Reflecting and Responding
Pseudo-Dionysius
Loving God Through the Threefold Way
Moses is first purified, then illumined,
then enters into union with God in the cloud of unknowing.
MYSTICAL THEOLOGY
THE NEWS STAGGERED THE ACADEMIC COMMUNITY. For hundreds of years Dionysius the Areopagite, the celebrated convert of the apostle Paul (Acts 17:34), was the presumed author of four of the most famous and influential texts in the history of Christian spirituality. But in 1895 the charade was up. Scholars successfully proved that the texts that had mysteriously surfaced in 532 were deeply indebted to Plotinus, Proclus and the entire Neoplatonic tradition. Aquinas had intimated a possible connection while Luther claimed a direct influence. Even Erasmus found undeniable parallels, but nobody could muster conclusive proof. Until 1895.
As the dust settled from yet another academic scandal, “Pseudo-Dionysius” became established as the pen name of this mysterious author. Despite the scandal, everyone agreed that the texts had done much good for many people in guiding their walk with God. Their seasoned wisdom ushered these core texts back into a period of visibility and celebrity that continues to this day.
Today the works of Pseudo-Dionysius (ca. 500) provide one of the clearest expressions of how to begin, understand and grow in our life with God. Purification, illumination and union: the threefold way that guides our ascent to God. To capture his main themes, we turn to his four primary works.
Four Primary Works
The Divine Names is the longest of these works. In thirteen power-packed chapters, he defines the nature of “cataphatic theology.” Cataphatic theology is incarnational theology; it is seeing how God uses everything in the created order to mediate his presence to us. This means that every part of our spiritual life matters. Our participation in the church, our personal experiences of God, our corporate disciplines, the way we see the hand of God in nature, our understanding of Christian doctrine, even language and the way it is formed becomes a vehicle for helping us understand our life with God.
The Divine Names is an ancient text that teaches us a contemporary lesson: everything we do in life either brings us closer to God or takes us further away. There are no neutral activities. Pseudo-Dionysius helps explain how God lets us know who he is in ways we understand. But eventually a new thought awakens: even when we compile the learning of every person from every age, there is no way we can ever know everything there is to know about God. This recognition inspired his second work, Mystical Theology.
Mystical Theology is short and precise. It helps us realize that there is much more to God than we can ever comprehend. Here Pseudo- Dionysius explains “apophatic theology,” defining who God is by everything he is not. This, too, is an obscure concept, but it has a profound impact. It forces us to recognize the limits of human knowledge.
Apophatic theology is slightly difficult to embrace. If God is known by everything he is not, how can we be sure this is even relevant learning? The human drive to know brings us to the limits of what is possible to know. And reaching the boundaries of human knowledge results in one of two responses: either we recognize our limits and develop a recognition of revelation, or we say there is nothing more to know and we stop pursuing a deeper life with God.
Dionysius continues by describing how “mystical theology” teaches us about our life with God. “In my earlier books,” he writes, “my argument traveled downward from the most exalted to the humblest categories. But my argument now rises from what is below up to the Transcendent, and the more it climbs, the more language falters.” Later, he adds, “The supreme cause of every perceptible thing is not itself perceptible.” This is why a complete explanation of God is impossible for those who believe in him. Even an explanation of why everything works the way it does eludes our understanding. This isn’t a copout or lazy thinking; it is simply an acknowledgment that there is much more to God than we will ever know.
Dionysius covers the earlier stages of the threefold way in his last two works. In The Celestial Hierarchy he defines each category of ascent. It is here that Dionysius uses the term “hierarchy” (he actually created the word) and explains the three levels that have guided us through the ages. Purgation, illumination and union: these are the steps that lead us back to God. If we traverse these three levels, we will reach the ultimate end of our human destiny.
The point of Dionysius’s work is to teach us that no one is given an instant relationship with God. We must go through a process of learning what it means to live in relationship with him. This process begins with the point of conversion when we first awaken to God, and we follow the threefold path from that moment onward. The first step, purgation, harnesses our misdirected desires so that we can cultivate moral virtue. Unfortunately, too often this is viewed as the final step. In far too many cases we substitute moral piety for ultimate union with God. In other words, most of us end up believing that the moral life is the core and essence of the spiritual life.
This is an unfortunate conclusion. Although Christianity is a moral religion, moral achievement is not God’s ultimate intention for us. Rather, our destiny is a life-giving, ongoing interaction with God. Moral virtue is necessary but not sufficient for sustaining ourselves in this life.
Here, The Celestial Hierarchy provides the mediating link between earth and heaven. In the ancient world, it was believed that the nine planets of our solar system reflected the nature of heaven. In order to ascend to the highest level of heaven, people thought they had to go through nine distinct stages. Dionysius reflects this understanding when he shows how the nine choirs of angels help us understand how every dimension of the created order can lift us to God. Over and over again, Dionysius wants us to see how God, who is ultimately unknowable, makes himself known through every element of human learning.
For our purposes, this creative scheme helps us see the multiple levels of learning. Often we believe truth is one-dimensional and entirely visible without requiring careful thinking and reflection. Over time we discover that there are depths to every situation, and we often come to appreciate that people and situations have multiple levels of meaning requiring deeper insight. Once we realize this truth, we are able to grow and develop.
In The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, Dionysius follows the same pattern. In a churchless age such as our own, when so many believe they can progress in the spiritual life without participating in a specific community of faith, his claims seem astonishing. For example, he states that we are indebted to the church and to its structure and liturgy in shaping the way we understand God. In his mind, the church literally patterns how we will know God.
What if he is right? What if we literally know God only in the ways our community of faith teaches us about him? What an incredible idea. We would do well to consider more of his thesis as we try to get our minds around this thought.
Table 7.1. Pseudo-Dionysius’s Ecclesiastical Hierarchy
Level
Highest
Middle
Lowest
Office
Bishop
Priests
Deacons
Sacrament Performed
Anointing with oil
Eucharist
Baptism
Object of Sacrament
Monastics
Baptized
Catechumens
Outcome
Union
Illuminated
Purified
At the lowest level of Dionysius’s scheme, deacons work to perform the rituals that usher new believers into the faith. In the ancient world, becoming a Christian was a much longer process than it is today. It did not occur as simply a change of perception or an intellectual ascent. It required a declaration of intent in order to be categorized as a “catechumen.” This began a process that could last up to two years, with baptism as the goal. Baptism indicated moral reform and the washing away of the past as the believer prepared to walk with God. Purification, if you will.
Becoming a catechumen is like saying you want to be an engineer. It is specifying a direction or path in life that takes you to your ultimate destiny. But the declaration itself doesn’t make you an engineer; it begins the process. In the same way, becoming a catechumen doesn’t make us a mature Christian; it just begins the process.
The first level of the hierarchy is purgation or purification, which is guided by the deacons. In the ancient world everyone had a prescribed role. There was an order and a process to life. In a day like our own when so much of life is relational, the equivalent of a deacon would be a caring elder or a loving friend—someone who helps us come to an awareness of God and begin our life with him. One of the main movements of the twentieth century has been described as “relational theology.” The whole movement is predicated on our relationship to one another mimicking our foundational relationship with God.
The next level of the hierarchy is illumination, which is guided by the priests. If we were living during this period, had confessed faith in Christ and had successfully completed our time as a catechumen, we would be allowed to enter the church through baptism. Once baptized, we would be initiated into an elaborate process in preparation for our first Eucharist. The Eucharist indicated our acceptance of Christ and solidified our relationship with the church. The notion that we could enter into a relationship with Christ without entering into the life of the church was unthinkable. It is through our participation in the life of the people of God that our mind is raised to God and our understanding is illuminated.
We have to remember that this was an age that believed every spiritual activity and process had to be mediated. Direct, immediate knowledge of God was believed to be reserved only for mystics who had devoted their entire life to prayer. Even though this idea seems arcane and outdated in our own time, it reminds us that we often short-circuit an opportunity for deep knowing by believing every spiritual channel is instantly available to us. But there is simply no way our minds can absorb all there is to know instantly. As much as we want to believe that our minds handle information and ideas like digital processors, both our mind and our morality develop over time. We become more and more like what we think and do.
On the highest level of Dionysius’s hierarchy, the bishop works to bring us into union with God. For Dionysius, this level was restricted to monastics. And today this level is almost totally neglected. Ultimately, Dionysius wants us to realize that our return to God must include participation in the life of the church. We need its teaching, its liturgy and its patterned life. We need its community. We need its language. We need its symbols. We need its enduring presence as the one institution created by God to bear witness to him.
Every community ultimately produces what it values. If you are in a community that values intimacy with God, then it will cultivate a level of understanding that leads to intimacy with God. In this Moses is our role model. Borrowing from Exodus 19 and 20, Dionysius uses Moses’ encounter with God on Mount Sinai as the archetypal experience for each one of us. His ascent into God’s presence on the mountain is our ultimate destiny. If we decide to ascend our own Mount Sinai, we can anticipate our own profound relationship with God. Nevertheless, as great as it is, it is incomplete. No matter how well we know God, he is ultimately beyond any understanding we can have of him. The chart of Dionysius’ thought gives a summary in outline form.
Learning from Ancient Wisdom
Why should we even bother with this ancient wisdom? The reason we need Dionysius is that he tells us about ourselves in ways we seldom hear today. He states succinctly and clearly that we cannot grow into a deeper life with God without the guidance and support of the Christian community. We cannot grow in our life with God without a deeper connection through worship. Ultimately, Dionysius teaches us that we cannot grow in our life with God without a deliberate coordination of our life with others.
The unfortunate message from many religious leaders is that the spiritual life is an individual quest. They treat our life with God as strictly individual and consider the role of others as an afterthought. But different religious communities convey the essence and meaning of the Christian life differently. Some do it well, while others do it poorly. And it shows. It shows in the levels of Christian maturity we realize.
Table 7.2. Dionysius’s Thought
Levels
Highest
Middle
Lowest
Faculty of Judgment
Will
Intellect
Senses
Level of Spiritual Reality
God
Angels
The church
Types of Knowing
Intuition
Interpretation-driven
Percept and concept
Types of Spiritual Insight
Spiritual vision
Spiritual knowing
Spiritual experience
Theology
Apophatic mystical theology
Cataphatic
Symbolic
Key Texts
Mystical Theology
Divine Names
The Celestial Hierarchy
Ecclesiastical Hierarchy
Outcome
Perfect union with God
Illumination
Purification
REFLECTING AND RESPONDING
I find Dionysius genuinely helpful. To begin with, he gives us the concepts of the cataphatic and apophatic approaches to the knowledge of God—and we do need both. The words are strange to our ears, but the ideas are clear enough.
In cataphatic theology we come to understand how God mediates his presence to us through the physical world. Everything in creation—the cathedral elm and the Christmas rose, hummingbird and moose, sun, moon and stars, bread and wine—opens us to a life that is in back of and beyond the physical world. How good of God to use the physical world we understand so well to lead us into realities we can barely comprehend and need so badly to experience.
In apophatic theology, on the other hand, we learn that in our life with God we face massive limitations. God is far beyond us. We can know only a fraction of the whole. We are in way over our heads and it behooves us to recognize this fact.
In cataphatic theology, God is near to us, or “immanent,” as we say. In apophatic theology, he is beyond us, or “transcendent,” as we say. Both are true and both are essential to a clear understanding of an experiential life with God. We have Dionysius to thank for setting forth these matters in such a clear and understandable manner.
Another thing I am glad for is this word Dionysius gave to the world: “hierarchy.” Now, I know this isn’t a concept we are thrilled about in today’s egalitarian mindset. But we need to understand that Dionysius is using this word in a thoroughly positive way. He is making it clear to us that there is a right ordering of the universe. He is underscoring the importance of place in our world. When, for example, we speak of refugees as “displaced persons,” we mean more than that they have had to leave their homes. We mean that all their roots have been torn up, that their whole sense of identity as persons has been shattered.
Many today have rejected the very idea of place because they find themselves oppressed by their place. And we should reject oppressive places, for they represent a severe disorientation in the right ordering of the universe. However, we cannot be “placeless.” As long as we are finite human beings we need a place, a role, a function in life. Placeless human beings are among the most miserable in our day.
In the Hebrew world, there is a proper place for the aged, the orphan, the widow, the sojourner. The New Testament describes the church as a set of places. The gifts of the Holy Spirit are a way of describing the place of the various members of the body of Christ. There is a place—a proper function, a proper role—for the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, the pastor and teacher, and all the gifts of the Spirit. So I’m glad Dionysius has helped us to think carefully about place. It helps us see why we cannot live this life of discipleship to Jesus by ourselves. We need the community of faith to be the person we are called to be. And there is a place—a proper function or role—for every one of us within this community.
Now, of course, the heart of our thinking in this chapter is the threefold way of divine ascent: purgation, illumination and union. We will work on other aspects of this threefold progression as we get into the other representatives of this teaching. For right now we pause to think about the second of the three: illumination.
Illumination means, very simply, our growth in the practical knowledge of God. By it we are learning to love God with all our mind. This is why the priest oversees this stage of the divine ascent. The idea is that the pastor/priest informs our mind with a lived knowledge of God. We listen carefully and prayerfully to the sermon, for example, for in it we hope to receive knowledge of God that informs our living. When we receive the Eucharist, we take in knowledge of God in a different way. We study the Scripture—or in the case of the sixth century, if we cannot read we receive a passage from the pastor/priest to memorize—and knowledge of God increases in our mind. Simple . . . and so very essential.
All three aspects of this progressive ascent work hand in hand, and so it is a little artificial for us to focus only on the second of the three here. Even so, we can begin now to experience aspects of illumination, especially as it comes to us through the cataphatic path—through the physical world of the senses and the mind. For example, perhaps we take a day to watch the created order—really watch it. Or maybe we take a day to soak in the book of Jeremiah or Romans—really soak in it. Or perhaps we take a phrase of Scripture and let it fill our mind for an entire day—really fill our mind. These simple exercises, and many others like them, are ways of beginning to love God with all our mind.
O God who is First, O God who is Last,
O God who is one Substance, O God who is three Persons:
We come humbly and bow before you. The world we live in has taught us to short-circuit our relationship with you. We’re taught to expect an instant relationship, instant answers to prayer, instant growth in grace, instant spiritual maturity.
O God, truly merciful, forgive us our sins. Forgive our impatience. Forgive our arrogance. Forgive our impetuousness. O Lord, our Lord, forgive.
Teach us to take one step at a time. Teach us contentment in growing into your life little by little. Teach us the humility of unanswered prayer. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.