The End of Nothing: Bulgakov and Eriugena from Creation to Resurrection

Abstract This article examines the theological relationship between Sergii Bulgakov and Johannes Scotus Eriugena, focusing on their respective accounts of creation, divine “nothingness,” and eschatology. While Bulgakov was influenced by Eriugena’s apophatic theology and his metaphysical treatment of divine self‐revelation, he ultimately critiqued Eriugena’s account of creation as overly immanentist and monistic. Drawing on Bulgakov’s early work Unfading Light , this study reevaluates his engagement with Eriugena’s Periphyseon and argues that Bulgakov’s critique rests on a misreading—one that overlooks Eriugena’s own distinctions between divine transcendence ( ad intra ) and theophanic manifestation ( ad extra ). Despite this misinterpretation, the article contends that Bulgakov was right to identify a deeper point of theological divergence: eschatology. Where Eriugena envisions the end as a return ( reditus ) to an overly spiritualized divine unity, Bulgakov insists on the transfiguration—not dissolution—of creaturely being in the resurrection. Through a close reading of primary texts, this article clarifies the conceptual nuances of “nothing” in both thinkers and highlights how differing views on what, if anything, remains of the creature in the eschaton ultimately shape their ontologies. In doing so, it contributes to contemporary discussions on divine self‐revelation, the dignity of materiality, and the correlativity of the God‐world relationship.