The holy glory of the gospel of grace grounds Orthodox hesychasts in the peace of pure stillness, way beyond a formal grasp of doctrines and ritual, practicing the invocation of the Name. God communicates God through God, empowering revelation of the Holy Trinity transfiguring seers and glorifying saints. Formal dogmatism and external ritualism are transitional, therefore provisional, because it is the prayer of… Read more »
Wisdom bestows a kiss of peace unveiling the Song of Songs in the Holy of Holies, embracing the beloved with her radiant gaze. Returning to the Father through the Son, saints rest in peace in the Holy Spirit, abiding in the serenity of stillness. The gentle humour of wise stillness is kindly as it deifies saints in the way of the… Read more »
The way of truth is wisdom’s way of life, uniting noetic intelligence with the heart, revealing wondrous mysteries of glory. Binary thinking opposes the real to the unreal, good from bad, being with nothing, unable to embrace opposing extremes before they degenerate into warring extremism. Wisdom empties the dualistic mind into the undivided heart, opening noetic purity to uncreated light…. Read more »
Lectio divina reads inspired texts with inspiration, gathering deifying glorification from illumination, welcoming the Holy Spirit, purifying the heart. To read with the eye and ear of the heart is to open through wisdom to glory, breaking through external obstructions, leaping over mountainous resistance. Literalism clings to outward, external surfaces, whereas wisdom, awakening to the Holy Spirit, uncovers the living Word… Read more »
The Name enthrones seers in uncreated glory, hallowing saints in wisdom as they invoke and hallow the Name. Wisdom is seated in the radiance of uncreated glory, whose splendour deifies those who are hallowed by grace, dissolving fear into whole-hearted trust. Wisdom abides in the awakened heart, transmuting terror into generous love. Orthodox Hesychasts dwell in the purifying wisdom of gracious stillness,… Read more »
To know yourself is to know God, according to the ‘Letters of Saint Antony the Great,’ so to turn and see is to awaken to God at centre in the midst, which wisdom does when she beholds the glory of God. According to Saint Maximus the Confessor, the Name reveals oneness of being, well-being and timeless openness of being, by awakening to… Read more »
The sovereign majesty of God in Scripture is intimately connected with the glory of God, kabod in Hebrew, doxa in Greek. The glory revealed on Mount Sinai is the glory of the Name, the majesty of God unveiled in tabernacle and temple, the majestic glory that leaves the corrupted temple and adorns Christ in his incarnation, full of grace and… Read more »
The heart sings wisdom songs when grace overflows the heart and glory soars over mountains of resistance, prevarication, postponement and perversion. The Spirit prays as it wills in the depths of the heart, so why fuss about ways and means? Our spirit rejoices in the Holy Spirit when wisdom turns and sees God present at centre in the heart, dissolving… Read more »
Orthodox asceticism is training in unselfish love, turning the light of awareness round into uncreated light, seeing God with the single eye of the awakened heart, glorifying God with the deifying glory of hallowing glorification. Metanoia turns the mind back into the heart where love dwells in God, enabling seers to see God’s love with God’s eye of wisdom, theoria, opening… Read more »
Resurrection reveals love and love trusts resurrection. Trust in love and trust in resurrection are one holy mystery. Holy Orthodoxy teaches that training in love is asceticism in resurrection, purification of the heart, illumination of the mind in the heart and deification in the glory of love. Love trusts love because God first loved us, empowering us to love God in… Read more »