The Sight of God in the Theology of Saint Symeon the New Theologian [30]

Here, parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29.

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We have, from the first enunciation, a few certain things: during the prayer of George it came, in unexpected mode, in his being, a brightness from part of God, which he has lived it as coming from above, from heaven.

Symeon does not speak about a simple e[llamyij, that would have caused by something physical but not the adverb a;nwqen, an adverb that expresses the place, the location from where something comes to us, to those on earth, should not lead us with the thought, that it indicates a terrestrial or cosmic source of light.

We believe that a;nwqen wants to emphasize the role that has the adjective qei,a, that accompanies e[llamyij.

The light is divine, is from above, namely is  from God.

George asked God’s mercy and God shows His mercy as light.

But the phrase open by Symeon is not finished.

After specifying that the light comes from above, Symeon affirms that the divine brightness filled the whole place where was the young George [91 line].

The aorist of plhro,w, and namely evplh,rwse, that Symeon uses here, in our opinion, it does not indicate the fact that our young man looked around, with his physical eyes, and saw that everywhere, in his cell, was light, but, rather, that everything what sees him now, in this moment, was only that brightness.

Symeon looks retrospectively the things and compendious.

He has not present the ecstatic event in progress, like a televisual horse racing, where is showing to us, finally, in slow motion, which of the competitors walked first across the finish line and how it actually happened.

Symeon includes in running the event details that he did not realized during the ecstasy, but he understood the post-ecstatic, at some time after the event.

This thing is evident from the following two phrases.

If, further, in the phrase following that in which we reported before, Symeon said that the young man „did not know [anything by himself, to him, who prayed] and he forgot that he was in the house or under a roof” (91-93 lines), immediately Symeon opens an another phrase and says: „because everywhere he sees only light and he did not know whether he was walking on the earth” (93-94 lines).

The idea of the roof, of ste,gh, that suddenly disappears, collapses, that he does not see it because the light, it will reappear in the symeonian description.

The light of God coming down, coming in human, and it takes over completely, is what separates us from things seen, catapulting us, suddenly, in the vastness of the divine light.

The divine light does not give us the possibility to think something related at the visible world, but we see fw/j mo,non, only light in that moment.

The transition from what we see, to that what-we-do-not-expected-to-see of the ecstasy, but that we was ready to see it, fills us with amazement. Our young man forget everything he knew, what he wanted, what he believed that he was.

The symeonian relating presents again post-ecstatic details.

It says that the young George felt not in him the fear of not falling into sin, he did not take care of things from the world and he bore himself like one immaterial (94-98 lines).

But the ecstatic state, that to be o[lwj fwti. avu/lw| sunw.n [completely united with the immaterial light] (97 line), does not permit the evidence of the world with which we are accustomed, but is a transposition of us in eternity.

Therefore and returns Symeon at the narration of the ecstatic event, through characterization of divine brightness right the immaterial light and through emphasis the fact that light was in the young George with such interior evidence, that he himself felt the light (97-98 lines).