Last modified on Tuesday August 03, 2004 at 9:56 PM EDT
In old Russian the word 'piety' (blagochestie) was ordinarily used to express 'orthodoxy', and the expression 'pious belief' (blagochestivaya vera) was used instead of 'orthodox belief'.
By certain physiological or psychological processes which are summed up among us under the name of 'cerebral action' (umnoye delanie) the hermits of Athos experience unique sensations and achieve a state of ecstasy in which they claim to see the divine light which manifested itself at the Transfiguration of our Lord. The curious thing is that this phenomenon is regarded as an eternal, subsistent reality. In the fourteenth century furious controversy arose in the Greek Church over the inquiry into the real nature of the light of Tabor and its relation to the essence of the Godhead.
―Russia and the Universal Church