The role of the Weyl curvature tensor in static sources of the Schwarzschild field is studied. It is shown that in general the contribution from the Weyl curvature tensor (the ‘‘purely gravitational field energy’’) to the mass-energy inside the body may be positive, negative, or zero. It is proved that a positive (negative) contribution from the Weyl tensor tends to increase (decrease) the effective gravitational mass, the red-shift (from a point in the sphere to infinity), as well as the gravitational force which acts on a constituent matter element of a body. It is also proved that the contribution from the Weyl tensor always is negative in sources with surface gravitational potential larger than (4/9. It is pointed out that large negative contributions from the Weyl tensor could give rise to the phenomenon of gravitational repulsion. A simple example which illustrates the results is discussed.

• Received 22 July 1987

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.37.309