Completation-theoria

Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev

   The term ‘contemplation’ occurs in Isaac in conjunction with different adjectives: essential, divine, hidden, exact, noetic, single, natural, angelic, exalted, spiritual, lofty, true, heavenly, etc. Isaac speaks of the contemplation of mysteries, of the Being of the Divinity, of divine care, of the creative activity of God, of created things, of the properties of Christ, of wisdom, of noetic things, of the Scriptures, of the angels, of prayer, of truth, of light, of glory etc. As S.Brock, shows, many of these phrases are indeed borrowed from the language of Evagrius, but some appear to be innovations of Isaac himself.[1] Our interest here is primarily in theoria as a mystical phenomenon; this is why we shall limit ourselves to looking at certain texts where the question is of the contemplation of God and of the reality of the immaterial world.

            In Isaac the term ‘contemplation’ very often appears as a synonym for the ‘vision of God’. He speaks of the supernatural state of the soul, which is ‘her movement in the contemplation of the transubstantial Deity’.[2] In this state, the soul ‘rushes forward.., and on the wings of faith she soars aloft, taking leave of visible creation; she becomes as one drunken in awestruck wonder of her continual solicitude for God; and by simple, uncompounded vision, and by unseeing intuitions concerning the Divine nature’.[3] At the same time Isaac emphasizes that the righteous cannot see the essence of God: when one is raised to the contemplation of God, one sees not God’s essence, but ‘the dark cloud of His glory’.[4] One can see only a reflection of God’s essence, though this vision will be fuller in the age to come: ‘The more a man becomes perfect with respect to God, the more he follows after Him. But in the age of truth, God will show him His face, although not His essence. For however much the righteous enter into the contemplation of Him, they behold an enigma of His vision, like an image that is seen through a mirror;[5] but yonder they behold the revelation of the truth’.[6]

            Isaac speaks of contemplation-theoria as a high mystical state, to which a very few people have attained: ‘It is not possible that even one in a thousand righteous men should be accounted worthy of this lofty noetic perception. And indeed, the theoria concerning our Lord’s incarnation and His manifestation in the flesh is also said to arise from theoria concerning the Divinity’. Apart from the contemplation of God in His nature and His actions, there is also contemplation of the angelic powers ‘in their very nature and their own realm’. This contemplation of angels should be distinguished from those visions when angels appear to people in certain visible forms. Such visions are not a true vision, but only a manifestation for encouraging the simple. Only the first type of vision, that is, the contemplation of the angels in their own invisible realm, is true contemplation: it ‘belongs to illumined and wise men who have been exalted by the glorious discipline of stillness to the rank of purity’.[7]

            Isaac draws a distinction between ‘natural (kyanayta) contemplation’, that is, the one related to the nature of the soul, and ‘spiritual (ruhanayta) contemplation’, which is a supernatural gift of God. The first is characteristic of human beings in their primordial natural state before the fall; the second is related to the blessed life of the age to come. ‘Spiritual contemplation’ is equated by Isaac with the blessings of the Kingdom of heaven.[8] The experience of this Kingdom begins in earthly life and continues in the age to come. However, in this life only very few are counted worthy of this gift, mostly ascetics and solitaries who renounce the world: 

...A spiritual theoria... is arrayed in luminous intuitions. He who possesses it will not gaze searchingly at the world again nor will he cleave to his body... If God would send forth this true theoria to mankind but for a short while, the world would remain without succeeding generations. This divine vision is a bond before which nature cannot stand, and it proves to be for the man who has received this meditation in his soul a God-given grace... It is given especially to those concerning whom God knows that they must truly withdraw from the world to a better life because of the good volition that He has found in them. But it increases and abides with them when they dwell in a secluded and solitary place. Let us make entreaty for this contemplation in our prayers. Let us keep long vigils for the sake of it. And let us beseech the Lord with tears that He grant us this as a gift which has no equal.[9] 

            The contemplation of God, according to Isaac, is accompanied by the presence of angels: ‘When by the inworking of the divine grace there suddenly arise within us great thoughts and astonishment at the intellect’s contemplations, which are more lofty than nature, and when, as Saint Evagrius[10] says, the holy angels draw nigh to us, filling us with spiritual vision, then all things that oppose us retreat and there is peace and ineffable tranquillity for as long a time as we remain in these things’.[11] Isaac speaks of ‘angelic contemplation’ (te‘orya mal’akayta),[12] and of ‘heavenly contemplations’ (te‘oryas Šmayyanyata) when the intellect is ‘moved without the senses by the spiritual powers of those worlds on high which possess wonders without number’.[13] This phraseology is meant to point to the presence of the angelic world when one contemplates divine realities.

            We should note that, in his teaching on contemplation-theoria, Isaac was under the influence of the hierarchical system of the Areopagite, according to which contemplation of God is impossible for human beings except through the mediation of the angels. Divine revelations are transmitted from God to the angels, through the mediation of Jesus, and then from the angels to people. Echoing the Areopagite, Isaac speaks of the hierarchical order of transmission of divine revelation from God to human beings.[14] He emphasizes that, while in the age to come the saints contemplate God face to face, in this present life contemplation is possible only through the mediation of angels: 

Whenever the perception of the revelation of a mystery descends into the intellects of the saints, this is also from the angels. When it is permitted by God, a mystery is revealed from a higher angelic order to a lower one, even unto the lowest; and in the same manner, when it is permitted by the Divine nod that a mystery should come even to human nature, it is transmitted by those who are wholly worthy of it. For by their intermediary the saints receive the light of divine vision... In the future age, however, this order of things will be abolished. For then one will not receive from another the revelation of God’s glory unto the gladness and joy of his soul; but to each by himself the Master will give according to the measure of his excellence and his worthiness.[15]