Barlaam of Seminara (Bernardo Massari, as a layman), ca. 1290-1348, or Barlaam of Calabria was a southern Italian scholar (Aristotelian scholastic) and clergyman of the 14th century, as well as a Humanist, a philologist, and a theologian. When Gregory Palamas defended Hesychasm (the Eastern Orthodox Church's mystical teaching on prayer), Barlaam accused him of heresy. Three Orthodox synods ruled against him and in Palamas's favor (two "Councils of Sophia" in June and August 1341, and a "Council of Blachernae" in 1351).