COMMUNION WITH GOD IN CHRISTIAN ANTHROPOLOGY: WESTERN AND EASTERN TRADITIONS

Annotation

The article presents metaphysical and epistemological justifications for interpreting the experience of communion with God in the Western and Eastern Christian traditions. In modern Catholic thought (K. Rahner et al.), the possibility of knowledge of God is understood as the principle of “dialogical personalism”. In the Orthodox tradition, dialogue is revealed through the idea of the synergy of personalities, which is based on the dogmatic doctrine of the Holy Trinity, which also implies the difference between the Essence and uncreated Energies. Orthodox spiritual teaching points to the possibility of transforming human nature and can be considered as an active model of attitude to the world, while Catholic teaching does not imply internal changes in man in the process of knowledge of God. Modern theology, represented by Western theology and Russian theology abroad, strives to meet the spiritual needs of the twentieth century, implying an emphasis on anthropological, hermeneutic and phenomenological interpretations. With the general similarity of methodologies, the differences between the two traditions in assessing the possibilities of communion with God essentially form two different cultural traditions of the Christian picture of the world. The Catholic world is strongly focused on intellectual contemplation and the leveling of corporeality. In the Orthodox tradition, on the path of asceticism, human nature is transformed, sanctified spiritually and physically.

Keywords

theology, synergy, dialogical personalism, personality, God, person, Neopatristic synthesis

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