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4. Abstract of:  Reconciliation of science and religion

The usefulness of Palamas' Triads depends particularly on their crucial timing, right on the ‘cusp’ when a new intellectualism was first arising. In this situation significance of Palamas’ work as a philosopher to us today lay in his ability to make a specific contribution to the ‘meta-relationship’ between major forms of knowledge of the present time. Palamas' writings, once they have been separated from the polemic style dictated by the times in which he lived, a style which is believed by some to have intentionally obscured their deeper content, can now make a specific contribution to the 'meta-relationship' between different disciplines that exist in our present time. This interaction is most fertile, drawing on apparently disparate disciplines as different as physics and theology, science and religion so that each throws light on the other. 

An ancient and psychologically different approach to integrating specialist viewpoints

Even in translation, Saint Gregory Palamas' Triads touch with precision on the problems of the use of language for the deeper subjects of human concern - not only within for example science or religion, but particularly that invisible link between these fields of truth which so often look so very different to us. It is this link which touches very much on the concerns of Praxis Research Institute and its work over the past decade. Like binocular vision, the added viewpoint given by studying Palamas gives new depth to our understanding of the faith. This shows us more of what has changed over two long millennia of the Christian era, and a surprising view of how much has been lost by those changes. This re-emergence of the inner tradition of the early church is a re-emergence of what was once an important part of the mainstream of the church. This important aspect of church teaching was discredited as an accidental result of the persecution of Western and was finally eliminated with the Reformation. But now many of the teachings of the fathers are becoming available in English. For example, an English translation of the five volume Greek classic, The Philokalia, a book of the teachings of the early fathers, is now in print, and with these and similar books we find we can begin to learn about that ancient Christian world-view.

In rediscovering old ways of understanding the inner life is a re-emergence of the original teaching of the one church before its division into different denominations. Although the teachings of the early fathers became discredited with monasticism in the late Middle Ages, so that it has been virtually ignored since the Reformation, it becomes increasingly clear that its politically motivated suppression was a serious mistake whose long-term effects may have been disastrous for the Western world.

Notices to Readers