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Gregory Palamas Quotes
1290–1350 Turkey
Gregory Palamas (1296–1359) was a monk of Mount Athos in Greece and later the archbishop of Thessaloniki, known as a preeminent theologian of Hesychasm. The teachings embodied in his writings defending Hesychasm against the attack of Barlaam are sometimes referred to as Palamism, and his followers as Palamites.
Also known as: Saint Gregory Palamas
Random Gregory Palamas quote
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Do you see? There exists a kind of knowledge that is without love. It does not purify the psyche in any way, but kills it, as it lacks the love that is the head, the body, and very root of all virtue.
Anyone who considers himself guilty before God and repents must believe that the reproach and contempt of others towards him is just and to be endured.
How can someone have the freedom to choose and the power to act freely, unless he were able to be evil, should he so wish?
As the separation of the soul from the body is the death of the body, so the separation of God from the soul is the death of the soul. And this death of the soul is the true death.
To the Most Reverend Nun Xenia (1344)
Let us take off our life’s complex covering of rapacity and greed, since it is ugly in God’s sight and condemned, and let us put on, as the elect of God, compassion, humility, modesty and meekness.
Anybody who thinks he is something great, even before God, is rightly abandoned by God, as one who thinks that he does not need His help.
Some people, because their minds have gone so long without nourishment, lose their desire to eat and so do not notice the harm they are suffering.
The summit of evil, the crime most natural to the devil, pride, was born of knowledge. But if this is so, how can it be possible that all the passions result from ignorance? Does knowledge purify the psyche? Paul says: Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up (1 Corinthians 8:1).
Anyone who states that God should not have made those people who will be punished, is also saying that He should not have made those who will be saved, or any rational and free beings at all.
The soul completely dominated by its desire for spiritual instruction is never sated. It is because of this that Wisdom says of herself, 'Those who eat Me will still be hungry' (Eccles. 24:21); while the Lord, who has instilled this divine desire in the soul, says of Mary who chose 'what is best' that it will not be taken away from her (cf. Luke 10:42).
To the Most Reverend Nun Xenia (1344)
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