Select Works, Section 358
Active Contemplationpraxis
A form of meditation that uses imagery, imagination, or symbolic thought rather than purely empty stillness.
The text describes the All as seeking or 'contemplates The Good' through its activity.
All passages →Apophatic Theologytheology
Describing the divine only by negation—God transcends all positive categories and concepts; the via negativa.
The author negates standard causal attributions, stating we cannot attribute causation to bodies or wills in the usual sense.
All passages →Cosmic Sympathycosmology
The Stoic and Plotinian doctrine that all parts of the cosmos are bound by hidden affinities, so that a movement in one part resonates through the whole; the metaphysical basis for astrology, magic, and divination.
[auto] The passage explicitly describes the All as 'self-sympathetic' and states that all things become one entity grouped by the diffusion of power.
All passages →Divine Providencetheology
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 passage describes the cosmos as being under a 'law of reason' with 'harmony and ordinance' rather than haphazard chance.
All passages →Divine Simplicitytheology
The doctrine that God has no parts, divisions, or composite attributes; pure undivided being.
The description of the being as a 'living unity' implies an undivided nature without composite parts or divisions.
All passages →Emanation Hierarchycosmology
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 implies a structure where Reason-Principles and Nature produce entities within the All.
All passages →Evil As Privationtheology
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.
The passage explicitly states that where harm appears, 'the flaw must be found in the inability of the subject to take in what would serve it' and that deficiency arises from 'the reluctance of its material substratum having prevented its perfect shaping under idea,' locating evil in lack rather than positive being.
All passages →Involutioncosmology
The doctrine that the cosmos unfolds as a structured descent of spirit into matter — a directional process traced stage by stage from an unconditioned principle down through successive planes to full materialization — complemented by its own eventual return ('evolution'). Distinct from emanation_hierarchy (the static structure of the resulting levels of the cascade) and cosmogony (a single originating event rather than an ongoing staged process) in naming the directional cosmic PROCESS of descent itself, paired with its own complementary ascent.
The passage describes a directional descent: 'whatever springs automatically from the All' and 'flowing from the major of an integral to its minor,' tracing the process from the higher principle down through successive levels of production.
All passages →Living Godtheology
The divine conceived as active, present, and dynamic—not an abstract principle but a personal responsive reality.
[auto] The divine being is characterized as a 'living unity' with a life that knows harmony and ordinance rather than haphazardness.
All passages →Logoscosmology
The divine reason, word, or ordering principle through which the universe was created; mediates between the transcendent God and the material world.
[auto] The text describes the universe as being under a 'law of reason' where groupings follow reason and harmony rather than haphazardness.
All passages →Monadcosmology
The absolutely simple, undivided first principle from which all multiplicity and existence flows.
The concept of a 'one will' governing the whole suggests a singular unifying principle.
All passages →Mystical Unionsoteriology
The merging of the individual soul or self with the divine, transcending personal identity.
The text mentions the good servant whose purpose is in 'union with his master's' and the All seeking The Good.
All passages →Numerical Mysticismtheology
Numbers, proportions, and mathematical relationships as the underlying structure of divine reality.
[auto] The passage explicitly states that all members of the living whole are under a 'rule of Number' and references triangular configurations as examples of power.
All passages →Unity Of Beingtheology
The doctrine that all existence is ultimately one substance or one divine reality; non-duality as a theological claim.
[auto] The passage defines the being considered as a 'living unity' and refers to the 'expressive act of the All' as a cohesive whole.
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