Reflections on Light from the Christian East: Part 2

Here is the second of my reflections on Light from the Christian East...

10/7/08
In this second reading, the Eastern Orthodox views on knowledge of God drew me in. They seem to have two principles that go hand-in-hand as they approach theology. The first is that intimacy with God informs theology, and the second is that we should start from a foundation of what we can not know about God (apophatic theology). Both paint a picture in stark contrast to our Western view that knowledge of God forms the basis for theology. The alternative to this Western view was very appealing to me though. It evoked feelings of simplicity, achievability, mystery, awe, and intimacy.

See, I feel conflicted right now about nurturing my relationship with God. On one hand, I feel like God is a part of everything in my life, a thread woven beneath the whole. But on the other hand, I don’t feel like I do enough intentionally to nurture my encounters with God. The idea of Scripture reading and study deter me while the ideas of meditation, prayer, and mysticism draw me in. Granted, both ends are necessary and require one to create space for them, but perhaps a more balanced view of the two would help me more readily enter into these encounters…