“THEOLOGICAL RULE” BY NEILOS KABASILAS IN THE CONTEXT OF HESYCHASTIC POLEMICS OF THE 1350S: HOMONYMY AND METHOD OF THEOLOGY

Annotation

The paper considers the historical context and the circumstances of writing of Neilos Kabasilas’ treatise “Theological Rule” and specifies its dating as well. Theophile Kislas, a researcher of the manuscripts with the autographs of Neilos Kabasilas, dates the treatise to the period circa 1351 on the grounds that the earliest manuscript is included into the codex Vat. gr. 705 containing the renown Palamite florilegium on the divine essence and energy in 16 chapters and being compiled in the period of preparation and conduction of the Constantinople Synod of 1351 and immediately thereafter. However, it was most likely written after the public dispute between Gregory Palamas and Nicephorus Gregoras, which took place upon a request and in the presence of the emperor John V Palaiologos in 1355. In the treatise, Neilos sets an objective for himself to wrest the proposition of Gregory of Nyssa “there is nothing uncreated except divine nature” (ἄκτιστον δὲ πλὴν τῆς θείας φύσεώς οὐδέν) from the area of the Anti-Palamite wrong interpretation. In its turn, in the study we demonstrate that the discussion of this Gregory’s of Nyssa formula by Gregory Palamas and Nicephorus Gregoras was in the focus of perception of their debates alongside some other themes of them such as rules of method of theology and the issue of homonymy in the statements of the Saint Fathers on God. It turned out that one of those having responded to the content of this part of the polemics and, primarily, to the presentation of rules of theology by Nicephorus Gregoras was Neilos Kabasilas who took in his treatise an attempt of presenting the Palamite version of method of theology on the basis of the philosophical concept of homonymy.

Keywords

Neilos Kabasilas, Nicephorus Gregoras, Gregory Palamas, homonymy, polynemy, method of theology, nature, essence, hypostases, energies

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Asknowledgments: The study was funded by the grant of the Russian Science Foundation
No. 23-28-01028 “George Gemistus Plethon and the Role of Platonism in the Philosophical
and Theological Tradition of Byzantium in the mid-11th–15th centuries” (Federal Center
of Theoretical and Applied Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences), https://rscf.ru/
en/project/23-28-01028/