Unfading Light: Contemplations and Speculations

by Sergius Bulgakov, Thomas Allan Smith (Translator)

Overview

With its scholarly discussions of myth, German idealist philosophy, negative theology, and mysticism, shot through with reflections on personal religious experiences, Unfading Light documents what a life in Orthodoxy came to mean for Sergius Bulgakov on the tumultuous eve of the 1917 October Revolution. Written in the final decade of the Russian Silver Age, the book is a typical product of that era of experimentation in all fields of culture and life. Bulgakov referred to the book as miscellanies, a patchwork of chapters articulating in symphonic form the ideas and personal experiences that he and his entire generation struggled to comprehend. Readers may be reminded of St. Augustine's Confessions and City of God as they follow Bulgakov through the challenges and opportunities presented to Orthodoxy by modernity.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780802867117
Publisher:	Eerdmans, William B. Publishing Company
Publication date:	12/12/2012
Pages:	554
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Sergius Bulgakov (1871-1944) is widely regarded as the twentieth century's leading Orthodox theologian. His other books include Relics and Miracles, The Unfading Light, The Burning Bush, The Lamb of God, The Comforter, Jacob's Ladder, and Churchly Joy (all Eerdmans).


Thomas Allan Smith is associate professor of the history and theology of Eastern Christianity at the University of St. Michael’s College, Toronto.

Table of Contents

A Note from the Translator x

Translator's Introduction: Bulgakov's Journey towards the Unfading Light xx

From the Author xxxvii

Introduction: The Nature of Religious Consciousness 1

I How Is Religion Possible? 1

II Transcendent and Immanent 20

III Faith and Feeling 39

IV Religion and Ethics 47

V Faith and Dogma 53

VI The Nature of Myth 63

VII Religion and Philosophy ; 79

First Section Divine Nothing 103

I The Fundamental Antinomy of Religious Consciousness 103

II Negative (Apophatic) Theology 111

1 Negative Theology in Plato and Aristotle 111

2 Plotinus (Third Century A.D.) 114

3 Philo of Alexandria (First Century) 118

4 The Idea of Negative Theology in the Alexandrian School of Christian Theology (Third Century) 119

A Clement of Alexandria 119

B Origen 120

5 Fathers of the Church: St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory the Theologian, St. Gregory of Nyssa (Fourth Century) 121

6 Areopagitica 125

7 St. Maximus the Confessor (Seventh Century) 129

8 St. John Damascene (Eighth Century) 130

9 St. Gregory Palamas (Fourteenth Century) 131

10 Johannes Scotus Eriugena (Ninth Century) 134

11 Nicholas of Cusa (Fifteenth Century) 137

12 Jewish Mysticism: Cabbala 140

13 Negative Theology in German and English Mysticism 143

A "German Theology" (Das Büchlein vom vollkommenen Leben von Deutschherr) ca. Fifteenth Century 143

B Meister Eckhart and His School (Tauler, Suso) 143

C Sebastian Frank (Sixteenth Century) 146

D Angelus Silesius (Seventeenth Century) 147

E Jacob Böhme (Sixteenth-Seventeenth Centuries) 148

F John Pordage (Seventeenth Century) 149

14 Kant and Negative Theology 150

III Divine Nothing 152

1 Johannes Scotus Eriugena 165

2 Meister Eckhart 167

3 Jacob Böhme 170

Second Section The World 181

I The Creatureliness of the World 181

1 Creation 181

2 Creaturely Nothing 186

3 The World as Theophany and Theogony 195

4 Time and Eternity 202

5 Freedom and Necessity 207

II The Sophianicity of the Creature 214

1 Sophia 214

2 What Is Matter? 239

3 Matter and the Body 250

4 The Nature of Evil 266

Third Section The Human Being 285

I The First Adam 285

1 The Image of God in the Human Being 285

2 Sex in the Human Being 294

3 Human and Angel 311

4 The Likeness of God in the Human Being 315

5 The Fall of Humankind 318

6 Light in the Darkness 326

7 The Old Testament and Paganism 336

II The Second Adam 342

1 The Creation of the World and the Incarnation of God 342

2 The Salvation of Fallen Humankind 350

III Human History 359

1 Concrete Time 359

2 Economy and Art 363

3 Economy and Theurgy 370

4 Art and Theurgy 382

5 Power and Theocracy 404

6 Society and Ecclesiality 416

7 The End of History 424

IV Completion 427

Notes 437

Index of Names 505

Index of Scripture References 509

Index of Liturgical Texts 512

Editorial Reviews

Theological Book Review
"This important translation of Bulgakov's semi-genealogical treatise on the shape and trajectory of divine wisdom (Sophia) offers English students of twentieth-century philosophical theology insight into a profound neo-Chalcedonian constructive system. . . . The translator-editor and publisher have done English-speaking students of modern theology a service by producing a usable volume that includes details of both the author, and his sources."

Church Times (UK)
"A work of real intellectual and spiritual excitement. It is a cause for celebration that it is at last available in English. . . . A good introduction to Bulgakov's evolving thought."

Theology
"Unfading Light is the last of Bulgakov's works to be written in Russia, and the first explicitly theological work. It marks a watershed. . . . Bulgakov's theology, even as early as this, is marked by a profoundly eschatological dimension."

Paul Valliere
"In Unfading Light Bulgakov masterfully expounds human religious consciousness using an astonishingly varied tool kit, including Bible and Church fathers, Kabbalah and other mystical texts, ancient and modern philosophy, and modern economic thought. Despite Bulgakov's eclecticism, however, his book is remarkably lucid, and thanks to Thomas Allan Smith's impressive translation, the work loses none of its clarity in English. This volume belongs in the library of anyone interested in Russian religious thought."

Boris Jakim
"One of the greatest works of philosophy of the twentieth century, Unfading Light is full of a radiance that penetrates the reader's mind and heart. . . . We see Bulgakov's mind growing to encompass great sophiological truths and his heart expanding to absorb the Divine light as he prepares to begin work on his two unparalleled theological trilogies. With his superb translation, Thomas Allan Smith has given the twenty-first century a luminous gift."

Myroslaw Tataryn
"For the English-language reader who wishes to understand the mature Bulgakov, Smith's translation of Unfading Light &8212; probably Bulgakov's most challenging volume &8212; will be indispensable."

Johannes M. Oravecz
"Thanks to Thomas A. Smith's attentive editing and sensitive translation, this rich work of intellectual and spiritual quest is available for the first time in English. It will undoubtedly be a source of inspiration to many on their own spiritual-intellectual quest for God."

Robert F. Slesinski
"This pellucid translation sheds important light on Bulgakov's highly personal and philosophical life journey."

From the Publisher