Our first addition this week is a brief homily by Demetrios, Greek Orthodox Archbishop of America, on the ancient Delphic maxim, “Know Thyself”, and its place in Christian spirituality.

“If you give heed to yourself, you will not need to look for signs of the Creator in the structure of the universe; but in yourself, as in a miniature replica of cosmic order, you will contemplate the great wisdom of the Creator.” In other words, man is a microcosm…

• An article by David Bradshaw on the relation between the reality of the divine glory and the divine energies, and on the place of this concept in Orthodox theology and in Christian theology in general.

The Christian tradition has always contained the resources for a view of God that is both philosophically cogent and Scripturally sound. All we have to do is look to the East.

• Finally, an article by William Chittick on “The Islamic Concept of Human Perfection”, considering the profound relevance and the contemporary fate of this crucial Islamic doctrine in which metaphysics and traditional psychology converge:

The Islamic concept of human perfection has been banished from the stage, to be replaced by various types of outwardly orientated human endeavour borrowed from contemporary ideologies. The traditional Muslim quietly set out on a personal quest, while the modern zealot shouts slogans from the pulpits with the aim of reforming everyone but himself.