3 The Go()d--(i) ihc Undifferentiated (jodhcad, and hence, in Manifesiion, (2) CJod the Father as tlic Fount of Godhead to the ollur
The Mystical Theology 197
Jesus being above all essence^ has stooped to an
essential state in which all the truths of human nature
meet ; and all the other revelations of Scripture
whereof my Outlines of Divinity treat. And in the
book of the Divine Names I have considered the
meaning as concerning God of the titles Good,
l^^xistent, Life, Wisdom, Power and of the other titles
which the understanding frames, and in my Symbolic
Divinity I have considered what are the metaphorical
titles drawn from the world of sense and applied to
the nature of God ; what are the mental or material
images we form of God or the functions and instru-
ments of activity we attribute to Him; what are the
places where He dwells and the robes He is adorned
with; what is meant by God's anger, grief, and
indignation, or the divine inebriation and wrath ;
what is meant by God's oath and His malediction, by
His slumber and awaking, and all the other inspired
imagery of allegoric symbolism. And I doubt not
that you have also observed how far more copious
are the last terms than the flrst^for the doctrines of
God's Nature and the exposition of His Names could
not but be briefer than the Symbohc Divinity.^ For
Persons. The Rays == God the Son and God the Holy Ghost, Who, as manifested Differentiations, eternally proceed from the Father.
The separate being of the Three Persons exists on the plane of Manifestation (of. St. Augustine, who says : " They exist seciindiini relativum and not secundum essentiavi"). [Augustine says non secundum suhstantiani. The translator quotes it correctly in his intro- duction, p. 10. — Ed.] But this plane is eternal. They wholly inter- penetrate, and the state of rest is co-eternal with the Act of Their Procession, because They possess eternal repose and eternal motion.
^ This is a case of cornmtinicatio idiomaium (cf. the title " Mother of God" applied to ihe Blessed Virgin Mary). The Godhead of our Lord is Super-Essential, not His Manhood.
^ ll\i(t Symbolical Divinity v;z% an attempt to spiritualize "popular " theology, the Divine Names sought to spiritualize philosophical theo- logy, the present treatise is a direct essay in Spiritual Theology.
198 Dionysius the Areopagite
the more that we soar upwards the more our language
becomes restricted to the compass of purely intel-
lectual conceptions, even as in the present instance
plunging into the Darkness which is above the
intellect we shall find ourselves reduced not merely
to brevity of speech but even to absolute dumbness
both of speech and thought. Now in the former
treatises the course of the argument, as it came down
from the highest to the lowest categories, embraced
an ever-widening number of conceptions which in-
creased at each stage of the descent, but in the
present treatise it mounts upwards from below towards
^ the category of transcendence, and in proportion to
its ascent it contracts its terminology, and when the
whole ascent is passed it will be totally dumb, being
at last wholly united with Him Whom words cannot
describe.^ But why is it, you will ask, that after
beginning from the highest category when one method
was affirmative we begin from the lowest category
where it is negative P^ Because, when affirming the
existence of that which transcends all affirmation,
we were obliged to start from that which is most
akin to It, and then to make the affirmation on which
the rest depended ; but when pursuing the negative
method, to reach that which is beyond all negation,
we must start by applying our negations to those
qualities which differ most from the ultimate goal.
Surely it is truer to affirm that God is life and good-
ness than that He is air or stone, and truer to deny
that drunkenness or fury can be attributed to Him
^ At the last stage but one the mind beholds an Object to Which all terms of thought are inadequate. Then, at the last stage, even the distinction between Subject and Object disappears, and the mind itself is That Which it contemplates. Thought itself is transcended, and the whole 0])ject-realm vanishes. One Subject now knows itself as the part and knows itself as the Whole.
^ In the Divine Names the order of procedure was: Goodness, Existence, Life, etc. Now it passes from sense-perception to thought.
The Mystical Theology 199
tlian to deny that we may ap[)ly to llim the categories of liuman tlioiight.^
Chapter Iv
That He Who is the rrc-cmi?ient Cause of ei'erythifijj; sefisibly
perceived is not Himself any oi.e of the things sensibly
perceived.
We therefore maintain ^ that the universal Cause
transcending all things is neither impersonal nor
lifeless, nor irrational nor without understanding: in
short, that It is not a material body, and therefore
does not possess outward shape or intelligible form,
or quality, or quantity, or solid weight ; nor has It
any local existence which can be perceived by sight
or touch ; nor has It the power of perceiving or
being perceived ; nor does It suffer any vexation
or disorder through the disturbance of earthly
passions, or any feebleness through the tyranny of
material chances, or any want of light ; nor any
change, or decay, or division, or deprivation, or ebb
and flow, or anything else which the senses can
perceive. None of these things can be either
identified with it or attributed unto It,
^ This shows that the Via Negativa is not purely negative.
^ Being about to explain, in these two last chai:»teis, that no mateiial or mental qualities are pj-esent in the Godhead, D. safeguards the position against pure negativity by explaining that they are not absent either. The rest of this chapter deals with the qualities (i) of inanimate matter ; (2) of material life.
200 Dionysius the Areopagite
Chapter V
That He WIio is the Pf-eemhicut Cause of every thi7ig intelli-
gibly perceived is not Himself any one of the thiiigs
intelligibly perceived.
Once more, ascending yet higher we maintain^
that It is not soul, or mind, or endowed with the
faculty of imagination, conjecture, reason, or under-
standing ; nor is It any act of reason or under-
standing ; nor can It be described by the reason
or perceived by the understanding, since It is not
number, or order, or greatness, or littleness, or
equality, or inequality, and since It is not immovable
nor in motion, or at rest, and has no power, and is not
power or light, and does not live, and is not life ; nor
is It personal essence, or eternity, or time ; nor can
It be grasped by the understanding, since It is not
knowledge or truth; nor is It kingship or wisdom ;
nor is It one, nor is It unity, nor is It Godhead^ or
Goodness ; nor is It a Spirit, as we understand the
term., since It is not Sonship or Fatherhood ; nor
is It any other thing such as we or any other being
can have knowledge of; nor does It belong to the
category of non-existence or to that of existence ;
nor do existent beings know It as it actually is, nor
docs It know them as they actually are ; ^ nor can
the reason attain to It to name It or to know It ;
nor is it darkness, nor is It light, or error, or truth ;^
' It is not (i) a Thinking Subject ; nor (2) an Act or Faculty of Th()Uf;ht ; nor (3) an Object of Thought.
"^ Divine Names, II. 7. Godhead is regarded as tlie property of Deified men, and so bek)ngs to relativity.
•' It knows only Itself, and there knows all things in their Supcr- I^ssence — stib specie adtrnilalis.
■• Truth is an Object of Thought. Therefore, being beyond ob- jectivity, the ultimate Reality is not Truth. But still less is It Error,
The Mystical Theology 201
nor can any affirmation or negation^ ''^PP^y ^^ i^ i
for while apj)l)'ing afilrmations or negations to those
orders of being th;it come next to It, we api)Iy not
unto It either affirmation or negation, inasmuch as
It transcends all affirmation by being the perfect
and unique Cause of all things, and transcends all
negation by the pre-eminence of Its simple and
absolute nature — free from every limitation and
beyond them all.^
^ Cf. p. 199, n. 2.
' It is (i) richer than all concrete forms of positive existence; (2) more simple than the barest abstraction. (Cf. p. 196, n. i.)
THE INFLUENCE OF DIONYSIUS IN RELIGIOUS HISTORY
By W. J. Sparrow-Simpson
The significance of the teaching of Dionysius
cannot be appreciated aright without tracing to
some extent his influence on subsequent religious
thought.
Four works of the Areopa^^ite survive. They
are: Concerning the Heavenly Hierarchy; Concern-
ing the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy ; Concerning the
Divine Names ; and, Concerning Mystical Theology.
Commentaries upon them began to be written at
an early date. The first great propagator of Dio-
nysian theories was the very able monk and confessor
Maximus. Maximus, who died in the year 662,
wrote notes on all four treatises. These still survive,
and may be found in the collected edition of the
works of the Areopagite. Maximus is remarkably
clear and acute, and contributed not a little to extend
his Master's reputation. He was gifted with a sim-
plicity of style which the Areopagite by no means
shared, and expounded with great clearness the
difficult passages of Dionysius. And certainly the
reader will not deny that those passages are by no
means few.
Already, before Maximus's labours, the teaching of the Areopagite was known in the West, and was
appealed to by Pope Martin the First in the Latcran
Influence in Religious History 203
CoLincil of 649. Martin complained that the doc-
trine of the Areopagite was being mi.sre[)resented.
Dionx'sius was being credited with ascribing to Christ
one divino-human activity (^nna opcraiio deivii'ilis)^
whereas what Dion}'sius had written was a new
divino-human activity (y.atvr] Oeardqix}) Eveoyeia, nova
ope ratio dciviyills)} Apart from tlie theological
controversy implied in the respective phrases, it is
remarkable to find what authority is already ascribed
to its teaching.
But it is really quite impossible to appreciate the
historic place of Dionysius without a study of John
Scotus Erigena. It was Erigena who in reality
popularized Dionysius for Latin Christendom. The
Greek writings of the Areopagite had been sent
to the Galilean Church by Pope Paul in 757, and
remained for nearly a century unread in the Abbey
of St. Denis. Then Erigena, at the request of Charles
the Bald, undertook to translate them into Latin.
This he accomplished for all the four principal
works.
But Erigena did vastly more than merely act as
translator. He incorporated the principles of the
Areopagite in his celebrated treatise De Divisione
NaturcE, in which his own speculative system is con-
tained, and which may be said to be as representative
of his mind as the De Pi'incipiis is for Origen or the
Sinnma for St. Thomas.
Erigena bases his whole conception of Deity on
the teaching of Dionysius. The treatise is thrown
into the form of a discussion between the Master and
a Disciple. It is an attempt to reconcile Theology
with Philosophy After the Master has insisted on
the ineffable and incomprehensible nature of the
Divine essence, the Disciple inquires how this propo-
sition is to be reconciled with the teaching of the
^ See Hefele, Conciliengeschichte, Bd. III. 196.
204 Dionysius the Areopagite
Theologians on the Unity and Trinity of God. The
incomprehensibility of the First Cause appears self-
evident. And if Deity is incomprehensible, definition
is impossible. For that which cannot be understood
certainly cannot be defined. We can only say that
God is ; but what He is we are unable to affirm.
But if this is so, why have the Theologians ventured
to predicate Unity and Trinity as characteristics of
the ultimate reality ?
To the Disciple's criticism the Master replies by
appealing to the teaching of the Areopagite. Did
not the Areopagite affirm that no words, no names,
no expression whatever, can express the supreme and
causal essence of all things,? That authority is quoted
as decisive.
Neither the Unity nor the Trinity in God is such
that the clearest human intellect is able to conceive
it. Why, then, have the Theologians taught these
doctrines?
Erigena's answer is : In order to provide religious
people with some definite object for contemplation
and instruction.
For this purpose the faithful are bidden to believe
in their heart and confess with their lips that God is
good, and that He exists in one Divine essence and
three persons.
And this teaching of the Theologians is, in the
Master's opinion, not without philosophical justifi-
cation.
Vox contemplating the ineffable cause of all things, the Theologians speak of the Unity.
Then again, contemplating this Divine Unity as
extended into multiplicity, they affirm the Trinity.
And the Trinity is the unbegottcn, the begotten, and
the proceeding.