Hesychasts ($1v(acrai or ilaux4ovres, from avxos, quiet, also called &ﾵc/mMﾑlivxoe, Umbilicanimi, and sometimes referred to as Euchites, Massalians or Palamites), a quietistic sect which arose, during the later period of the Byzantine empire, among the monks of the Greek church, especially at Mount Athos, then at the height of its fame and influence under the reign of Andronicus the younger and the abbacy of Symeon. Quietism is a term with multiple meanings and definitions. ... A sect is a small religious group that has branched off of a larger established religion. ... The Byzantine Empire is the term conventionally used to describe the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, centered at its capital in Constantinople. ... ... One of the 20 monasteries on Mount Athos Mount Athos is a mountain and a peninsula in Macedonia, northern Greece, called Άγιο Όρος (Ayio Oros or Holy Mountain) in Modern Greek, or Ἅγιον Ὄρος (Hagion Oros) in Classical Greek. ...

Owing to various adventitious circumstances the sect came into great prominence politically and ecclesiastically for a few years about the middle of the 14th century. Their opinion and practice will be best represented in the words of one of their early teachers (quoted by Gibbon, Decline and Fall, c. 63): (13th century - 14th century - 15th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 14th century was that century which lasted from 1301 to 1400. ... Edward Gibbon. ...

"When thou art alone in thy cell shut thy door, and seat thyself in a corner; raise thy mind above all things vain and transitory; recline thy beard and chin on thy breast; turn thine eyes and thy thought towards the middle of thy belly, the region of the navel (bj aXos); and search the place of the heart, the seat of the soul. At first all will be dark and comfortless; but if thou persevere day and night, thou wilt feel an ineffable joy; and no sooner has the soul discovered the place of the heart than it is involved in a mystic and ethereal light."

About the year 1337 this hesychasm, which is obviously related to certain well-known forms of Oriental mysticism, attracted the attention of the learned and versatile Barlaam, a Calabrian monk, who at that time held the office of abbot in the Basilian monastery of St Saviour's in Constantinople, and who had visited the fraternities of Mount Athos on a tour of inspection. Amid much that he disapproved, what he specially took exception to as heretical and blasphemous was the doctrine entertained as to the nature of this divine light, the fruition of which was the supposed reward of hesychastic contemplation. This page concerns 1337, the year. ... Hesychasm (meaning quietness in Greek) is a mystical tradition of experiential prayer in Eastern Orthodox Christianity. ... Barlaam of Calabria was an Italian clergyman who converted to Eastern Orthodoxy in the 14th century. ... Heresy, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is a theological or religious opinion or doctrine maintained in opposition, or held to be contrary, to the ‘catholic’ or orthodox doctrine of the Christian Church, or, by extension, to that of any church, creed, or religious system, considered as orthodox. ... Blasphemy is the defamation of the name of God or the gods, and by extension any display of gross irreverence towards any person or thing deemed worthy of exalted esteem. ...

It was maintained to be the pure and perfect essence of God Himself, that eternal light which had been manifested to the disciples on Mount Tabor at the transfiguration. This Barlaam held to be polytheistic, inasmuch as it postulated two eternal substances, a visible and an invisible God. On the hesychastic side the controversy was taken up by Gregory Palamas, afterwards archbishop of Thessalonica, who laboured to establish a distinction between eternal ouvia and eternal Evil yeta. This article focuses on the monotheistic concept of a singular God. ... Mount Tabor may refer to a number of places: Mount Tabor is a hill in the Holy Land near Nazareth. ... The upper part of The Transfiguration (1520) by Raphael, depicting Christ miraculously discoursing with Moses and Elijah The word Transfiguration means a changing of appearance or form. ... Gregory Palamas (1296 - 1359) was a monk of Mount Athos in Greece, and later became Archbishop of Thessalonica. ...

In 1341 the dispute came before a synod held at Constantinople and presided over by the emperor Andronicus; the assembly, influenced by the veneration in which the writings of the pseudo-Dionysius were held in the Eastern Church, overawed Barlaam, who recanted and returned to Calabria, afterwards becoming bishop of Hierace in the Latin communion. Events Petrarch becomes famous Beginning of the Breton War of Succession over the control of the Duchy of Brittany Margarete Maultasch, Countess of Tyrol, expells her husband John Henry of Bohemia, to whom she had been married as a child. ... A synod (also known as a council) is a council of a church, usually a Christian church, convened to decide an issue of doctrine or administration. ... Map of Constantinople. ... Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite is the name scholars have given to an anonymous theologian and philosopher of the 5th century, who wrote a collection of books (Corpus Areopagiticum) falsely ascribed to the Dionysius mentioned in Acts 17:34. ...

One of his friends, Gregory Acindynus, continued the controversy, and three other synods on the subject were held, at the second of which the Barlaamites gained a brief victory. But in 1351 under the presidency of the emperor John VI Cantacuzenus, the uncreated light of Mount Tabor was established as an article of faith for the Greeks, who ever since have been ready to recognize it as an additional ground of separation from the Roman Church. Events End of the reign of Emperor Suko of Japan, third of the Northern Ashikaga Pretenders Start of the reign of Emperor Go-Kogon of Japan, fourth of the Northern Ashikaga Pretenders May 1 Zürich joins the Swiss Confederation. ... John VI Cantacuzenus (c. ...

The contemporary historians Cantacuzenus and Nicephorus Gregoras deal very copiously with this subject, taking the Hesychast and Barlaamite sides respectively. It may be mentioned that in the time of Justinian the word hesychast was applied to monks in general simply as descriptive of the quiet and contemplative character of their pursuits. See article "Hesychasten" in Herzog-Hauck, Realencyklopädie (3rd ed., 1900), where further references are given. Justinian may refer to: Justinian I, a Roman Emperor; Justinian, a storeship sent to the convict settlement at New South Wales in 1790. ...

This article incorporates text from the public domain 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ... The Eleventh Edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica ( 1911) in many ways represents the sum of knowledge at the beginning of the 20th century. ...