International congress of byzantine studies belgrade, 22 27 august 2016

Dmitrij I. Makarov
Urals State M. P. Mussorgsky Conservatoire, Ekaterinburg, Russian Federation; 
[e-mail]
The 13
th
-Century Prerequisites of St. Gregory Palamas’ Theology
*
1. It is well-known due to the latest efforts of patrologists that in order to properly understand 
the Palamite theology of the Divine Light and energy one ought to cope with the problem of its 
immediate roots and antecedents within the period from St. Photius to the early 14
th
century. 
In our paper we propose to take a fresh look at the problem of the immediate prerequisites 
of this theology, namely at those which were arising during the thirteenth century. To reach 
this aim, we must envisage the century (
a
) in its entirety – as a complete epoch in the history 
of the European and Byzantine theological and philosophical thought – and (
b
) in its living 
connection with the previous twelfth century.
2. This approach brings a scholar substantial results. To begin with, it is impossible to deeply 
understand the 13
th
-century Byzantine theology without turning to the 
Sacred arsenal 
by 
Andronicus Camaterus (
ca. 
1173–1174), because the first notable Greek theologian of the 
century, Nicholas Mesarites, turns out to be a faithful compiler of the compendium (
Makarov 
2016). The importance of Camaterus can be seen at the example of John VIII Veccus having 
written a special piece 
Against Andronicus Camaterus. 
As Veccus was a pronounced opponent to 
the idea of any interpenetration between the Persons of the Trinity, such a hostile stance against 
Camaterus who had argued in favor of this idea cannot be surprising for a scholar. The famous 
Palamas’ assertion that there can be an Orthodox approach to the 
Filioque 
was prefigured 
already in a conservative, but, nevertheless, in a way the ‘proto-Palamite’ theology by Georges 
Moskhambar. The description of the Persons’ interpenetration (Μονιοῦ 2011: 294.107 – 295.115) 
as the original order in the Trinity, which is effectuated from eternity τῷ λόγῳ τῆς φεραλληλίας, 
is also one of the most serious and well-thought-out prefigurations of the Palamite theology.
3. In our attempt at summarizing these debates we would offer such a preliminary periodization 
of the main trends in the 13
th
-century Byzantine theology:
• 1174/1200 to 1234/40. The century’s first attempts at theological dialogue with the Latins. 
The formulation of the prerequisites of the later teaching on the interpenetration (Camaterus, 
Nicholas Mesarites, Germanus II);
• From 1234/40 to 1265/1275 arise: the innovative teaching on the eternal manifestation of 
the Spirit through the Son (Nicephorus Blemmydes) and a kind of neo-paganism of a Proclean type 
(George Acropolites);
• The years from 1265/1275 to 1285/1297 saw the most important theological controversies 
of the century. The clash between: the pro-Latin and a ‘tritheist’ theological doctrine of Veccus; 
* This research was conducted with the generous help of the Russian Foundation for Humanities, project no. 15-03-
00665, “Varieties of Humanism and Its Ways: The Intellectual Legacy of Late Byzantium, Thirteenth to Fourteenth Centuries”.

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the Orthodox theology using Blemmydes’ renewed language by Gregory of Cyprus; and a bit 
conservative, but also proto-Palamite doctrine by Moskhambar.
4. If we now look at the polemical literature written by Palamas and his allies, as well as at the 
oeuvre by the anti-Palamites, we will see that the contents of these debates was thoroughly 
investigated by both sides of the conflict, and the main ‘lines of fissure’ were inherited by the 
protagonists from their predecessors of the 13
th
century.