Modern Hesychasm in Christianity

One of the greatest works in Protestant literature begins:

"Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes and gives birth to the other."

A longer quote is given below.

It is the Protestant view that a person feels no need of God until he has a knowledge of himself, of his impurity, weakness, vileness and depravity. And yet he flatters himself so much he can have no sense of these, and thus no knowledge of himself, until he has some knowledge of God's perfections, purity, holiness and goodness, and is further persuaded that the perfections of God is the standard to which he himself is required to conform.

Seeing as these perfections of God can only be discovered by a study of the Scriptures, i.e. the Bible, it follows that any contemplation of ourselves without a study of Holy Scripture, and a comparison of ourselves with the standards of Scripture, is likely to lead us far astray from both the way of salvation and from a true knowledge of ourselves.

The two great needs of the soul. A Protestant view :-

"Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes and gives birth to the other.

For, in the first place, no man can survey himself without forthwith turning his thoughts towards the God in whom he lives and moves; because it is perfectly obvious, that the endowments which we possess cannot possibly be from ourselves; no, that our very being is nothing else than subsistence in God alone.

In the second place, those blessings which unceasingly distil to us from heaven, are like streams conducting us to the fountain. Here, again, the infinitude of good which resides in God becomes more apparent from our poverty. In particular, the miserable ruin into which the revolt of the first man has plunged us, compels us to turn our eyes upwards; not only that while hungry and famishing we may thence ask what we want, but being aroused by fear may learn humility. For as there exists in man something like a world of misery, and ever since we were stripped of the divine attire our naked shame discloses an immense series of disgraceful properties every man, being stung by the consciousness of his own unhappiness, in this way necessarily obtains at least some knowledge of God. Thus, our feeling of ignorance, vanity, want, weakness, in short, depravity and corruption, reminds us, that in the Lord, and none but He, dwell the true light of wisdom, solid virtue, exuberant goodness.

We are accordingly urged by our own evil things to consider the good things of God; and, indeed, we cannot aspire to Him in earnest until we have begun to be displeased with ourselves. For what man is not disposed to rest in himself? Who, in fact, does not thus rest, so long as he is unknown to himself; that is, so long as he is contented with his own endowments, and unconscious or unmindful of his misery? Every person, therefore, on coming to the knowledge of himself, is not only urged to seek God, but is also led as by the hand to find him.

2. On the other hand, it is evident that man never attains to a true self-knowledge until he has previously contemplated the face of God, and come down after such contemplation to look into himself. For (such is our innate pride) we always seem to ourselves just, upright, wise, and holy, until we are convinced, by clear evidence, of our injustice, vileness, folly, and impurity. Convinced, however, we are not, if we look to ourselves only, and not to the Lord also — He being the only standard by the application of which this conviction can be produced.

For, since we are all naturally prone to hypocrisy, any empty semblance of righteousness is quite enough to satisfy us instead of righteousness itself. And since nothing appears within us or around us that is not tainted with very great impurity, so long as we keep our mind within the confines of human pollution, anything which is in some small degree less defiled delights us as if it were most pure just as an eye, to which nothing but black had been previously presented, deems an object of a whitish, or even of a brownish hue, to be perfectly white. Nay, the bodily sense may furnish a still stronger illustration of the extent to which we are deluded in estimating the powers of the mind. If, at mid-day, we either look down to the ground, or on the surrounding objects which lie open to our view, we think ourselves endued with a very strong and piercing eyesight; but when we look up to the sun, and gaze at it unveiled, the sight which did excellently well for the earth is instantly so dazzled and confounded by the refulgence, as to oblige us to confess that our acuteness in discerning terrestrial objects is mere dimness when applied to the sun. Thus too, it happens in estimating our spiritual qualities. So long as we do not look beyond the earth, we are quite pleased with our own righteousness, wisdom, and virtue; we address ourselves in the most flattering terms, and seem only less than demigods. But should we once begin to raise our thoughts to God, and reflect what kind of Being he is, and how absolute the perfection of that righteousness, wisdom, and virtue, to which, as a standard, we are bound to be conformed, what formerly delighted us by its false show of righteousness will become polluted with the greatest iniquity; what strangely imposed upon us under the name of wisdom will disgust by its extreme folly; and what presented the appearance of virtuous energy will be condemned as the most miserable impotence. So far are those qualities in us, which seem most perfect, from corresponding to the divine purity." (Quoted from the opening paragraphs of "The Institutes of the Christian Religion" by John Calvin, 1536)

If you are interested in mystical traditions you may want to look further afield:

There are surprising parallels with

"For the first time you [lift your heart to God with stirrings of love], you will find only a darkness, and as it were a cloud of unknowing [...] Whatever you do, this darkness and the cloud are between you and your God, and hold you back from seeing him clearly by the light of understanding in your reason and from experiencing him in the sweetness of love in your feelings. [...] And so prepare to remain in this darkness as long as you can, always begging for him you love; for if you are ever to feel or see him...it must always be in this cloud and this darkness."

— The Cloud of Unknowing and Other Works. Translated by A. C. Spearing

and a work by Ibn Arabi, the Spanish Islamic mystic, The Universal Tree and the Four Birds where he writes:

I heard a voice coming from me – but neither inside me nor outside me – say: “Why do you demand a high station when you are on the road? What have you to do with the sittings on the Throne; What have you to do with the celestial couches and sublime litters? What have you to do with the uppermost horizon? What have you to do with the screens of splendour? What have you to do with the radiant curtain? What have you to do with the Cloud? What have you to do with the impenetrable Veil of Sublimity?

The Cloud here is referred to in a hadith in which, before creation, God is said to have been in a Cloud above and below which there was no air. Given that Ibn Arabi lived in Andalusia (and well before The Cloud of Unknowing had been written) it wouldn't surprise me if there has been some cross-over; the Wikipedia page suggests the inspiration may have been St Augustines Confessions where he mentions he might have 'given more vigilant heed to the voice from the clouds' and 'thy Word which now appears to us in the dark image of the clouds and through the glass of heaven, and not as it really is'.

As further evidence of the above; there is this article, published in Greek Orthodox Theological Review by Seyyed Nasr in 1986 who writes:

There is a striking resemblance between Hesychast and Sufi teachings concerning the nature and meaning of the prayer of the heart itself ... The Hesychast tradition and Sufism share the belief that one should remember God constantly and with every breath, that this remembrance is none other than the invocation of a divine Name revealed as a sacrament, that this prayer is related to the heart understood spiritually and that the practice of the incantory method must be based upon the guidance of a teacher and master and is accompanied by appropriate instruction concerning meditation, the practice of virtue and other elements of the spiritual life