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62Revolutionary Epektasis: The Radical Challenge of Life in Theosismoreby Emma BrownAn exploration of the radical implications of early Greek Christianity for present day living. Exposition on the image of God and other elements ofEastern orthodox theology drawing especially from Athanasius, Gregory of Nyssa, John of... moreAn exploration of the radical implications of early Greek Christianity for present day living. Exposition on the image of God and other elements ofEastern orthodox theology drawing especially from Athanasius, Gregory of Nyssa, John of Damascus, Maximus and Palamas.More Info: Undergraduate Dissertation submitted for MA Divinity and History.Research Interests: Theology, Anarchism, Eco-Theology, Christian Neoplatonism, Trinitarian Theology, and 11 moreSystematic Theology, Patristics,Greek Patristics, Environmental Ethics, Political Theology, Divinity, Eastern Orthodox Liturgical Theology, Eastern Orthodox Theology, ChristianAnarchism, Byzantine Theology, and Cappadociansedit

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be possible to speak of the being of God” as “the substance of God, ‘God’, has no

ontological content, no true being, apart from communion”.10 This community is

inseparable, however, from the oneness of God, a unity which is preserved in the

east through the dogma of perichoresis. John of Damascus describes the activity in

the Godhead as “the mutual indwelling of the Persons in one another as ‘I am in

the Father and the Father in me’, and their inseparable indwelling”.11 In his

Handbook of Theological Terms,Harvey describes perichoresisas “the term used in the

doctrine of the Trinity to refer to the mutual interpenetration of the persons of the

godhead, so that although each person is distinct in relation to the others,

nevertheless, each participates fully in the being of the others”, so that ultimately

“the being of the godhead is thus one and indivisible”.12 The preservation of

oneness is in this mutual indwelling, so that it is not possible to speak of separate

beings within God since merely the contemplation of one necessitates talking of

the others as each is defined by this ever-flowing relationship of love. Gregory of

Nazianzus illustrates the eternity of this relationship and its contemplation in one

of his orations:

No sooner do I conceive of the One than I am illumined by the Splendour of the

Three; no sooner do I distinguish Them than I am carried back to the One. When I

think of any One of the Three I think of Him as the Whole, and my eyes are filled,

and the greater part of what I am thinking of escapes me. I cannot grasp the

greatness of That One so as to attribute a greater greatness to the Rest. When I

contemplate the Three together, I see but one torch, and cannot divide or measure

out the Undivided Light.13

Thus for Gregory of Nazianzus, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are names that

relate not to separate substances, but “names [that] make known a genuine and

intimate relation”, so that “they denote an identity of nature”.14 Not only is this

10 J. Zizioulas, Being As Communion: Studies in Personhood and the Church . (New York: StVladimir’s Seminary Press, 1985), 17.

11 John, Orthodox , 377.12 Harvey, Handbook , 155.13 Gregory of Nazianzus, ‘Oration XL’ in Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen . C. Browne & J.

Swallow(trans.) (Christian Classics Ethereal Library:http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf207.html[accessed 17.03.12] ), 41

14 Gregory, ‘ Five Theological Orations’ in Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen . C. Browne, &J. Swallow,(trans.) (Christian Classics Ethereal Library:www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf207.html[accessed 14.02.11] ), 561.


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perpetual relation a definition of the unity of the persons of the Trinity then, but it

is also precisely the means by which the different hypostases in God are identified,

since in order to have relation there must be otherness in the participants.15

All we know and all that remains a mystery then, is encapsulated in: “God is

Love”(1 John 4:16 ). Unity and Trinity, one and many, relation and otherness,

simplicity and paradox are presented within ‘God is Love’, and more specifically,

Love in perichoresis.

The complexity of God is in this embodiment of love. An understanding of the

relations within God can only really be introduced into the human mind through

the economic outworking of the Trinity. The evidence and the depiction of God’s

love in creation is expressed in the Passion story of the New Testament: “For God

so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him

shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). Love, then is defined in creation

by God’s act of kenosis, where he “emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being

born in human likeness, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of

death- even death on a cross” (Phil 2:7-8). Thus, when we ask ‘what is God?’, we

might start by describing God as Love; a Love that is communal, mutually

interpenetrating, and that in its outworking iskenotic , which is self emptying for

the sake of the other. When looking for the image of God in man it is perhaps the

aligning of humanity toward this activity of Love in God that should be focused

upon.

2.3 The Aspiration of the Image of God toward Deification

The Byzantine tradition places great emphasis on not only being made in the

image of God, but also the implicit purpose that being made in the image entails. It

is this realisation and translation of an image which is referred to as ‘likeness’. The

distance between the realised state of ‘image’ and the ‘likeness’ towards which

humanity aspires are described in the Orthodox dogma of deification.

15 “No one, however, is properly said to have charity on the ground of his own private love for himself.In order to be charity, love must be directed toward another. This charity cannot exist, where a

plurality of persons lacks”. Richard of St Victor quotation from/further discussion in M. Meerson,The Trinity of Love in Modern Russian Theology. (Quincy: Franciscan Press, 1998),151.

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Deification ortheosisis defined by Archimandrite George as literally

To become gods by Grace... Theosis is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, whereby

through Grace one becomes a participant in the Kingdom of God. Theosis is an act

of the uncreated and infinite love of God. It begins here in time and space, but it is

not static or complete, and is an openended progression uninterrupted through all

eternity.16

Having been made in the image of God, humanity, by the grace of God, has the

potential to become like God. When talking of this potential, Gregory of Nyssa

terms it epektasis, literally a ‘constant progression’ or aspiration of humanity

toward likeness with God,17 which, according to Danielou means that it “belongs to

the very essence of the spiritual life to be a continual progress, so that, however

paradoxical it may seem, perfection consists in a continual progress”.18 Unification

with God does not entail identity with God’s essence but rather an experience of

adoption by grace,19 and, as will be discussed later, a participation in the Divine

Energies. Importantly, human identity is not lost in this process of deification.20

Humanity not only retains its personal identity but becomes more truly human,

more perfect and realises its true purpose through participation in the divine.

Bartos writes that it is this “growing into a perfect humanity” that brings it to its

“appointed consummation, that perfection for which man was intended at his

creation”.21As such, deification is “a divine gift and the ultimate and supreme goal

for human existence”,22 though importantly it is never an imposition, so likeness to

God, whilst being the goal of human existence, is left to humanity’s own free will to

pursue.23 In this way “the imitation of Christ is the ‘cooperation’ of the man

regenerate in Christ with the author of this regeneration; a cooperation directed

towards the attainment of likeness to God and deification”,24 so that humanity has

16 George, Theosis: The True Purpose of Human Life. (Mount Athos: Holy Monastery of SaintGregorios, 2006), 86.

17 Gregory of Nyssa, Life of Moses, A. Malherbe & E. Ferguson(trans.), (New York: Paulist Press,1979). 2.225-30. See also E. Bartos, Deification in Eastern Orthodox Theology. (Carlisle:Paternoster Publishing, 1999), 9.

18 J. Danielou, quoted in L. Mateo-Seco & G. Maspero, The Brill Dictionary of Gregory of Nyssa.(Leiden: Brill, 2009) , 263.

19 Bartos, Deification, 7.20 Bartos, Deification, 10.21 Bartos, Deification, 8.22 Bartos, Deification, 7.23 Mantzaridis, Deification , 22.24 Mantzaridis, Deification , 64.

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