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Apophatic (un-saying) theology -This theology says that God is not any of the things that he is called. Traditional theology commonly uses negative words (via negativa), beginning in or im, than positive words: God is invisible, infinite, incomprehensible, immortal. Hindu's show this by repeating "neti neti"- Not that, not that. Muslim philosophers developed the 'double negative' eg. God is not a being, but he is not a non-being. In the writings of Plato In the Timaeus Plato unfolds the teaching that the Demiurge, the Creator of the Cosmos. This is the totality of that which possesses real Being. But far beyond the Demiurge, beyond all the conceivable gods lies the First Being, the First Manifestation, the One, the Firstborn Light from Light. So beyond even the Intelligible Gods is The One. "He is the God of all Gods, the unity of all unities, and above the first adyta; He is more ineffable than all silence, and more unknown than all essence; He is the Holy among the holies and is concealed among the Intelligible Gods." (Proclus' Theology of Plato) But although the Absolute One in His ineffable nature is beyond the reach of human thought, yet, paradoxically, the mind of man can ascend in mysticism, draw close to him almost to the point of union. Thus there are two main methods of approach in Mystical Theology, the Via Affiminativa and the Via Negativa. Negations, when applied to The One, are not privative but signify that It entirely transcends whatever is attributed. They may also signify that in some manner that which is denied of The One proceeds from It and is dependent on it. Plato was not the first Greek writer to use writer to use the notion of the via negativa. He would have found such allusions in the Greek mysteries and in the writings of Parmenides. Philo of Alexandria 20BCE - 50 CE Philo of Alexandria was a Hellenized Jew. He tried to develop a speculative and philosophical justification for Judaism in terms of Greek philosophy. It was a bringing together of the two worlds of Judaism and Greek philosophy. He greatly influenced many Christian writers such as Clement of Alexandria, Athenagoras, Justin Martyr and Origen. In may of his writings he shows a mystical strain. He differentiated between the existence of God which could be discovered and the nature of God which he believed was inaccessible to man. This nature of God could only be talked about in negative terms, stating what God is not, via negativa "For God is not only devoid of peculiar qualities, but he is likewise not of the form of man" In the writings of Pseudo Dionysius The collection of writings of a now unknown author were appealed to in 533 by Monophysites who assumed that they had come from Dionysius the Areopagite, mentioned in Acts 17:34. This proved to be a mistaken hypothesis, but held good for over a thousand years, so the incorrect reference has been retained, and we now describe the author as Dionysius, Pseudo-Dionysius. One of his writings was Divine Names, on the nature and attributes of God. Pseudo-Dionysius drew a distinction within theological method on the basis of the non-conceptuality of God, namely, via positiva and via negativa. Via negativa: It denied all literal descriptions of God, organized from the least suitable to the most suitable, that indirectly indicates what God is by ruling out what God is not. The via negativa, which Pseudo-Dionysius used in the Mystical Theology, insists on speaking negatively about God, ruling out that which the divine mystery is not as a way of speaking indirectly of what the divine mystery is. Thought of as an aspect of mystical practice, the via negativa The writer began saying what God is not. Many characteristics were trivial, but others more potent. The final state of this practice is a silence that is which is made more potent by the prelude of negations. Thus God is beyond all names and all categories. Later Writers The traditional alternative to Aquinas' view: the via negativa ('the negative way'). This view was expounded by a contemporary of Aquinas, the German mystic Meister Eckhart (1260-1327), and also by the Jewish thinker Moses Maimonides (1135-1204). This is how Maimonides expressed his views on religious language. There is no necessity at all for you to use positive attributes of God with the view of magnifying Him in your thought…I will give you…some illustrations, in order that you may better understand the propriety of forming as many negative attributes as possible, and the impropriety of ascribing to God any positive attributes. A person may know for certain that a 'ship' is in existence, but he may not know to what object that name is applied, whether to a substance or to an accident; a second person then learns that a ship is not an accident; a third, that it is not a mineral; a fourth, that it is not a plant growing in the earth; a fifth, that it is not a body whose parts are joined together by nature; a sixth, that it is not a flat object like boards or doors; a seventh, that it is not a sphere; an eight, that it is not pointed; a ninth, that it is not round shaped; nor equilateral; a tenth, that it is not solid. It is clear that this tenth person has almost arrived at the correct notion of a 'ship' by the foregoing negative attributes…. In the same manner you will come nearer to the knowledge and comprehension of God by the negative attributes…. I do not merely declare that he who affirms attributes of God has not sufficient knowledge concerning the Creator…but I say that he unconsciously loses his belief in God. Moses Maimonides, The Guide for the Perplexed, trans. M. Friedlander (London: 1936), pp. 86ff. Not all philosophers would agree with that point of view. The philosopher of religion Brian Davies criticises Maimonides' view. Davies writes only saying what something is not gives no indication of what it actually is, and if one can only say what God is not, one cannot understand him at all. Suppose I say that there is something in my room, and suppose I reject every suggestion you make as to what is actually there. In that case, you will get no idea at all about what is in my room. Going back to the quotation from Maimonides…it is simply unreasonable to say that someone who has all the negations mentioned in it 'has almost arrived at the correct notion of a "ship"'. He could equally well be thinking of a wardrobe. Brian Davies, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986), p 23. |