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Is the concept of passion the same in the Western and Eastern Churches? (Thomas Aquinas – Saint Gregory Palamas)translated

November 6, 2026 · 1 min read

Reading the texts of Western philosophy, from Descartes onwards, until today, but also meeting with the literature of the West, I found that the concept of "passion", as we know it in the ascetic and more general theological literature of our Church, is unknown.

By Dimitris Ioannou (Philologist – Author)

"Passion" in the western world is something very different. So I tried to go back to the roots of the whole issue, to understand where the difference lies. I thus turned to the sources of Western theology and today's idiosyncratic "spirituality", Thomas Aquinas, to understand where exactly the differentiation comes from. And then I tried to compare the teaching of Aquinas with the Hesychastic and Neptic theology of the Orthodox Church, whose main compiler and doctrinal founder is exactly Saint Gregory Palamas. But under the name of this leading Father of the Church, I include the whole of the Philocalic secretariat.

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So we will start with Thomas Aquinas. However, I must say that, not being an expert in scholastic philosophy, and for fear of doing the medieval theologian some injustice,…

Source: Orthodoxia News Agency  ·  Read the full story →
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