Jaarboek Thomas Instituut 2006 - Thomas Instituut te Utrecht

NICHOLAS OF CUSA 37
possibilities in naming so endlessly that our knowing is an
unknowing:
[... ] Here too let us hold on to the scriptural rule that when we
say anything about God, we should set down the truth 'not in
the plausible words of human wisdom but in demonstration of
the power granted by the Spirit' to the scripture writers, a
power by which, in a manner surpassing speech and
knowledge, we reach a union superior to anything available to
us by way of our own abilities or activities in the realm of
discourse or of intellect. This is why we must not dare to
resort to words or conceptions concerning that hidden divinity
which transcends being, apart from what the sacred scriptures
have divinely revealed. Since the unknowing of what is
beyond being is something above and beyond speech, mind, or
being itself, one should ascribe to it an understanding beyond
being. Let us therefore look as far upward as the light of
sacred scripture will allow, and, in our reverent awe of what is
divine, let us be drawn together toward the divine splendor.'
The name that Dionysius gives to God indicates that his unknowing is
caused by God's eminence: God is the 'Divinity which transcends
being', the 'Super-Essential Godhead' (C.E. Rolt, 1920), renderings
of the Greek hyperousios thearchia. At the beginning of his shorter
treatise on mystical theology, he even addresses God as the Super­
Essential, Supra-Divine, Super-Excellent Trinity; as higher than any
being, any divinity, any goodness, and prays:
Guide of Christians in the wisdom of heaven! Lead us up
beyond unknowing and light, up to the farthest, highest peak
of mystic scripture, where the mysteries of God's Word lie
simple, absolute and unchangeable in the brilliant darkness of
a hidden silence. Amid the deepest shadow they pour
overwhelming light on what is most manifest. Amid the
wholly unsensed and unseen they completely fill our sightless
minds with treasures beyond all beauty."
Thomas Aquinas was one of the theologians who was influenced by
Dionysius in his theology, even though his sober and precise
5 Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, The Divine Names, in The Complete
Works, translatedby C. Luibheid,Mahwah1987,49.
6 Ibid., The Mystical Theology, 135.