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| Saint Gregory Palamas. |
St. Gregory Palamas belongs to
the category of those Hagiorite Fathers who see God. He himself, as St.
Philotheos Kokkinos describes, had experiences of God many times, but also
participation in the deifying energy of God. His way of writing and the way in
which he analyses the texts of the holy Fathers manifest his personal
participation in the uncreated glory of God.
For the Glory of God, we have
written testimonies about vision of the uncreated Light in our days. Several
Hagiorite monks, for many reasons, chiefly to help the Christians whose faith
was wavering, came to the point of revealing their experiences. Thus we have
written testimonies of this life. In what follows we should like to mention
four such testimonies, which show the value and importance of the Mountain of
holy name.
The first is the witness of
father Paisios. He describes how St. Arsenios of Cappadocia appeared to him at
the moment when he had finished writing his biography. It was an experience of
God, for saints appear in the uncreated Light. Moreover the saints enjoyed
Paradise and the Kingdom of God, which is the vision of the uncreated Light. It
is very characteristic that on Mt. Tabor the Prophet Elijah and the Prophet
Moses appeared in God's Light. Paisios writes:
"The Father also has
other such garments, but my own spiritual hands have been paralyzed by my many
sins and I cannot loose them for the present to pray. May the good Father
forgive me for this and for the fact that I have defiled his name, which he
gave me. It is true also that I have not imitated him in any way. And while I
was regarded as a young scamp the indulgent Father Arsenios, as an imitator of
Christ, was vindicating me by his love. It seems that for years he was
collecting all his love for me in order to give it to me at one time and to
jolt me, careless and insensitive as I am, into recovering my senses.
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| Saint Arsenios with Saint Paissios. |
"It was the day of the
Saints Theodoros, the twenty-first of February, 1971, All Souls' Day. I had
written his biography for the first time, from the materials which I had then
and was reading it, in case I might have happened to make any mistake in the
translation of the Pharasiotiki which I had heard from the elders.
"It was two hours before
sunset, and while I was reading, Father Arsenios visited me; and just as a
teacher caresses his pupil who has written the lesson well, he himself did the
same thing to me. Along with this, he allowed me an inexpressible sweetness and
heavenly elation in my heart, which was impossible to endure. Then I ran out
to the grounds surrounding my Cell like a fool and called out to him, because I
thought that I would find him. (Fortunately no visitor had come, because he
too would have been troubled and I could not have told him the reason for this
holy madness in order to reassure him). Sometimes I was calling out loudly:
"My Father, my Father!" And sometimes I was calling more softly:
"My God, my God, hold my heart quite tightly until I see what is going to
happen tonight!" For my heart of clay could not possibly endure that great
Paradisal sweetness unless God helped me.
"When night had already
fallen and my hopes had subsided -for I had thought that I would find him- I
no longer looked to Heaven. What made me go back into my cell was when I
remembered the day of the Lord's Ascension. When after forty days Christ
visited the Panagia with His disciples for a moment on Ascension Day they saw
Him being taken up into the Heavens before their eyes.
"When I came to my cell
afterwards, I felt that sweetness again and on into the night. But this set me
thinking. Had the Good and Just God perhaps sent Father Arsenios to settle with
me in this life for the five or six prayer ropes which I had done as a monk, by
sending this Paradisal sweetness, since my sins are many and great? I do not
know, so I beg you to pray for me, pray for the love of Christ that God may
have mercy on me'",
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Elder Joseph the Hesychast
with scenes of his life.
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The second testimony comes
from another Hagiorite, who died in 1959, Gerontas Joseph Spilaioti. He lived
the full hesychastic life; he had noetic prayer of the heart, and in his
personal life he experienced the purifying, illuminating and deifying energy of
God, such as miracles which he describes in various letters that were sent to
his spiritual children and have been collected in a special volume. In one
letter he writes:
"And one day many
experiences happened to me. All that day I was crying out with quite great
pain. And already in the evening at sunset I was resting, fasting, exhausted
from the tears. I was looking at the church with the Transfiguration at the
top, and, wilting and wounded, I was calling on the Lord. And it seemed to me
that a strong wind was coming to me from there. And my soul was filled with an
ineffable fragrance. And at once my heart began to say the prayer like a clock
noetically. I got up then full of grace and immense joy and went into the cave.
And bending my chin to my breast I began to say the prayer.
"And no sooner had I said
the prayer a few times than I was caught up into a vision of God. And while I
was in the cave -and its door was barred- I found myself outside in heaven, in
a wonderful place in profound peace and calm of soul. Complete rest. I thought
only this: My God, let me not return to the world, to the wounded life any
more, but let me stay here. Next, after I had been rested as the Lord wished, I
came to myself again and found myself in the cave".
Gerontas Joseph had visions of
the uncreated Light, and that is why he describes this state wonderfully. In
one letter of his he says characteristically:
"The true monk is a product of the Holy Spirit.
"And when in the
stillness the nous purifies the senses and becomes calm and the heart is
purified, then one receives grace and illumination of knowledge. And one
becomes light, all nous, all clarity. And one pours forth theology - where
three write they do not overtake the current which wells forth in waves and
spreads peace and utter motionlessness of passions through the whole body. The
heart is set aflame by divine love and cries out: "My Jesus, control the
waves of thy grace, for I am melting like wax". And indeed it cannot help
melting. And the nous is caught up into the vision of God. And there is
blending into union. And the person is transubstantiated and becomes one with
God, so that he does not know or contain himself, like iron in the fire when it
is ignited and is assimilated to the fire'",
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| Saint Silouan the Athonite. |
The third testimony comes from
St. Silouan the Athonite, who fell asleep in the Lord in 1938. He describes a
vision of God which he had, when he was granted to see the living Christ. All
his life he remembered Christ's sweetness and humility. St. Silouan writes with
great simplicity, which is an expression of truth, humility and life:
"At one time the spirit
of despair laid hold of me - it seemed to me that God had finally rejected me,
and there was no salvation for men, that, on the contrary, my soul bore
evidence of everlasting damnation. And I felt in my soul that God was merciless
and deaf to entreaty. This lasted an hour or a little over. A humour of this
kind is so oppressive, so harrowing, that even to recall it terrifies. The soul
cannot bear it for long. In moments such as these, man may well be lost for all
eternity. Such was the battle which the Merciful Lord allowed the spirit of
evil to wage with my soul.
"A short time elapsed. I went into church, to
Vespers, and looking at the icon of the Saviour, I cried:
'Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy upon me, a sinner'.
"And as I uttered these
words I saw the living Lord in the place where the icon was, and the grace of
the Holy Spirit flooded my soul and my whole body. And so it was I came to know
through the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ is God; and I was filled with a sweet
longing to endure suffering for His sake.
"Since that day when I came to know the Lord, my
soul is drawn to Him, and the earth holds no delight for me. God is my only
gladness. He is my joy and my strength, my wisdom and my treasure".
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| Elder Sophrony Sacharov. |
And the fourth testimony
belongs to Father Sophrony, who, as he describes in his book, experienced such
blessed states. To be sure, he writes them with deepest humility, in order to
help the world and to support the orthodox faith, living in a country which
has different opinions about Christ. Father Sophrony describes with great
humility:
"Early in the 1930's -I
was a deacon then- for two weeks God's tender mercy rested on me. At dusk, when
the sun was sinking behind the mountains of Olympus, I would sit on the balcony
near my cell, face turned to the dying light. In those days I contemplated the
evening light of the sun and at the same time another Light which softly
enveloped me and gently invaded my heart, in some curious fashion making me
feel compassionate and loving towards people who treated me harshly. I would
feel quite sympathy for all creatures in general. When the sun had set I would
return to my cell as usual to perform the devotions preparatory to celebrating
the Liturgy, and the Light did not leave me while I prayed.
"One evening a monk from
a cell near mine came to me and said, 'I have just been reading the hymns of
St. Simeon the New Theologian. Tell me -what do you make of his description of
his vision of the Uncreated Light?' Up to that moment I had lived with grateful
heart the Lord's blessing upon me but had not posed any question about the
occurrence -my thoughts were fixed upon God to the exclusion of self. In order
to answer Father Juvenaly I reflected on what was happening to me at the time.
Trying to cover up, I answered evasively. 'It is not for me to pronounce upon
St. Simeon's experience ... But perhaps when grace was with him he was conscious
of it as Light. I don't know. 'I had the impression that Father Juvenaly
retired to his cell without suspecting anything more than I had said. But soon
after this brief exchange I began to pray as usual. Light and love were no
longer with me.
"Thus over and over again
I learned from bitter experience that pure prayer happens only when our spirit
is completely absorbed in God without any reverting to self. It is curious -
when I was talking to Father Juvenaly I was not aware of conceit stirring in me
... And yet... But could I not have foreseen that my continuing vision of Light
in the evenings and at night at that time (the beginning of my priesthood)
might lead to pride? If such a misfortune lay on my path the Lord found an
excellent way of humbling me by taking away the gift. Glory be to Him for ever
and ever'",
He saw the uncreated Light many times. He describes
one more such vision of God:
"On Easter Saturday, in
1924 perhaps, the Light visited me after I had taken communion, and I felt it
like the touch of Divine Eternity on my spirit. Gentle, full of peace and love,
the Light remained with me for three days. It drove away the darkness of
non-existence that had engulfed me. I was resurrected, and in me and with me
the whole world was resurrected. The words of St. John Chrysostom at the end
of the Easter Liturgy struck me with overwhelming force: 'Christ is risen and
there are no dead in the grave'. Tormented hitherto by the specter of universal
death, I now felt that my soul too was resurrected and there were no more dead
... ".
We have presented these four
written testimonies from the Hagiorite fathers themselves in order to show that
in each epoch, and so today as well, on the Holy Mountain there are witnesses
to seeing the Light of divine glory. Of course there are others who see God and
whom we do not know, on the one hand because they themselves wish to live in
obscurity, on the other hand because God has not manifested them. If there are
special reasons, God will reveal them.
Reference:
St Gregory Palamas As A Hagiorite. Hierotheos Vlachos.(2000)