Transparența – taina creșterii persoanei întru Persoană în viziunea Părintelui Dumitru Stăniloae
Transparency – The Mystery of the Person’s Growth into Personhood in the Vision of Father Dumitru Stăniloae

Author(s): Georgiana HUIAN
Subject(s): Christian Theology and Religion, Theology and Religion
Published by: Editura Doxologia
Keywords: man; image and likeness; transparency; deification; relationship; communion;
Summary/Abstract: This paper explores the theological anthropology of Father Dumitru Stăniloae through the lens of the concept of “transparency,” examining its functions in his dogmatic thought as well as in his ascetic and mystical theology. Perfect transparency is found in the Holy Trinity, where it appears as a mode of the perichoresis of the divine Persons. For humanity, transparency appears as an essential potentiality and as the goal of personal becoming in Christ. Darkened by the fall into sin (opacity), human transparency to the Light of God is restored in the Person of Christ; it is given to us through the Holy Eucharist and is perfected in the Kingdom of God. Situated between the rigour of the concept and the ineffability of the mystery, transparency allows for an overlap between the cataphatic and apophatic understanding of the Person. Thus, the ascent toward knowledge and contemplation does not diminish, but rather enhances the Mystery of the Person, the mystery of the other and of the Other. Thus, transparency defines the path of spiritualisation and sanctification of the human being; it entails a Eucharistic and eschatological realisation. The vision of the human person as an inexpressible mystery rooted in the mystery of the Triune Godhead becomes thus the cornerstone of an apophatic anthropology.

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