Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names · 1 of 4 · tr. C.E. Rolt
Chapter 3, Section 1a
CHAPTER III What is the power of Prayer?
Also concerning the Blessed Hierotheus and concerning Reverence and the Writing of Divinity.
1.
And first of all, if it like thee, let us consider the highest Name, even “Goodness,” by which all the Emanations of God are conjointly revealed.
231 231 All God’s activities are good.
And let us begin with an invocation of the Trinity, the Which, as It surpasseth Goodness, and is the Source of all goodness, doth reveal all conjoined together Its own good providences.
232 232 The particular activities of God exist as one Act in Him, cf.
p.
79, n.
2.
So St.
Thomas (following Aristotle) calls Him Actus Purus.
For we must first lift up our minds in prayer unto the Primal Goodness, and by drawing nearer Thereunto, we must thus be initiated into the mystery of those good gifts which are rooted in Its being.
For the Trinity is nigh unto all things, and yet not all things are nigh unto It.
233 233 Cf p.
77, n.
1.
And when we call upon It with holy prayers and unspotted 82 mind and with our souls prepared for union with God, then are we also nigh Thereto; for It is not in space, so as to be absent from any spot, or to move from one position to another.
234 234 This is profound.
Spatial metaphors are always dangerous, though unavoidable, in Theology.
In space if A is touching B then B must be touching A.
In the spiritual world this is not so.
God is near me (or rather to me), and yet I may be far from God because I may be far from my own true self.
I must seek my true self where it is, in God.
It is the paradox of Personality that my true self is outside myself and I can only gain it by casting aside this counterfeit “self.” Cf.
p.
77, n.
1, and Intr., p.
15.
Nay, to speak of It as omnipresent doth not express Its all-transcendent all-embracing Infinitude.
235 235 Even the word “omnipresent” suggests that God is in space, whereas really His existence is non-spatial.
Let us then press on in prayer, looking upwards to the Divine benignant Rays, even as if a resplendent cord were hanging from the height of heaven unto this world below, and we, by seizing it with alternate hands in one advance, appeared to pull it down; but in very truth instead of drawing down the rope (the same being already nigh us above and below), we were ourselves being drawn upwards to the higher Refulgence of the resplendent Rays.
Or even as, having embarked on a ship and clinging to the cables, the which being stretched out from some rock unto us, presented themselves (as it were) for us to lay hold upon them, we should not be drawing the rock towards ourselves, but should, in very truth, be drawing ourselves and the vessel towards the rock; as also, conversely, if any one standing upon the vessel pushes away the rock that is on the shore, he will not affect the rock (which stands immovable) but will separate himself therefrom, and the more he pushes it so much the more will he be staving himself away.
Hence, before every endeavour, more especially if the subject be Divinity, must we begin with prayer: not as though we would pull down to ourselves that Power which is 83 nigh both everywhere and nowhere, but that, by these remembrances and invocations of God, we may commend and unite ourselves Thereunto.
2.
A form of meditation that uses imagery, imagination, or symbolic thought rather than purely empty stillness.
The prayer practice described uses rich imagery (the cord, the ship, the rock, the rays) and imaginative engagement with divine presence rather than purely empty stillness.
The doctrine that the divine is present within all things and the universe itself, pervading creation rather than remaining solely transcendent above it. Distinct from unity_of_being (the general claim that all existence is one substance, agnostic about whether that substance indwells its parts) and from kingdom_within (the divine present specifically IN THE INDIVIDUAL human, accessible without mediation) — divine_immanence is the general pervading-presence claim applied to all of creation, not a human-specific indwelling.
'The Trinity is nigh unto all things' and 'nigh both everywhere and nowhere' express the divine as pervading all of creation while simultaneously transcending it.
Pronoia — the doctrine that the divine actively orders the unfolding of the cosmos and human affairs toward intelligible ends, against pure chance or blind necessity.
The Trinity 'reveal[s] all conjoined together Its own good providences,' explicitly naming the doctrine of active divine ordering of all things.
A chain of divine beings or principles flowing downward from a single transcendent source (the One or the Father), each level less perfect than the one above.
It references 'Emanations of God' and distinguishes between the Trinity and Goodness.
Disciplined inward attention — sitting, focused, or open-awareness practice — as a stand-alone term that umbrellas active_contemplation, inner_silence, and dhyana-style sitting.
The practice of lifting the mind in prayer and remembrance constitutes disciplined inward attention.
Using apparent contradiction, reversal, or riddle to destabilise ordinary understanding and induce insight.
The passage repeatedly employs paradox ('nigh unto all things, and yet not all things are nigh unto It'; 'nigh both everywhere and nowhere'; the rope that is not pulled down but draws the puller up) to destabilize ordinary spatial and causal understanding.
A staged journey of the soul upward through heavenly realms or levels of being toward the divine source.
The rope and ship metaphors both describe the soul being drawn upward toward the divine source, and 'looking upwards to the Divine benignant Rays' frames the entire prayer practice as an upward movement.
The doctrine that the one Godhead or first principle subsists as three co-equal aspects or persons rather than a bare unity — the Christian Father/Son/Holy Ghost invoked in the recurring liturgical formula 'In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,' but structurally the same pattern as the Egyptian Amen/Ptah/Osiris, the Hindu Brahma/Vishnu/Siva, and the Kabbalistic Chochmah/Binah/Kether triads that esoteric writers explicitly map onto it as instances of one universal law. Distinct from unity_of_being (the general claim that all existence is one substance, agnostic about internal plurality) and divine_simplicity (God as having no parts or divisions at all) in asserting a definite three-aspected differentiation within a single divine essence.
The passage explicitly invokes the Trinity as the subject of prayer and identifies it as the source of all goodness and the revealer of divine providences.