The Divine Names

^7. Now all the grounds of these Unifications, and Differentiations in the Divine Nature which the Scriptures have revealed to us, we have explained in the Outlines of Divinity, to the best of our abilities, treating separately of each. The latter class we have philosophically unravelled and unfolded, and so have sought to guide the holy and unspotted mind to contemplate the shining truths of Scripture, while the former class we have endeavoured (in accordance with Divine Tradition) to apprehend as Mysteries in a manner beyond the activities of our minds.^[202] For all Divine things, even those that are revealed to us, are only known by their Communications. Their ultimate nature, which they possess in their own original being, is beyond Mind and beyond all Being and Knowledge.^[203] For instance, if we call the Super-Essential Mystery by the Name of “God,’’ or “Life,” or “Being,” or “Light,” or “Word,” we conceive of nothing else than the powers that stream Therefrom to us bestowing Godhead, Being, Life or Wisdom;^[204] while that Mystery Itself we strive to apprehend by casting aside all the activities of our mind, since we behold no Deification,^[205] or Life, or Being, which exactly resembles the altogether and utterly Transcendent Cause of all things. Again, that the Father is Originating Godhead while Jesus and the Spirit are (so to speak) Divine Off-shoots of the Paternal Godhead, and, as it were, Blossoms and Super-Essential Shinings Thereof we learn from Holy Scripture; but how these things are so we cannot say, nor yet conceive.

8. Just so far can the powers of our.minds attain as to see that all spiritual paternity and sonship is a gift bestowed from the all-transcendent Archetypal Fatherhood and Sonship both upon us and also upon the celestial Powers: whereby Godlike Minds receive the states and names of Gods, and Sons of Gods, and Fathers of Gods, such paternity and sonship being perfected in a spiritual manner (i. e. incorporeally, immaterially, and invisibly) because the Divine Spirit setteth above all invisible Immateriality and Deification, and the Father and the Son, supernaturally transcend all spiritual fatherhood and sonship.^[206] For there is no exact similitude between the creatures and the Creative Originals;^[207] for the creatures possess only such images of the Creative Originals as are possible to them, while the Originals Themselves transcend and exceed the creatures by the very nature of Their own Originality. To employ human examples, we say that pleasant or painful conditions produce in us feelings of pleasure or pain while yet they possess not these feelings themselves; and we do not say that the fire which warms and burns is itself burnt or warmed. Even so if any one says that Very Life lives, or that Very Light is enlightened, he will be wrong (according to my view) unless, perchance, he were to use these terms in a different sense from the ordinary one to mean that the qualities of created things pre-exist, after a superlative manner as touching their true Being in the Creative Originals.^[208]

9. Even the plainest article of Divinity, namely the Incarnation and Birth of Jesus in Human Form, cannot be expressed by any Language or known by any Mind—not even by the first of the most exalted angels. That He took man’s substance is a mysterious truth, the which we have received; but we know not how from the Virgin’s seed He was formed in another manner than is natural, nor how His dry feet supporting the solid weight of His material body He walked upon the unstable substance of the water, nor understand we any of the other things which belong to the Supernatural Nature of Jesus. Of these things I have spoken enough elsewhere; and our renowned Teacher hath wonderfully^[209] declared, in his Elements of Divinity, what he hath either learnt directly from the Sacred Writers, or else hath discovered from his cunning research concerning Scriptural truths through the much toil and labour which he bestowed thereon, or else hath had revealed unto him by some diviner inspiration wherein he received not only true spiritual notions but also true spiritual motions,^[210] and by the kinship of his mind with them (if I may so express it) was perfected to attain without any other teacher to a mystical communion with these verities and a belief therein.^[211] And to put before them in briefest compass the many blessed speculations of his ingenious mind thus speaketh he concerning Jesus in his compilation of the Elements of Divinity.

10. From the Elements of Divinity, by S. Hierotheus.

The Universal Cause which filleth all things is the Deity of Jesus, whereof the parts are in such wise tempered to the whole that It is neither whole nor part, and yet is at the same time whole and also part, containing in Its all-embracing unity both part and whole, and being transcendent and antecedent to both.^[212] This Deity is perfect in those Beings that are imperfect as a Fount of Perfection;^[213] It is Perfectionless^[214] in those that are perfect as transcending and anticipating their Perfection; It is the Form producing Form in the formless, as a Fount of every form; and it is Formless in the Forms, as being beyond all form; It is the Being that pervades all beings at once though not affected by them;^[215] and It is Super-Essential, as transcending every being; It sets all bounds of Authority and Order, and yet It has Its seal beyond all Authority and Order.^[216] It is the Measure of the Universe;^[217] and it is Eternity, and above Eternity and before Eternity.^[218] It is an Abundance in those Beings that lack, and a Super-Abundance in those that abound; unutterable, ineffable; beyond Mind, beyond Life, beyond Being; It supernaturally possesses the supernatural and super-essentially possesses the super-essential.^[219] And since that Supra-Divine Being hath in loving kindness come down from thence unto the Natural Estate, and verily took substance and assumed the name of Man (we must speak with reverence of those things which we utter beyond human thought and language), even in this act He possesses His Supernatural and Super-Essential Existence—not only in that He hath without change or confusion of Attributes shared in our human lot while remaining unaffected by that unutterable Self-Emptying as regards the fullness of His Godhead, but also because (most wonderful of all wonders!) He passed in His Supernatural and Super-Essential state through conditions of Nature and Being, and receiving from us all things that are ours, exalted them far above us.^[220]

[202] Undifference belongs to the ultimate Godhead, Differentiation to the distinction between the Three Persons of the Trinity. The former is the sphere of Mystical Theology, the latter is that of Dogmatic Theology. The former implies the Via Negativa the latter the Via Affirmativa.

[203] Even the Differentiations finally lead us up into the Undifferenced Godhead Where they transcend themselves. (Cf. p. 70, n. 3 and the passage in ii. 4 about the torches.) Into that region we cannot track them. But on the other side they flow out into creative activity, and thus are, in some degree, revealed.

[205] The doctrine of “Deification” is not a mere speculation. It embodies an experienced fact. See Intr., p. 43.

[206] The act by which one spirit or soul imparts spiritual life to another is a manifestation in time of a Mystery which is eternally perfect in the Trinity, and would be impossible were it not ultimately rooted in that Mystery. Just as all life draws its existence from the Divine supra-vitality, so all spiritual paternity draws its existence from the Divine supra-paternity.

[207] τὰ αἴτια—i.e. The Persons of the Godhead.

[208] So St. Augustine constantly teaches that God acts not in the manner which we call activity, but by causing the creature itself to perform the action. Thus he explains God’s rest on the Seventh Day to mean not that God Himself rested but that the creation now rested in Him. Aristotle and his disciple, St. Thomas, teach that God moves all things simply through being desired by them. So God causes action without Himself acting (somewhat as fire causes warmth without feeling it). Cf. p. 87, n. 1.

[209] ὑπερφυῶς. The proper meaning of ὑπερφυής in the Dionysian writings appears to be “supernatural.”

[210] οὺ μόνον μαθὼν ἀλλὰ καὶ παθὼν τὰ θεῖα.

[211] πρὸς τὴν ὰδιδακτὸν αὐτῶν καὶ μυστικὴν ἀποτελεσθεὶς ἕνωσιν καὶ πίστιν.

[212] Being beyond Unity the Godhead is, of course, beyond the categories of whole and part. The Godhead is not a Whole because it is indivisible, nor a Part because there is nothing, on the ultimate plane, outside It. Yet It is a Whole because It includes the true existence of all things, and is Partitive because It contains the principle of separate Individuality whereby Christ possesses a Human Soul distinct from all other human souls, and whereby, too, we possess distinct and separate souls.

[213] God is in us even before we are in Him. Cf. Luke xvii. 21. Cf. St. Aug., “Thou wast within; I was without.” Also cf. c. i. 3; c. iii. i: “For the Trinity,” etc. See Intr., p. 6 on the use of the word ” outside.”

[214] Perfection implies an objector purpose achieved. Hence it implies a distinction between self and not self. The Godhead is beyond such a distinction. Compared with imperfection, It is perfect; compared with perfection, It is perfectionless (ἀτελής), or, rather, beyond Perfection (ὑπερτελής) and before it (προτέλειος), just as compared with impersonal things It is personal, and compared with personality It is non-personal, or, rather, supra-personal.

[215] Cf. p. 75, n. 3.

[216] Cf. St. Paul on the Law and the Spirit. The Law is deposited, as it were, by the Spirit; and yet the Law cramps the Spirit, and the Spirit must break loose from this bondage.

[217] i. e. It gives the universe its bounds and distinctions.

[218] Eternity, in the sense of ” Very Eternity” (αὐτοαιών), is an Emanation of the Godhead—a distinct view of Its transcendent state (cf. Intr., p. i7). It is the Divine Rest taken in the abstract, as Very Life is perhaps the Divine Motion taken in the abstract. The Godhead includes both rest and Motion by transcending them.

[219] Behind Nature are certain higher supernatural possibilities (which are manifested, e. g., in the Miracles of Christ and His Disciples), and beyond our personalities there is a mystery which is greater than our finite selves, and yet, in a sense, is our true selves. The Godhead possesses in Itself the supernatural possibilities of Nature and the supra-personal possibilities of our personalities.

[220] i. e. Christ did not merely keep His Godhead parallel, as it were, with His Manhood, but brought It into His Manhood and so exalted the Manhood.