is in search, he intuitively feels and reaches out to knowledge, but cannot master it, since the third eye and other chakras are not sufficiently developed and human consciousness does not allow one to turn off the human brain and trust 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 certain rules, knowledge or ignorance of which does not relieve one from responsibility. One of the most important rules was, until recently, ignorance of our origins. And if many people now think and say, if this is one of the most important rules, why break it and announce our origin?! We have been given permission! To us people! And it’s not just me who is announcing it, I’m not alone! There are already many people like me on the planet! Many are still small, so it is not in vain that they say “through the mouth of a child the truth speaks!” And so it is! Ask your children, many remember everything, and many came with a similar goal: NOT TO CONVERSE, NOT TO PROVE, BUT TO PROMPT them to look at the same situation from a different angle, approach it from a different angle, expand their consciousness and trust in the Divinity of the Universe! Indeed, this is so, there are certain things over which a person does not always have influence. 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 the divine principle (this is the divine DNA, which can be activated at high vibration) and duality. Divinity is inherent in us by our VYa, 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 associated with this part. At birth, we, the Supreme Beings, descending from the Divine Supreme Beings, are given the second side of the coin - this is our duality, humanity. All our negative qualities, our dark side, which pushes us towards anger, deception, dissatisfaction, irritation and other not very pleasant feelings. With this alignment, plus certain karmic dependencies, we begin to live on earth. With all this, in the process of birth, our knowledge of our superiority, our Divinity, is annulled! 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 us, our mind is limited in perception, not like our true one, we seemingly do not have telepathy, not like our true me!!! Our human consciousness should not know anything about our divinity. But our subconscious dictates and has always dictated to us the opposite. Intuitively we feel our potential, but we see and feel only limitation and fading! Therefore, almost all people do not unconditionally love themselves, they torment and hate themselves for their complexes and shortcomings. Because of this situation, a person with early childhood unhappy with his situation. Since the early childhood human feelings can take over and then only intense work on oneself can return that purity and love that came at birth and comes from our VY, with which we always keep a connection. This is exactly what the 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 initial ignorance and subsequent knowledge, a person goes through many lessons, sending energy at different levels. Humanity and the feelings associated with it are inherent in a person; a person vibrates on low levels. A person knows how to control his human feelings, brings light, positivity 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 Universe and its inhabitants need processed energy by man, as it serves as an engine for development!

Therefore, there is no right or 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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« P Since Nathanael and Thomas fully shared Rodan's views on the gospel of the kingdom, there was only one question left to discuss - the doctrine of the divinity of Jesus, only recently proclaimed openly. Nathanael and Thomas jointly expounded their views on the divine nature of the Master, and the following is an abbreviated and systematic summary of their teaching:

1. Jesus acknowledged his divinity and we believe him. Many of the wonderful things that happened in connection with his ministry we can only understand through faith that he is both the Son of God and the Son of Man.

2. His life, lived with us, serves as an ideal of human friendship; only a divine being can be such a friend to people. We do not know another person who would be as truly unselfish as he. He is a friend even to sinners; he is not afraid to love his enemies. He is completely devoted to us. Although he does not hesitate to criticize us, it is clear to everyone that he truly loves us. The better you get to know him, the more you begin to love him. His unwavering devotion is endearing. Throughout all these years we did not understand his mission, but he remained a loyal friend. Without resorting to flattery, he really treats each of us equally cordially; he remains invariably sensitive and responsive. He always lived the same life with us and shared everything. We live in a happy community; We have everything in common. We do not believe that such an impeccable life can be lived in such difficult conditions, being only human.

3. We are confident in the divinity of Jesus because he always does the right thing; he doesn't make mistakes. His wisdom is extraordinary; his piety is sublime. Day after day he lives in perfect harmony with the will of the Father. He never repents of evil deeds, for he does not violate any of the Father's laws. He prays for us and with us, but he never asks us to pray for him. We believe in his absolute sinlessness. We do not think that anyone, being only human, could lead such a life. He claims to live perfect life, and we admit that this is true. Our piety comes from repentance, but his comes from righteousness. He even claims to forgive sins and he actually heals people. No one, being only a man, would in his right mind claim the forgiveness of sins, for this is a divine prerogative. And it seems to us that Jesus is so perfect and righteous from the moment we first meet him. We grow in grace and the knowledge of truth, but our Master demonstrates the maturity of righteousness from the very beginning. All people - good and evil - see in Jesus these attributes of virtue. Yet his piety is never forced or ostentatious. He is as meek as he is fearless. It seems to us that he approves of our belief in his divinity. Either he is what he claims to be, or he is the greatest hypocrite and deceiver the world has ever seen. We are convinced that he is who he says he is.

4. The uniqueness of his character and perfect control of his own emotions convince us that he combines the human and the divine. Scenes of human need always resonate in his heart; suffering never leaves him indifferent. Physical suffering, mental torment or spiritual torment alike awakens compassion in him. He immediately sees and generously acknowledges the presence of faith or any other grace in his human fellows. He is so fair and honest - and at the same time so merciful and sympathetic. He is saddened by the spiritual stubbornness of people and rejoices when they agree to see the light of truth.

5. It seems to us that he knows the thoughts of people and understands the desires of their hearts. And he always sympathizes with our troubled spirit. It seems to us that he has all human emotions, but these emotions delight in their greatness. He has a great love for virtue and an equally strong hatred for sin. He has a superhuman consciousness of the presence of the Divine. He prays like a man, but behaves like God. It seems to us that he knows everything in advance. Even now he is not afraid to talk about his death - a mysterious hint at his future glory. Being kind, he at the same time has courage and bravery. He always does his duty without hesitation.

6. We are constantly amazed by his phenomenal superhuman knowledge. Almost every day some event occurs that once again confirms: the Teacher knows about what is happening outside of his immediate presence. Apparently he also knows what his comrades are thinking. He undoubtedly communicates with celestial persons; he undoubtedly lives on the highest spiritual level, far superior to the rest of us. Everything seems to be within his unique understanding. He asks us questions to provoke conversation, not to get information.

7. B Lately The teacher does not hesitate to assert his superhuman origins. From the day we were ordained as apostles, he never denied that he came from the heavenly Father. He speaks with the confidence of a divine teacher. He decisively refutes modern religious teachings and proclaims a new gospel, confident in his authority. He is distinguished by persuasiveness, confidence and indisputability. John the Baptist, hearing Jesus, also declared that he was the Son of God. He seems self-sufficient. He does not seek support from the people; he doesn't care about people's opinions. He is brave - and at the same time completely devoid of pride.

8. He constantly speaks of God as a constant companion in everything he does. He does good everywhere, because it seems to us that God is in him. He claims absolutely amazing things about himself and his mission on earth; such claims would be absurd if he were not a divine being. He once declared, “Before Abraham was, I am.” He declared his divinity quite definitely; he claims to act in concert with God. He practically exhausts the possibilities of language, repeating his statements about the intimate connection with the heavenly Father. He even has the courage to claim that he and the Father are of the same essence. He says that everyone who saw him saw the Father. And he says and does all these grandiose things with purely childlike spontaneity. He speaks of his connection with the Father in the same way as he speaks of his connection with us. It seems to us that he knows God perfectly; he talks about his relationship in a completely matter-of-fact manner.

9. It seems to us that in his prayers he communicates directly with his Father. We have heard only a few of his prayers, but the little that we have heard indicates that he speaks with God as if face to face. He seems to know both the future and the past.

10. He simply could not be all this and do all these extraordinary things if he were just a man. We know that he is a man, we are sure of it, but we are almost as sure of his divinity. We believe in his divinity. We are convinced that he is the Son of Man and the Son of God.

Having completed their conversations with Rodan, Nathanael and Thomas hurried to Jerusalem to join the rest of the apostles, arriving there on Friday of the same week. This meeting played an important role in the lives of all three believers, and the other apostles learned a lot when Nathanael and Thomas told them about their impressions.

Rodan returned to Alexandria, where for many years he taught philosophy at Meganta's school. Subsequently, he became an outstanding figure in the kingdom. Until the end of his days he remained a staunch believer and, at the height of persecution, died in Greece along with others.”

Archbishop Vasily (Krivoshein)
"Created Essence" and "Divine Essence" in spiritual theology Venerable Simeon the New Theologian

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

It is unnecessary to remind you of 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 applications of this word are. Open the dictionary of Greek patristics by Prof. Lamp - this word and its derivatives are allocated 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 apologists (for example, Athenagoras), the holy martyr Irenaeus, the spiritual theology of Clement of Alexandria or Origen, the defense of ?μο?σιον by St. Athanasius or the anti-Eunomius polemics of the Cappadocians, the mystical theology of Dionysius the Areopagite, the Christological disputes of Monophysites and Monothelites, the spirituality of Evagrius and Macarius, the Venerable Maximus the Confessor, the iconoclastic crisis and Orthodoxy’s response to it, Photius and the Filioque, not to mention Saint Gregory Palamas, who belongs to a later era than the Venerable Simeon, we will everywhere find that the problem of ουσ?α and its manifestations, the paradox of the 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 the work of St. Simeon the New Theologian, in whom this is expressed with his characteristic originality. Following the Holy Fathers, in particular Saint Basil and Saint Gregory of Nyssa, Saint Simeon, with the same word ουσ?α, designates the essence of God and the essence of created things and always contrasts created essences with God the Creator. So, using this word in the plural - α? However, he means angels when he says that God is “above 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 angels are spoken of. The Monk Simeon also talks 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 created essence? What is this mental light, invisible to anyone?" - exclaims the Monk Simeon, contrasting all created things with 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 essence is not capable of knowing secrets, since “they are by their nature inexpressible, completely ineffable, forbidden to people, incomprehensible to angels, and unknown to any other created essence.” Here the concept of “created essence” includes people and angels. It is also applied 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 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 comes into contact with the essence, like brushwood, how can it not burn [it], not to destroy, not to cause inevitable suffering?" Or: "The flame that reached the heavens and burned inside me with special force, nevertheless did not burn my essence in my womb, like grass, but lo and behold! turned all of it into flame." However, the ontological gap between God and every earthly entity is not abolished: "For God is uncreated, but we are all created<...>He is the Spirit above every spirit as the Creator of all spirits and their Lord, but we are flesh taken from dust, earthly essence (γε?δης ουσ?α)." And again: "Tell me, is it possible to compare a shadow and a real thing or a ministering and servile spirit with the Spirit of the Master, the Almighty and God, Who affirms and strengthens every created essence (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 (which will be discussed below) - it differs in that it is created in contrast 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 creations, but at the same time it is able to perceive the Divine fire and be ignited by it without dying. It can also be said that in these cases the concept of ουσ?α for St. Simeon acquires a specific meaning that almost coincides with the objects he designates in their deepest sense. Likewise, the Monk Simeon never considers the created essence speculatively, but always in relation to God and his own spiritual life.

In our present study of the Monk Simeon, we are going to talk primarily about the uncreated essence of God, about His ουσ?α. Without trying to give it a theological or philosophical definition, considering this completely impossible, the Monk Simeon insists that exploring it is a daring task, especially on the part of those who do not have the Holy Spirit in themselves: “It surprises me,” he writes in his “Theological Words," - as most people, not yet having had time to be born of God and become His children, without any fear they begin to theologize and reason about God. And therefore, if I hear how some of them philosophize about Divine and unknowable objects, they theologize in an unrefined 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 seem to lose my temper simply because I reflect and see how incomprehensible the Divinity is for anyone, and we, not knowing what is under our feet, not knowing ourselves, hasten to philosophize without the fear of God and with audacity about what is inaccessible to us, and we do all this, not having the Spirit, which illuminates this area and reveals it to us: we sin by the very fact that we talk 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, instead of putting things in order within yourself, do you explore what concerns God and Divine things? First we must move from death to life - this is an indispensable condition<...>to attract the Spirit inside oneself and, by His light, to proclaim what relates to God, as far as possible and to the extent that 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 oneself is already very relative, as for knowledge of the essence of God, the very desire to explore it is absurd. The most important thing is that all “theology”, that is, knowledge of “the truths of God and that which concerns God” - traditional term for the attributes and actions of God - implies holiness and illumination and is proportionate to them within the limits, accessible to man. All this argumentation is very “in the spirit of St. Basil,” with the only difference that St. Simeon reveals the possibility of mystical knowledge in more detail than St. Basil.

About the fact that grace is necessary for communication with God, the Monk Simeon, starting from the contrary, says this in the hymn: “How can a soul, full of thorns, passions and sin, withstand the nature of this unbearable flame? How can it contain an essence that cannot be contained anywhere? being darkness, will merge with the impregnable light and not disappear from His presence? . As we see, even in the presence of light the Divine essence remains absolutely uncontainable. The Monk Simeon calls it “the hidden essence” (κρυπτ? ουσ?α): “Oh, immaculate nature, the hidden essence, love for mankind, unknown to most people, mercy, invisible to those who live recklessly, the unchanging, indivisible, trisagion essence.” And yet, 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 the immaterial fire,” I said “substance,” pointing you to the essence of God, to light 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 ουσ?α does not satisfy the Monk Simeon when he begins to talk 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 “supersubstantial” (?περο?σιος). The Monk Simeon asks himself the question whether it is possible to call God an essence: “If You are truly completely inexplicable, invisible, inaccessible, incomprehensible and incorporeal, intangible 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, truly in You, O my God, there is nothing [created]." And he claims that God is transcendental to any essence: “The divine and uncreated super-essential nature is called super-essential, because it is above the essence of all creations, but it is essential and above any essence existential (?νυπ?στατος) and by nature is incomparable with the created hypostasis. What to call indescribable hypostasis? . The same idea about the complete transcendence of God in relation to every creature is expressed in the following lines: “You completely fill everything, and are completely outside of everything; You are above all things, Master, above all essence, above nature itself, above all ages, above All light, Savior!" . Let us note that here, as above, the Monk Simeon addresses the super-essential 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: “You yourself are super-essential, previously uncreated, You took on flesh and became visible to me as created.”

This “super-essential essence” is threefold, and the Monk Simeon speaks at length about its threefold 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, inseparable<...>God is entirely undivided in His nature and His essence is truly above all essence<...>He is all contemplated as simple light<...>three - one essence, one Divinity." Elsewhere he points to the immutability of the triple essence: "O Trinity, Creator of the universe, oh my only God, Whose nature is indescribable, Whose glory is incomprehensible, deeds inexplicable, essence unchangeable." Sometimes St. Simeon the word “supersubstantial” denotes the ineffable and incomprehensible nature of the trinity relations: “As for the non-existent being (ανυπ?ρκτου υπ?ρξεως) of God, birth without conception, non-hypostasis hypostasis, supersubstantial existence (?περουσ?ου ο?σι?σεως) and I don’t know what more<...>then it is completely impossible to expound, express and understand the properties of the supersubstantial Divine nature, and the human mind is not able to comprehend them."

“Essence” for 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 (ο?σ?αι) of Christ in a single hypostasis: “I am the seven, one God and perfect man, - says Christ about Himself in the hymns, - whole, excellent, flesh, soul, mind and reason, 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 hypostases. At the same time God and man, I am One of the Trinity." Elsewhere, the Monk 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 thereby be a complete unity of our two essences, soul and body, with the two essences of Christ: “and I myself become god<...>soul and body are<...>one in two entities. So, those who are one and two, since they have partaken of Christ and drank His blood, they, united with two essences, as well as with the two natures of my God, become god by their participation."

Insisting, as we see, on the hidden and unchanging nature of the Divine essence, the Monk 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 unapproachable 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 about the “energies” (?ν?ργειαι) 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 made famous by St. Gregory Palamas. Thus, the Monk 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 can we investigate the nature of the Creator of all things? And His energies? How do you propose to explain them to me?” . True, the Monk Simeon speaks here not about the essence, but about the nature of God, but in another place he identifies both concepts: “They are not divided or separated in You, but Your nature is Your essence, and Your essence is Your nature.” . At the same time, in his most sublime visions, the Monk Simeon draws a distinction between the essence and energies of God: “Let me see Your face, the Word, and enjoy Your ineffable beauty, contemplate and indulge in a vision of You. To the ineffable and invisible vision, the terrible vision, let me tell at least not about its essence, but about its energies (τας ενεργε?ας αυτ?ς, ου την ο?σ?αν)". For the sake of precision, let's say that a distinction is being made here rather between the essence and energies of Divine vision than between the essence and energies of God Himself, but this discrepancy, apparently, is not so important, since we are talking about the vision of the Word Himself. The Monk Simeon explains the inability to see the essence by the fact that God is above the essence. 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: this is a simple light, a pleasant light; like light it opens, like light it, I think, unites all of us, all of us, with Your servants, light, spiritually contemplated in the distance, suddenly found within us."

In "Moral Words" the Monk Simeon goes even further. Thus, speaking about the sacrament of the Resurrection and asserting that this sacrament was realized in every holy person of past times and continues to be realized 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 by partaking of His Presence pure Body, that is Divine mysteries, we really become completely united and akin to Him." The participation of the Divine essence is associated here with the Eucharist and the gift of the Holy Spirit. However, this statement by the Monk Simeon is just a paraphrase of the words “participants 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 one day come to such a state, we are made like God by grace<...>restored to our original [state], having a renewed soul, becoming blameless and alive as resurrected from the dead, that is, we see the One who deigned to become like us, and He sees us, to whom it was given to become like Him, sees as they see from a distance the face of a friend with whom they talk, to whom they turn and whose voice they hear." Thus, what is meant is not essential identification with God, but communication “from afar” (μακρ?θεν), although genuine and embracing our entire nature.

Before continuing the study of the Divine essence of the Monk Simeon, we must consider his use of [this word] in the form κατ" ο?σ?αν (by essence) and τη ουσ?α (by 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, about the Father it is said: “He is unborn in essence.” This means that the hypostatic property of the Father is not “accidental.” ", but belongs to His very existence. And in order to designate the true equality of the Son with the Father, the Monk Simeon says: “He is God, equal to the Father 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 never separated from the Father." Let us note that a distinction is made here between “in essence” and “in power” 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 do you appear as a radiance, and appear to me as light, and burn matter, being essentially immaterial?” . To this question of the Monk Simeon, Christ answers: “I am by nature ineffable, limitless, perfect, unapproachable, invisible to anyone, incorporeal, intangible, unchangeable 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,” scorches 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." Elsewhere, the Monk Simeon says that the creative nature of God, or His Wisdom, is outside everything and at the same time "in essence" is present everywhere: "The Creator of the whole world, the Divine nature and Wisdom are not [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 generally completely fills everything is in essence, in nature and in hypostasis." This paradox of God, invisible "in essence" and visible to the saints, the Monk Simeon explains, using the opposition of the sun and rays: "He is seen by the worthy, but we are not seen by 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 - but the sun, He Himself, rather blinds, and His ray is perceptible to 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 carries them [in herself] in essence, inseparably and unmerged, and thus she is consubstantial." The expression "in essence" here is equally applied to both the Holy Trinity and the soul as Her image, and at the same time it does not in any way shade the root the difference between the uncreated 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 essence” or “for essence” (either instrumental or dative cases) is often found where the Monk Simeon emphasizes that God is completely invisible and inaccessible, but despite this he paradoxically connects 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, in You they are not separated and not dissected in any way, but nature is Your essence, and essence is nature." Essential unity with God places man above the angels, and St. Simeon bases it on the Eucharistic communion: “By partaking of Your Flesh, I partake of Your nature and become a true partaker of Your essence, a sharer of the Divine, and moreover, becoming a joint heir [of the Divine] in my flesh, I see myself as the highest of the bodiless, the son of God, as You said this not to the angels, but to us, calling us gods: I said: you are gods, and you are all sons of the Most High (Ps 81:6)" . IN this text The Monk Simeon speaks most definitely about communion with the Divine essence in the [sacrament] of the Eucharist. In other places, as we will see, the Monk Simeon, trying to speak more precisely and as a theologian, significantly narrows this statement. Thus, although he declares that God is with us in essence, he asks whether this term actually applies to God, since He is above essence: “Thou art who art with the Father and abides with us not only in energy , as some argue, and not only by will and strength, as many think, but also by essence, if one can dare to speak and think about the essence in You, the One Immortal, the Superessential!<...>how dare we call You an essence and what kind and what! " It is obvious that here the Monk Simeon distinguishes between presence by essence and presence by energy, and rejects presence by energy alone, as well as by essence alone. Elsewhere, the Monk Simeon speaks of such a unity of the Divine fire with the very essence of the soul, that the two become one: “Then merges with it unmerged and unites ineffably, essentially with its essence, all with everything completely<...>and, I don’t know how to say, the two become one, the soul with the Creator and in the soul the Creator." This indescribable unity, merging without merging, which is difficult for St. Simeon to characterize, extends to the body: "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." We are talking here about the participation of the body in the glory of God.

In the face of all these indescribable realities and still trying to explain the mystery in theological terms, the Monk Simeon speaks of his perplexities like this: “Lord our God, Father, Son and Soul, You are formless in appearance, but most beautiful for contemplation, eclipsing everything with Your inexplicable beauty visible, splendor You are beyond sight, You surpass everything<...>Super-essential in essence, unknown to the angels. We know that You exist thanks to Your energies.<...>after all, You named Yourself God who truly is (Exodus 3:14), we call it essence, we call it hypostasis, for what does not exist has neither essence nor hypostasis. That is why we boldly call You the essential (?νο?σιον), we say that You are a hypostasis, You, Whom no one has ever seen, the Trinitarian God, the One beginningless Beginning. Otherwise, how can we dare to call You the essence or glorify in You three separate Hypostases?" And then he continues, emphasizing the unknowability of God: "And how can a creature conceive the image of Your existence? Or the birth of Your Son, God and Word? Or the procession of Your Divine Spirit, in order to cognize Your unity and division and to reliably understand the form of Your 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’s essence, form and image (μορφ?ν), as well as hypostasis, because only You, in Yourself, are the Trinitarian God<...>You Yourself, what You are in essence and of what kind, or how You gave birth once and forever give birth<...>[knows] Omniscient and All-Filling, for He is God in essence<...>And none of the angels has ever seen, none of the people have 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 about his powerlessness to express it in words, he directly states that we are talking about a vision not in essence, but in participation: “What terrible sacrament is taking place in me?” he asks. yourself first of all - the word is powerless to express it, the hand is powerless to describe<...>And if what is happening now in me, prodigal son, - unspeakable and ineffable, then really, tell me, the Giver and Author of this may need praise and glorification on our part?<...>Here my tongue grows numb, and my mind sees what is happening, but cannot explain: it looks and wants to tell, but cannot find words, for it looks at the invisible, without any form, simple, not composed of anything, limitless in size." no less, the Monk 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 holistic whole, but not in essence, but in participation (ου τη ουσ?α π?ντως δε αλλ? τη μετουσ?α) ". Wanting to make this vision of participation more understandable, St. Simeon uses an analogy with material fire: “Here you light a fire from a fire and take the fire as a whole, and it remains indivisible and still inexhaustible, although the transferred fire is separated from the first and turns into many lamps, for this is a material fire. And that [fire] is spiritual, inseparable, completely inseparable, inseparable, not transferred and not divided into many [fires], but even inseparable it abides in me." The following is a description of the mystical revelation of the Divine: "Arises in me, inside my pitiful 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, communication with God not by essence, but by participation, is regarded as a sign of Orthodoxy: “You hear,” says the Reverend, as if on behalf of Christ, “that I am with the saints, Myself, with all essence (ουσ?α) tangibly (αισθητ?ς ), through contemplation and even through participation (μετουσ?α) with My Father and the Divine Spirit and clearly I 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 knowledge (εν α?σθ?σει κα? γν?σει) not in essence, but in participation, just like that one must think Orthodoxy." It is difficult to be more categorical: whatever his statements in other places, here the Monk Simeon asserts that deification is accomplished not by essence, but by participation. And this statement acquires particular importance, since the Monk Simeon makes it the criterion of Orthodoxy Nevertheless, in the same Hymn, continuing his confession and mystical and theological reflections, the Monk Simeon admits that the Divine immaterial essence is visible within us and permeates us through and through: “And then, that is, after you have followed Christ along the path of His commandments and sufferings, you will see the most brilliant light appearing in the completely enlightened air of the soul, in an immaterial way you will clearly see the immaterial essence that really penetrates everything.” There is no fundamental contradiction between these two passages, because the essence (ουσ?α) is diffused in the soul in the form of light, that is, as a manifestation, and not as it is in itself, or “in essence,” as the Monk Simeon would say. This term contains a particularly deep meaning for him.

Now, in conclusion of our study, we must analyze the term derived from ουσ?α, the adverb ουσιωδ?ς “essentially”. It is very characteristic of the Monk Simeon, especially in his Theological and Moral Words, where it occurs very often. In general, we can say that with the adverb ουσιωδ?ς the Monk 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 the manifestation Divine love: “This love, otherwise called the main principle of all virtues, is Christ God, who descended from heaven and became human, becoming a partaker of our earthly flesh in order to essentially grant us participation in His Divinity (?να μεταδ? της αυτ?ς θε?τητας ουσιω δ?ς ?μ?ν) and, having made us spiritual and completely blameless, raise us to heaven." Elsewhere, the Monk Simeon speaks of the Divine fire, which scorches our entire soul and burns passions like dry firewood: “When all this is finally destroyed and only the essence of the soul remains, freed from passions, then the Divine and immaterial Fire is essentially united with it ", and it ignites, becomes translucent, and like a furnace participates in this tangible Fire. This is how the body becomes a burning coal through participation (κατ? μ?θεξιν) in the Divine and ineffable light." Word essentially In these texts, it means the true and deep involvement of the essence of our soul in the deity - the involvement that transforms our whole nature, as the Rev. Simeon himself testifies to this: "It is precisely the complicity and involvement of its deity (μετουσ? α και μ? α?το?) form our unity with God." This mystery is great, it amazes the Monk Simeon: “How is God beyond everything with His essence, nature, power and glory, and how He dwells everywhere and in everything, and especially in [His] saints, and makes an abode in them consciously and essentially ( γνωστ?ς και ουσιωδ?ς), Is he completely super-essential?" . This conscious indwelling of God and vision of Him are the essence of true unity with God: “Once they are essentially united,” says the Monk Simeon, “with God Himself and are worthy to see Him and be involved in Him, they are no longer attracted to themselves by either the image of His creations or shadow of visible things<...>Since their thought resides primarily in supersensible realities, as if immersed in them, clothed in the brilliance of the Divine nature, their feelings are no longer directed, as before, to objects visible world". Here unity (ουσιωδ?ς) is put in connection with the fact that [man] is enveloped in the light of the Divine nature.

A number of texts say that “essentially” it is the Holy Spirit who acts in us primarily. 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 (?λον ουσιωδ?ς) to accept into himself Comforter." We can say that the word essentially means here the complete and conscious indwelling of the Spirit. In another place, the presence of the Spirit is “essentially” identified with His energy, and this suggests that there is no talk of infusion “in essence”: “Love (π?θος) is the energy of the Spirit, or rather His essential presence ( ουσιωδ?ς), hypostatically visible within me as 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 benefits He bestows are given essentially: “You have no need,” he says in one prayer to the Holy Spirit, “to take from without what You give us, for You Yourself are precisely that (αυτ? εκε?νο υπ?ρχον) that only good can be; those in whom You dwell possess in themselves all the good essentially." Here the truth and fullness of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as the reality of their possession, are brought to the fore. Sometimes unity with the Holy Spirit is considered in the context of trinity by analogy with the tripartite structure of man: “Oh miracle!” exclaims St. Simeon, “man is united with God both spiritually and physically, for the soul is inseparable from the mind, and the body from the soul, but in In essential unity (τη ουσιωδ?ς εν?σει), man by grace also becomes trinitarian (τρισυπ?στατος) and one god in position (θ?σει)."

At the same time, it is the Incarnation that remains the basis of the unity of God with man. It is precisely this that makes this unity 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, the Monk Simeon in his hymns declares that before the incarnation God “spoke with His Divine Spirit and with His energies worked miracles, but “essentially” never united with us until Christ and my God became man Indeed, having assumed flesh, He bestowed 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 womb of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, from whom the God-man Jesus Christ was incarnated and born, and all believers participate in him through the Holy Spirit. The divine hypostasis is united with the human essence. God, writes the Monk Simeon, “took from Holy Mother of God and Ever-Virgin Mary 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; incongruously mixing the first with the last, human with His own, He built it as a holy temple for Himself; without changes or transformations, the Creator of Adam Himself became a perfect man." The reality of this hypostatic unity in the Virgin Mary was expressed by the Monk Simeon with the same adverb ουσιωδ?ς: "Mary, the Mother of God, is the first to hear the good news from the angel; She trusts God's Providence<...>and gives consent<...>And then She was the first to essentially receive into Herself the Word of God, which truly redeemed Her soul from the previous [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, from her are 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, received flesh from the Most Pure Mother of God (αγν?ς Θεοτ?κου) , and in return It gave not flesh, but in 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 designates the reality of the union of the Divine and the human in Christ, the fullness of the descent of the Holy Spirit on 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 Venerable One, “we do not accept Him physically, as the Virgin Mother of God accepted Him, but spiritually and essentially; in our hearts we have Him 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 truly formed in us is manifested, according to the thought of St. Simeon, in the awareness of this and in this way it differs from illusory visions. The monk gives an explanatory example: “The light of the lamp is reflected in the mirror; the presence of Christ is not similar to such an image, devoid of own basis(ανυποστ?τφ); Christ reveals Himself existentially and essentially (?νυποστ?τως και ουσιωδ?ς), in a formless form, in an appearance without guise, visible invisibly and understood incomprehensibly how." The unknowability and even inaccessibility of God is paradoxically emphasized by the Monk Simeon simultaneously with his participation in Him." in an essential way ".

Where the Eucharist is discussed, St. Simeon uses the same dialect essentially denotes the sacrament of our communion with the Body and Blood of the Lord. “You have vouchsafed me,” he writes, “to hold and eat Your essential Flesh and drink Your All-Holy Blood.” St. Simeon obviously wants to reveal the truth of Eucharistic communion here, as well as in the passage below, 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 am 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 (μυστηρ?ων) , for having been cleansed by repentance and streams of tears, communing with the deified Body (Σ?ματος τεθεωμ?νου) as God, I myself become god through an ineffable union. Look [what happens] the sacrament: soul and body<...>having communed with Christ and drunk His Blood<...>become god by participation and are called by the name of the One to whom they became essentially involved (Ου ουσιωδ?ς μετ?σχον)."

Trying to summarize our study of the Divine ουσ?α in the works of St. Simeon the New Theologian, we come to the conclusion that, as where we are talking about 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 the interest that it represents from a theological point of view, but rather brief remarks and observations, a little scattered, dictated by the vital need to give oneself an account of one’s mystical experience, to understand by the possibility of 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 for St. Simeon’s theological discussions about “essence” can be considered the need to protect his spirituality from attacks from opponents who accused him of heresy. It should also be noted - and this follows from what we have said - that the Monk Simeon lacks precise and consistent terminology and logical development of arguments. Moreover, in his statements about essence one can detect contradictions and disagreements that seem, at least at first glance, to be confusing. Thus, he often, in the spirit of absolute apophaticism, speaks of the complete unknowability of God, and in other places he declares that God is known in a positive way. He sometimes 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. The Monk 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 of not only the essence of God, but also His energies, which he calls unknowable. However, more often the Monk Simeon, insisting that the essence is hidden and unknowable, says that we see God in His energies, that in them we have a partial vision of God, like a vision of the rays of the sun, unattainable in its brilliance. In some places, the Monk Simeon goes even further and asserts that we participate in God essentially and that we become participants even in His nature and His essence, especially in the sacrament of the Eucharist. Once he even admits that one can have a vision of the Essence of God. In other places, the Monk Simeon categorically rejects the possibility of unity with God in essence, allowing only unity by participation (ου τη ουσ?α αλλ? τη μετουσ?α), and, which is very important, considers this as a sign of Orthodoxy.

Maria NAPRIENKO
Poet. Born in 1985 in N. Ovosibirsk. Graduate of the Literary Institute named after. A. M. Gorky. Published in “Youth”, “Literary Lounge”, “Day of Literature”, “Khreshchatyk”, “Istoki”, “Growth”, a collection of poems “And again, as if according to the laws of magic, poems are born...”. Author and performer of songs, author of poetic translations from Italian language. Lives in St. Petersburg.

Divine essence

This year Joseph Alexandrovich Brodsky would have turned 75 years old. The poet's fate is unique, as is his work. This is partly why I would like to turn to the theme of God in Brodsky’s poetry, to the poet’s attitude to the Divine principle and to religion, to the poet’s perception of God and to the talent of the poet, who in many of his poems acts as a guide of faith.
Even without taking into account Brodsky’s answer at his trial in 1964, based only on his works, we can conclude that the writer was a believer. If we take into account what he said at the trial, then Brodsky not only believed, he knew that higher power exist, and he considered God to be the very power under the guidance and through which he fulfills his calling, that is, writes.
In his work, in his discussions about God, Brodsky is quite simple, but he is also confident in the use of religious terms. Through most of his work, the poet carries philosophical reflections on everything that the Almighty could touch.
The poet not only speaks directly about the Divine presence already in his early poems, but also speaks about it quite often, speaks with love and reverence.

That temple surrounded them like a frozen forest.
From the eyes of people and from the eyes of heaven
the peaks were hidden, having managed to spread out,
that morning Mary, the prophetess, the elder.

(“Candlemas”, March 1972)

Brodsky sees the Divine essence in all people, obviously hinting that each of us is, at a minimum, a mediator, a guide in the fulfillment of the plans of the Universe. Everyone decides his own life and thereby is like God. This point of view is nothing new for us now. But the individuality and innovation of Brodsky’s language makes the well-known postulates sound literary and poetic in a new way, and this language does not spare harshness and directness in presenting the main knowledge gained by the poet.

Everyone is naked before God,
pathetic, naked and wretched.
In every music there is Bach.
There is God in each of us.

(“Poems under an epigraph”, 1958)

Until a person’s actions begin to correspond to the norms of spiritual values, a person will not become complete and self-sufficient, he will not be at the proper level of development, and accordingly, he will not be able to constantly be in a state of joy, but will carry within himself a feeling of shame and his own insignificance. And therefore faith is not just necessary - it is necessary for everyone sent into the material world. And it is faith that is the main criterion of decency.

...and we ourselves are hardly gods in miniature.
That's why we are happy because we are insignificant. Dali,
heights and so on disdain the smoothness of the skin.
The body is back to space, no matter how you twist the pedal.
And we are unhappy, apparently, for the same reason.

("Roman Elegies", 1981)

The poet will carry the idea that everything that exists is filled with God throughout his entire creative life. Drawing and rhyming the signs of time, merging with this time, going into a poetic frenzy from his own inspiration, Brodsky accepts all life circumstances offered. He is able to dissolve in them in order to merge with God, in order to become even more devoted to him and thereby earn godlikeness.

And like a shaman circling around the room,
I reel in like a ball
take on its emptiness so that the soul
knew something that God knows.

(“How long have I been trampling, you can see from the heel…”, 1980–1987)

God is not only inside every person, but also inside everything that surrounds a person: God is inside every thing, inside every event, every natural phenomenon, inside every sound - he permeates and nourishes everything.

In the village God does not live in corners,
as scoffers think, but everywhere.

The village here is a place where, by definition, there is more open and clean space, inhabited by people who alone have consciousness and intelligence, through which they have the opportunity to evaluate and thank the given.
The rural space itself and its inhabitants are much less spoiled than city dwellers by modern civilization, information, and other attributes of the growing global progress. And therefore everyone in the village is much closer to God. God's holiness touches everything that a person is surrounded by and encounters. God is honest and just. And everyone is equal to him and equally loved.

He sanctifies the roof and dishes
and honestly divides the doors in half.

Brodsky does not attribute anything new to God, but with his poems he emphasizes the significance and power of faith, he strengthens this faith and, even if not on purpose, spreads it.
Brodsky confronts atheism with the fact of the existence of God, no matter what name is ascribed to God by religions. Be it even just the laws of physics, energy and its reversibility.
For Brodsky, living in the real, tangible world, using material values, capable of contemplating and, moreover, enjoying, first of all, natural natural phenomena, the primordial beauty of being, a person, no matter what religion or religious movement he may be, cannot deny some common principle, the original power of all this.

The opportunity to observe all this,
listening to the autumn whistle,
the only, in general, grace,
available in the village to an atheist.

(“In the village God does not live in corners...”, 1964)

Speaking about God in general, Brodsky still relies precisely on the Christian worldview.

During the cold season, in areas
rather accustomed to the heat,
than to the cold, to a flat surface,
more than to the mountain,
a baby was born in a cave to save the world;
It's as shallow as it can be in the desert in winter.

But religious specification does not change the essence of Brodsky’s attitude, understanding and presentation of faith. God for him is everything that is around, this is the entire infinite world with all its components and cause-and-effect relationships. God is not only in everything you can think of. God is all this.
IN different years Brodsky wrote several Christmas poems. As the poet himself said, he loved to treat himself to writing poems on Christmas time dedicated to the great holiday.

The smoke was like a candle. The fire curled like a hook.
And the shadows became shorter,
then suddenly longer. No one around knew
that the count of life will begin from this night.

("Christmas", January 1964)

In some lines with this theme, there is openly considerable irony, sharp and special author’s humor, which may seem inappropriate to a believer, but, on the other hand, if these poetic characteristics carry a bright mockery, it is precisely at those who do not understand , misunderstands or is not sincere in relation to faith, to one’s religious views, to Christian symbols, to the concept sin and to true knowledge of sinfulness.

It's snowing; they don't smoke, but they blow
roof pipes. All faces are like spots.
Herod drinks. The women are hiding the boys.
No one knows who is coming:
we don't know the signs and hearts
They may suddenly not recognize the alien.

The theme of God and man and their comparison serves as the leitmotif of many of Brodsky’s works, not only specifically touching on the Almighty or religion. The very language of the poet’s poems is initially directed somewhere into eternity, and this language a priori contains the depth and significance of everything that happens.
Often Brodsky absolutely consciously agrees to suffering, as if he likes to intensify his experiences and pain by writing poetry, where he sincerely rejoices in the present moment, perhaps because he knows that it can be even worse, even harder, or, no matter how trite it sounds , I am sure that all changes are only for the better.

But until my mouth is filled with clay,
only gratitude will be heard from it.

Humility, which cannot be called anything other than Christian, is heard repeatedly in Brodsky’s poetry. Accept the events of life, see spiritual experience in everything, allow the Lord to command and thank Him...

Lean over, I'll whisper something in your ear: I
grateful for everything...

("Roman Elegies", 1981)

Brodsky treated poetry as God's providence. It is through a person endowed with speech abilities that God brings truth to the world, to this “deaf-mute Universe.”

Page and fire, grain and millstones,
poleaxe point and truncated hair -
God preserves everything; especially - words
forgiveness and love, like your own voice.

And it is in the mouth of the poet that this truth finds its perfect form in beauty, artistry and spirituality. Poems have a beating heart, pulsating nerves, a bright and untainted soul - through language, through poetic speech, they allow the Universe and man to enter into dialogue, to know, understand and find each other.

Because there is only one life, they are from mortal lips
sound more clearly than from supermundane cotton wool.

(“On the centenary of Anna Akhmatova”, July 1989)

A revelation and a real confession in the spirit of Brodsky is his poem “Conversation with a Celestial” (1970). This is the main and reasoned proof of the unconditional faith of the poet, who through poetry finds meaning in mental anguish. This is the faith of a poet tormented by his mastery, the self-development of which he is unable to stop or drown out, but which ultimately created a poetic world of a new intellectual level. This is a poet who, involuntarily and freely, acts at one with the Lord, no matter what questions and no matter what wounds remain open.
The poet repents of his sins on earth and, exhausted by his inexorable gift, except for which he knew nothing about himself, turns to the Almighty with a request to take this gift back.

...this is your gift
I return - I didn’t bury it, I didn’t drink it away;
and if the soul had a profile,
you would have seen
so does she
just a cast of a sorrowful gift,
that she had nothing more,
that together with him it is addressed to you.

(“Conversation with a Celestial,” March-April 1970)

In this poem, faith constantly tests itself. Here she does not find a dialogue with God, does not hear his answers, rushes from one extreme to another, but still does not question the existence of God and his power.
Neither exile, nor persecution, nor sadness, nor bitterness, nor loneliness, nor the feeling of abandonment by God gave rise to doubts in Brodsky that God exists. And faith in him turns out to be higher for Brodsky than confessional rituals and higher than the reality that dominates consciousness.
The poet does not curry favor with God, he is merciless in the formulation of his thoughts, but, so often raising the topic of the inevitability of death in his poetry, he retains the knowledge that everything is controlled from above, and after leaving the earthly incarnation, the “kingdom of God” awaits everyone.

And my shadow, blocking the light,
there, behind his back, he goes into the kingdom of God.

(“My candle, casting a dim light...”, 1965)

Repenting of his sinfulness, convicting himself of despondency, reproaching himself for it, Brodsky sees exclusively the Lord as the measure of everything. He sees him in the day, in the night, in fire, in snow, in pain, in dreams, in spring... But he just can’t reach him, can’t talk to him - he doesn’t have the right to do this because of his imperfection, which is incurable. He loves his God, although he is tormented by his helplessness.

…And already
nor to a high syllable,
neither to space nor to God
not to break through to the soul.

("March", 1965)

The poet also touches on the issue of the loneliness of God. The Lord appears to Brodsky as a wanderer in the Universe, in eternity, in timelessness. And this wanderer is looking for earthly shelter in human form. This wanderer needs love and understanding of his neighbor, as every person needs it. And how painful it must be for this wanderer from the awareness and feeling of general loneliness, caused, perhaps, simply by the reluctance to find each other.

Imagine the Lord in the Son of Man
recognizes himself for the first time on a huge
distance in the dark: homeless in homeless.

(“Imagine, striking a match, that evening in the cave...”, 1989)

This is why Brodsky apologizes. This is what he feels guilty about. His loneliness and melancholy turned out to be insurmountable neither by reality, nor by society, nor by poetry. But for this he only blames himself. He simply did not find a way to find complete happiness in the gift of life... And, buried after death by force of circumstances in the Protestant part of the Venetian cemetery, still very young, Brodsky talks with God, as is customary in the evangelical religion, asking for forgiveness, without intermediaries and - alone one…

...into the auricle of God,
closed to the noise of the day,
whisper just four syllables:
- I'm sorry.

(“Lithuanian Divertissement”, Tomas Venclova, 1971)

It is unnecessary to remind you of the importance of the concept essence, oShs...a, about what a huge place it occupies in the theological thought of the Holy Fathers, how diverse their meanings and applications of this word are. Open the dictionary of Greek patristics by Prof. Lamp - this word and its derivatives are allocated 16 columns of quotations from Greek patristic literature, and 11 columns are occupied by the word oShs...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! In fact, if we take into account the writings of apologists (for example, Athenagoras), the holy martyr Irenaeus, the spiritual theology of Clement of Alexandria or Origen, the defense of Pmosion by St. Athanasius or the anti-Eunomius polemics of the Cappadocians, the mystical theology of Dionysius the Areopagite, the Christological disputes of Monophysites and Monothelites, the spirituality of Evagrius and Macarius, St. Maximus the Confessor, the iconoclastic crisis and Orthodoxy’s response to it, Photius and the Filioque, not to mention St. Gregory Palamas, who belongs to a later era than St. Simeon, we will find everywhere that the problem of oShs...a and its manifestations is a paradox the transcendental 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 the work of St. Simeon the New Theologian, in whom this is expressed with his characteristic originality. Following the Holy Fathers, in particular St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nyssa, the Monk Simeon, with the same word oShs...a, denotes the essence of God and the essence of created things and always contrasts created essences with God the Creator. Thus, using this word in the plural - aѓ oШs...ai, he means angels when he says that God is “above mental entities, for they too are His creation.” However, this is patristic terminology, especially characteristic of St. Gregory of Nazianzus and St. Dionysius the Areopagite where angels are spoken of. The Monk Simeon also talks 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, moon, stars." However, more often the term oShs...a 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 created essence? What kind of mental light is this, invisible to anyone?” - exclaims the Monk Simeon, contrasting all created things with mental light. In another place he contrasts the created with the Divine fire: “For You cleanse defiled souls, You illuminate the mind and embrace the earthly and material essence.” A created essence is not capable of knowing secrets, since “they are by their nature inexpressible, completely ineffable, forbidden to people, incomprehensible to angels, and unknown to any other created essence.” Here the concept of “created essence” includes people and angels. It is also applied 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: “A strange miracle: my flesh, I’m 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 comes into contact with an entity like brushwood, how can it not burn it, not destroy it, not cause inevitable suffering?” . Or: “The flame that reached the heavens and burned inside me with special power, nevertheless did not burn my essence in my womb, like grass, but lo and behold! it turned all of her into flames.” However, the ontological gap between God and every earthly entity is not abolished: “For God is uncreated, but we are all created<…>He is the Spirit above every spirit as the Creator of all spirits and their Lord, but we are flesh taken from dust, earthly essence (geиdhj oШs…a).” And again: “Tell me, is it possible to compare a shadow and a real thing or a serving and servile spirit with the Spirit of the Master, Almighty and God, Who affirms and strengthens every created essence (ktistsn oShs…an).” So, we can conclude that St. Simeon has the expression essence, oShs...a, denoting the created world (angels and man, soul and body), is fundamentally different from the Divine essence (which will be discussed below) - it differs in that it is created in contrast 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 creations, but at the same time it is able to perceive the Divine fire and be ignited by it without dying. It can also be said that in these cases the concept of oShs...a with the Monk Simeon acquires a specific meaning, almost coinciding with the objects he designates in their deepest sense. Likewise, the Monk Simeon never considers the created essence speculatively, but always in relation to God and his own spiritual life.

In our present study about the Monk Simeon, we are going to talk mainly about the uncreated essence of God, about His essence...a. Without trying to give it a theological or philosophical definition, considering this completely impossible, the Monk Simeon insists that exploring it is a daring task, especially on the part of those who do not have the Holy Spirit in themselves: “It surprises me,” he writes in his “Theological Words,” - like most people, having not yet had time to be born of God and become His children, without any fear they begin to theologize and talk about God. And therefore, if I hear some of them philosophizing about Divine and unknowable things, theologizing in an unrefined 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 seem to lose my temper simply because I reflect and see how incomprehensible the Divinity is for 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 audacity about what is inaccessible to us, and we do all this without the Spirit, which illuminates this area and reveals it to us: we sin by the very fact that we talk 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, instead of putting things in order within yourself, do you explore what concerns God and Divine things? First we must move from death to life - this is an indispensable condition in order to attract the Spirit inside ourselves and, in His light, proclaim what relates 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 of himself is already very relative; as for the knowledge of the essence of God, the very desire to explore it is absurd. The most important thing is that all “theology”, that is, the knowledge of “the truths of God and the things of God” - the traditional term for the attributes and actions of God - presupposes holiness and illumination and is proportionate to them within the limits accessible to man. All this argumentation is very “in the spirit of St. Basil,” with the only difference that St. Simeon reveals the possibility of mystical knowledge in more detail than St. Basil.

The reverend Simeon, starting from the opposite, says in the hymn that grace is necessary for communication with God: “How can a soul full of thorns, passions and sin withstand the nature of this unbearable flame? How will it contain an essence that cannot be contained anywhere? How, being darkness, will he merge with the impregnable light and not disappear from His presence?” . As we see, even in the presence of light the Divine essence remains absolutely uncontainable. The Monk Simeon calls it “the hidden essence” (krupt¾ oÙs...a): “Oh, immaculate nature, the hidden essence, love for mankind, unknown to most people, mercy, invisible to those who live recklessly, the unchanging, indivisible, trisagion essence.” And yet, 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 the immaterial fire,” I said “ substance,” pointing you to the essence of God, in order to light the mental lamp of the soul, in order 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 oShs...a does not satisfy the Monk Simeon when he begins to talk 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 “supersubstantial” (ШperoЪsioj). The Monk Simeon asks himself the question whether it is possible to call God an essence: “If You are truly completely inexplicable, invisible, inaccessible, incomprehensible and incorporeal, intangible and completely elusive, Savior, then how dare we give You a name, how dare we call You at least some some kind of entity? Indeed, truly in You, O my God, there is nothing created.” And he claims that God is transcendental to every essence: “The divine and uncreated supersubstantial nature is called superessential, because it is above the essence of all creations, but it is essential and above any essence existential (™nupÒstatoj) and by nature is incomparable with the created hypostasis. How to call an indescribable hypostasis? . The same idea about the complete transcendence of God in relation to every creature is expressed in the following lines: “You fill everything completely, and you are completely outside everything; You are above all things, Master, above all essence, above nature itself, above all centuries, above all light, Savior!” . Let us note that here, as above, the Monk Simeon addresses the super-essential 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: “You yourself are super-essential, previously uncreated, You took on flesh and became visible to me as created.”

This “super-essential essence” is threefold, and the Monk Simeon speaks at length about its threefold 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, inseparable<…>God is entirely undivided in His nature and His essence is truly above all essence<…>He is all contemplated as simple light<…>three - one essence, one Divinity.” Elsewhere he points to the immutability of the threefold essence: “O Trinity, Creator of the universe, O my only God, Whose nature is indescribable, Whose glory is incomprehensible, works ineffable, essence unchangeable.” Sometimes St. Simeon uses the word “supersubstantial” to designate the ineffable and incomprehensible nature of the trinity relations: “As for the non-existent being (ўnupЈrktou ШpЈrxewj) of God, birth without conception, non-hypostasis, supersubstantial existence (Шperous…ou oÙsièsewj) and I don’t know what else<…>then it is completely impossible to expound, express and understand the properties of the super-essential Divine nature, and the human mind is not able to comprehend them.”

“Essence” for 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 (oShs...ai) of Christ in a single hypostasis: “I am the one God and perfect man,” says Christ about Himself in the hymns - whole, excellent, flesh, soul, mind and reason, 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 of the Trinity.” Elsewhere, the Monk 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 thereby be a complete unity of our two essences, soul and body, with the two essences of Christ: “and I myself become god<…>soul and body are<…>one in two entities. So, those who are one and two, since they have partaken of Christ and drank His blood, they, united with two essences, as well as with the two natures of my God, become god by their participation.”

Insisting, as we see, on the hidden and unchanging nature of the Divine essence, the Monk 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 unapproachable 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 about 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 made famous by St. Gregory Palamas. Thus, the Monk 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 things? And His energies? How do you propose to explain them to me?” . True, the Monk Simeon speaks here not about the essence, but about the nature of God, but in another place he identifies both concepts: “They are not divided or separated in You, but Your nature is Your essence, and Your essence is Your nature.” . At the same time, in his most sublime visions, the Monk Simeon draws a distinction between the essence and energies of God: “Give me to see Your Face, the Word, and enjoy Your ineffable beauty, to contemplate and surrender to the vision of You. To the ineffable and invisible vision, the terrible vision, let me tell at least not about its essence, but about its energies ( t¦j ™energe…aj aШtБj, oШ tѕn oШs…an)" . For the sake of precision, let us say that here a distinction is made between the essence and energies of the Divine vision rather than between the essence and energies of God Himself, but this discrepancy is apparently not so important, since we are talking about the vision of the Word Himself. The Monk Simeon explains the inability to see essence by saying that God is above essence. He perceives the reflection of Divine glory as a simple light with which he enters into unity: “For You are above nature, You are above all essence, You are my God and Creator, but we see the reflection of Your Divine glory: this is a simple light, a pleasant light; like light it opens, like light it, I think, unites all of us, all of us, with Your servants, light, spiritually contemplated in the distance, suddenly found within us.”

In “Moral Words” the Monk Simeon goes even further. Thus, speaking about the sacrament of the Resurrection and asserting that this sacrament was realized in every holy person of past times and continues to be realized until today, 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 by tasting His Most Pure Body, that is, the Divine mysteries, we really become completely united and akin to Him.” The participation of the Divine essence is associated here with the Eucharist and the gift of the Holy Spirit. However, this statement by the Monk Simeon is just a paraphrase of the words “participants 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 one day come to such a state, we are made like God by grace<…>restored to our original state, having a renewed soul, becoming blameless and alive as resurrected from the dead, that is, we see the One who deigned to become like us, and He sees us, to whom it was given to become like Him, sees how they see the face of a friend from a distance , with whom they talk, to whom they turn and whose voice they hear.” Thus, what is meant is not essential identification with God, but communication “from afar” (makrTqen), although genuine and embracing our entire nature.

Before continuing the study of the Divine essence of the Monk Simeon, we must 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 is close to “having the same substance”, “genuine”, “real”. Thus, it is said about the Father: “He is unborn in essence.” This means that the hypostatic property of the Father is not “additional,” but belongs to His very being. And in order to designate the true equality of the Son with the Father, the Monk Simeon says: “He is God, equal to the Father in essence, and in nature, and in power, and in image (kat¦ morfѕn) truly and in appearance (kat' „dљan ) and is never separated from the Father in time.” Let us note that a distinction is made here between “in essence” and “in power” 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 do you appear as a radiance, and appear to me as light, and burn matter, being essentially immaterial?” . To this question of the Monk Simeon, Christ answers: “I am by nature ineffable, limitless, perfect, unapproachable, invisible to anyone, incorporeal, intangible, unchangeable in essence (tsn oShs...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,” scorches our soul and unites with its essence. His absolute transcendence is once again evidenced by such terms: Divine Fire is “elusive, uncreated, invisible, beginningless, and immaterial<…>He is beyond all material and immaterial creations, visible and invisible.<…>He is beyond all these creations by nature, by essence and also by power.” Elsewhere, the Monk Simeon says that the creative nature of God, or His Wisdom, resides 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 among them (after all, 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 generally completely fills everything with itself in essence, in nature and in hypostasis.” The Monk Simeon explains this paradox of God, invisible “in essence” and visible to the saints, using the opposition of the sun and rays: “He is seen by the worthy, but is not completely visible to them; they see Him invisibly, like one ray of the sun, and He is perceptible to them, elusive by essence. We see a ray - but the sun, He Himself, rather blinds, but His ray is perceptible to you.” Finally, the soul, as created in the image of God, also has its properties “in essence”: “And my soul is His image. Having mind and word, she carries them within herself in essence, inseparably and unmerged, and thus she is consubstantial.” The expression “in essence” here is equally applied to both the Holy Trinity and the soul as Her image, and at the same time the fundamental difference between the uncreated prototype and His created likeness is not shaded. However, many ancient Fathers did exactly the same thing 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 oШс…v) “by essence” or “for essence” (the instrumental or dative cases) is often found where the Monk Simeon emphasizes that God is completely invisible and inaccessible, but despite this he paradoxically connects 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, in You they are not separated and not dissected in any way, but nature is Your essence, and essence is nature.” Essential unity with God places man above the angels, and St. Simeon bases it on the Eucharistic communion: “By partaking of Your Flesh, I partake of Your nature and become a true partaker of Your essence, a sharer of the Divine, and moreover, having become a joint heir of the Divine in my flesh, I see yourself as the highest of the bodiless, the son of God, as You said this not to the angels, but to us, calling us gods: I said: you are gods, and you are all sons of the Most High (Ps 81:6)". In this text, the Monk Simeon speaks most definitely about communion with the Divine essence in the sacrament of the Eucharist. In other places, as we will see, the Monk Simeon, trying to speak more precisely and as a theologian, significantly narrows this statement. Thus, although he declares that God is with us in essence, he asks the question whether this term actually applies to God, since He is above essence: “Thou art who art with the Father and abides with us not only in energy , as some argue, and not only by will and strength, as many think, but also by essence, if one can dare to speak and think about the essence in You, the One Immortal, the Superessential!<…>How dare we call You an essence and what kind and what kind!” . It is obvious that here the Monk Simeon distinguishes between presence by essence and presence by energy, and rejects presence by energy alone, as well as by essence alone. Elsewhere, the Monk Simeon speaks of such a unity of the Divine fire with the very essence of the soul that the two become one: “Then it merges with it ineffably and unites inexpressibly, essentially with its essence, all with all, completely<…>and, I don’t know how to say it, the two become one, the soul with the Creator and in the soul there is the Creator.” This indescribable 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 my body - participates in the Divine glory and is illuminated by the radiance of the Divine ray ". We are talking here about the participation of the body in the glory of God.

In the face of all these indescribable realities and still trying to explain the mystery in theological terms, the Monk Simeon speaks of his perplexities like this: “Lord our God, Father, Son and Soul, You are formless in appearance, but most beautiful for contemplation, eclipsing everything with Your inexplicable beauty visible, splendor You are beyond sight, You surpass everything<…>Super-essential in essence, unknown to the angels. We know that You exist thanks to Your energies.<…>after all, You named Yourself God truly exists (Exodus 3:14), we call it essence, we call it hypostasis, for what does not exist 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 Trinitarian God, the One beginningless Beginning. Otherwise, how can we dare to call You the essence or glorify in You three separate Hypostases?” . And then he continues, emphasizing the unknowability of God: “And how can a creature conceive the image of Your existence? Or the birth of Your Son, God and Word? Or the procession of Your Divine Spirit, so that we may know Your unity and understand your division and reliably understand the form of Your essence (oShs…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’s essence, form and image (morf”n), as well as hypostasis, because only You, in Yourself, are the Trinitarian God<…>You Yourself, what You are in essence and of what kind, or how You gave birth once and forever give birth<…>knows the Omniscient and All-Filling One, for He is God in essence<…>And none of the angels have ever seen, none of the people have ever known Your existence (Іparxin), for You are uncreated.”

And in the first hymn, where the Monk Simeon speaks at length about his mystical experience and about his powerlessness to express it in words, he directly states that we are talking about a vision not in essence, but in participation: “What terrible sacrament is taking place in me? - he asks himself first of all, - the word is powerless to express it, the hand is powerless to describe<…>And if what is happening now in me, the prodigal son, is unspeakable and inexpressible, then tell me, can the Giver and Author of this really 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, for it looks at the invisible, which has no appearance, simple, not composed of anything, infinite in size.” Nevertheless, the Monk Simeon tries to understand: “the mind does not see the beginning, does not see the end, does not notice any middle, how will it tell about what it has seen? It is seen, I think, as a whole, whole, but not in essence, but in participation ( oШ tН oШs…v pЈntwj d ¢ll¦ tÍ metous…v)" . Wanting to make this vision of participation more understandable, the Monk Simeon uses an analogy with material fire: “Here you light a fire from a fire and take the fire as a whole, and it remains indivisible and still inexhaustible, although the transferred fire is separated from the first and turns into many lamps , for this is material fire. And that fire is spiritual, inseparable, completely inseparable, inseparable, cannot be transferred and is not divided into many fires, but even indestructible it abides in me.” What follows is a description of the mystical revelation of the Deity: “Arises in me, inside my pitiful heart, like the sun or like the disk of the sun 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, communication with God not by essence, but by participation, is regarded as a sign of Orthodoxy: “You hear,” the Reverend says, as if on behalf of Christ, “that I am with the saints, Myself, with all my essence (oShs...v) tangibly (a„sqhtoj ), through contemplation and even through participation (metous...v) with My Father and the Divine Spirit and 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 exactly how one should think Orthodoxy ". It is difficult to be more categorical: whatever his statements in other places, here the Monk Simeon asserts that deification is accomplished not by essence, but by participation. And this statement acquires special importance, since the Monk Simeon makes it the criterion of Orthodoxy. Nevertheless, in the same Hymn, continuing his confession and mystical and theological reflections, the Monk Simeon admits that the Divine immaterial essence is visible within us and permeates us through and through: “And then, that is, after you have followed Christ in the path of His commandments and sufferings - you will see the most brilliant light appearing in the completely enlightened air of the soul, in an immaterial way you will clearly see the immaterial essence that really penetrates everything.” There is no fundamental contradiction between these two passages, because the essence (oShs...a) is diffused 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 contains 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 the Monk Simeon, especially in his Theological and Moral Words, where it occurs very often. In general, we can say that with the adverb oШsiwdîj the Monk 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 chief principle of all virtues, is Christ God, who descended from heaven and became human, becoming a partaker of our earthly flesh, to essentially grant us participation in His Divinity ( †na metadш tБj aШtБj qeТthtoj oШsiwdoj №m‹n) and, having made us spiritual and completely blameless, lead us to heaven.” Elsewhere, the Monk Simeon speaks of the Divine fire, which scorches our entire soul and burns passions like dry firewood: “When all this is finally destroyed and only the essence of the soul remains, freed from passions, then the Divine and immaterial Fire is essentially united with it , and it ignites, becomes translucent and, like a furnace, participates in this tangible Fire. This is how the body becomes a burning coal through participation (kat¦ mšqexin) in the Divine and ineffable light.” Word essentially in these texts denotes the true and deep participation of the essence of our soul in the Divine - a participation that transforms our entire nature, as the Monk Simeon himself testifies to this: “It is participation and participation in His Divinity ( metous…a kaˆ mšqexij tÁj qeÒthtoj aÙtoà) form our unity with God.” This mystery is great, it amazes the Monk Simeon: “How is God beyond everything with His essence, nature, power and glory, and how He dwells everywhere and in everything, and especially in His saints, and establishes an abode in them consciously and essentially (gnwstîj kaˆ oÙsiwdîj), He is completely super-essential?” . This conscious indwelling of God and vision of Him are the essence of true unity with God: “Once they are essentially united,” says the Monk Simeon, “with God Himself and are worthy to see Him and be involved in Him, they are no longer attracted to themselves by either the image of His creations or shadow of visible things<…>Since their thought resides primarily in supersensible realities, as if immersed in them, clothed in the brilliance of the Divine nature, their feelings are no longer directed, as before, to the objects of the visible world.” Here unity (oШsiwdîj) is put in connection with the fact that a person is enveloped in the light of the Divine nature.

A number of texts say that “essentially” it is the Holy Spirit who acts in us primarily. 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 oШsiwdîj) to accept the Comforter into himself.” We can say that the word essentially means here the complete and conscious indwelling of the Spirit. In another place, the presence of the Spirit is “essentially” identified with His energy, and this suggests that there is no talk of infusion “in essence”: “Love (pТqoj) is the energy of the Spirit, or rather, His essential presence (oШsiwdîj), what is hypostatically visible within me is like 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 benefits He bestows are given essentially: “You have no need,” he says in one prayer to the Holy Spirit, “to take from without what You give us, for You Yourself are exactly that (aShtХ ™ke‹no ШpЈrcon) that only can be good; those in whom You dwell possess in themselves all the good essentially.” Here the truth and fullness of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as the reality of their possession, are brought to the fore. Sometimes unity with the Holy Spirit is considered in the context of the trinity, by analogy with the tripartite structure of man: “Oh, miracle! - exclaims the Monk Simeon, - man is united with God both spiritually and physically, for the soul is inseparable from the mind, and the body from the soul, but in essential unity (tН oШsiwdîj ˜nèsei) man by grace also becomes trinitarian (trisupТstatoj) and one 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 precisely this that makes this unity 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, the Monk Simeon in his hymns declares that before the incarnation God “spoke with His Divine Spirit and with His energies worked miracles, but “essentially” never united with us until Christ and my God became man . Indeed, having assumed flesh, He bestowed 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 womb of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, from whom the God-man Jesus Christ was incarnated and born, and all believers participate in him through the Holy Spirit. The divine hypostasis is united with the human essence. God, writes the Monk Simeon, “having received animate flesh from the Most Holy Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary<…>united her with His incomprehensible and inaccessible Divinity; or, rather, with our essence (oШs...a) He essentially (oШsiwdîj) unites the entire hypostasis of His Divinity; incongruously mixing the first with the last, human with His own, He built it as a holy temple for Himself; without changes or transformations, the Creator of Adam Himself became a perfect man.” The reality of this hypostatic unity in the Virgin Mary was expressed by the Monk Simeon with the same adverb oШsiwdîj: “Mary, the Mother of God, is the first to hear the good news from the angel; She trusts God's Providence<…>and gives consent<…>And then She was the first to receive into Her essence the Word of God, which truly redeemed Her soul from its previous 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 Adam’s rib, 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, received flesh from the Most Pure Mother of God (¡gnÁj QeotÒkou), and in return It gave not flesh, but in the essential image of the Holy Spirit.” As we see, in these discussions about the Incarnation, the Venerable Simeon, with the same word oШsiwdoj, designates the reality of the union of the Divine and the human in Christ, the fullness of the descent of the Holy Spirit on 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 accept Him not bodily, as the Virgin Mother of God accepted Him, but spiritually and essentially; in our hearts we have the One Whom the Pure Virgin conceived.” Here the word oШsiwdîj 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 truly formed in us, according to the thought of St. Simeon, is manifested in the awareness of this and thus differs from illusory visions. The monk gives an explanatory example: “The light of the lamp is reflected in the mirror; the presence of Christ is not similar to such an image, devoid of its own basis (ўnupostЈtJ); Christ reveals Himself existentially and essentially ( ™nupostЈtwj kaˆ oÙsiwdîj), in a formless form, in a form without guise, visible invisibly and understood incomprehensibly.” The unknowability and even inaccessibility of God is paradoxically emphasized by the Monk Simeon simultaneously with participation in Him in an “essential way.”

Where the Eucharist is discussed, St. Simeon uses the same dialect essentially denotes the sacrament of our communion with the Body and Blood of the Lord. “You have vouchsafed me,” he writes, “to hold and eat Your essential Flesh and drink Your All-Holy Blood.” St. Simeon obviously wants to reveal the truth of Eucharistic communion here, as well as in the passage below, 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 grace I am talking about? About unity with Him sensually and mentally, essentially and spiritually. I have already told 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, communing with the deified Body (Simatoj teqewmšnou) as God, I myself become god through an ineffable connection. Look at the sacrament being performed: soul and body<…>having communed with Christ and drunk His Blood<…>become god by participation and are called by the name of the One to whom they became involved essentially (oШsiwdîj metšscon)"