Review and Evaluation of Research Approaches to Reconstructing the Doctrine of St. Gregory Palamas on the Vision of the Uncreated Light: The Paradigm of the Created Vision of God. Part 1

Abstract

The article presents a systematisation of research approaches to the reconstruction of St. Gregory Gregory’ doctrine of the way of seeing the uncreated light, which have been formed in the scientific space since the beginning of the 20th century and exist up to the present. Three systems of thought are identified, each of which solves this problem in a special way: the paradigm of created vision of God, the paradigm of uncreated vision of God and the paradigm of the antinomianism of vision of God. Each paradigm is considered in a separate part of the article. The first part of the article is devoted to the analysis of the studies of the key representatives of the paradigm of the paradigm of creationless vision of God: M. Jugie, R. Sinkewicz, archpriest V. Asmus, M. M. Bernatsky, M. Knežević, M. Plested, J. Blackstone, A. Chouliaras and D. S. Biriukov. The continuity of the tradition within the paradigm of created vision of God is established, namely the conceptual dependence (direct or indirect) on the conclusions of R. Sinkewicz. Exactly those concepts of St. Gregory’s doctrine have been identified and described that are 1) used as meaningful and basic within this paradigm, and 2) ignored and not integrated into its explanatory model. The strengths and weaknesses of the paradigm of the created vision of God have also been identified.