The Premise
St. Athanasius wrote that “God became man so that man might become God”; this is the doctrine of divinization, or theosis. In other articles, I speak of prayer, operative grace, and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit – but what of divinization itself? What does it mean to “become God,” and how does it happen? Generally, disagreements about this fall along the East-West fault line. The most influential teachers are, respectively, Gregory Palamas and Thomas Aquinas. I will contrast their theories in order to draw out a proper understanding of divinization.
Deifying Grace
The Essence-Energy Distinction and Uncreated Grace
First, the Eastern doctrine of “uncreated grace.” A 14th century Orthodox monk, Barlaam of Seminara, in criticizing the Latin Church’s position that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, claimed that statements about God’s nature should be entirely abandoned, since His nature is not in any way demonstrable. Barlaam suggested that participation in God can only be through the mediation of created things – particularly study, which he argued was necessary for Christian perfection. He argued that the theophanies (the burning bush, the light of the transfiguration) were mere creaturely effects, not actually God. Gregory Palamas, a monk with a greater focus on inner stillness than learning, argued that Barlaam’s theory made the power of the Holy Spirit, “which transformed fishermen into Apostles,” into nothing. An Eastern synod agreed with Palamas that Barlaam was effectively elevating philosophy over the Holy Spirit and condemned his writings.
To explore Palamas’ argument against Barlaam, we must first understand his distinction between essence and energy. Essence is the “what-ness” of a thing, whereas the energies are the expression of that essence. So, for example: you cannot interact directly with fire’s essence, but you can interact with fire’s energies by standing near fire and enjoying the heat. Palamas argues that God is the same way – we can interact with His energies (grace), but not His essence. However, this does not turn God into a composite being; the same way heat is not “numerically separate” from fire’s essence, but connatural to it, really imparting the effect of fire’s distinct essence, so God’s energies (wisdom, justice, truth) emanate from Him and really are Him, not a composition or a medium. This real distinction protects God’s absolute transcendence while still allowing us to really participate in Him.
And how do we “really” participate? Palamas distinguishes between cognitive, conceptual, symbolic participation and the “eye of the soul,” or “nous.” As we free ourselves from the shackles of concupiscence, distractions, and prelest, the scattered, fallen nous descends into the heart and becomes capable of perceiving the Divine Energies directly. Palamas identifies the pinnacle of this perception as the vision of the Tabor Light, the same light which blinded the Apostles at the Transfiguration. This light is not a physical photon, nor is it a hallucination or a “symbol” of divinity. It is the Uncreated Energy of God made visible to the “transformed eyes” of the saints. Crucially, this light is not something we look at from a distance; it is something we enter into and radiate. This light permeates the entire human composite, body and soul. To Palamas, theosis is just as physical as it is spiritual.
The Palamites reject the idea that we can interact with God’s essence in any way. From their perspective, that would require consubstantiality. Palamas refuses to even make apophatic claims about God’s essence – for example, he would not say something like “God’s essence is good.” Rather, he would say “God’s essence is beyond good and evil.” Palamas responded to the accusation that his teaching contradicted divine simplicity by saying – quite beautifully – that, “God is indivisibly divided and united divisibly, and experiences neither multiplicity nor composition.” This inaccessible transcendence means we cannot participate in God’s essence in Heaven, but rather participate in His uncreated energies more intimately, endlessly drawing closer to Him. Remember though that these energies are Him. Though Palamites do reject essential vision in Heaven, they do not reject direct vision.
Created Grace
Next, the Western doctrine of “created grace.” St. Thomas Aquinas most comprehensively set this forth. It is also the foundation of most Protestant theology surrounding sanctification. This doctrine holds to absolute divine simplicity, as opposed to Palamite simplicity with real distinction. Under the Thomistic system, one might view God as the “soul,” or animating principle, of reality. As the soul permeates every cell of the body without being contained by them, so God’s essence (which is existence) permeates all things, but as containing them, not as contained by them (Summa Q8, A3). The process of divinization cannot involve God drawing closer to us, since omnipresence already entails perfect closeness. Rather, divinization is a process whereby we draw closer to Him by some effect within us. Since we are creatures, all effects within us must also be creatures, and thus we have the term “created grace.”
This created grace is an entitative habit within the soul. An entitative habit is an accident which changes one’s disposition, such as health. Health gives on the interior desire, capacity, and ability to exercise. Sanctifying grace orders the soul to God as health orders the body to physical feats. The soul elevated by grace is able to experience God directly in this life through love. Although God only appears to the mind darkly through analogies, images and teachings, He appears to the will as its true object, and in this way the will is united to God even as the mind is under the fog of faith. This even allows for a certain experimental sense of God in this life; as a virtuous person gains an intuitive sense for the good beyond what any textbook can teach, people vivified by charity gain a sense for God dwelling in their souls.
But St. Thomas does not think this is the fullest way man can experience God. He teaches that in Heaven, we receive a further elevation called “the light of glory,” an intellectual power which allows the mind to see God directly without being destroyed (Summa Q12). In Heaven, the mind finally catches up to the heart. Instead of knowing God through created analogies or darkly through faith, God’s actual self replaces our created concept of Him. He unites Himself to the mind as the soul to the body, and the blessed see Him through direct, intuitive vision, as one knows cause-and-effect. In this way we see God “face to face,” “as He is,” and “know [Him] fully, even as [we] are fully known [by Him]” (1 Cor 13:12, 1 John 3:2). This is unthinkable for many Palamites, who consider viewing the essence as entailing consubstantiality.
Although all the blessed in Heaven see God face-to-face, they remain distinct in three ways. First, the degree of charity. The more love one has, the more intellectual light they will receive, and the more clearly they will see God (Summa Q12, A6). Since God’s mind is infinite, He can see Himself with perfect clarity. The blessed are all finite, so despite the direct vision, they can never fully comprehend God (Summa Q92, A1-R2). Thus, they are distinct from God in their finitude, and distinct from each other in their understanding. Second, nature. Angels are distinct from each other in their unique angelic natures, and obviously distinct from humans. Third, accidents. We know, for example, that we will be men and women in Heaven, for the resurrected Christ was yet a man. Further, He had other unique accidents, such as the wounds of His hands, feet, and side.
Reconciliations and Errors
The Palamite view is not considered heretical among Catholics. Eastern Catholics venerate him, and Pope John Paul II had many good things to say about his theology. Some would say that these competing views are actually two different vantage points describing the same thing. Palamas himself said: “There is nothing strange in using the word ‘grace’ both for the created and the uncreated… the former is the gift, the latter is the giving.” Both agree that man experiences God directly through grace. Both agree that God is one. Even regarding Heaven, the touchiest subject, modern theologians argue that Aquinas’s lumen gloriae functions identically to Palamas’s energeia: it is the divine power that elevates the creature to a supernatural state, and both agree that the essence is beyond our power to grasp. Aquinas’ emphasis on intuitive intellectual vision and Palamas’ emphasis on the “eye of the heart” are complementary, not contradictory.
Regardless of which view we take, we must avoid certain excesses. Palamites must remember that God is not at a distance from creation. Omnipresence is not a footnote to a discussion about “really” experiencing God. Creation is not a patient; creation exists ex nihilo. Everything is a “partaker in the divine nature,” which is existence (2 Peter). Divinization cannot involve God becoming more present to us, because God is already omnipresent; “in Him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). Thomists must likewise remember that God is not “over there” while grace is “over here.” Grace’s function is to press us against the divine in ways more intimate than we can fathom. We experience faith as darkness in this life, yes, but it is the sort of darkness that comes from looking at a light too bright to comprehend.
Palamites must remember that we are not at any distance from God in Heaven, and scripture says as much. “We see now through a glass in a dark manner, but then face to face” (1 Cor 13:12). “We shall see Him as He is” (1 John 3:2). “Show Thy face and we shall be saved” (Psalm 79:20). “Lord, show us the Father and we shall be satisfied” (John 14:8). “[The saints] will see His face” (Rev 22:4). “I shall behold your face in righteousness” (Psalm 17:15). “Come,’ my heart says, ‘seek his face!’ Your face, Lord, do I seek” (Psalm 27:8). Rejecting the Beatific Vision (direct vision) was condemned by Florence, Benedictus Deus, Mysitici Corporis, and Allatae Sunt. Thomists must remember that the Beatific Vision does not mean we grasp nor master God, and that full comprehension is infinitely distant from our created minds despite this closeness.
Palamites must not forget that there is a true category difference between earth and Heaven. This world is exile. Seeking the experience of the uncreated light must never deter one from carrying out their duties with ascetic simplicity. On the other hand, Thomists must not forget that Heaven begins on earth. Seeking to ascetically carry out ones duties with ascetic simplicity must never deter one from seeking divine experience. One cannot build a proper spiritual life on dry intellectualism nor on obscurantist irrationalism. God is neither a proposition nor an experience. God is God.
Conclusion
I do not suspect that all I said above has left you feeling like you’ve grasped divinization. This is one mystery the sublimity of which reminds me of the words of St. Augustine: “If you understand God, what you understand isn’t God.” Although we cannot fully grasp divinization, these great teachings should illuminate the unfathomable intimacy with which God fashions us into “little gods,” preparing us to directly experience Him in Heaven.