Pseudo-Dionysius: The Mystical Theology · 8 of 11 · tr. C.E. Rolt
Chapter V-a
That He Who is the Pre-eminent Cause of everything intelligibly perceived is not Himself any one of the things intelligibly perceived.
Once more, ascending yet higher we maintain 537 537 It is not (1) a Thinking Subject; nor (2) an Act or Faculty of Thought; nor (3) an Object of Thought.
that It is not soul, or mind, or endowed with the faculty of imagination, conjecture, reason, or understanding; nor is It any act of reason or understanding; 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 538 538 Divine Names, II.
7.
Godhead is regarded as the property of Deified men, and so belongs to relativity.
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 does It know them as they actually are; 539 539 It knows only Itself, and there knows all things in their Super-Essence—sub specie aeternitatis.
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; 540 540 Truth is an Object of Thought.
Therefore, being beyond objectivity, the ultimate Reality is not Truth.
But still less is It Error.
201 nor can any affirmation or negation 541 541 Cf.
p.
199, n.
2.
apply to it; for while applying affirmations or negations to those orders of being that come next to It, we apply 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.
542 542 It is (1) richer than all concrete forms of positive existence; (2) more simple than the barest abstraction.
(Cf.
p.
196, n.
i.) 514 Lit.
“Super-Essential, Supra-Divine, Super-Excellent.” 515 Lit.
“Oracles” i.
e.
to the most exalted and mystical teaching of Holy Scripture.
516 Gk.
ἀγνώστως refers to a transcendent or spiritual Unknowing (as disinguished from mere ignorance).
517 “The Super-Essential Ray of Divine Darkness.” 518 i.
e.
Philosophers and unmystical theologians.
519 i.
e.
Those who accept “popular theology.” The first stage of theistic Religion is anthropomorphic, and God is thought of (like Jehovah) as a magnified man of changing moods.
Popular religion seldom rises above this level, and even gifted theologians often sink to it.
But it is, D.
tells us, the lowest stage.
Then comes a metaphysical stage.
God is now thought of as a timeless Being and therefore changeless, but the conception of a magnified man has been refined rather than abolished.
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 ascending higher levels of being toward the divine source, implying a hierarchical structure.
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.
Existence is contrasted with non-existence, and evil is defined as a lack of the good rather than positive being.