Tnis also looks like a barren paradox and yet it may contain a spiritual truth. Evil is, in the words of Goethe, " ihe spirit that denies" : It is destructive, e.g. injustice, cruelty, immorality, etc., undermine or overwhelm civilization and so destroy it. But the Good supersedes civilization and so in a sense destroys it. Cf. the eschatological teach ing of Christ. Civilization, art, morality, etc., are good so lar as they go, but imperfect. Being halfway, as it were, between Good and evil, and being of necessity neither wholly the one nor wholly the other, they must disappear wherever the one or the other completely triumphs. Christ's teaching on Marriage illustrates this. Marriage is sacred, and divorce is wrong, because it seeks to abolish Marriage. And yet Marriage is finally abolished in heaven. St. Paul's antithesis of Law and Spirit is another example. The Law is good and yet is not the Good. Sin is contrary to the Law, but the Spirit is contrary to the Law in another sense and so supersedes it. So too with art. A modern vandal is indifferent to beauty because he is below it, a Mediaeval Saint became sometimes indifferent to beauty by rising to a super-sensuous plane above it. Greek idolatry is a higher thing than Calvinism, but the Christianity of the New Testament is a higher thing than Greek idolatry. The Saints sometimes employ negatives in one sense and those who are not saints employ the same negatives in another ; whence disaster. Much of Nietzsche's language {e. g. the ))hrase "Beyond Good and Evil") might have been used by a Mediaeval Christian Mystic ; but Nietzsche did not generally mean what the Christian Mystic would have meant by it. Soo too with pain. All pain is in itself bad, being a negation of our personality. And yet a self-abnegation springing from Love which bravely bears pain is the liighest kind of Good. " The devil . , . put it into the heart of Judas to betray" Christ, and yet the Passion was in accordance with " the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God."
The Divine Names 91
thinkini^ of other matters) owe their oric,n"ii to
the Good. Such is this universe, which lessens not
nor grows, and such the noiseless movements (if
noiseless they be)^ of the vast heavenly revolution,
and such the starry orders whose light is fixed as
an ornament of heaven, and such the various wander-
ings of certain stars — especially the repeated and
returning orbits of those two luminaries to which
the Scripture giveth the name of '* Great," ^ whereby
we reckon our days and nights and months and
years ; which define the round of time and temporal
events and give them measurement, sequence, and
cohesion. And what shall I say concerning the
sun's rays considered in themselves ? From the
Good comes the light which is an image of Good-
ness ; wherefore the Good is described by the name
of " Light," being the archetype thereof which is
revealed in that image. For as the Goodness of the
all-transcendent Godhead reaches from the highest
and most perfect forms of being unto the lowest,
and still is beyond them all, remaining superior to
those above and retaining those below in its embrace,
and so gives light to all things that can receive It,
and creates and vitalizes and maintains and perfects
them, and is the Measure ^ of the Universe and its
Eternity,^ its Numerical Principle,-^ its Order, its
^ 61 ovTw xph (pdvaL. D. is alluding to the ancient belief in the Music of the Spheres.
2 Gen. i. 16.
^ fierpov. All things have their pre-existcnt limits in the Super- Essence.
* alwv — 7.1?. The Permanent Principle underlying its temporal process. This and the next phrase explain what is meant by the words "the Measure of the universe." The Good sets bounds to the world (i) temporally, because Eternity is the Fount of Time, (2) spatially, because Transcendent Unity is the Fount of Number. All temporal things are permanent in God ; and all diversities are one in Him.
^ All number has its roots in the Good. Elsewhere D. says that the Good being beyond Unity, is a Multiplicity as well as an Unity. Cf. Intr., p. 5.
92 Dionysius the Areopagite
Embracing Power, its Cause and its End : ^ even so
this great, all-bright and ever-shining sun, which is
the visible image of the Divine Goodness, faintly re-
echoing the activity of the Good, illumines all things
that can receive its light while retaining the utter
simplicity of light, and expands above and below
throughout the visible world the beams of its
own radiance. And if there is aught that does not
share them, this is not due to any weakness or
deficiency in its distribution of the light, but is due
to the unreceptiveness of those creatures which do
not attain sufficient singleness to participate therein.
For verily the light passeth over many such sub-
stances and enlightens those which are beyond them,
and there is no visible thing unto which the light
reacheth not in the exceeding greatness of its proper
radiance.^ Yea, and it contributes to the birth of
material bodies and brings them unto life, and
nourishes them that they may grow, and perfects
and purifies and renews them. And the light is the
measure and the numerical principle of seasons and
of days and of all our earthly Time ; for 'tis the
selfsame light (though then without a form) which,
Moses the Divine declares, marked even that first
period of three days which was at the beginning of
time. And like as Goodness draweth all things to
Itself, and is the great Attractive Power which unites
things that are sundered ^ (being as It is : the God-
head and the Supreme Fount and Producer of Unity) ;
^ Here we get once more the Aristotelian classification of causes. The Good is : —
(i) Formal Cause (i) immanent in the world (Order — Ti\i%); (2) containing the world (Embracing Power — Trepioxv)-
(ii) Efficient Cause (Cause — alria).
(iii) Final Cause (End — reAos).
^ The lii^ht permeates water but it does not permeate a stone. It passes over the stone and permeates the water beyond it.
•* apxiavvayuiyos iari twv effKebaff/xevwu.
TlIK DIVINE NAMES 93
and like as all thiiii^s desire It as their bcginniiii^,
their cohesive power and end ; and like as 'tis the
Good (as saith the Scripture) from which all thini^s
were made and are (having been brought into exist-
ence thence as from a Perfect Cause) ; and like as in
the Good all things subsist, being kept and controlled
in an almight}' Receptacle ; ^ and like as unto the
Good all things are turned (as unto the proper End
of each) ; and Hke as after the Good all things do
yearn — those that have mind and reason seeking It
by knowledge, those that have perception seeking
It by perception, those that have no perception seek-
ing It by the natural movement of their vital instinct,
and those that are without life and have mere
existence seeking It by their aptitude for that bare
participation whence this mere existence is theirs ^ —
even so doth the light (being as it were Its visible
image) draw together all things and attract them
unto Itself: those that can see, those that have
motion, those that receive Its light and warmth,
those that are merely held in being by Its rays ; ^
whence the sun is so called because it summeth*^ all
things and uniteth the scattered elements of the w^orld.
All material things desire the sun, for they desire
either to see or to move and to receive light and
warmth and to be maintained in existence by the
light. I say not (as was feigned by the ancient
myth) that the sun is the God and Creator of this
Universe, and therefore takes the visible world
under his special care ; but I say that the " invisible
things of God from the creation of the world
are clearly seen, being understood by the things
^ i'S ej/ iTavroKpaTopiK(f TrvO/xepi. ~ (1) Man, (2) Animal, (3) Vegetable, (4) Matter. ^ This seems to imply that matter itself could not exist without the influence of the light. Perhaps this belief rests on Gen. i. i, 2. ■* r,\ios oTi TTOLvra aoWrj irotel. With the wa?/ etymology of. iv .5.
94 Dionysius the Areopagite
that are made, even His eternal power and God- head." 1
5. But these things are dealt with in the'' Symbolic
Divinity." Here I desire to declare what is the
spiritual meaning of the name " Light " as belonging
to the Good.^ The Good God is called Spiritual Light
because He fills every heavenly mind with spiritual
light, and drives all ignorance and error from all
souls where they have gained a lodgment, and giveth
them all a share of holy light and purges their
spiritual eyes from the mist of ignorance that sur-
rounds them, and stirs and opens the eyes which
are fast shut and weighed down with darkness, and
gives them first a moderate illumination, then (when
they taste the Light and desire It more) He giveth
Himself in cfreatcr measure and shineth in more
abundance on them " because they have loved much,"
and ever He constraineth them according to their
powers of looking upwards.
6. And so that Good which is above all light is
called a Spiritual Light because It is an Originating
Beam and an Overflowing Radiance, illuminating
with its fullness every Mind above the world, around
it, or within it,^ and renewing all their spiritual
powers, embracing them all by Its transcendent com-
pass and exceeding them all by Its transcendent
elevation. And It contains within Itself, in a simple
form, the entire ultimate principle of light ; '^ and is
^ Rom. i. 20. The sun is not personal or supra- personal. But its impersonal activity is an emblem, as it were, of God's supra-personal activity.
^ Two worlds : (i) Nature, (2) Grace. God is revealed in both ; the former was apparently the subject oi \ht Symbolic Divinity; the latter is that of the present treatise.
^ i.e. Men and different orders of angels.
* Material lic^lit is diffused in space and hence is divisible. The Spiritual Light is indivisible, being totally present to each illuminated mind. Hence the Spiritual Light is simple in a way that the material light is not.
The Divine Names 95
the Transcendent Archetype of Light ; and, while bearing; the h'i;ht in its womb, It exceeds it in qiiah'ty and precedes it in time ; and so conjoineth together all spiritual and rational beings, uniting them in one.^ For as ignorance leadeth wanderers astray from one another, so doth the presence of Spiritual Light join and unite together those that are being illuminated, and perfects them and converts them toward that which truly Is — yea, converts them from their mani- fold false opinions and unites their different percep- tions, or rather fancies, into one true, pure and coherent knowledge, and filleth them with one unifying light.
7. This Good is described by the Sacred Writers
as Beautiful and as Beauty, as Love or Beloved, and
by all other Divine titles which befit Its beautifying
and gracious fairness. Now there is a distinction
between the titles " Beautiful " and " Beauty " applied
to the all-embracing Cause. For we universally dis-
tinguish these two titles as meaning respectively the
qualities shared and the objects which share therein.
We give the name of " Beautiful " to that which
shares in the quality of beauty, and we give the
name of " Beauty " to that common quality by which
all beautiful things are beautiful. But the Super-
Essential Beautiful is called " Beauty" because of that
quality which It imparts to all things severally ac-
cording to their nature,^ and because It is the Cause
of the harmony and splendour in all things, flashing
forth upon them all, like light, the beautifying com-
munications of Its originating ray ; and because It
summons all things to fare unto Itself (from whence
It hath the name of '* Fairness "2), and because It
^ All our spiritual and mental powers are due to the same Spiritual Light working in each one of us. Cf. Wordsworth: "Those mys- teries of Being which have made and shall continue evermore to make of the whole human race one brotherhood."
2 Cf. ii. 8.
' uiS iravra irphs eavrh KaKovv {oQfv koX kolWos \4yeTai). Cf. iv. 4.
96 Dionysius the Areopagite
draws all things together in a state of mutual inter-
penetration. And it is called " Beautiful " because
It is All-Beautiful and more than Beautiful, and is
eternally, unvaryingly, unchangeably Beautiful ; in-
capable of birth or death or growth or decay ; and
not beautiful in one part and foul in another ; nor yet
at one time and not at another ; nor yet beautiful in
relation to one thing but not to another ; nor yet
beautiful in one place and not in another (as if It
were beautiful for some but were not beautiful for
others); nay, on the contrary. It is, in Itself and by
Itself, uniquely and eternally beautiful, and from
beforehand It contains in a transcendent manner the
originating beauty of everything that is beautiful.
For in the simple and supernatural nature belonging
to the world of beautiful things,^ all beauty and all
that is beautiful hath its unique and pre-existent
Cause. From this Beautiful all things possess their
existence, each kind being beautiful in its own manner,
and the Beautiful causes the harmonies and sympa-
thies and communities of all things. And by the
Beautiful all things are united together and the Beau-
tiful is the beginning of all things, as being the
Creative Cause which moves the world and holds all
things in existence by their yearning for their own
Beauty. And It is the Goal of all things, and their
Beloved, as being their Final Cause (for 'tis the desire
of the Beautiful that brings them all into existence),
and It is their Exemplar^ from which they derive
their definite limits; and hence the Beautiful is the