What is Favorsky light
The term “Light of Tabor” in Orthodoxy is used not only when talking about events that occurred during the earthly journey of Jesus Christ. Indeed, most often this concept is used in describing the light of Divine glory with which the face of the Son of God shone.
Light of Tabor - Divine radiance of Jesus Christ
But the light of Tabor is also called the radiance that comes from Christian righteous people, famous for their special prayer feats and true Christian piety.
The term “Light of Tabor” is inextricably linked with the concept of “Uncreated Light”.
Uncreated light
The Son of God said about himself that He “is the Light of the world.” These words contain special wisdom, because in this case what is meant is unearthly light, but the radiance of Truth. That very Truth, which is the highest Truth and dispels the darkness of lies and unbelief.
Important! The Lord tried to convey to us the essence of life and Eternity through natural analogies understandable to people. When dawn comes and the sun rises over the horizon, the darkness dissipates and a clear day arrives. When the sun sinks below the horizon, its light gradually decreases and night falls.
In these images, people must understand that the physical, carnal world that we see with our own eyes is not true life, the real state of affairs. Everything that we cannot see with our eyes, we can see with our soul and heart. In our hearts we also acquire Eternity, for “The Kingdom of Heaven is within us.”
The concept of “Uncreated Light” means that this radiance is uncreated. This is an opportunity to see with your own eyes the halo of the Divine essence. Sometimes people are given the opportunity to see this light so that they have the opportunity to see with their own eyes that God is speaking to them, and not an ordinary person. This is exactly what happened on Mount Tabor.
Doctrine of the Uncreated Light
The doctrine of such Divine radiance goes back to the origins of Christian culture. The Son of God Himself said that a person who follows Him will never get lost in darkness, since he will see the Light of Life. During prayer on Tabor, He provided the opportunity for His disciples to see the radiance of His coming glory.
The source of the Uncreated light is the Divine nature of Jesus Christ
According to the teachings of the Church, this radiance is not a derivative of the mind or the sensory sphere. The Tabor light is described as something “super-intelligent and unapproachable,” something that is timeless and defies simple human explanation.
The uncreated light evokes associations with Eternity and incorruptibility, but it cannot be imagined, considered or described. This radiance is considered super-essential, since it stands above the reality that a person can perceive. In the context of this concept, theologians distinguish between the terms “Divine Essence” and “Divine Energy”.
The concept of Divine essence means the nature of God, the ontological content of the Divine Hypostasis. By Divine energy we mean the movement of nature, manifestations of the Divine essence, its actions, but not itself.
Interesting! The Tabor light is precisely considered an uncreated manifestation of the Divine essence. The light that arose at the moment of Transfiguration is that ghostly, ephemeral phenomenon that appeared for a few moments and immediately disappeared.
Theologians claim that this radiance is Divine energy and grace, eternally emanating from the Divine essence itself. Having devoted years to research and reflection on Divine energy, they highlight the following properties of the Uncreated Tabor Light:
- This Divine energy is inseparable from the essence, but at the same time, unmerged with it.
- The origin of this light is uncreated.
- Energy does not share the essence itself.
- The term "God" refers not only to His nature, but also to His energy.
Another week of Great Lent has passed, dear brothers and sisters, and tomorrow we celebrate the memory of St. Gregory Palamas.
The name of Saint Gregory is associated with a special practice of prayer. On the one hand, this is an ascetic activity that requires a lot of attention, tension, and diligence, associated with the constant repetition of one short text of the prayer, so that nothing extraneous enters the heart and mind of a person. On the other hand, in addition to ascetic effort, this practice is associated with the mystical teaching of unity through this prayer with the Tabor light - with that light that directly emanates from God, with the uncreated divine light, divine energy emanating from the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, energy , which we usually call the grace of God. We can talk about the grace of the Father, we can talk about the grace of the Son - the grace of Christ, we can talk about the grace of the Holy Spirit, and we can talk about the grace of the Holy Trinity, about the grace of God. These two aspects, which are associated with the main work of the life of St. Gregory, are important, and especially important during Lent, when many things distract people, tear them apart, and it is difficult for them to fight it: it is difficult to fight some kind of carnal thoughts, It’s difficult to deal with spiritual unevenness, with despondency or some kind of disarray, and with spiritual devastation, especially since Lent is always in the spring - and it all leads to one another.
And so, as you and I know, in the middle of the 14th century, after long debates between theologians oriented towards the Western and Eastern theological and philosophical traditions, in the East, in the Eastern Roman Empire, thanks to the fact that a disciple of St. Gregory ascended to the patriarchal throne, his teachings were accepted by the church itself. This was recorded at several councils, and since the second half of the 14th century it has been preached as an Orthodox teaching that does not raise any doubts. However, Orthodox people sometimes have questions, some doubts arise, which is normal in spiritual life: a person should always check himself whether he is in the Holy Spirit, whether he is on the right path, even when it concerns nuances and not just any then global things, such as the doctrine of the Holy Trinity or about Christ.
And the debate was about whether the Tabor light, which shone on Christ on Mount Tabor during the Transfiguration, was created or uncreated. Can a person connect with this light and be enlightened by it - or cannot he? How in general does a person unite with God, being in the flesh, living in this world, and in general does he unite or not unite with Him? The question was sharpened: if God is unworldly, transcendental to the world, is outside this world, absolutely supramundane, then what should a person do in this case who lives in a created world? Can God be present in this world in His fullness if He is transcendental, or cannot? This is a somewhat “philosophical”, abstract question, which, however, has caused great controversy, strife, and even disagreement. Some said this, others said differently. The Western Church has more accepted the point of view that God cannot be present in this world, that the Light of Tabor is a created light, and the Eastern Church, as usual, is just the opposite. And since this theological dispute was also connected with ascetic, monastic work, with the Jesus Prayer, this seemed important to the church, because there was a lot of evidence that those saints who created repeatedly repeated the Jesus Prayer in their hearts and minds or something similar to her was illuminated by light, clothed in light, as in a robe.
These questions turned out to be really important and quite complex. And we cannot say that there was no truth in the spiritual experience of St. Gregory. We rejoice that the prayer work to which the holy ascetics, saints, and monks devoted their lives led them to such close, deep unity with God, which was expressed in such a blessed illumination. We rejoice in the fact that God is present in this world despite his transcendence to this world, despite the fact that He is the Creator and the world is created, which means, speaking in the language of that time, these two natures are completely different. But probably, no human words are enough to explain these things, and yet to reason only in the categories of transcendence, immanence is too simple, isn’t it? Some additional reflections are needed here regarding both ascetic and mystical teachings associated with the Jesus Prayer.
With regard to ascetic work, more than once the desire was voiced not to reduce the question of man’s unity with God, the question of his spiritual salvation, to things that are a little technological, related to quantities and not qualities: if you say thousands of Jesus prayers a day, that means you have every reason to in order to find this Tabor light in yourself and be saved, but no means no. You have probably all read the book “Frank Stories of a Wanderer to His Spiritual Father,” where all this is described in detail. And this somewhat mechanical, technical attitude towards prayer raises certain questions. On the other hand, ontological categories really do not accommodate the mystical experience of divine revelation, divine life, as well as the life of the world and man and the life of the Church. Therefore, it is not enough to talk about unity with God only from the point of view of natures, transcendence, immanence - here we need some more existential categories, more living, deeper, less rational, and this is probably worth talking and thinking about. Because even while fasting, gathering ourselves into some kind of internal unity - ourselves as a person and ourselves as a Church, as a cathedral - we really achieve this unity thanks to the grace of God. And this in no way interferes with our concept of God as the Creator of the world, life and man, and does not at all contradict the fact that God does not mix with this world, keeping Himself within Himself, and at the same time does not rape this world with His inclusion in its life. God is present and communicates, God seeks presence and seeks communication, He gives, sends His gifts, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, into people’s hearts, so that they can gain service and thereby multiply their talents, bear their cross, fulfill the will of God. And all this does not necessarily require an ontological apparatus of explanation, or some exclusively dogmatic approach. And I wanted to reveal these things to you a little, so that you would think about them or experience them for yourself, because this adds to us wisdom, strength and light, which many, even believers, often lack or lack.
Let us also think about the fact that not only the Jesus Prayer leads to Communion with God, that you can go in different ways, multiplying your gifts, your talents, bearing your cross in this world, serving God and the Church in love for God and your neighbor. Probably, even when we simply create the truth, or show beauty, or expose the untruth and ugliness, the ugliness of this world, we still somehow get closer to God. And even more so - when we discover the will of God in this world and do God's work, when we gain the revelation of the way of the Lord, the revelation of God's Truth, and not just the truth, when we gain the revelation of Love and Freedom, what happens, how good we are with you we know, throughout life in all its areas - not only in prayer, not only in deepening into the doctrinal provisions of the church.
Let us know and remember this. Because sometimes you and I lack attention to things that are not strictly religious. It seems to us that our Christian life only manifests itself and realizes itself, embodies it, in the religious sphere, and therefore sometimes we turn out to be rather indifferent to other aspects of life, or we consider it a secular life and do not know how to church our everyday life - we do not know how to church our family, our work, and ultimately, taking care of yourself – your health and relaxation. Therefore, these things all the time “overlap” on the spiritual tasks of our Christian life - they overlap so much that they begin to crowd out each other, interfere with each other. And you often hear complaints about this: “I would like this and that, but it turns out that I have to be at home all the time”, “someone is sick” or “I can barely move myself”, “but I have a lot of work, I need to earn money,” and so on, not to mention all sorts of excesses associated with recreation - this is often very funny. And this duality leads to relaxation, and then the word of God is lost and is not found in our lives. But you and I cannot allow this. So for us, the memory of St. Gregory is a reason to ask ourselves a very serious question: how should we live - what should we emphasize, how to combine everything, knowing the measure of everything, without crossing these internal boundaries, doing without any overlaps? We need to learn to church all our lives, but to do this we need to see this whole life from the point of view of eternity - the whole life, and not just the religious part of it. Christianity does not fit into any religious framework! Christianity, as you know, has a religious part, but you also know very well that Christianity is much greater than any religion, precisely because it is capable of bringing everything in this world to God, and not just what belongs to the religious sphere.
May the Lord help us to understand this extraordinary depth and fullness, revealed to us by God through Christ in the Holy Spirit, revealed in the Church, in the church tradition, and one way or another revealed by the holy fathers. Let one holy father reveal one side, another – another, a third – a third, let them sometimes not get along with each other and even argue fiercely. It's no problem. This often happens in life. Let each of us know that we strive for the fullness of life, we strive for what the Lord announced and revealed to us, therefore the time of fasting, the time of repentance and prayer is very important for us - and not only personal, individual, but also church repentance, and sometimes even more – say, national. This year 2021 is very conducive to this. Yes, we can’t get around this, pretend that we don’t know anything, don’t understand anything here and don’t want to know or understand. We cannot help but draw conclusions from what has happened over the last century to all our people and peoples, and therefore we must learn not to repeat mistakes, including the mistakes of the church, which was too fixated on the purely religious sphere. The church was just a temple and everything in the temple. That's all. Therefore, it turned out to be unable to be the main guiding force in a difficult transitional historical moment. What was happening at that time in life and in the world did not affect the religious sphere in any way - and the church did not know how to react to it. There were individual people like the circle of “32” St. Petersburg priests and very few others - you can count on one hand those who understood this and did what was necessary. But the rest of the church was completely unprepared for this, absolutely not ready. And we need to avoid these mistakes, we must not repeat them. Otherwise, there will be no place left at all, neither from the people, nor from the country, nor from our church. This is the question of today. Therefore, national repentance is a spiritual, church issue, although the term “national repentance” does not mean a church sacrament at all: all people who have a conscience and responsibility for the past, present and future must respond to this, and respond in a divinely, and not simply based on socio-political, historical and national interests.
For example, on Wednesday you and I will have a concert-reflection on just this topic. And I even highly recommend, in connection with the memory of Gregory Palamas, to go to this concert, to this reflection, which will require spiritual effort from each of us. And this will not contradict at all, but on the contrary, it will very much help our fasting, and fasting will help us to be in this space - not at all socio-political, but in fact spiritual. I think that there will be a reason for further reflection, including those related to our approach to God, so that our land no longer cries out to Heaven, so that the blood of tens of millions of innocent people shed in the 20th century does not cry out for vengeance. If we miss these moments, then no one will have to expect anything good.
You see how sometimes Lent can push its boundaries. But we must learn to do all this in a divine, Christian, churchly way. Although it seems that this has an indirect relation to the Church. But this only seems due to the inertia of our thinking.
So let us, dear brothers and sisters, pray that the Lord will more often send real great saints, thinkers and doers, prayer books and creators of new life in the new world, so that the Lord will open the way for us, give us the opportunity to get rid of all fears and doubts, bring us to the fullness of Christian life to which He called us!
Amen.
Saints who shone with the light of Tabor
The history of Christianity knows cases when ascetics, distinguished by special piety, could also shine with Divine Light.
First of all, we should remember the life of the Russian ascetic Job of Pochaevsky. Saint Job led a hermit's life and lived in a cave, far from people. And yet, history has preserved numerous eyewitness accounts who claimed that real miracles took place in the cave of St. Job.
Icon of St. Job, Abbot of Pochaev
At the time when Job Pochaevsky began to pray, flames burst out of his cave. What is this if not a manifestation of Divine energy?
All the people who saw the services conducted by Sergius of Radonezh claimed that during the service a special light emanated from the Reverend Father Sergius. Then this energy descended into the chalice from which St. Sergius received communion.
One of the most revered Saints of the Russian Orthodox Church, Seraphim of Sarov, was also related to the manifestations of Divine energy. According to witnesses, during prayer the face of the righteous man was illuminated with a special insubstantial radiance.
The former erroneous position of the Russian Church
The Western Church still remains in the position of opponents of Gregory Palamas. It must be admitted that in Russia for centuries his teaching did not find proper understanding, although the day of memory of St. Gregory himself was celebrated regularly. There was previously no place for him within the walls of Russian seminaries, as well as theological academies.
Only the best sons of the church, such as Job of Pochaev, Sergius of Radonezh, Seraphim of Sarov and a number of other saints, embodying the principles of Orthodoxy in practice, became its spokesmen, but did not have the opportunity to theoretically explain what was happening to them.
Alternative interpretation in Western culture
The doctrine of the Uncreated Light is considered canonical only in the Eastern Church. In Western Christian culture, it is believed that the light emanating from Christ during His Transfiguration was as material as everything that He had previously created.
According to Western theologians, light was not an external manifestation of Divine energy, it was not part of God himself. He was only an artificially created creation, necessary in order to impress the apostles and strengthen them in the faith.
The Transfiguration of the Lord in the Orthodox Church is celebrated on August 19
Lifetime contemplation of the Kingdom of God
It was this that the apostles saw on the top of the mountain. The Transfiguration of Jesus Christ, according to Gregory Palamas, revealed to the apostles the uncreated (not created) light, which was a visual manifestation of his grace and energy. This light was revealed, of course, only to the extent that it enabled the disciples to become partakers of its holiness without risking their lives.
In this context, the words of Jesus Christ that some of his disciples - in this case Peter, John and James - are destined to see with their own eyes the Kingdom of God during their lifetime become quite understandable. This is quite obvious, since the Light of Tabor, being uncreated, is, as it were, a visible manifestation of God, and therefore of his Kingdom.
