SOURCE: "Apophaticism and Deification," in Depicting the Word: Byzantine Iconophile Thought of the Eighth and Ninth Centuries, E. J. Brill, 1996, pp. 114-24.

[In the following essay, Parry examines the paradoxical characterization of God by John of Damascus—in which he described God's humanity as well as His divinity—and discusses how this depiction affected the iconoclastic controversy.]

The two doctrines of apophaticism … and deification …, are here treated together because they often complement one another in Byzantine theology. For example, Pseudo-Dionysius writes: 'Since the union of deified minds with that light which is beyond all deity occurs when all intellectual activity ceases, those deified and unified minds who imitate the angels, as far as they are capable, praise it most appropriately through the abstraction … of all things." In this passage the two doctrines we are dealing with are made the foundation of mystical theology.

Here our attention is drawn to the relationship that exists between them. On the one hand, the light of which Pseudo-Dionysius speaks beggars all description (apophaticism), while on the other, those who seek it find themselves participating in it (deification) to some extent. By the fourteenth century Gregory Palamas speaks of apophaticism with regard to the divine essence, and deification with regard to the divine energies.² Although the two doctrines may be considered the twin pillars of Byzantine mysticism they occur in fact in a variety of theological contexts, including iconophile apologia.

It is a matter of some interest that both doctrines attract the label of 'unwritten tradition' in Byzantine Christianity. They belong to a sphere of theologising that is not enshrined in scripture, canon law or the apostolic tradition. Gregory of Nazianzus says that some laughed at him when he spoke of the divine origin of human beings and their destiny in terms of theosis.³ For Maximos the Confessor, the doctrine of theosis was a mystery of the Christian faith known through true worship. This 'theological mystagogy,' as he terms it, was something that went beyond the usual sources of authority.⁴ The doctrine of salvation through deification was to be understood by way of liturgical experience.

Likewise, for Maximos, the only true statements about God are negative ones. The ultimate unknowability of God was to be grasped in that silence which comes from recognising the nature of true ignorance.⁵ Similarly, Gregory of Nyssa considers human speech inadequate to express that reality which transcends all thought and every concept. The only option is silence when it comes to speaking of the divine essence, although God may be spoken of in terms of his works and operation.⁶ The respective roots of the two doctrines of apophaticism and theosis may be traced to certain elements in the earlier Greek, and to a lesser extent, the Jewish approach to the divine.' We shall deal first with apophaticism.

At its most basic apophasis is an element of Greek grammar. The addition of the alpha privative is a common way of negating a word in Greek, as a cursory glance at Liddell and Scott will show. The theological significance of this grammatical point becomes apparent, however, when we look at the attributes of God. For example, in his First Oration, John of Damascus lists the divine attributes as follows: without beginning …, uncreated …, immortal …, unassailable. … eternal …, everlasting …, bodiless …, incomprehensible …, invisible …, uncircumscribed …, and formless.…⁸

… [Each] one of these attributes has as its prefix an alpha privative. John of Damascus discusses two ways in which negations may be used in speaking about God. They can either take the form of an affirmative proposition in which the predicate is prefixed by an alpha privative, as in 'God is incorruptible,' or they can be negative propositions such as 'God is not corruptible.¹⁹ The basic distinction he makes between 'privation' and 'negation' goes back to Aristotle, mediated through various commentators.²⁰ In contrast to these negative attributes, John mentions terms which are predicated of God affirmatively, such as 'being,' 'substance,' 'life,' 'power,' and the like. However, he suggests the best names are those which involve a combination of both negation and affirmation, such as 'superessential essence."¹¹

It is cataphaticism … that affirms what God is, and as both apophatic and cataphatic theology are of equal importance, the one should not be used in isolation from the other, although in the end knowledge of God may be beyond both apophatic and cataphatic thought.¹² But in general, as human language and thought is ultimately incapable of comprehending the divine nature, it is more appropriate to use negative expressions. In addition to preserving the divine transcendence, the doctrine of apophaticism also safeguards the doctrine of theosis. Without the counterweight of negative theology the doctrine of theosis is liable to be misunderstood.¹³

The relation between apophaticism and iconology, although not developed by iconophile writers, is, nevertheless, implicit in their discussions concerning the nature of Christ and what is or is not represented in his icon. If the divine nature is invisible, uncircumscribed, formless and bodiless, then what does the icon of Christ depict, for he is human as well as divine. It is this kind of question that is the main source of iconoclast attacks on the icon of Christ. To answer this question iconophile writers have recourse to the distinction between [theologia] and [oikonomia] and to the notion of the hypostatic union.¹⁴

It is worth turning aside for a moment to consider some other aspects of apophatic thought. Although we are primarily concerned with the application of apophaticism to theology, we should note that it is also found as a scientific method. We find it being used as such by the Middle Platonists in their speculations on the nature of matter. For example, in his work On Matter, Calcidius writes that when his teacher Numenius wanted to show an image of naked matter, he suggested that first all bodies should be taken away one by one.¹⁵ This method allowed for the contemplation of pure matter, which was equated with the void, also referred to as the womb, left by the process of negation. Plotinus exploited this method when he developed his theory of the non-existence of matter, a theory that was to influence the thought of the Cappadocian fathers.¹⁶

Another aspect of apophaticism we should consider, is its application to prayer. We first encounter the method of 'imageless prayer' in the writings of the desert fathers of the fourth century. For example, Evagrius Ponticus writes: 'When you are praying, do not shape within yourself any image of the deity, and do not let your intellect be stamped with the impress of any form; but approach the immaterial in an immaterial. manner.'¹⁷ It is clear that stripping the intellect of images requires the monk to practice a mental discipline of negation. This type of imageless prayer became associated in Byzantium with the Jesus Prayer and the light-mysticism of the hesychast tradition. In order to achieve the pure state of imageless prayer it was recommended not to confront the thoughts and images that enter the mind, but rather to detach oneself from them through the invocation of the name of Jesus.¹⁸ Perhaps this tradition of imageless prayer had some bearing on the iconoclast distaste for representations of the Word made flesh. Certainly the contemplative tradition of pure prayer would seem far removed from the icon cult. We may recall that Gregory Palamas himself was accused of iconoclasm because of his hesychast doctrine.¹⁹

There is a third aspect of apophaticism which we need to mention before moving on. It could be said that Byzantine iconoclasm itself is a form of apophaticism. If Meyendorff is correct in asserting that belief in the absolute transcendence and invisibility of God were part of Islamic anti-Christian polemic, and that the iconoclastic emperors decided to cleanse the church of idolatry in order to fight Islamic theology more effectively, then apophaticism may be said to have contributed to Byzantine iconoclasm.²⁰ However, as apophaticism was already an established part of Byzantine thought before the eighth century, the iconoclast emperors had no need to turn to Islamic theology to bolster their standing on that score. That they may have been ignorant of apophaticism in their own tradition is another matter. There is no doubt that the nonfigural tradition in Islamic art does reflect a strong apophatic tendency. But the anti-image element in early Islam owes as much to the desire for socio-political hegemony as it does to the theology of transcendence.²¹

There is a sense, then, in which it is legitimate for the Christian to say 'God does not exist.' Or as John of Damascus puts it: 'As regards what God is, it is impossible to say what he is in his essence, so it is better to discuss him by abstraction … from all things. For he does not belong to the class of existing things, not because he does not exist, but because he transcends all existing things, even existence itself.'²² Given that the nature of the deity is utterly incomprehensible to the human intellect, it may be better to say what he 'is' not. Yet the use of names to attribute positive qualities to him is not thought in any way to impose limits on his nature. 'That which is without limit is certainly not limited by name,' says Gregory of Nyssa.²³ While apophatic theology is concerned with such abstract attributes as infinity, invisibility, and uncircumscribability; cataphatic theology is concerned with what can be affirmed of God, namely that he is good, loving and merciful.

For Theodore the Studite it is clear to all that the Godhead … is incomprehensible, uncircumscribable, boundlesss, limitless, formless and whatever adjectives signify the abstraction … of what it is not. According to the doctrine of theology …, so far from inventing some kind of circumscription or comprehension, we do not even know that the Godhead exists at all, or what sort of thing it is, as it alone can refect upon itself (1.2).²⁴ Such is the nature of the Godhead that it remains beyond all predication. Because it is of an altogether different order from that which we know, we have recourse to negative descriptions. As far as God is concerned there is no designation, no likeness, no circumscription, no definition, nothing at all of what comes within the comprehension of the human mind (1.5).²⁵ Like John of Damascus Theodore operates with privations on the one hand and negations on the other.

Turning to the subject of theosis, we find that the Greek fathers base their teaching on both the Old Testament and the New. From the Old Testament they take 'I say, you are gods' of Psalm 82.6, and link it with the New Testament 'you shall become partakers of the divine nature' of 2 Peter 1.4. In general, however, theosis reflects biblical teaching rather than biblical texts.²⁶ This is apparent in the patristic dictum: 'God became man in order than man might become God.' Theosis through Christ is the means by which our original relationship with God is restored. According to Maximos the Confessor, as created beings we are not by nature able to attain deification, since we are not capable of grasping God. This can happen only by divine grace.²⁷ The Byzantine view of grace, and its relation to human salvation, is embodied in the idea of cooperation. … We have to work together with God because we cannot depend upon grace alone nor on our own efforts. Human beings are called to respond to divine grace, but they are free to accept it or to reject it. The process of theosis begins with baptism and continues through participation in the sacramental life of the church, especially the eucharist.²⁸

That the concept of theosis is thought of as a process and not an event can be seen in the Cappadocian doctrine of extension. … For Gregory of Nyssa human participation in divine grace is unending, and although it may begin here and now, it cannot be fulfilled in time.²⁹ It is a present possibility and a future hope based on the restoration of the capacity for grace through the person of Jesus Christ. In the words of the fathers of Nicaea 11: 'God re-created man for immortality, thus giving him a gift which cannot be revoked. This re-creation was more God-like and better that the first creation because it was an eternal gift.'³⁰

Gregory of Nazianzus would appear to be the inspiration behind this.³¹ Gregory's word for re-creation is [anaplasis] and he makes it clear that this re-creation is a more exalted creation that the first. John of Damascus makes a similar claim when he says that the new dispensation is better than the old because it is based on better promises (2.22).¹² This means that human salvation is not simply a recovery of the unfallen state, but rather a renewed capacity for growth and future progress in grace. For the Greek fathers, then, theosis is dynamic not static, progressive not retrogressive.

What Christ renews for us is the potential to move once more towards defication. He provides us with a focus of attention that our original ancestors lacked. According to Gregory of Nazianzus, it was due to the immaturity of Adam in contemplating God that the original paradise was lost.³³ We might infer from this that it was too much to expect Adam to contemplate God without the incarnation. In other words, from an iconophile point of view, Adam would have done better with an icon of Christ because he was not sufficiently mature to contemplate God in a spiritual way.³⁴ Put like this, it can be seen that the icon may form a rung on the ladder leading to the state of imageless prayer.

John of Damascus hints at this when he states that we use bodily sight… to attain spiritual contemplation … (3.12).³ We find the patriarch Germanos speaks of the icon as a kind of guiding hand … for those who cannot attain spiritual contemplation.³⁶ We should note, however, that there are few references to the contemplation of icons as a form of prayer in the spiritual life. For this reason it is not always clear where the incarnation stands in this higher form of prayer. On this point it is of interest to find Origen stating that 'even at the very highest climax of contemplation we do not for a moment forget the incarnation.'³⁷ It seems ironic to quote Origen on this given the condemnation of so-called Origenist spirituality in Byzantium.³⁸

It would appear that the icon belongs to liturgical spirituality rather than to hesychast spirituality.³⁹ But that being said, perhaps there is no hard and fast division between them, and it should not be thought that the tradition of imageless prayer is opposed to the veneration of icons. This was the mistake made by the opponents of Gregory Palamas in the fourteenth century, when they accused him of promoting an iconoclastic spirituality. Gregory is insistent that hesychasm does not invalidate other aspects of Orthodox practice.⁴⁰ Nevertheless, it should be pointed out that there are no references to icons in the liturgical commentaries of our period. However, from what Nikephoros says of the images displayed on the sanctuary barrier …, 'it is safe to assume that icons did play a role in the liturgy long before it was felt necessary to comment on their significance. Just as canon 82 of the Quinisext Council comes long after the painting of Christ's image, so lack of reference to images in the commentaries does not preclude their being censed and venerated during the liturgy.

John of Damascus refers to the serpent's temptation of Adam, who instilled in him the desire to become like God …, and as a result brought death into the world. Although humanity was created in God's image it was brought down to share the death of animals… (2.2).⁴² It is clear from this that human beings cannot by their own efforts achieve theosis. John says of the saints that they are likenesses of God …, and are called gods not by nature but by adoption … (3.33).⁴³ It is common for our iconophiles to stipulate the phrase 'not by nature' in respect of deification." The distinction between 'nature' and 'adoption' is strictly that between 'creator' and 'creature.' Only God is divine by nature. Theosis is to be understood above all in a relative sense, as signifying a relation between God and humanity. For John the saints become sons of God by adoption because they are not divine by nature, only through grace can they become partakers of the divine nature (3.26).⁴⁵ Nikephoros agrees in this by distinguishing our relation to God as one of adoption and grace … from that of the Son to the Father as one of nature and power … (3.31).⁴⁶

According to John's christology salvation comes through the humanity of Christ participating in the divine nature. He did not depart from his divinity when he became man, nor was his human nature lost when it became part of the Godhead. He took on human nature in order to glorify us and make us partakers of the divine nature (1.4).⁴⁷ John follows the fathers in using the incarnation as an analogy for human deification. It is by means of the incarnation that Christ deifies our flesh and sanctifies us by surrendering his Godhead to our flesh without confusion (1.21).⁴⁸ John refers here to the negative definition at the heart of the hypostatic union as proclaimed at Chalcedon. He does so in order to show that the deification of the human nature in Christ is not an absorption into the Godhead. On the contrary, as our iconophiles stress, even after his ascension into heaven Christ retains his human nature.⁴⁹ The means by which Christians attain deification is through the sacraments of the church. It begins with the water of baptism and continues through the bloodless sacrifice of the eucharist (3.26).⁵⁰

If the doctrine of theosis is based upon a theological anthropology which recognises the value of the whole person, then the body must be included in the process as well. For John of Damascus Christ assumed both soul and body because human beings are made from both (3.12).⁵¹ Or as the patriarch Nikephoros says, because human nature was in need of re-creation …, it was necessary for Christ to become the same in nature in all respects (1.26).⁵² In Byzantine iconography the Transfiguration of Christ on the mountain is the supreme representation of the theology of deification.

This is the one occasion in the New Testament when the glorified body of the Lord is revealed to his disciples. In fact both apophasis and theosis meet in the iconography of the Transfiguration. For as Maximos the Confessor says: 'The light of the face of the Lord, which for the apostles surpassed human bliss, belongs to the mystical theology according to apophasis.'⁵³ This theological point is illustrated by the light symbolism of Christ's mandorla in depictions of the Transfiguration.

The sequence of blue bands in the mandorla is from dark at the centre to light at the edges, thus defying the natural diffusion of light from its source. This can be seen in the famous sixth-century mosaic of the Transfiguration in the church at St. Catherine's monastery at Mt Sinai.⁵⁴ For Gregory of Nyssa, the spiritual life is conceived as moving from light to darkness. He writes: 'Moses' vision of God began with light; afterwards God spoke to him in a cloud. But when Moses rose higher and became more perfect, he saw God in the darkness.'⁵⁵ Thus the divine darkness for Gregory becomes a symbol of the apophatic Godhead.

Futhermore, the blue in the mandorla is related to the state of spiritual prayer as described by Evagrius Ponticus. He writes: 'When the spirit has put off the old man to replace him with the new … he will see that his own state at the time of prayer resembles that of a sapphire; it is clear and bright as the very sky. The scriptures refer to this experience as the place of God which was seen by our ancestors, the elders, at Mount Sinai.'⁵⁶ These quotations from the fathers of the fourth century provide the theological background for the mosaic depiction of the sixth.

For Theodore the Studite there appear to be no restrictions on where divinity may be found. There is nowhere where divinity is not present, he says, in beings with or without reason …, with or without life. … However, it is present to a greater or lesser extent depending on the capacity of the nature which receives it. Therefore it would not be wrong to say that divinity is in the icon, but by the same token it is also in the representation of the cross, and in other sacred objects. Yet divinity is not present in them by a union of natures, for they are not the deified flesh, but by a relative participation … (1.12).⁵ Theodore considers it heretical to think that in venerating the icon of Christ we are venerating Christ's divinity as if it were present naturally in the icon (1.20).⁵⁵ He again reminds us that in the debate about icons we should keep in the mind the distinction between [theologia] and [oikonomia]. For what is said about veneration in spirit and truth (Jn. 4.24) belongs to theology, but what is said about the veneration of Christ in the image belongs to economy (3.C15).⁵⁹

In the thought of our iconophiles the apophaticism of the Godhead is balanced by the deifying grace of the economy. On the one hand it appears that 'God is not like a man' (Num. 23.19), while on the other, 'man is made in the image and likeness of God' (Gen. 1.26). We are presented with the paradox that God is not like us and yet we are like him. From the Christian point of view our relationship with God is at once distant and near. While our minds cannot grasp the divine transcendence we may at least experience something of his presence. As John of Damascus remarks, what makes both Christian salvation and Christian image-making possible, is the glorification of our nature (2.10).⁶⁰

Notes

¹On the Divine Names, 1.5, [Patrologia Graeca (PG)] 3, 593BC.

²Gregory Palamas: The Triads, ed. J. Meyendorff (London 1983) 93 ff.

³Oration [(or.)] 2.7, PG 35, 416A. See Winslow, The Dynamics of Salvation: a study in Gregory of Nazianzus, (Cambridge, Mass. 1979) 181.

⁴ J. Pelikan, "'Council or Father or Scripture": the concept of authority in the theology of Maximus Confessor,' in The Heritage of the Early Church: essays in honor of Georges Florovsky, ed. D. Neiman and M. Schatkin (Rome 1973) 277-88.

⁵Centuries on Love, 3.99, The Philokalia, vol. 2, 99.

⁶Commentary on Ecclesiastes 7, PG 44, 724D-732D.

⁷ See Winslow above for theosis, and for apophaticism, R. Mortley, From Word to Silence, 2 vols. (Bonn 1986) esp. vol. 2, 'The way of negation, Christian and Greek.'

⁸ Or. 1.4, [Kotter (Kot.)] 3, 76; [De Fide Orthodoxa (DFO)] 1.4, Kot. 2, 12-13.

⁹ DFO 1.9, Kot. 2, 32.

¹⁰ Aristotle, Metaphysica IV, 2, 1004a, 10-16. See H. A. Wolfson, 'Negative Attributes in the Church Fathers and the Gnostic Basilides,' [Harvard Theological Review (HTR)] 50 (1957) 154.

¹¹ DFO 1.12, Kot. 2, 36.

¹² See the remarks to this effect by Gregory Palamas, One Hundred and Fifty Chapters, ed. R. E. Sinkewicz (Toronto 1988) 225-227.

¹³ See, for example, the approach of B. Drewery, 'Deification,' in Christian Spirituality: essays in honour of Gordon Rupp, ed. P. Brooks (London 1975) 35-62.

¹⁴ See Chapter 11.

¹⁵ See J. G. M. van Winden, Calcidius on Matter: his doctrine and sources, (Leiden 1959) 119-20.

¹⁶ A. H. Armstrong, 'The Theory of the Non-Existence of Matter in Plotinus and the Cappadocians,' [Studia Patristica (SP)] 8 (Berlin 1962) 427-429.

¹⁷The Philokalia, vol. 1, 63.

¹⁸ See Diadochos of Photiki, The Philokalia, vol. 1, 270.

¹⁹ See J. Meyendorff, A Study of Gregory Palamas, (Leighton Buzzard 1974) 95.

²⁰The Byzantine Legacy in the Orthodox Church, (New York 1982) 23. For the view that Byzantine iconoclasm was a reaction against Islam, rather than an adoption of its tenets, see L. Barnard, The Graeco-Roman and Oriental Background of the Iconoclastic Controversy, (Leiden 1974) 13.

²¹ See O. Grabar, The Formation of Islamic Art, (New Haven and London 1978) 96-103.

²² DFO 1.4, Kot. 2, 13.

²³That there are not three gods, PG 45, 115 36.

²⁴ PG 99, 329CD.

²⁵ PG 99, 333C.

²⁶ Winslow, The Dynamics of Salvation, 182.

²⁷Various Texts on Theology, The Philokalia, vol. 2, 181-82.

²⁸ See Chapter 18.

²⁹From Glory to Glory: texts from Gregory of Nyssa's mystical writings, intro. by J. Danielou (New York 1979) 56-71.

³⁰ Mansi 13, 216A.

³¹Oration 40.7, PG 36, 365C. See Winslow, 191.

³² Kot. 3, 121. Found also in his Oration on the Transfiguration, 4, Kot. 5, 441.

³³ See Winslow, above, 191.

³⁴ Cf. Irenacus, Against Heresies, 5.16.2, PG 7, 1167C 1168A.

³⁵ Kot. 3, 123 21. See further the remarks of Gouillard, Synodicon, 180.

³⁶Letter to Thomas of Claudiopolis, PG 98, 173B.

³⁷ Quoted by H. Chadwick, The Early Church, (Harmondsworth 1967) 108.

³⁸ See J. Meyendorff, 'The Origenist Crisis of the Sixth Century,' in his Christ in Eastern Christian Thought.

³⁹ On the art historical evidence see, N. Patterson Sevcenko, 'Icons in the Liturgy,' [Dumbarton Oaks Papers (DOP)] 45 (1991) 45-57.

⁴⁰ Meyendorff, A Study of Gregory Palamas, 95.

⁴¹ [Antirrheticus (Antir.)] 3, 45, PG 100, 465A. The Horos of 754 may make a similar reference, see Sahas, Icon and Logos, 103, n. 20. Euscbius of Caesarea is an early witness to a lattice-work barrier, Ecclesiastical History, 10.4.42. See most recently C. Walter, 'A New Look at the Bzyantine Sanctuary Barrier,' [Revue des ètudes byzantines (REB)] 51 (1993) 203-28.

⁴² Kot. 3, 69.

⁴³ Kot. 3, 137.

⁴⁴ See Chapter 19.

⁴⁵ Kot. 3, 134.

⁴⁶ PG 100, 421D 424A.

⁴⁷ Kot. 3. 77 78.

⁴⁸ Kot. 3, 109.

⁴⁹ See Chapter 11.

⁵⁰ Kot. 3, 134.

⁵¹ Kot. 3, 124.

⁵² PG 100, 273B.

⁵³Ambigua, 10, PG 91, 1168A.

⁵⁴ See K. Weitzmann, Studies in the Arts of Sinai, (Princeton 1982) ch. 1.

⁵⁵From Glory to Glory, above, 23.

⁵⁶Praktikos, PG 40, 1244A. See Evagrius Ponticus: the Praktikos and Chapters on Prayer, tr. J. E. Bamberger (Kalamazoo 1981) xci.

⁵⁷ PG 99, 344C. See Chapter 6 and 17.

⁵⁸ PG 99, 349D.

⁵⁹ PG 99, 428B.

⁶⁰ Kot. 3, 101.

Works Cited

Primary sources

John of Damascus. Conba imaginum calumnialores orationes tres, ed. B. Kotter, Schriflen des Johannes von Damaskos, vol. 3 (Berlin 1975). Part English tr. D. Anderson, St. John of Damascus On the Divine Images, (New York 1980)

De Fide Orthodoxa, ed. B. Kotter, Schriflen des Johannes von Damaskos, vol. 2 (Berlin 1973). English tr. F. H. Chase, St. John of Damascus: writings, (Washington 1958)

Dialectica, ed. B. Kotter, Schriflen des Johannes von Damaskos, vol. I (Berlin 1969). English tr. F. H. Chase, St. John of Damascus: writings, (Washington 1958)

Mansi, J. D. Sacrorum Conciliorum Nova et Amplissima Collectio, vol. 13 Nicaca II (Florence 1767 repr. Graz 1960). English tr. of sixth session, D. Sahas, Icon and Logos. sources in eighth century iconoclasm (Toronto 1986)

Philokalia. The Philokalia. the complete text, tr. and ed. G. E. H. Palmer et al., vols. 1-2 (London 1979 81)

Secondary sources

Sahas, D. J. John of Damascus on Islam: the heresy of the Ishmaelites (Leiden 1972)