04 — Key Themes

Two central threads of Stăniloae’s theology: the world as God’s gift and the dialogue of love it opens between God and humanity, held within his account of apophatic theology; and his theology of the person, communion, and deification, in which the human being is fulfilled only in love, in the image of the Triune God.

Tradition: Romanian Orthodox

This section develops the doctrinal heart of Stăniloae’s thought. The World as Gift and Apophatic Theology treats his Maximian theology of creation and his two-fold apophaticism; Person, Communion, and Deification treats his personalism — the person as being-in-communion — and its consummation in theosis.

Contents

File	Description
The World as Gift and Apophatic Theology	Creation as gift and dialogue; the rationality of creation; apophatic and cataphatic theology
Person, Communion, and Deification	The person, love, intersubjectivity, and theosis in the image of the Trinity

See Also

• The Experience of God — the Dogmatics in which these themes are developed
• Theosis — deification in Orthodox theology
• Stăniloae and Palamism — the essence–energies framework underlying deification