Sophia, Energies & Logoi in A Neo-Chalcedonian Cosmotheandrism

Sophia, Energies & Logoi in a Neo-Chalcedonian Cosmotheandrism
Sophia has been a challenge to map as revealed in historical treatments. Setting those descriptive
accounts to the side, at least in part, below is my own normative formulation.
I like to conceive Sophia as an
attribute of the divine essence, belonging to the Trinity,
exemplified hypostatically by the Son as wisdom & Spirit as glory, &
manifested as uncreated Sophia thru such as divine energies (Palamite) & logoi (Maximian).
These uncreated logoi are manifested theophanically, as they terminate in effects on determinate

being (as created logoi) in manifold & multiform participable ways, e.g. teloi, laws, nomicities,
gifts, grace, signs & wonders.
Every creaturely cooperation with, hence participation in, the logoi constitutes a theotic,
sophianic eternalization that incorporates us into created Sophia, Christ’s Bride or Mystical
Body.
Thus we imitate the Bridal Fiat of the Theotokos & thereby participate in her incarnational

synergism as it’s both eschatologically consummated in the divine nuptial
union & protologically anticipated by (contained in) the pre-existent logoi of Christ.
Creation happens.
To Be or Not, to Sophianize or Not our human secondary nature: The Unbearable Lightness of
Being (eternally self-determined)
Divine Modes of Identity – Bulgakov, Balthasar & Bracken with Scotus & the Greek Fathers
Retreblement – a Systematic Apocatastasis & Pneumatological Missiology per a Neo-

Chalcedonian Cosmotheandrism
Creativity would be the nature of God, pattern of existence & activity proper to God that God
shares in varying degrees w/finite entities in an expression of divine empowering love. ~
Bracken
Thus I re-situate Bulgakov’s sophiology, Maximus’ Logos-logoi & Palamas’ energies.
re: use of Whitehead’s cosmology for Christian understanding of the God- world relationship
risks misinterpretation of ANW: In my judgment, Aquinas made basically the same “mistake” in
employing Aristotelian metaphysics to set forth his understanding in the ST. ~ Joe Bracken
Bulgakov claims Aquinas’s account is insufficiently Trinitarian, too influenced by pagan

philosophy, & separates the divine will & intellect in such a way as to introduce arbitrariness
into the relationship between the divine ideas & creation. ~ John Hughes
Here I am not endorsing the controversial thesis of creatio ex nihilo advocated by Irenaeus and
others over the centuries, but instead proposing the notion of creatio ex deo. ~ Joseph Bracken
Bulgakov understood the doctrine of creation to be negatively defined as creatio ex nihilo and
positively defined as creatio ex Deo. ~ Pavel L. Gavriljuk
Christian systematic theologians until quite recently grossly overemphasized the role of divine
power and thereby significantly underestimated the role of divine love in their understanding of
how God deals with the creatures of this world. ~ Joseph Bracken
For God to be the transcendent source of creativity within the cosmic process, God must be
ontologically both the primordial source and ultimate goal of the cosmic process. ~ Joseph
Bracken
A New Process-Oriented Approach to Theodicy Joseph Bracken, Process Studies, Vol. 48, No. 1
(Spring-Summer 2019), pp.105-
120 https://jstor.org/stable/10.5406/processstudies.48.1.0105#metadata_info_tab_contents
The Problem of Pantheism in the Sophiology of Sergii Bulgakov: A Panentheistic Solution in the
Process Trinitarianism of Joseph Bracken? by Brandon Gallaher
This essay explores Bulgakov’s thought as an alternative form of panentheism to Bracken’s
‘The Problem of Pantheism in the Sophiology of Sergii Bulgakov: A Panentheistic Solution in

the…academia.edu
The God-World Relationship Between Joseph Bracken, Philip Clayton, and the Open Theism, by
Dong-Sik Park, Claremont Graduate University
The God-World Relationship Between Joseph Bracken, Philip Clayton, and the Open
Theismscholarship.claremont.edu
In Whom We Live & Move & Have Our Being, Panentheistic Reflections on God’s Presence in
a Scientific World, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2004 Below, I will list several
chapters of this book, above, as are relevant to energies, logoi & sophia in a panentheism.
a) God immanent yet transcendent : the divine energies according to Saint Gregory Palamas,
Kallistos Ware
b) The universe as hypostatic inherence in the logos of God : panentheism in the eastern
orthodox perspective, Alexei V. Nesteruk
c) The cosmic vision of Saint Maximos the Confessor, Andrew Louth
d) Panentheism : a field-oriented approach, Joseph A. Bracken
e) The logos as wisdom : a starting point for a Sophianc theology of creation, Celia E. Deane-
Drummond
Bulgakov’s Account of Creation: Neglected Aspects, Critics and Contemporary Relevance,
Pavel L. Gavriljuk, International journal of systematic theology, 2015, Volume: 17, Issue: 4,
Pages: 450-463
Creatio ex nihilo and the Divine Ideas in Aquinas: How fair is Bulgakov’s critique?, John
Hughes, Modern Theology, Volume 29, Issue 2, 2013
“Words and phrases must be stretched towards a generality foreign to their ordinary usage; and,
however such elements of language be stabilized as technicalities, they remain metaphors mutely
appealing for an imaginative leap” ~ Whitehead, Process and Reality
Implicit here is my long- standing conviction that every metaphysical system is inevitably
provisional and thus in principle open to reform and revision. ~ Joseph Bracken
Notes regarding Divine-Human Interaction & Grace per Libertarian Free Will
My account, below, will not exhaust every manner of divine-human interaction & of grace, but
will address one aspect that I find deeply consoling — that God infuses grace universally,
superabundantly & even without our assent, ever respecting our libertarian free will.
In reconciling divine-human interactions via grace & libertarian freedom of the will, might we
draw on diverse conceptions from Scotism, Neoplatonism & Thomism (analytical not
Banezian)?
We could conceive of both Scotus & Maximus as libertarians for whom the intellect’s
necessarily operative but not wholly determinative in volition, where self-determinative
volitional acts remain limited in potency to the logoi of being, well-being & eternal being.
The divine & human wills are thus not connected by one’s choosing between “this or that” but in
“why the will wills at all,” as it does remain free not to act (via a type of quiescence). Such a
volition would entail a moderately libertarian & moderately voluntarist free will.
Scotus locates the will in efficient causation. For many, this represents a conceptual relocation
from the formal.
Interestingly, this can be squared with Eleonore Stump’s relocation of the operation
of grace from efficient to formal causality over against Banezian premotion.
Stump distinguishes between an “assent to,” a “refusal of” & an “absence of refusal of” grace,
as, per Aquinas, one can cease to refuse grace without assenting to it.
God thus infuses grace in us all, even when we don’t assent, as long as we’re not refusing it, i.e.
as long as our wills are “quiescent.”
Thereby He infuses the good will of our justifying faith.
Thereby we can abandon ourselves to Divine Providence through quiescence.
Thus, let us pray –
w/Ignatius: “Take, Lord, receive all my liberty.”
w/the Psalmist: “Be still & know that I am God.”
with Merton: “I know you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.”
May we both cooperate with the graces of today & be alert to divine infusions.
Posted in religious epistemology, spirituality, systematic theology, systematic

theophany, UncategorizedTagged apocatastasis, apokatastasis, Bulgakov, cosmotheandric, cosmothean
drism, energeia, energeiai, Incarnation, kenosis, logoi, maximian logoi, maximus the
confessor, Palamas, Palamatic, Palamism, pansemioentheism, pneumatology, retreblement, russian
sophiology, Sophia, Sophiological, sophiological trajectory, sophiology, synergeia, tehomic
panentheism, theological anthropology, theophany, theosis, Theotokos, trinitophany, universal
salvation, universalism
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Sophia, Energies & Logoi in a Neo-Chalcedonian Cosmotheandrism

attribute of the divine essence, belonging to the Trinity,

exemplified hypostatically by the Son as wisdom & Spirit as glory, &

manifested as uncreated Sophia thru such as divine energies (Palamite) & logoi (Maximian).

These uncreated logoi are manifested theophanically, as they terminate in effects on determinate

Thus we imitate the Bridal Fiat of the Theotokos & thereby participate in her incarnational

Retreblement – a Systematic Apocatastasis & Pneumatological Missiology per a Neo-

Thus I re-situate Bulgakov’s sophiology, Maximus’ Logos-logoi & Palamas’ energies.

Bulgakov claims Aquinas’s account is insufficiently Trinitarian, too influenced by pagan

This essay explores Bulgakov’s thought as an alternative form of panentheism to Bracken’s

‘The Problem of Pantheism in the Sophiology of Sergii Bulgakov: A Panentheistic Solution in

c) The cosmic vision of Saint Maximos the Confessor, Andrew Louth

d) Panentheism : a field-oriented approach, Joseph A. Bracken

Thereby He infuses the good will of our justifying faith.

Thereby we can abandon ourselves to Divine Providence through quiescence.

Thus, let us pray –

w/Ignatius: “Take, Lord, receive all my liberty.”

w/the Psalmist: “Be still & know that I am God.”

Posted in religious epistemology, spirituality, systematic theology, systematic

 Sophia, Energies & Logoi in a Neo-Chalcedonian Cosmotheandrism

 Retreblement – a Systematic Apocatastasis & Pneumatological Missiology per a Neo-

 A 12 Step Contemplative Spirituality

 My Move from a Hopeful to an Essential Universalism

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