Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names · 9 of 12 · tr. C.E. Rolt
Chapter 5, Section 1i
364 The ultimate Godhead is reached only by the Negative Path, and known only by Unknowing.
The Affirmative Path of philosophical knowledge leads only to the differentiated manifestations of the Godhead: e.g.
the Trinity, in Its creative and redemptive activities, is known by the Affirmative Method, but behind these activities and the faculty for them lies an ultimate Mystery where the Persons transcend Themselves and are fused (though not confused).
365 In spiritual Communion, the mind, being joined with God, distinguishes itself from Him as Self from Not-Self, Subject from Object.
And this law was fulfilled even in the Human Soul of Christ, Who distinguished Himself from His Father.
The Persons of the Trinity, though they lie deeper than this temporal world (being, in Their eternal emanative Desire, the Ground of its existence), were manifested through the Incarnation.
Hence the distinction of Father, Son, and Spirit, revealed in the Human Soul of Christ, exists eternally in the Trinity.
And those who reach the Unitive State, since they reach it only through the Spirit of Christ and are one spirit with Him, must in a lesser degree reveal the Personal Differentiations of the Trinity in their lives.
But because the eternal Differentiations of the Trinity transcend Themselves in-the Super-Essence, therefore Their manifestations in the Unitive State lead finally to a point beyond Union where all distinctions are transcended.
At that point the distinction between Self and Not-Self, Subject and Object, vanishes in the unknowable Mystery of the Divine Darkness.
The Self has disappeared and been, in a sense, merged.
But in another sense the Self remains.
This is the paradox of Personality—that it seeks (and attains) annihilation in the Supra-personal plane, and yet on the relative plane retains its own particular being.
This is the paradox of Love.
See Intr., p.
28 f., and p.8.
366 i.
e.
Extends both to good things and to bad things and is beyond the opposition between good and bad.
The Good extends to bad things because evil is a mere distortion of good, and no evil thing could exist but for an element of good holding it together: its existence, qua existence, is good.
See ch.
iv.
The Good is beyond the opposition between good and evil because on the ultimate plane nothing exists outside It.
It is beyond relationships.
Hence also beyond Existence, Life, and Wisdom, since these (as we know them) imply relationships.
367 Sense-perception is a direct apprehension of that which we actually touch, see, hear, taste, or smell; Reason or Inference is an indirect apprehension of that which we do not actually touch, see, etc.
Intuition is a direct apprehension of that which (by its very nature) we do not touch, see, etc.
Sense perception, Reason, and Intuition are refractions from the perfect Light of Divine Wisdom; but the Divine Wisdom is beyond them because God apprehends all things, not as existent outside Himself, but as existent in Himself, under the form of a single Unity which is identical with His own Being.
The Godhead is a Single Desire wherein alt the souls eternally exist as fused and inseparable elements.
368 See Ps.
xvii.
22 .
369 i.
e.
Is the Source of Goodness, existence, life, wisdom, etc.
370 The title “Good” applies to all God’s providential activity, for everything that He makes is good.
And even evil is good depraved; and exists as good in the Good (see p.
132, n.
i ).
Or, rather, evil possesses not an existence but a non-existence in the Good.
It is (according to D.) a kind of non-existent good.
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.
The text mentions the Trinity's manifestation through the Incarnation and the Ground of existence lying deeper than the temporal world.
Augustinian and Plotinian doctrine that evil has no positive being of its own but is a lack, distortion, or absence of the good — denying ontological dualism while preserving moral seriousness.
Evil is described as a distortion of good or a non-existence in the Good rather than a positive ontological entity.
Sufi self-effacement in God — the via by which the lover is unmade as a separate ego and recovered as God's act; specifies the practice/event rather than mystical_union's resulting state.
The passage describes the Self disappearing and being merged with God in the Unitive State.
Diotima's staged ascent from love of beautiful bodies → beautiful souls → beautiful pursuits → beautiful knowledge → Beauty itself; the canonical scala amoris that grounds Plotinus's On the Beautiful and Bruno's Eroici Furori — distinct from generic spiritual_ascent in that eros is the specific motive force.
Love is presented as a paradoxical force that seeks and attains annihilation in the Supra-personal plane.
The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive.
The passage notes that the Persons of the Trinity lie deeper than the temporal world and are manifested through the Incarnation.