Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names
§ About this work
Writing to his fellow-Presbyter Timothy, Dionysius, having ended the Outlines of Divinity, undertakes an Exposition of the Divine Names, holding that God is celebrated only as the Scriptures reveal, as Super-Essential Cause who is nameless yet named from His beneficent Emanations (Part 1). Part 2 shows the Sacred Writers calling the Godhead both Nameless—citing the vision that rebukes one asking "What is thy name?"—and possessed of all names, human and symbolic. Continuing sections state that qualities pre-exist in the Creative Originals, that the Incarnation of Jesus surpasses all minds, and quote Hierotheus's Elements of Divinity on the Deity of Jesus and on Differentiation; extensive scriptural and editorial notes accompany each part. Chapter 3 opens with invocation of the Trinity, prayer figured by cord and cables, and Dionysius naming Hierotheus his preceptor next to Paul, recalling the gathering where James and Peter were present. Chapter 4 treats Good, Light, Beautiful, and Yearning, then argues at length that Evil is not existent and inheres neither in angels, devils, souls, beasts, nature, bodies, nor matter, being only deficiency of Good. Chapter 5 celebrates "Being" and the Exemplars; Chapter 6, Eternal Life, dismissing Simon; Chapter 7, Wisdom and "Foolish Wisdom"; Chapter 8, Power, Righteousness, Salvation, and Redemption, where the reply confounds Elymas the sorcerer. Chapters 9 and 10 expound Great, Small, Same, Motion, Equality, and "Omnipotent" and "Ancient of Days." Chapter 11 praises Peace and Very Being; Chapter 12, Holy of holies, King of kings, Lord of lords, God of gods. Chapter 13, on "Perfect" and "One," preferring the Negative method, closes the treatise on Intelligible Names, Dionysius asking Timothy to correct it before proceeding to Symbolical Divinity.
Chapter VII considers the Good and Eternal Life as Wise and as Very Wisdom, the Fount of all wisdom transcending all wisdom and understanding. God overflows with wisdom yet transcends Reason, Intelligence, and Wisdom. The text cites the divine man who says "The foolishness of God is wiser than men," explaining that writers on Divinity apply negative terms to God in a higher sense; the divine Apostle uses "foolishness" to hint at ineffable Truth. It states the act whereby the Intellect communes with what is beyond it transcends its nature, urging that language about God be given a transcendent sense and that one be transported wholly out of oneself and given unto God. This "Foolish Wisdom" is called the Cause of all Intelligence, Reason, Wisdom, and Knowledge. Section 2 describes how Angelic Minds derive blessed simple perceptions, free from matter and multiplicity. Human souls possess discursive Reason but through concentration attain intuitions like the Angels'. Sense-perceptions echo Wisdom; diabolic intelligence is called a declension from Wisdom. The text asks how the Supra-Sapient God can be called Wisdom, Mind, Reason, and Knowledge, answering that lack of Mind is predicated by excess, not defect. The Mind of God knows all things causally, knowing and creating angels before they were, citing "Who knoweth all things before their birth." Section 3 asks how one knows God, who is unknowable by nature; God is known in all things and apart from all things, through Knowing and Unknowing. Wisdom made all things (Prov. viii). Section 4 states God is called "Word" or "Reason," the existent Truth around which Faith revolves. It closes noting the Teachers die daily for the Truth, witnessing to the single Knowledge Christians possess.
Chapter 7, Section 1aChapter 7, Section 1bChapter 7, Section 1cChapter 7, Section 1dChapter 7, Section 1eChapter 7, Section 1f