In this study, focusing our attention on Gregory Palamas’ treatise under the title Περί θείας ενώσεως και διακρίσεως, we attempt to investigate, first of all, the volitional nature and the polymorphism of the divine energies and their relation to the divine essence. We also attempt to approach the divine distinction as a good “procession” and to prove, relying exclusively on the Christian thinker’s text, the inconsistencies according to his view that arise from the positions supported by Barlaam and Akindynos regarding the fact that the (divine) distinction is a creature. Regarding the matter on distinction, we conclude that it is a concept with a clearly different meaning when it comes to divine matters from the meaning that it gets when it concerns the created reality. From the gnoseological point of view, we focus our attention on the fact that the created beings are a source of knowledge for the revealed divine power-energy.

At a time when certain scholars insist that the self does not exist and is not worth discussing, a return to the work of Kierkegaard proves valuable insofar as he considers this topic without appeal to abstractions and instead by way of lived experiences. My paper argues that we gain crucial insights into what constitutes Kierkegaard’s lived self by considering the trajectory of a debate between two of his most prominent predecessors, Hume and Kant. From Hume we gain an account of the problem of thinking the self abstractly (i.e., the paradox of the bundle of perceptions having to be itself a perception) and how this problem vaguely connects to the passions. From Kant we gain an account of the psychological morality framing the self and the radical evil at its heart. I suggest that Kierkegaard builds on these accounts by synthesizing their abstract components in an embodied, dynamic context, showing (not telling) how the self can be presented in everyday experiences.

Building on the Christian and far-eastern understanding of evil, the author points out that evil that affects us can have a positive meaning. Troubles and suffering that we experience serve as a means of our purification from sin or are trials through which we gain the winning crown. God’s punishment, which primarily has an educational role, is nuanced. The guilt of an individual for violations of the divine moral order depends on the level of their consciousness, life circumstances and their social position. Since God is love, His mercy prevails over justice. God does not allow evil if good does not flow from it. Awareness that the meaning of evil that strikes us is to tear us away from a superficial, hedonistic lifestyle and turn us to God, contributes to an attitude deprived of hatred towards the enemy and those who harm us. If we understand that the enemy is merely a tool used for our moral improvement and spiritual transformation, we will focus primarily on fighting against the evil within ourselves.

In this paper, I will propose an interpretation of the mutual definition of aeon and time from St. Maximus’ Amb. 10 based on its conceptual and contextual proximity to another one that we find in Ad Thalassium 61 and which deals with the concepts of monad and myriad. I will try to show in which way, through these definitions of aeon and time and monad and myriad, St. Maximus gives us a logical device and frame for his christologicaly founded doctrine of the divinization of man.