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06 Interpreting God's Charismatic Self-Sharing in Terms of Palamas 研究論文（Research Paper） 鄭維亮 以帕拉瑪斯天主本質與能量的分別來解釋天主在神恩復興 運動中的自我分享 非屬於本刊當期企劃之主題，但對宗教研究領域有創新、評論上有 建設性、資料蒐集及分析有貢獻之完整學術規範論文，其字數限制與審 定方式皆同專題論文。 《新世紀宗教研究》第十三卷第二期（2014年12月），頁179-232 DOI 10.3966/168437382014121302006 以帕拉瑪斯天主本質與能量的分別 來解釋天主在神恩復興運動中的 自我分享 鄭維亮 加拿大基督聖體恩寵研究所研究員 24205新北市新莊區中正路510號 輔仁大學格物學宛 202室 [email protected] 摘要 為了證明天主在天主教神恩復興運動中真實分享自己本體的確實，作者以 東正教St. Gregory Palamas（聖額我略．帕拉瑪斯，約西元1296-1359年）天主 本質與能量的分別來證實之。本文分為五節。第一節簡介今天在天主自我分 享上的幾個神學論題。第二節歸納Palamas（帕拉瑪斯）天主本質與能量的分 別。第三節精簡指出神化奧蹟（theosis）及天主自己神化人的能量。第四節以 天主自己神化人的能量去解釋天主在神恩復興運動中真實分享自己本體的議 題。第五節是本合一對話的結語。 關鍵詞： 東正教、聖額我略．帕拉瑪斯天主本質與能量的分別、天主教神恩復 興運動、天主真實分享自己的本體、天主神化人的能量、合一對話 投稿日期：102.12.17；接受刊登日期：103.08.05；最後修訂日期：103.08.29 責任校對：林鈞桓、何維綺 180 新世紀宗教研究 第十三卷第二期 Interpreting God’s Charismatic Self-Sharing in Terms of Palamas’ Distinction between God’s Essence and Energies Cheng, Wai-leung Grace Institute of the Holy Eucharist [email protected] Abstract To explore, demonstrate or prove the possibility of God’s sharing His real Being or Self with us charismatically,1 this paper employs the distinction of St. Gregory Palamas (c. 1296-1359) between God’s Divine Essence and Divine Energies. Divided into five sections, section A introduces concisely what is at stake with the theological issues today as regards God’s Self-sharing. Section B briefly sums up Palamas’ distinction between God’s Divine Essence and Divine Energies. Section C succinctly deals with theosis or deification and Divine Energies as God’s deifying Energies. Then, section D interprets God’s Charismatic Self-sharing in terms of God’s deifying Energies. Finally, section E consists of the concluding remarks as regards this ecumenical dialogue. Keywords: Eastern Orthodoxy, St. Gregory Palamas’ distinction between God’s Divine Essence and Divine Energies, Catholic Charismatic Renewal, God’s real Self-sharing, God’s deifying Energies, ecumenical dialogue 1 It may be true that the Catholic Charismatic Renewal movement has been in general decline in the West for more than two decades, but it is not so in many parts of Africa, Latin America, and some parts of Asia such as mainland China and South Korea. Interpreting God’s Charismatic Self-Sharing in Terms of Palamas’ Distinction between God’s Essence and Energies 181 A. INTRODUCTION Is God’s very Divine Being per se shareable or participable by us human beings on earth?2 Present-day Christianity is facing at least five issues inextricably related to this question, i.e., theism, deism, atheism, pantheism, and the Charismatic Renewal. First of all, theism “is the belief in a transcendent, personal God who creates, conserves and intervenes (e.g. through miracles) in our world. Unlike pantheism, theism does not push the divine immanence to the point of identifying God with the world. Unlike deism, theism holds that God is not a mere remote creator but through providence, revelation and a variety of salvific acts is ceaselessly engaged on our behalf. A Cambridge Platonist Ralph Cudworth (1617-1688) probably coined the term. Despite their major differences, Christianity, Islam and Judaism may be bracketed together as theistic religions.”3 As explained later, there is a major difference between Eastern Orthodox Christianity and Western Christianity as regards this question on the possible human participation in God’s very Being. While the Christian West in general states that we can only partake in God’s Being or essence in unmediated union only in Heaven, the Christian East teaches that we can even do so here and now. Second, atheists like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens believe that there is simply no God－or that there is almost certainly no God－in whose Being we can partake. In fact, we should not even believe in any religion about the real existence of any Deity, since such a religion is by nature poisonous or delusive.4 2 Pope Benedict XVI recently stated that many people today lack an experience of God, assessed on Sept. 27, 2011, http://www.zenit.org/article-33522?1=english (ZE11092410–2011-09-23) 3 Gerald O’Collins, S.J. & Edward G Farrugia, S.J. (1991). A Concise Dictionary of Theology. New York/Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, p.238. 4 Cf. Christopher Hitchens (2007). God is not Great: How religion poisons everything. Toronto, Ontario: Mc Clelland & Stewart, pp.1ff; Richard Dawkins (2006). The God Delusion. Boston, New York: Houghton Mifflin, pp.113-159. 182 新世紀宗教研究 第十三卷第二期 At the same time, secular pantheism in its many faces tells us that everything is God or that we can partake in God’s very Being so completely that we are God or a real part of God. For example, the poem “Charge of the Goddess” by Doreen Valiente, a modern witch, which can be easily read pantheistically: “For I am the soul of nature, who gives life to the universe. From Me all things proceed, and unto Me all things must return.”5 Margot Adler, a priestess of Wicca, wrote in Drawing Down the Moon: “Divinity is immanent in all Nature. It is as much within you as without.”6 In How to know God: The soul’s journey into the mystery of mysteries, Deepak Chopra lists seven stages in knowing God. In the highest stage of the soul’s journey, one sees no difference between himself and God.7 Seemingly, secular pantheism teaches that everyone is a part of God and that God is completely shareable to each one on earth. Moreover, Christian transcendent deism inspired by the philosophy of Aristotle informs us that God’s Being is imparticipable. In other words, deism is a summary term “for the beliefs of many British, European and American writers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, who in various ways stressed the role of reason in religion and rejected revelation, miracles and any providential involvement in nature and human history.”8 Commenting on the traditional deistic and theistic theology in the West, George A. Maloney, S.J. (1924-2005), a prominent Western scholar in Eastern Christianity, cogently stated about Western Christians in general: “On all levels of Christian life the faithful are searching for a more immediate experience of God. Descartes’ ‘clear and distinct ideas’ 5 Cf. Paul Harrison (1999). The Elements of Pantheism: understanding the divinity in nature and the universe. Boston, MA: Element Books, p.11. 6 Ibid.. 7 Deepak Chopra (2000). How to Know God: The soul’s journey into the mystery of mysteries. New York: Random House, p.490. 8 Gerald O’Collins, S.J. & Edward G Farrugia, S.J. (1991). A Concise Dictionary of Theoloy, p.53. Interpreting God’s Charismatic Self-Sharing in Terms of Palamas’ Distinction between God’s Essence and Energies 183 have given the West a rationalistic science of theology.”9 Hence, “Western theology by and large has become reduced to a static form of objectifying God’s transcendence by separating Him in His primary causality in all things from the created world in its createdness.”10 In other words, there is God, but He is so transcendent that we cannot really participate in His transcendent Being as such. As a result, countless Christians in the West have been desperately looking “for an immediate encounter with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”11 Subsequently, as an overall universal reaction to traditional transcendent nominalistic deism and theism, a deep hunger for a personal experience of God has emerged. Thus, we witness inter alia the rise of the world-wide Pentecostal-Charismatic Renewal movement since the beginning of the last century. Historically, this prominent Pentecostal-Charismatic Renewal which swept through North America and beyond was started by Protestants at the turn of the twentieth century.12 On the Catholic side, it was via the initiation of two professors in 1966 at Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, that the Catholic Charismatic Renewal gushed forth and began to spread.13 Through the personal experience and witness of countless Protestant Pentecostals and Catholic Charismatics, it is now clear that human beings can partake in God’s very Being in terms of His numerous charismatic gifts or charismata. Apparently, the variegated spectrum of charismata in the Catholic Charismatic renewal consists at least of the following six areas: (1) God the Uncreated Grace; (2) Sanctifying 9 Rev. George A. Maloney, S.J. (1978). A Theology of Uncreated Energies. The 1978 Pere Marquette Theology Lecture. Milwaukee, Wisconsin: Marquette University Press, pp.7-8. 10 Ibid., p.8. 11 Ibid.. 12 Cf. Randall J. Stephens, “Assessing the Roots of Pentecostalism: A historiographic essay,” accessed on July 25, 2011, http://are.as.wvu.edu/pentroot.htm 13 Rev. Edward D. O’Connor, C.S.C. (1972). The Pentecostal Movement in the Catholic Church. Notre Dame, Indiana: Ave Maria Press, pp.13-14; Ralph Martin (1971). Unless the Lord Build the House: The Church and the New Pentecost. Notre Dame, Indiana: Ave Maria Press, p.62. 184 新世紀宗教研究 第十三卷第二期 gifts or charismata of the Holy Spirit; (3) The nine-fold fruit of the Holy Spirit; (4) Charismatic gift-ministries of the Holy Spirit; (5) The Church as the Mystical Body of Christ; and (6) Baptism in the Holy Spirit.14 However, many Christians, including the Charismatics, are still not sure to what extent they could participate in God’s Being per se. Many tend to ask the following questions directly and indirectly: Is it possible for human beings to experience an infinite God? How could the infinite God be confined to an experience? How could Charismatics be aware of an “object” so vast and transcendent? How should our encounter with an infinite God be properly understood. How could this infinite God make Himself shareable?15 Focusing shapely on the core of these challenging questions, it is the intention of the present paper, therefore, to address specifically “the extent in which Charismatic Christians can partake in God’s very Being per se in terms of Palamas’ distinction of God’s Essence and Energies.” To effectively engage in this issue of God on sharing Himself or His Being with us charismatically, the present article, in view of St.
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