From Monachos.net
Dionysius (or 'pseudo-Dionysius') presents the historical and theological reader with a question far from unique amongst analyses of early patristic sources, and, in fact, the majority of Christian writers through to the seventh century and beyond: do the writings of the author at hand contain primarily a philosophical theology, or a spirituality based on mystical experience? Dionysius' heavy involvement with this dialectic, namely his own ponderings of the very issue, make the question especially pertinent in his case. Much in his writings makes it a difficult question to answer succinctly, as we shall see. Indeed, vast amounts of scholarship have been devoted to such a task, to varying degrees of success. Still it remains a pertinent question to any who address themselves to the Areopagite's thought.
The present study will attempt to locate a reasonable response primarily via a brief examination of Dionysius' own writings. The very nature of the inquiry, however, will require some level of investigation of the general school of thought to which he is often said to have been a part. This is the intellectual world of the fifth and sixth century Neoplatonists, the Athenian descendents of Plato's Academy. It is a world which, as we shall see, was to have a profound influence on the thought of Dionysius the Areopagite.
But we must begin with the foundations: 'philosophical theology' and 'spirituality based on mystical experience' are, to say the least, loaded terms. These two categories must be examined in some detail if one is effectively to attempt to locate Dionysius in either.
Philosophical Theology: God by Intellect.
In the broadest of terms, 'philosophical theology' might be described as the approach to an understanding of God by means of intellectual growth. More specifically, this category of theology is often reckoned as that which takes as its fundamental structure the framework of larger philosophical thought, especially as forged by various traditional schools and their methodologies. The philosophical tools of discursive reason and logical analysis, along with such standard motifs as the gradation of transcendence and ascent to Being, are understood in such a theological conception in a markedly religious context. Being (or the Good, the One) is correlated directly to God, and thus the philosophical programme of existence based upon an understanding of this Being is understood as the theological definition of life in relation to God.
Such a system of theology was, of course, quite common in the early Church. The culture into which young Christianity took root was one of philosophy. The people of the Roman Empire were the inheritors of a philosophical tradition that spanned centuries, and that tradition had, in turn, become deeply ingrained in the general social consciousness. Greece, in particular, was home to an abundance of philosophical systems by which the people (and not just the professional philosophers) attempted to explain the foundational truths of life and the world in which they lived. By the time Christianity came into the scene, the general trend toward metaphysical discussion was already commonplace. Its adoption by many of the early Christian writers hardly comes as a surprise: in the world of philosophy they found not only a language capable of expressing metaphysical ideas, but a general mode of thought that, with some alteration, seemed adequately to fit with Christian teaching.
Such a 'system' (though this is perhaps to formal and rigid a term) of philosophical theology was not unknown to Dionysius. Indeed, the late fifth and early sixth centuries in which the anonymous author wrote were times of heightened philosophical development in the Greco-Roman world. The tenets of Neoplatonism were being further refined in Athens and would certainly have been well-engrained into the knowledge of a thinker such as Dionysius. Particularly notable among the Neoplatonic thinkers of his age was Proclus, the diadochos or head of the descendent of Plato's Academy. For much of the fifth century he stood as a dominant figure in contemporary philosophical thought, and it is evident that he had a notable influence on the development of Dionysius' own arguments.
A. The Philosophical Thought of Proclus.
Proclus' philosophy, based largely upon that of Plotinus and Porphyry, is essentially an elaborate doctrine of henosis (e(/nwsij). The supreme simplicity, the summit of all being and life, is the One. From this transcendent unity, the multiplicity of the world has proceeded as a result of personal differentiation; from, as Andrew Louth summarises it, 'an outward movement of progressively diminishing radiation from the One' [1]. This 'outward' movement must not be understood in a literal sense of motion through space, but rather as a procession away from the simplicity of ultimate unity, the source of being. The 'further' a being proceeds from the One, the more diminished is its possession of and participation in true Being.
One sees in this model a heavy reliance upon earlier, Platonic cosmogony. Equally apparent is the classic Neoplatonic notion of return: the diminishing radiation from the One is countered by an inherent longing in all things for a return to their original state of unity. The return itself is mediated, in Plato, by the concept of Forms or Ideas, which stand as a sort of 'halfway house' between the One and the soul. In the Neoplatonic language of Plotinus--closely echoed by Proclus--the Forms give way to the intellect (nou~j). Thus we find in Proclean Neoplatonism a threefold pattern to human existence: yuxh/, or the soul of a person, the nou~j which mediates, and the e(/n toward which the yuxh/ is drawn. The progression of the soul back into the unity of the One is the course and goal of true existence. As Ysabel de Andia writes,
L'unification ou la simplification de soi est la condition de l'union avec Celui qui est un et simple. Dépassement de soi, simplification ou unification de soi et union avec l'origine coïncident. [2]
In this portion of Andia's research, the notion of simplification is expressly stated. Ultimately, any real progression toward the One must be, in essence, a simplification of self, for it is the ongoing state of 'complication'--of multiplicity proceeded from Unity--that is precisely what must be overcome. This simplification involves, in Proclus' model, a retreat of the yuxh/ from the perception of the external world, and its inward contemplation of the nou~j. It is, as Andia writes, 'le retrait de l'extérieur et le retour à l'intérieur [...] où l'âme se tourne vers l'intellect' [3]. And this is followed by the pinnacle of inward progression: union with that toward which the progression is aimed--union with the One.
Lorsque toute activité est dirigée sur l'objet contemplé, nous devenons cet objet (ka)kei~no gi/gnetai). [4]
Thus the encapsulation of the Proclean model in the term e(/nwsij, for it is ultimately from and to the One that all things move, and in the One that they find their fulfilment. We might here forego any attempt at artful wording, and simply translate this term with the crude 'One-ification': it is the process of once more becoming One that forms the centre and core of Proclus' thought.
B. A Philosophical Theology in Dionysius the Areopagite.
With the above taken as an example of the prevalent philosophical mode of Dionysius' day, one cannot but admit that a clear adaptation of this very scheme is to be found in his own works. An examination of a few selections from those works will, in fact, reveal a remarkable amount of parallelism between the Proclean philosophical system and the theology present in Dionysius.
First, from the opening chapter of the Divine Names:
Indeed the inscrutable One is out of the reach of every rational process. Nor can any words come up to the inexpressible Good, this One, this Source of all unity, this supra-existent Being. Mind beyond mind, word beyond speech, it is gathered up by no discourse, by no intuition, by no name. It is and it is as no other being is. Cause of all existence, and therefore itself transcending existence, it alone could give an authoritative account of what it really is. [5]
One finds several things worthy of note in this short paragraph. First is the obvious use of the title 'One' for the deity (it is clear from the preceding phrases that Dionysius is explicitly referring to the Christian God). Such Christian specification of the general philosophical notion was entirely common among the early writers of the Church and can be found in such notables as Irenaeus of Lyons and Clement of Alexandria. Yet it is the transcendence of this One that stands out in this passage: it is an inexpressible Good, a supra-existent Being, a word beyond speech. Dionysius and Proclus alike are emphatic in their stress upon the utter transcendence of divine Being: the One is not only greater than all creation, it transcends even the notion of greatness. It is completely other. Such had been a dominant theme in philosophy since the days of Plato. The One is the 'cause of all existence, and therefore itself transcending existence.' Such divine transcendence was a stock theme in the writings of Gregory of Nyssa, with whom Dionysius seems to have much in common (and indeed, Andia and Louth have both posited the likelihood that the author of the Dionysian corpus was familiar with Gregory's works) [6]. The Areopagite's repeated mention of the point is therefore not, alone, enough to warrant too strong a connection to the philosophy of Proclus. Yet his further theological developments reveal much stronger parallels. Again from the pen of Dionysius:
We learn, for instance, that it [the One] is the cause of everything, that it is origin, being, and life. To those who fall away it is the voice calling, 'Come back!' and it is the power which raises them up again. It refurbishes and restores the image of God corrupted within them. It is the sacred stability which is there for them when the tide of unholiness is tossing them about. [...] Source of perfection for those being made perfect, source of divinity for those being deified, principle of simplicity for those turning toward simplicity, point of unity for those made one. [7]
The resemblance to Proclus is here overwhelming. One sees God as the One, the 'principle of simplicity' which is the source of all being. The philosophical notion of diffusion away from this simplicity is clearly seen in the image of stability lost as 'the tide of unholiness' tosses a person about. And further, one even encounters the Neoplatonic notion of return: the One calls out 'Come back!' to the lost, and serves as the restorer of perfection, divinity, simplicity, and unity. This is echoed further in the same chapter:
And so it is that as Cause of all and as transcending all, he is rightly nameless and yet has the names of everything that is. Truly he has dominion over all and all things revolve around him, for he is their cause, their source, and their destiny. [8]
God as the cause, source, and destiny of all creation is a nearly mirror concept to the One as the source from which all things have their being, the unity from which they process, and the goal to which they return. Even the image of circular radiation is echoed in this passage, as it is in other places within the same treatise.
Further study of Dionysius' works reveals that the Neoplatonic mindset, especially that of the Proclean school, is of substantial influence in his overall thought. He makes a conscientious effort to remove the paganizing trends within the philosophical models (Proclus himself was a devout pagan), and to this end he is quite successful. Yet to thereby surmise that he has left behind the philosophical realm is to greatly misread the text. Dionysius represents, we might say, a 'theologising' of Proclean philosophy ยจ the rendering theocentric of a conceptual model that might otherwise have little in common with a Christian worldview. Yet what he presents the reader with, especially in the Divine Names, the Celestial Hierarchy, and the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, is a truly philosophical theology, for he uses as the foundation for a knowledge of God and the growth of humanity, the same model--albeit with some variations--as that of his contemporary philosophy.
A Spirituality Based on Mystical Experience.
But Dionysius' works do not end with these three treatises. Still to be addressed are his ten letters and, most importantly, his fourth treatise: the Mystical Theology. We have endeavoured to show, above, that aspects of Dionysius' theology are decidedly philosophical in character. We shall now attempt to show that other aspects (and quite possibly the greater themes) of his writings present a spirituality that is based on mystical experience.
This category, too, requires some explanation. 'Mystical experience' is a term far more ambiguous than our previous 'philosophical theology', for it does not necessarily imply any specific background or framework with which it can be correlated. What makes an experience 'mystical' is an issue of earnest and often animated debate, especially in the present day, and it is not within the scope of the present work to analyse such debate in any general manner. For our purposes here, the word 'experience' is that upon which an investigation may be grounded. The key difference between our two categories of discussion is approached in this distinction: while one is based on the activity of the intellect and of thought, the other is based on experiential knowledge. The term 'mystical', which holds as its own all manner of deep meaning and symbolism, might here simply imply that the experience of which we speak is of a transcendental nature: that which is experienced is not the customary world of the senses and perceptions, but the transcendent reality of the divine godhead. As Carmody and Carmody have written, mysticism is the 'direct encounter with ultimate reality' [9]. While this definition may fail to take into account much of the meaning of the so-called 'mystical tradition', especially within the patristic heritage of the East, it will nonetheless provide us with a workable framework in which to examine the writings of Dionysius the Areopagite.
In the Mystical Theology, Dionysius' shortest treatise and one which some see as forming a summarisation of his whole theology [10], he writes:
Timothy, my friend, my advice to you as you look for a sight of the mysterious things, is to leave behind you everything perceived and understood, everything perceptible and understandable, all that is not and all that is, and, with your understanding laid aside, to strive upward as much as you can toward union with him who is beyond all being and knowledge. [11]
Following the opening prayer, these are the first words of Dionysius to Timothy, given that one places himself within the pseudonymous author's intended point of reference. Already in these opening lines one begins to see a type of theological understanding that differs notably from the approach discussed above. Where much of the personal activity discussed in the Divine Names was devoted to furthering one's understanding of God through meaningful reflection upon His attributes and qualities, here Timothy is urged to 'leave behind [...] everything perceived and understood.' We have reached the point in the Dionysian theological model at which intellectual knowledge, so important in the earlier stages, has reached its natural limit. It can go no further. Timothy, the venerable elder, is now urged to approach a new method of knowing, one which will allow him to progress even further toward union 'with Him who is beyond all being and knowledge' [12].
Dionysius here begins a strong exhortation to apophaticism: a method of theology for which he is often given credit as one of its first major exponents. He has spent much time and many words in the furtherance of kataphatic, affirmative knowledge, but now seems to realise that he must move beyond such modes of contemplation. All that has been affirmed must, in due course and with due understanding, eventually be denied. 'Now,' he writes, 'as we climb from the last things up to the most primary, we deny all things' [13]. Yet this negation is more than simply making opposites of previous affirmations; it is the realisation that God transcends all that can be affirmed and, ultimately, even all that can be denied. Dionysius writes:
Now we should not conclude that the negations are simply the opposites of the affirmations, but rather that the cause of all is considerably prior to this, beyond privations, beyond every denial, beyond every assertion. [14]
Such talk especially interests us here because it provides the tool (apophatic theology) by which one might begin the ascent beyond knowledge itself. Philosophy, having reached the point beyond which it can go no more, must thereafter begin a process of withdrawal as the human person ascends into the higher realm of direct experience. This is the foundation of a truly mystical theology, a theology based upon the experience of God.
Such experience is symbolised, in Dionysius, by darkness, and in this use of imagery he once again closely parallels Gregory of Nyssa. The ascent of Moses up Mount Sinai and into the 'thick darkness where God is' (Ex 20.20) had long been interpreted for its greater spiritual significance, yet it was Gregory and the author behind Dionysius that truly brought to the forefront the importance of that darkness as a symbol of ultimate spiritual knowing. Speaking first of the sense-perceptions, Dionysius writes: 'But then he [Moses] breaks free of them, away from what sees and is seen, and he plunges into the truly mysterious darkness of unknowing' [15]. Moses makes a shift from the perceptible into the ineffable, and so does Dionysius' spirituality proclaim a stage at which experience must overtake reason. The lower levels of Dionysian spirituality, as lofty as they may at times be, are ultimately the mount by which a deeper knowledge of God is attained through direct encounter. Again, he writes:
I pray that we could come to this darkness so far above light! If only we lacked sight and knowledge so as to see, so as to know, unseeing and unknowing, that which lies beyond all vision and knowledge. For this would be really to see and to know: to praise the Transcendent One in a transcending way. [16]
This is clearly a 'spirituality based on mystical experience', and not a solely philosophical theology. As much as affirmation has its place in the Dionysian corpus, so does negation. As much as Dionysius demonstrates a philosophical theology, so does he also demonstrate a mystical, or experiential, spirituality. Andrew Louth notes this consistent mixture of theological methods when addressing our author's portrayal of Hierotheus in the Divine Names:
From all this a remarkably consistent picture emerges. Hierotheus's knowledge of the divine is derived partly from his study of the Scriptures, and partly through an untaught experience, where he did not 'learn' but 'suffered' or experienced divine things. [17]
The present discussion on the question of philosophical versus mystical theology in the Dionysian corpus must eventually reach this very conclusion: Dionysius admits of both, and indeed strongly praises both, as each valid at its own place and time in an individual's spiritual progression. One without the other would leave the journey incomplete: Moses could not reach the darkness at Sinai's peak without first embarking on its ascent, and an individual cannot truly negate what he has not previously affirmed. In the spiritual journey they are tools which must be used together if the end is finally to be reached. The interrelation of the philosophical and experiential ways in the thought of Dionysius is testimony to this multi-dimensional reality of human knowing.
M.C. Steenberg
Points for Further Consideration
Space restraints have prevented the elaboration of several significant points raised in the above discussion. Among these topics, which will be of interest to those wishing to go further with the study of Dionysius' thought, are:
- For all the similarities between Dionysius' philosophical methods and those
of Proclus, there are also many differences. Andia notes: (a) there is no
talk of 'divine darkness' in Proclus; (b) in the One of Proclean Neoplatonism
there is nothing resembling the Dionysian love of God for humanity, there
is solely an infinite desire on the part of the creature; (c) in Plotinus,
union with the One risks a loss of one's individuality, whereas in Dionysius
the union is a)su/gxutoj, without confusion.
- The 'mystical experience' of Dionysius has a very direct setting: his mystical writings are deeply liturgical, and centre upon the experience of God in and through the liturgy and the community of the Church. This is a driving thesis in Andrew Louth's work, and indeed further emphasises an experience-based theme in his theology.
Further Reading.
Commentary and Study:
Primary Texts:
Andia, Ysabel de. HENOSIS: L'union à Dieu chez Denys l'Aréopagite, from the Pholosophia Antiqua series. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1996.
Louth, Andrew. Denys the Areopagite. London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1989.
Rorem, Paul. Pseudo-Dionysius: A Commentary on the Texts and an Introduction to Their Influence. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993.
Secondary Texts:
Editions du Serf: La vie de Moïse - ou traité de la perfection en matière de vertu (text in French and Greek). Paris, 1968.
Rolt, C.E. Dionysius the Areopagite: On the Divine Names and the Mystical Theology, translation and introduction. London: SPCK, 1957.
Texts:
Greek Text:
Critical edition of the full Corpus Dionysiacum, ed. B.R. Suchla, G. Heil & A.M. Ritter (Patristische Texte und Studien 33, 26: Berlin, 1990-1991).
English Translation:
Luibheid, Colm (trans.). Pseudo-Dionysius: The
Complete Works, from the Classics of Western Spirituality series.
New York: Paulist Press, 1987. Notes by P. Rorem.
[1] Louth, p. 12.
[2] 'The unification or the simplification of self is the condition of union with Him who is One and Simple. The surpassing of self, the simplification or unification of the self and the union with the origin, coincide'; Andia, p. 6 (English translation by M.C. Steenberg).
[3] 'The retreat from the exterior and the return to the interior ... where the soul turns itself toward the intellect'; Andia, p. 7.
[4] 'For when all activity is directed toward the object of contemplation, we become this object'; Andia, p. 7.
[5] The Divine Names (hereafter 'DN'), I.588B; Luibheid ed., p. 50.
[6] cp. Louth, pp. 101-2. cp. also Rorem, Pseudo-Dionysius, p.189ff.
[7] DN, I.589B-C; p. 51.
[8] DN, I.596C; p. 56.
[9] Carmody & Carmody, p. 8.
[10] This comment should be qualified: many consider the Mystical Theology to serve as an introduction to Dionysius' theology, whereby all his other works may then be read and properly understood. Yet my tendency is to agree with P. Rorem, who notes that the treatise's constant referral to concepts discussed in the Divine Names and other works rules out the possibility of the author intending it as an introduction (Rorem, Pseudo-Dionysius, p. 183). Rather, it seems to be a capstone to all that Dionysius has said before: that which was affirmed in the Divine Names and the hierarchies is now interpretively negated, and thus the author's own writing comes to mimic the theological flow he is describing.
[11] The Mystical Theology (hereafter 'MT'), I.1(997B); Luibheid ed., p. 135.
[12] MT, I.1(997B); p. 135.
[13] MT, II(1025B); p. 138.
[14] MT, I.2(1000B); p. 136.
[15] MT, I.3(1001A); p. 137.
[16] MT, II(1025A); p. 138.
[17] Louth, p. 102.