The Name-Glorifiers (Imiaslavie) Controversy

Abstract

In 1912–1913, a controversy erupted first among the Russian monks on Mount Athos of the claim in one book on prayer that ‘the Name of God is God Himself’. The so-called ‘Name-Glorifiers’ teaching would be condemned by the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church. Nevertheless, leading Russian religious thinkers, especially Sergius Bulgakov, Pavel Florenskii, and Aleksei Losev, would take up the issue. The very nature of the controversy would provoke these thinkers to reflect broadly on the philosophy of language in general. More specifically, they also reflected on the nature of religious symbols and the role of religious symbols such as language in mediating religious experience between the person in prayer and God. This chapter surveys the genesis of the debate and its treatment within the Church. The debate itself originated in connection with the practice of hesychastic spirituality and the Jesus Prayer, but the Church authorities reacted in a swift way, without fully understanding the issues at stake. One important consequence of the controversy was the revival of the theology of St. Gregory Palamas, the Byzantine theologian who had defended the hesychasts in the thirteenth century, but whose theology had largely been forgotten in Russia. Although the debate erupted on the eve of the revolution and therefore was forgotten by many, the reflections on language and symbols by thinkers such as Florenskii and Losev would have a broader resonance in later Russian thought, not only with regard to language but even in mathematics.