Divine Essence and Divine Energies

Over half a century ago, according to Eric L. Mascall, ‘the Thomist and the Palamite/Were walking hand in hand./Each did his very best to make/The other understand./“If only we could both agree,”/They said, “It would be grand”’(Mascall 1959). Western philosophical theologians—theists and atheists alike—have, till very recently, taken Aquinas as their guide, or at any rate their model (even when they fervently disagreed with his arguments and conclusions). The Eastern Orthodox, on the other hand, have felt as strongly about Gregory Palamas (1296–1359), and have mostly agreed with him. Debate has often seemed fruitless, since each side seems persuaded that the other is unreasonable and/or unfaithful (though an earlier volume of essays, Eastern Churches Review 9.1977, did manage some convergence). ‘“If sixty trained philosophers/Argued for half a year,/Do you suppose,” the Thomist said,/“That they could get it clear?”/“I doubt it,” said the Palamite,/And shed a bitter tear.’ Eastern and Western Christendom have been politically and ecclesiastically estranged for centuries, but the differences between them, and even between their later, ‘secular’, inheritors, are more than political. To discover what those differences are, what it is that creates so definite a frontier in the heart of Europe may require more attention to apparently minor or forgotten theological disputes than most modern Western philosophers will usually think appropriate. What difference did the ‘filioque’ make, the question whether the Spirit ‘proceeds from’ the Son as well as the Father (and what does the question mean in any case)? What difference does it make today that some Christians (mostly in the West) believed that God was rationally cognizable and others (mostly in the East) insisted that He was not (and what did either side intend)? There are larger questions: Can the division between Eastern and Western Christendom be considered in isolation from that other massive presence, Sunni (and Shi’ite) Islam? Does it matter for later thought whether God is One or Three, whether His Word is visible in a Jewish Hasid or solely in a sacred text, whether His ‘energeiai’ are ‘created’ or ‘uncreated’? Can Theology, or Philosophy, make any sense of our historical divisions, or are all wars and conflicts to be explained merely as an effect of economic or imperial interest? If we cannot be sure whether Reason, Art, Philosophy, Education, Justice mean the same even within—broadly—Abrahamic cultures, what hope have we for any more global agreement?

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