[Dionysius
the Areopagite was an Athenian of the first century, converted by St. Paul (Acts
17:34), who is known to all Christendom as St. Denis. There is also an
unknown author, of circa 500 AD, who used to be for centuries identified as the
said saint, whose works The Celestial Hierarchy, Mystical Theology,
Divine Names, and others, had an immense influence on medieval thought (St
Thomas Aquinas cited “Dionysius” more than 1700 times!), no doubt
because of such authoritative cover of the brilliant impostor, who might,
otherwise, have been quickly accused of heresy, and summarily dismissed... Sic
venit gloria ecclesiastica! Today the clever forger has been exposed as
one, but his identity still remains unknown, as he has received the “negative”
of name of Pseudo-Dionysius in the annals of history and philosophy.]
“So Paul departed from among them. Howbeit certain men clave unto
him, and believed: among which was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named
Damaris, and others with them.” (Acts 17:33-34.)
What
better authority could a sixth-century thinker assume for his writings in the
midst of the dark ages of philosophy than the authority of an obscure Pauline
convert, mentioned by name in the Holy Scriptures? A better-known cover name
would have been too easy to expose at the time, but the obscurity of Dionysius
in the Bible complicated the exposure and given his impeccable credentials as a
bona fide follower of Apostle Paul, the author could and did get away with much
of what would otherwise have been sternly disallowed. And so he did.
Pseudo-Dionysius
was an unmistakable Neo-Platonist, writing in Greek. His work The Mystical
Theology imitates the familiar form of the pre-Socratics, but tries to
reconcile the essence of Greek philosophy with the outward teachings of
Christianity, in the sense that he is eager to adapt Christianity to
Neo-Platonism, rather than the other way around. Here is the opening paragraph
of his Mystical Theology:
Supernal Triad (notice
how he addresses the Trinity in unmistakably Pythagorean, mystical terms!), Deity above all essence, knowledge and
goodness; Guide of Christians to Divine Wisdom; direct our path to the ultimate
summit of your mystical knowledge, most incomprehensible, most luminous, and
most exalted,--- where the pure, absolute, and immutable mysteries of theology
are veiled in the dazzling obscurity of the secret Silence, outshining all
brilliance with the intensity of their Darkness, and surcharging our blinded
intellects with the utterly impalpable and invisible fairness of glories
surpassing all beauties.
There
are many subtle heresies in Pseudo-Dionysian teachings, some of them quite
overt, such as the idea of a virtually pantheistic Henosis as opposed to
the more acceptable doctrine of the Christian Theosis. It is thus almost
inconceivable how the unimpeachable authority of a totally obscure,
once-mentioned Paul’s Biblical follower was able to so thoroughly confound the
otherwise razor-sharp acute theological sensibilities of all those
distinguished Christian leaders of the Church, who were either incapable, or,
more likely, deliberately reluctant to expose the glaring heresy of one of
their most revered original saints, which, had they done so, would
probably have exposed not the Saint himself, but the brilliant fraud hiding
behind his name.
The
Pseudo-Dionysian teachings were particularly popularized throughout the Catholic
Christian Church in the ninth century, being translated from the original Greek
by a certain John Scotus Erigena who must have taken the greatest
pleasure from that translation, finding the author’s views so close to his
heart. Now is the right time to introduce the great Irishman in our very next
entry.
No comments:
Post a Comment