Chapters of Kallistos Kataphygiotes (Angelikoudes)
1. Every living creature that is brought to birth finds one and the same rest and delight in the activity that is best suited to its nature; in that activity it rejoices, and toward it it strives. So too with man: since he possesses reason and therefore reflects upon his own life, he tastes the greatest delight and the truest rest when he considers his own better state, which may be called either his good or his beauty. That state arrives when a man holds God in his intellect and ponders the perfections of God as the perfections of the highest spiritual Being, who loves man beyond all measure — a thing past understanding — and who prepares for him honours and good gifts, above all in eternity.
2. When any creature is born, it resembles the creature that gave it birth. So the Lord said: «What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit» (Jn 3:6). And if spirit is born of the Spirit, then such will he also be with respect to God, according to the Spirit that begot him. For God is truly Spirit, and from Him, by grace, is born the partaker of the Spirit. And if God is such, then He is capable of contemplation; indeed God is called God because He beholds. Therefore whoever does not contemplate, or has not yet received spiritual birth and communion — or, having received it, restrains his contemplative power through ignorance and, like a man untaught, turns away from the divine rays of the noetic Sun of righteousness — such a man, wretched as he is, loses the activity of that power, even though he was once a partaker of it, and even though he were pressing on toward the summit of holiness.
3. All living creatures have received from the Creator, at His word, their movement and their natural properties, and from Him also they received intellect. But the movement of the intellect has in it something perpetual, and what is perpetual is infinite and unbounded. It would therefore be contrary to the dignity and the nature of the intellect for its movement to have an end and a limit. Yet the intellect will suffer just this if it moves only toward things that have an end and a limit. For it is impossible that a thing should have an end and a limit while the movement of the intellect toward it or around it passes over into the infinite. Hence the perpetual movement of the intellect requires something infinite and unbounded, toward which the intellect may press on according to the word of the Creator and according to its own nature. But apart from God there is nothing infinite and truly unbounded, self-existent and one by nature. It befits the intellect, then, to reach out, to contemplate and to move toward Him who is truly infinite and one, that is, toward God. Such movement is natural to the intellect.
4. Infinite and unbounded is that which the intellect may contemplate in God; yet this alone is not enough for its complete joy, for it seeks the One who made it. Everyone rejoices when he finds what is like himself; so too the intellect, one by nature though many are the thoughts within it, presses upward and reaches out toward God, who is one by nature and rich in energies. And it cannot attain complete joy until it abides in spirit in Him who is unbounded by nature. And this comes about when the intellect passes over from the many to the one. Only when the intellect moves in the one God can it naturally know perfect joy; for every creature takes most delight in that which shares its own nature. It is natural for the intellect to move and press upward, to abide in God and to find its full joy in Him alone, who is simply and boundlessly one.
5. Every movement of every created thing, and of the intellect as well, seeks to come to a halt and to pass over into a state of rest; this is its greatest longing and its repose. But the intellect, being itself one among created things, though it moves among created things cannot find among them stability and repose. Everything created has its beginning and likewise its end; hence the perpetual movement of the intellect would have to reach its term, and the intellect would have to search for something from which to be set in motion again, and would be unable to attain rest and stand still. Or else the intellect will not have perpetual movement at all, once it is encompassed by limited things that have their end — and this contradicts the natural properties of the intellect and its bent toward perpetual movement. It is impossible, therefore, that the intellect should halt or find rest while it remains among created things. Where, then, will the intellect be able to display its own property, namely to halt in the very act of moving — that is, both to keep stillness and to have peace and firmly to receive the sense of repose — if it does not attain to the uncreated and the unbounded? And the uncreated and unbounded is God alone, who is truly and transcendently one. It befits the intellect to press on by its movement toward God, the one and the unbounded, so as to attain in Him its natural repose, that is, noetic repose. For there is the standing in the Spirit, and the welcoming rest, and the endless end of all things; and when movement reaches that One it will never cease for the intellect that has attained the infinite and unbounded, the indescribable and formless, the inconceivable and wholly simple — and this is the One, that is, God.
6. If, as David says, God makes spirits His angels (that is, His messengers), and if He Himself says that He makes spirit of the man who is born of the Holy Spirit (Jn 3:6), then the man born of the Holy Spirit by manifest communion with Him becomes an angel too. Now it belongs to angels always to behold the face of the heavenly Father (Mt 18:10), as the Lord said of them; therefore it befits the partaker of the Holy Spirit likewise to press upward and to contemplate the face of God. So David teaches, saying: «Seek the Lord and be strong; seek His face continually» (Ps 105:4). Hence he does not preserve what is good and fitting who, having become a partaker of the Holy and life-giving and illuminating Spirit, full of love, and having been raised to the dignity of an angel, then out of excessive caution restricts his noetic perception of God and refuses to press upward toward Him and toward divine things — even though the Saviour commands us to abide in Him as He abides in us. And David says: «Draw near to Him and be enlightened» (Ps 34:5). And truly, if we wish to do what is fitting, then in the light of God the Father — I mean the Holy Spirit — we shall see the light of God, that is, the divine truth, unless through ignorance we take it into our heads to turn away from the divine rays.
7. In three ways does the intellect ascend to the contemplation of God: by its own motion, by motion from another, and by a third way that lies between these two. By its own motion — when the nature of the intellect desires this and has recourse to its own conceptions; and the completion of this way is the contemplation of divine things. Of this even the Greeks once dreamed. The second way is above nature; it comes solely because God wills to give illumination and gives it. Then the whole intellect falls under the divine influence, and is caught up into divine revelations, and comes to know the ineffable mysteries of God, and sees how what is to come will be accomplished. And the way that lies between these two is joined in part with both of them. Where the intellect acts by its own will and imagining, there this way agrees with the self-moved way; and it is joined with the other-moved way when, through divine illumination, the intellect is united with itself and ineffably beholds God above its own spiritual union. The intellect then finds itself beyond all the visible and aforesaid divine things. It sees then neither the good beginning, nor deification, nor wisdom, nor the power that gives strength, nor providence, nor any other of the divine realities; for it is then filled to the utmost with spiritual light, and beyond that with the joy stirred up by the divine fire mingled with love.
8. The intellect, resting on its own conceptions, learns from faith to contemplate invisible things; and when it is illumined by grace it is established in hope. The divine light seizes it, and it becomes a treasury of love for men, and still more of love for God. Thus the threefold order of the intellect and its movement in faith, hope and perfect love becomes deiform, firm and unshaken. And attaining the wide place of the heavenly city, it is established in the stronghold of love. From this comes what the apostle Paul says: love bears all things, endures all things — through the goodness of faith and hope. «Love», says the Apostle, «never fails» (1 Cor 13:8), for it is joined in flame and ineffably fused with God.
9. In nothing created is there anything singled out as one. It is impossible not to know that one thing differs from another in certain natural properties; but with respect to being created there are no differences: each has the same beginning and the same end, each is limited by its own nature and is not the true, simple and one. Only One is truly uncreated, as simple, as without beginning, as having no end and unbounded, and therefore infinite — and this is God. If the intellect, unified and outstretched, holding to a deiform order, were to contemplate Him in communion and co-operation with the Holy and life-giving Spirit, it would grow continually, as befits it. Moreover, the intellect knows that without the one God and the contemplation of Him in spirit it cannot become better. This is because the intellect has been scattered, submitting to a world of many parts and to the passions; and therefore it needs a power beyond the world and a contemplation beyond nature of the One, so as by this means to tear itself away from what divides it, to stand outside the passions and division, and thus to receive what is deiform. This is why the Lord makes supplication to the Father, that all the faithful may be one in the Father and in Him, the Son, through the Spirit, and thus be one as the Father, the Son and the Spirit are one — not, of course, in the blasphemous manner in which Sabellius spoke of oneness. Rather, that we may be perfect, as is fitting, by the grace of the Spirit who unites us, and by the single-formed contemplation of the one God. In this lies our progress; this is our end and our true and only rest. This is why the envious and man-hating regiments of the demons draw the intellect toward the veneration of many gods — may that never be! They scattered the unity of the intellect in delusion and did not allow it to conceive the one transcendent God, so that the intellect, against its own nature, should go off to serve many gods, contemplate them, be divided, and begin to desire all manner of passions and falsehood instead of truth and virtue. Therefore the Holy Spirit commands through the prophets: «Draw near to Him» — that is, to the One — «and be enlightened». And elsewhere: «I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no God» (Is 44:6). And again: «Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one» (Deut 6:4). The tri-hypostatic character of the one Godhead does not divide the one lordship; these Three are truly Persons, and they are in no way less one in nature and power, in will and energy, and in the other goods of their essence. To serve, then, the oneness of God, and to contemplate, and to tear oneself away from the many, and to be gathered in Him as far as one has strength — this is the will of God and the sure progress of the intellect, for thus it finds truth and divine love and, as a consequence, the fruit of deification.
10. If falsehood is composed of many parts and truth of one, then the intellect that presses on in the Spirit toward the transcendent One, who is above all things and from whom the many proceed, is moving upward toward genuine truth. But the intellect cannot be freed from the passions unless the truth frees it (Jn 8:32). And the intellect is freed from the passions when it contemplates and presses upward in a single manner toward the transcendent One. For dispassion, for a deiform order and for spiritual sonship, freedom befits the intellect better than slavery. For it is said: «The servant does not know what his master is doing» (Jn 15:15). And if ignorance is proper to servants, then clearly the partaker of freedom knows the mysteries of the Father, and so is able to ascend rightly and well into the dignity of sonship. For ignorance is plainly the opposite of knowledge, and slavery the opposite of sonship. And if he who does not know is a servant, then he who knows is truly not a servant but free — a son, one may say. For the Spirit of truth truly gives freedom and Himself leads into the sonship of God those in whom He has made His dwelling. For it is said: «All who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God» (Rom 8:14). If the contemplation of the One who is above nature is truth, and truth grants freedom to the intellect, and freedom is the mark of divine sonship, then there is nothing greater that could befit a rational being. It would therefore be reasonable and altogether necessary that the intellect, so far as it has strength, should press upward, contemplate the One, and be gathered in the transcendent One, that is, in God.
11. «The Lord your God», says the Holy Spirit, «the Lord is one». Therefore our concern also is this: in the divinity of the Spirit to raise the intellect to the transcendent One. And it cannot be that one should preach the One and yet not love Him and deny the intellect its inclination and turning toward Him. For when the Holy Spirit utters something, He wills that it should also be in our thought; and to what is in our thought the intellect must turn. When the intellect does not turn toward what is in the thoughts, then there is nothing for it to think about at all. And then it becomes vain to preach the One, and through this faith itself becomes vain. But if that is out of place, then it is also out of place for the intellect, which turns toward the One and presses on toward Him, not to ponder Him.
12. If it is natural for created, rational beings to reach out toward the cause of their coming into being and to turn their gaze toward it — and the cause of all things is God, from whom the intellect also proceeds, and God is the supreme and simple One — then it is natural for the intellect to turn and lift up its eyes toward the supreme and simply One as toward the cause of its coming into being.
13. If «all things are from Him and through Him and unto Him» (Rom 11:36), then the intellect too is one among all things and exists through Him — indeed more than all things through Him, and precisely through Him by reason of its likeness to God. For this very reason the intellect must lift up its eyes to Him. And the words «unto Him» mean that we must lift up our eyes by turning toward the manifestations of the transcendent One. That is, the intellect must contemplate the One.
14. From the One the many proceed, not the One from the many. And since created things are many, it is evident that they proceed from the One. The One is beyond all doubt above all created things, as their Maker and Builder. Therefore whoever contemplates created things as he ought will find his contemplation completed in the contemplation of the transcendent One; for in created things there are very many imprints of their cause, and through them is known the One who by His providence brought all things to life with artistry, wisdom, power and goodness, just as He willed. Therefore Isaiah too says in the Spirit: «Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created all these?» (Is 40:26). He said «all these» with a view to the abundance of created things; and he said «who» because he raised the intellect to Him from whom all these proceed, who is simply One by nature.
15. Created things too are gathered into a unity, but one that is composite and multipartite, and not without beginning, since it is created. But He who creates is one. He is one not merely as the harmonizing of the divergences among many things and their reduction to a single concord and to the goal of all, but as uncreated, as the first cause of all. The intellect, ascending step by step, will need to reach something one and originative, something that orders the visible arrangement and the being of all creatures, the harmony and agreement among them. If the intellect does not arrive at this, it will move on to infinity, which is absurd. For everything that moves and comes to pass once did not exist, and what did not exist once began. And if it began, it also acquired movement. We must therefore seek out precisely what gave being and set things moving, even if it is itself unmoving, since it is what imparts movement. Otherwise, what is it that causes movement, if not something that lies under another principle — since that other is itself without beginning? If it is unmoving, then it is also unchanging. And if it is such, then it is also simple; and so that what is uncompounded should not change, it has shown itself to us as unchanged. Composition is the beginning of discord, and discord the beginning of dissolution, and this leads to the end of movement. There is, then, no composition there, so that there may be no discord; and if there is no discord, there will be no dissolution; and if there is no dissolution, then change and movement will not be found in the unchanging and unmoving, in that which moves but is not moved, in that which leads to being but never came to be and does not come to be. What is unchanging and unmoving is of necessity also uncompounded, and therefore it is utterly simple and uniquely transcendent. The intellect that reaches up toward it finds itself outside all things, because it contemplates the beautiful and above all is drawn toward Him who truly is, and still more toward Him from whom all things proceed and toward whom all things naturally reach upward. When this happens, according to the word, the intellect finds itself beyond the passions. It stretches out higher than the beautiful and abides there, and therefore does not halt at shameful passions. Therefore the sacred Law says: «Him alone shall you serve» — that is, the one God. It befits us, then, to stretch upward to the supreme One, if we wish both to fulfil the Law of God and to be above the passions.
16. It is said in Scripture: «The Lord alone led him, and there was no strange god with him» (Deut 32:12). Do you see the power of the One alone? There was no strange god with them, because the one Lord led them. But the Lord leads those who follow Him, not those who turn away from Him. And whatever a man follows, toward that he turns. Therefore, if we do not wish to have beside us some other god, some demon or passion, let us walk with the turning of our intellect after the one God, so that of us too it may rightly be said: «The one Lord leads them; there is no strange god with them.»
17. The many proceed from the One, but in very different ways, since the modes by which beings come to be, and by which they proceed from the first unity, are themselves very different. For some of them have a beginning and were created, while others are uncreated and have no beginning in time; yet the cause of the coming-to-be of them all is the supernatural One — for some as Creator, for others by nature. Therefore it does not befit us to approach them all in the same way or to hold to them in the same way. Those that had a beginning and were created we should approach not for their own sake but for another reason — as one approaches a mirror, because something is seen in it or it reflects something. So, if you wish to make progress, you should not approach created things for any other reason than this: that in them the Highest One is made manifest. But to those creatures that are without beginning and are such by nature we come for no other reason than for their own sake and for the sake of Him from whom they proceed. For these are the beings we ought to approach for their own sake, and the Highest One is near to them and natural to them — or rather, it is they who are near to the Highest One and natural to Him. It befits us, then, not only to approach them but to cleave to them and with their help to strive to reflect within ourselves the first and only Good, so that by the co-operation and help of grace we may attain the dignity of the glory of God according to the image and likeness. Hence it comes about that those who think rightly, starting from the cause, creatively raise the intellect to the contemplation of the One and gather it into a single thought of the transcendent One, provided the intellect looks upon this as it ought. And those creatures whose cause is by nature have the power to gather the intellect into themselves — when it is turned toward them or built up in accordance with them — and to direct it toward the truly One. Thus, from any creatures whatever, whether natural or created, the intellect is naturally gathered toward the manifold-yet-one cause, whether in action or in contemplation. And whether the intellect makes use of one or of several created or natural beings, if it does so not for the sake of the One, and not so that, gathered within itself, it may press on toward the First One and contemplate Him alone in the holy participation and co-operation of the Spirit the Illuminator, who works simply, in a single form and in that form alone — this will be reckoned to the intellect as sin, however well it may seem to be doing. For everything that proceeds from the One naturally leads to the One those who use created things as they should. The great Dionysius says that every manifestation of light which proceeds from the Father comes to us beneficently and fills us again as a unifying power, and returns us to the unity of the Father who gathers us, and to deiform simplicity. For «all things are from Him and through Him and unto Him» (Rom 11:36). When it does not lead to this, such a manifestation of light is out of accord with nature and does not come about as it ought.
18. There is an activity that precedes contemplation, and there is a contemplation that precedes activity. The first is accomplished bodily, so that he who has bridled the impulses of the body and taught it to walk in virtue may allow the intellect to enter freely into its own space, that is, the noetic space, and there to labour for its own benefit. The second activity begins from the intellect and from reflection in the spirit, and is concentrated upon what is above the intellect, that is, upon God. Drawing near to Him, the intellect attains the One, and the One is God. Through this the intellect too is gathered within itself into a single whole and becomes once more undivided. The One, when contemplated, becomes the cause of unity — of deiform simplicity. For it will not do that the intellect, contemplating the One, should not itself become one and simple. But if it contemplates what is divided and composite, then it too must be divided and become manifold. And by «simple» I mean the one that exists of itself. For whatever the intellect may be, it undergoes changes in its activity; yet in itself it is simple, and therefore, contemplating the One, it must be one in its activities as well. But if it were to contemplate the One and yet be divided into at least two parts, what would one of its parts be doing, separated from the part that contemplates the One? For the separated part either contemplates something else or contemplates nothing at all. And this could happen for these reasons: either it does not wish to, or it has not the strength, or by its nature it is inclined to some other activity than contemplation. And if we suppose that the intellect contemplates something else as well, then know that the intellect does not see the One simply, but two. And when it sees two, it cannot be one. As is well known, it is divided into as many parts as it sees. Nor can it be that it does not see, when it does not wish to see: the intellect that thinks cannot be idle even for a moment. Nor does it happen that one part of the intellect slows down its activity while another speeds it up; nor that the intellect is composite and not simple, or made up of any parts, or that one part of it is appointed for contemplation and another for some other activity — for this too would be an expression of its compositeness, and one cannot speak thus of the simplicity of the intellect. If, then, the one and simple nature of the intellect looks upon what is simple and one, then it too will be one in its activities. And if it is simple and one, then it will see the simple and the one. Therefore every activity and every contemplation must press on toward the One who is above every intellect. And if it does not so press on, the intellect will attain nothing; its activity and its contemplation will be in vain. It will act divided by the passions, and the perception of the soul will not press on toward that single-formed union with the One who is above the intellect. Such union is able to filter and purify the contemplative power of the intellect, which is raised up and contemplates the One and perceives Him in Him from whom all things proceed, through whom and in whom and for whom all things come to be, and are, and exist.
19. The summit of all desires is the union of God with the soul, a union above every intellect. For divine union there is need of divine likeness, and for divine likeness there is need of the activity of the intellect, that is, of contemplation. For such is the nature of the Godhead, which is why He is called God. But contemplation leads at once to the thought of God; for everywhere and in all things God places within the contemplative intellect something like rays, and the contemplative intellect always beholds God before it — and God is the transcendent One. The nature of the intellect is such that in its activity it becomes like the one it contemplates; of this the theologian tongue of the divine Gregory informs us when he says that the intellect sees and perceives the radiance of God. For what the intellect sees, that it also perceives, and even becomes. According to Peter of Damascus, the intellect takes on the colour of what it beholds. When it beholds what is divided and manifold, it becomes divided and manifold itself; but when it has ascended to the contemplation of the transcendent and simply One, then plainly it becomes one, as I have already said. And when it attains the One, it beholds what is without beginning and without end, formless and simple, for such is the One. In this way it too becomes, in its activity, without beginning, without end, formless and simple. Having undergone this and been thus changed, it is made like God so far as is possible. And from there it attains the summit of all desires, that is, the divine union that is above the intellect and ineffable, which is the highest purpose there is under God. For this reason it befits the intellect to stretch upward with all its strength and to attain in spirit the sight and contemplation of the transcendent One.
20. When the intellect lingers over many things, or over even two, then plainly it does not behold the simply One. Therefore it is limited and has an end, for such is what is imperfectly simple. But when the intellect touches without touching the truly One, gazing upon it unseen with the noetic eye in the spirit, then it becomes without beginning, without end, without limit, formless and shapeless; it is clothed in stillness, and struck with wonder it learns to be silent, is filled with gladness and experiences the ineffable. But do not think I am saying that it becomes without beginning, without end and without limit in its essence rather than in its activity. For that in which the intellect is changed is not its essence but its energy. If the intellect were changed in its essence, having seen and received deification — that is, if it received deification because it beheld God — then it would become god in essence. But it is impossible for any created thing to become god in essence; this is impossible even for the angels, and can belong only to the one God on high. And since it is out of place to say that the intellect is deified in essence, we are obliged to say that the intellect experiences deification by way of contemplation. It is clear, then, that it is changed not in essence but in activity. And one may add that the intellect is changed according to what it sees; and since what it sees is by no means the divine essence but the divine energy, it too is then changed not in essence but in activity.
21. Everything that has, as it were, shone forth from the transcendent One has not departed from that from which by every means it received its being. As it came forth from Him, so in Him it is held together and brought to completion. And there is nothing among created things in which there is not an outpouring and a kind of fragrance of the creative and self-existent One. And all things have a share in Him who truly is — save only that they do not lift up a voice, and they point not to the transcendent One Himself, for He abides above all contemplation and understanding, but to something like a ray that goes forth from the transcendent One. Therefore, since all beings call upon the One, and all contemplate the One, and the transcendent One Himself makes Himself manifest to the intellect in all beings, the intellect must be directed, must press on and come to the transcendent One. On the one hand through the assurance given by the many beings, and on the other because the creative One of whom we now speak wills that the intellect should behold Him and should perceive in Him goodness beyond measure, and should perceive in Him life — as the ineffable One Himself says: «I am the life» (Jn 11:25). And again: «This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God» (Jn 17:3). And elsewhere: «Seek God and you shall live» (Ps 69:32) — for through seeking comes contemplation, and through contemplation life. And let the intellect rejoice and be enlightened and be glad, as David says: «All those who rejoice have their dwelling in You» (Ps 87:7). And elsewhere: «In Your light we shall see light» (Ps 36:9). This also explains why He created the intellect contemplative and scattered His own properties throughout all created things: so that through them, as through windows, He might show Himself to the intellect in spiritual illumination, and thus draw it, as it moves, to Himself.
22. God, the Trinitarian good One, made everything He made by His own will. And what God wills is the highest good. Goodness is a property of the intellect. God created the intellect so that it should contemplate God or the properties of God, whereby the intellect, when it contemplates, is gathered into the one. So God wills that the intellect contemplate Him Himself, and this is a great good. God is the truly and simply One; to contemplate Him and to be gathered in Him in a single form is, as has already been said, the highest good.
23. When there exists a single, self-united universal love, as those wise in God explain, it is evident that there is some one thing that is loved. For if there were even two things loved, there would be either two loves, or the single love would be divided into two and would no longer be called single and self-united. But since it is now said that there is a single universal love gathered in itself, we must understand that there is also a single beloved. Yet the beloved comes before the love directed to it, and it does not happen that anyone should feel love for what he has not yet perceived as lovable. This love is that intense love which we must have toward God, as both the natural and the written Law of God require of us. The natural law teaches the intellect, which loves the beautiful, to press on toward the still better, which is God. And the written law says: «You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. The Lord our God, the Lord is one» (Deut 6:4-5). There is, then, a single beloved, that is, the Trinitarian Unity, which must be present in the intellect before there can be love for Him. Therefore the intellect must reach upward toward the transcendent One, so that through finding and contemplating Him love for Him too may shine forth, and so that a man may be able to fulfil the Law and the commandments, loving, as the Law says, the Lord his God.
24. It cannot be that the intellect, having ascended to the One who is above every intellect, should for any reason be unable to love Him. For it encounters an ineffable and incomprehensible beauty that grows out of the One as out of an all-sustaining root. When divine illumination comes upon the intellect, it becomes like a net in which so many fish have been caught that it may break; the intellect is struck with wonder as it beholds the beauty that is above every intellect, and grows drunk with it as with wine, and becomes as one beside himself, and marvels beyond all measure, unable to contain the sight of that incomprehensible beauty. Because of this, of course, the bonds of love hold the intellect fast, and it is as though burnt with thirst. The One who is above every intellect is one. But all call Him the first cause of all things, the beginning and the end and the unification of all. Pouring forth the power that makes what is beautiful and good, He Himself brought out of Himself the beauty and goodness of everything beautiful and good, being Himself infinitely higher than all beauty and all goodness, present without end in created things and yet incomparably the transcendent One. By nature He is the one desirable beyond all that is desirable, the one true and good beyond every good and blessing, and the one truly beloved by the laws of nature and order, as the cause of all, since He has surpassed everything beloved and desirable by the excellence of His beauty and goodness; and He is the one truly transcendent, as the one truly self-existent, from whom all beings proceed. Therefore, as is said, with God’s help we must turn in spirit to the seeking and the finding of the One alone, from whom come all beginnings and all ends. And then the doors of divine love will open of themselves to us by the grace of Christ, and we shall enter into the rest of our Lord with great gladness and joy; we shall know the sweetness of that One and shall taste divine delight, ourselves remaining one, not torn apart nor divided into many, according to the prayer of the Saviour to the Father, who said: «That they may be one, even as we are one» (Jn 17:22). Then we shall be able diligently to fulfil the commandment that bids us: «Love the Lord your God with all your soul… and your neighbour as yourself» (Lk 10:27), and we shall attain perfection so far as is possible to man. For love is the end of the law, and upon it are established not only the law and the prophets but all who have been made perfect in God in Christ.
25. For everything that by its nature is inclined to be united with the Spirit, division leads to weakening. Therefore the intellect too, were it divided even a little in its activities, would find itself outside what belongs to it by grace. This happens when it looks upon a variety of things, for it is impossible, while looking upon a variety of things, to remain undivided. And if anyone were to suppose otherwise, he would not easily be able to explain why the intellect in a state of stillness differs from the intellect in a state of union; and by this he would be maintaining that the intellect of the God-fearing is like the intellect of those overcome by the passions, which is out of place. In its activity the intellect becomes like that upon which it looks: if it must behold what is composite, it becomes manifold itself, and departing from simplicity it cannot remain undivided. And when the intellect has fallen under division, it can in no way remain pure of sin; for even this is acknowledged as sin, that it is divided within itself — so think those who have seen such division in themselves. If, then, the spiritual part of the intellect, which is meant to know the good by noetic perception through the contemplation of the highest transcendent One, has suffered division and found itself outside grace, it befits it to hold fast to the transcendent One, to stretch upward and to contemplate Him, and to do so with the whole soul, if we wish to escape division and discord. Even if the intellect looks upon what is one but created, it will not be able to remain undivided. For the created one cannot be called truly simple: it is limited and composite and circumscribed; therefore it would be wrong to call it simply one, and the intellect, gazing unswervingly upon it, will not have a simple and single-formed activity. For its gaze will be circumscribed and limited and marked by composition, as is that upon which the intellect looks; and so the intellect will fall away from the divine grace that makes it simple and without beginning, unbounded and uncircumscribed, and it will find itself outside the hidden One who is above the intellect. The intellect will also lose its own glory, which is the delight of the property of unity, and the boundlessness of beginninglessness, and the simplicity in which it is formless in a single form; and the intellect will not attain the perception of that supernatural and ineffable beauty. It befits the intellect, then, to gaze toward the beginningless, simple and truly One and to stretch upward, so that the One may illumine it and it may be united with the unity that gathers all beginnings, and through it with itself; and this not only so that the Better may love it the more, since it is made like the Better so far as possible by boundlessness and simplicity, by formlessness and shapelessness, but also so that it may itself be able to love the divine and beautiful supernatural beauty, having risen, as has been said, to that likeness. For it is known that like things are inclined toward like; and so it is plain that God will love the intellect, and the intellect in its turn will love God. For like resembles like. Likeness, as is known, has correspondence; and so love on the one side will call forth answering love on the other. There is no stronger feeling that arises between God and the soul.
26. When the intellect attains Him who is above the intellect, then it becomes, beyond its own nature, formless and shapeless and altogether inconceivable in a deified way, without beginning and without end — in a word, beyond its own union. But when it keeps its own thoughts with it, even though it be concentrated upon divine and spiritual things, then, as they say, it moves and acts naturally and remains within the bounds of its own nature. Now the supernatural stands far higher than the natural, and therefore we must strive to love what is supernatural, since it is far better, according to the commandment that bids us earnestly seek the better gifts. But it is clear that when the intellect abides in the supernatural, it abides in God. For God is higher than every nature, since He is the very first beginning of all and is simply One. Therefore it befits the intellect to stretch upward, to strive to contemplate and to ascend to the first beginning and the simply One, so that, having risen to the supernatural One above its own natural activity, it may fare better in the supernatural than in its own natural state.
27. Every being finds repose and satisfaction in its own natural properties, which were first formed in the first cause on a single-formed basis. The intellect, then, will naturally come to true gladness, and will have no small joy, and will be wholly at rest, when, having come and left all things behind, it stretches out toward the single-principled and first cause and there by spiritual communion attains to Her from whom proceed all things and the properties of all things — the beginnings of all, the middles and the ends, which were formed in Her and are contained in Her, are accomplished in Her and come to their end in Her; through Her everything that knows good is consoled, and by Her that same intellect was created such as it is. The intellect is able in a certain way to turn toward itself when it turns toward the true cause of all, that is, toward its own archetype. And since every being naturally loves itself, and the intellect feels this above all, being the image of the immeasurable beauty of the One who is above the intellect, the intellect greatly loves to contemplate its own cause; for, as has already been said, in turning toward it, it sees itself and begins to love still more. On the other hand, there is also a kind of love that is naturally shown by creatures toward the Creator, while for their part parents are seized with love for their children. Therefore in the one who turns toward the single cause of all there arises a certain ineffable sweetness, for he turns toward the cause of his own being and toward himself, as has been said. For in Her, as in the cause of all, everything has its primordial being; and of course the intellect too, as one among all, is contained in the One who is above the intellect, as in its causal archetype.
28. From what is above essence every essence received its being; from what is above nature, every nature; from what is timeless and uncompounded, what is temporal and composite; from the uncreated everything created received its nature; so too every form arose from the formless, and from the transcendent One arose the many and the visible. Whoever, then, does not press on toward the formless One and does not look upon Him as his foundation, but turns instead to something visible in form among created things, prefers what is incomparably small to Him who truly is, and perhaps even comes close to idolatry. For whatever a man presses toward and gazes upon, that he also desires, and by that he is overcome; and by whatever he is overcome, to that he submits. Such a man serves the creature rather than the Creator. Every man’s intellect submits to and serves and loves the one upon whom it gazes and toward whom it presses. If pressing toward anything else besides the simple and formless brings so many falls, then toward the formless One we must press, and to Him turn our knowing, and with the intellect stretch upward, where we shall find the treasures of all knowledge, and where for those who have reached that place there comes rest and the ceasing of all contemplation, where thought halts, where silence beyond every intellect sets in, and ineffable joy in great wonder.
29. If all beings desire being, and the cause of the being of all lies in the One who is beyond being, then all beings, and especially rational ones, that move rightly — as they ought — toward being, by that very fact desire also the One who truly is, who is beyond being. Therefore the intellect that does not stretch upward toward the One and does not long for this is moving falsely; it is led astray and falls away from its own dignity, which consists in the knowledge of the One who is beyond being, and in the divine, single-formed union with Him in love, a union above all understanding.
30. Causes contain within themselves a superabundance of the beauty of what proceeds from them. And the common cause of all is the pre-eternal One. If the intellect were to cleave to anything whatever among the things that proceed from the pre-eternal One — whether to beauty or to something else that attracts the intellect — then this intention of its own would of course be false. For though it loves beauty, this is not the beauty of the first true One (which, once touched, makes all things beautiful); rather, the intellect through ignorance or weariness presses toward what takes its beauty from the pre-eternal One. But the intellect that reflects well upon where it should press directs its thoughts to the contemplation of the pre-eternal One, seeing clearly that it will receive a superabundance of what it desires, and that noetic contemplation is for it as a cause, and that nothing will grant it either its own properties or its own beauty except the pre-eternal One. For even if there seem to be powers able to grant their properties, they are not able to remain for ever in the intellect that loves them. For we believe that this is within the power of the Holy Spirit alone; He alone can act where He wills and as He wills, as Lord and as one having a sovereign nature — a Person of the tri-hypostatic Unity. It befits the intellect, then, to turn to the pre-eternal One, where there is not only the source of all blessings but also the unquestionable bestowal of gifts.
31. All beings by their nature reach out toward the good; and the good is in truth only one, although we call many things good. Among many things you will find nothing that is simply good and, as it were, all-perfect; in them there is only what we may call a partial good, since it touches upon the good of the One who is beyond essence, but does not have the good in itself. For only the pre-eternal One is simply good, and the highest good, and the source of all goodness; He is able to impart His own properties and naturally draws to Himself every being, every existence, every disposition, power, movement, activity and property, and every beauty and goodness whatsoever. Simply, all beings and everything visible around beings creatively received their appearing from the pre-eternal One. Therefore, when the intellect presses on not toward the simply One but toward something else, its movement is false; for though it presses perhaps toward a good, it is not toward the truly simple good, not toward that which pours out the fullness of grace and makes better everything else that stands in need of more good and of change for the better.
32. The intellect of many men, having suffered division through ignorance, lies in senselessness and, as it were, torn apart by the many, does not know the good and simply One; it does not seek Him and does not press toward Him. Of this the Holy Spirit says through David: «Many say, Who will show us good things?» — not the Good One. And this is understandable, for they are busy and anxious about many things, and therefore they do not know that the One must be sought. That portion of Him which the holy word of God calls good they have either passed by without understanding, or lost through their own negligence, not even thinking to seek Him who is most worthy of seeking. Supposing that they follow the teachings of David and walk as they ought in his footsteps, they repeat after him: «The light of Your countenance has been marked upon us, O Lord» — that is, the knowledge of Your single glory has been reflected in us as in a mirror. So then, the many find their consolation in many good things, but those who live spiritually are inwardly enlightened, and the Holy Spirit illumines them with the knowledge of the One who is simply good.
33. The force of a stream of water is greater when it flows forward in a single current and is not divided or broken up into many rivulets. So too the contemplation of the intellect, its movement and its longing, will be stronger if it presses on not divided into many parts and along many paths, but in a single current and undivided; and this happens when the intellect presses toward the transcendent and simply One, looks upon Him and contemplates Him. For the transcendent and simply One has the power to gather the intellect upon Himself; and the intellect, counted worthy to behold Him, cannot but take on the same appearance as He — that is, it cannot but become His reflection, and cannot but become formless in a single-formed disposition: simple, colourless, shapeless, without properties, unbounded, without end, imageless and simply the transcendent One; for it is illumined by the rays of divine and transcendent love in the revelation of mysterious knowledge, and it is crowned with stillness and with the repose of the thoughts beyond word and thought, delighting in spiritual joy and heavenly gladness. Moreover, it is changed into something more divine and is clothed in the divine image in spiritual accord with the simple and the endless and the imageless and the formless and the one and the rest that has already been mentioned. And if this did not happen, and the intellect did not undergo such a divine change, it would in no way attain the perception and knowledge of the transcendent One. For God is the unifying Unity and the Intellect above every thought; and then the intellect, if it can, conceives Him in a transcendent way, when it has become one in the manner described, having come to this through the knowledge of the Godhead.
34. The trinity of the transcendent Godhead is supernaturally gathered into a single one, for God is a tri-hypostatic One. Therefore it is impossible for the soul to be a true image of God unless it too, consisting of three parts, supernaturally becomes one in itself. I say that the soul consists of three parts, not because it has rational, desiring and incensive powers, for this is not the true threefold nature of the soul: the rational soul is not of itself prone to desire and anger. These powers entered the soul from the irrational part of creation through the present animal life, being in themselves irrational and dark. The soul itself is rational, and its full nature is spiritual light. It is therefore inclined to regard as its own only those parts without which it truly cannot act. And it can act without anger and desire, and it is precisely without them that it truly acts. These, then, are not its real parts, but powers that enter into it, as I said, through the animal and lowly condition. For the rational soul, which with its intellect examines what is above and conceives noetic things, and stretches out beyond itself and, so to speak, leaps upward, casts anger and desire somewhere far away, as one casts away something foolish, since it has no use for them there, where there is simplicity and the invisible, the colourless and inconceivable and all the rest that requires an intellect free, uniform, gathered in itself and wholly simple. The threefold soul in its simplicity is the intellect itself, and it uses word and spirit, which is most proper to it and in no way harms its simplicity; for even the trinity of the single-principled Godhead, whose image the soul is, does not hinder His unity and simplicity, but the Godhead is both the simple One and the transcendent, and at the same time no less and unfailingly the Trinity. Therefore the soul — that is, the intellect, for the soul is intellect and the intellect is soul — together with word and spirit, is supernaturally united and reflects the true likeness of the tri-hypostatic one Godhead. This can come about in no other way than through the vision and contemplation of the supernatural Triune Unity; for She created the soul such, and She also turns it, tempering it as in fire, toward likeness, and without seeing and contemplating Her the soul cannot grasp this. If this does not happen and the likeness is not restored, then we shall feel a lack in this, above all in contemplation and in truth, for which we must care most of all; for without them it is impossible for us to lay hold of dispassion. For just as we must be active in the good in order to become dispassionate, so must we also be contemplative regarding the truth in order to become godlike, servants of God who is above all, and to become gods by adoption and to be such by resemblance to the archetype. If we must become united by likeness to the primordial transcendent One, this happens to us when we look upon the universal One, contemplate Him, stretch upward, turn noetically and gaze unrelentingly upon that One. In every way one should strive to look upon the transcendent One, who is beyond the intellect, and to incline wholly toward Him with all zeal, with all the heart and soul, and to cultivate love for the transcendent One, so that love for Him may itself become holy wings for our noetic ascent to Him. And so we shall always be, as it were, in the air in an invisible disposition, single-eyed with the truly one Lord, hymning the Trinity in word and in spirit with a triune manner of thought, and pressing toward Her and being imprinted as She is pleased to imprint us, and being united in unity by our own powers with the One who is above all unity.
35. The unit is the perceptible beginning of every numerical quantity, and the transcendent One is the beginning of all multiplicity, visible and invisible, that can be conceived, and of everything that exists. Just as every number has its beginning in the unit, so everything that exists derives in some way from the transcendent One, by natural or by creative causation. Yet the place of the numerical unit, since it can be perceived by sense, is consistently determined by its nature, for the unit is the beginning of everything that is counted, and sense in counting places it before everything else. In the transcendent One, however, since He is beyond the intellect, we see the opposite. It is precisely this Unity, first of all things by nature, that the intellect places after everything else; for no intellect is able to perceive as a beginning the One who is above the world and to pass from Him to the many. On the contrary, it ascends from the many to the One above the world and is concentrated in Him. And just as in the first case the senses need the numerical unit, because they pass on to the many — since otherwise the intellect cannot count or go where it wishes — so here the soul’s condition needs the many, because through them it ascends to the transcendent One and is gathered within itself, and in no other way can it arrive at the conception of the transcendent One. Thus the intellect, using the order and the path proper to it, begins with the many, and its completion is the coming to the transcendent One. For just as by sense the numerical unit is fully grasped and determined, and therefore sense places it first in order, as its nature requires, so the transcendent and supernatural Being, whom the intellect seeks and cannot comprehend, is doubtless too far from the state natural to the intellect for the intellect to begin from Him; and since He is above nature, the intellect rather finds in Him, supernaturally, not a beginning but an end, after it has passed through and enumerated much.
Thinking belongs to the nature of the intellect, and the transcendent One is in Himself immeasurable and inaccessible; therefore the intellect inclines despite itself toward the many. The intellect cannot cease from thinking, and it cannot lay hold of the supreme and transcendent One. Yet, looking upon the many, it sees noetically in each thing something that does not belong to that thing but to the One alone. Gathering from all visible things what is made manifest to thought, and seeing that all these agree with one another, do not contradict one another and resemble flowers of one root and one growth, the intellect passes slowly from the many to the one supreme One, from whom the many and all things come, and is naturally concentrated, departing from natural beings, in a supernatural act, beholding as in a mirror the supernatural and primordial One, whose nature is above every nature — which is why natural men see Him only in one way. It is then that the intellect, ineffably contemplating Him who refines and creates goodness and all beauty, and having tasted the eternal One, turns back to the many only unwillingly, even though they are beautiful and contain some good in themselves. Above all the intellect loves beauty, and so it does not of its own free will avoid Him who is above all, unless this has befallen it through some circumstance.
And since the appearance of beings is very diverse, and the intellect understands them in different ways and reaches through them to the supernatural One in different ways, it is fitting, in my view, to define a certain order of transition from the many to the supernatural One, so that the intellect, going up as if by a ladder, may advance with confidence and may notice when something is lacking — whether it stands where it ought to stand, and what leads it astray and deprives it of that beauty and ascent, or of the divine banquet, and how to return it to the place from which it fell. From this it learns to recognize the fog of the passions, and the illumination of a pure heart, and the knowledge of truth, which it can see as in a mirror; it becomes a witness of divine visions, comes to know the divine sense, and it will be no secret to it whether that sense increases or diminishes. The intellect can grasp great and wondrous knowledge and understand the purpose of stillness and enclosure.
It may be put thus: all beings are divided into the perceptible created, the noetic created, the noetic uncreated, and the Uncreated. When the eye of the soul, that is, the intellect, turns to them and looks often, and chooses stillness in its endeavour, then it rises as if by stairs from what it delights to do alone to the contemplation and comprehension of Him who truly is, to the knowledge of heavenly things; it is crowned with the rays of truth and rejoices, it is enriched without end by the Ever-existent, it marvellously rejoices and delights, and with the co-operation of grace it can even be lifted, as it were, before its time from the earth, when the noetic light grows strong within it and it no longer perceives what is here, because it is possessed by a Being that is beyond the intellect and by the conception of Him who is better than all beauty. Although these sacred steps are divided into parts and seem to lead gradually to the highest goal, yet the distance between the steps is not measured by place; the distance and difference between them is, as it were, a degree of quality or property. For example, perceptible and noetic creatures are alike creatures, but the latter far surpass the former, as much as the intellect surpasses the senses in beauty. On the other hand, the uncreated noetic beings are superior to the created noetic ones, although a different order is discernible among beings; yet the uncreated noetic beings are lower than the Uncreated One who is above the intellect.
From this it can be seen that when the intellect, having passed beyond action, dwells upon Him who exceeds all beings and is in the highest hiddenness, hidden from everything that can be grasped by the senses and by the intellect, then this is its best vision and contemplation, more so than what is most accessible to perceptible creatures, or even than what is found in the midst of activity. For since the intellect by its nature loves what is beautiful, it delights to seek the better in every way — not only in order to know it, but also so that the better may act upon it and change it. Because, as we have already said, the intellect is changed in accordance with what it sees and in what it delights.
And since changeability, bound up with the nature of the intellect, will never depart from it so long as the present age lasts and, as someone has said, until the shadows withdraw — that is, until we pass beyond the present life, which shows the truth as in a mirror, shadowed by riddles — the intellect is inclined, when it must forgo the contemplation of the uncreated One who is above the intellect, to try to draw as near as possible to the noetic uncreated beings, so as to return the sooner to the uncreated One who is above the intellect. And when it meets a thick fog that darkens its thoughts and brings listlessness upon it, in order to turn it away from contemplation, then it must turn to active prayer with a humble heart; and when the darkness recedes by the power of prayer, then it must make perceptible creatures its foundation, and in the heart, through the spiritual activity taking place within it, spiritual light will shine again, and the intellect will plainly have power over its activity. For the intellect truly has the ability to go up, as it were, to the summit of a mountain or a high hill, from which one can see far, and to contemplate not only what is unseen by the many but also what is invisible and unattainable. Without this no one will see himself, still less God. And now, perhaps, the time has come to say something about this active virtue of the soul.
36. The soul has within itself three powers that require action: the rational, the desiring and the incensive. And the soul has three powers directed outside itself: the desire for glory, for pleasure, and for the possession of many things. The soul, contemplating noetically the life of Jesus Christ in the body, heals these two triads by the four chief virtues — wisdom (or righteousness), chastity and courage — through the grace of the Lord Jesus, and enables the unclouded intellect to rise above, to consider divine things and to contemplate God. When the Spirit led the Lord Jesus into the wilderness, where He was to defeat the devil, the Lord there healed the desiring power by fasting, and the rational power by vigilance and silent prayer, and the incensive power by refusal. Love of pleasure, love of glory and love of money He overcame in that, being hungry, He did not follow the counsel of the devil and did not turn stones into bread; did not cast Himself down from the pinnacle of the temple, so that the people should praise Him for not being broken by the fall; and did not bow down to the devil when he promised Him all the riches of the world. He repelled Satan’s assaults with a refusal that was full of holy anger, wise, righteous, all-embracing and courageous, teaching us to repel all his wiles.
The same may be seen at the time of the Saviour’s crucifixion. The Saviour prays, withdrawing from the disciples, and thereby heals the rational power; He keeps courage and watchfulness, and endures thirst on the cross — this heals the desiring power; He does not resist and does not dispute, though He is slandered, and He prays for the slanderers — thereby He brings the incensive power to good action. Such an example consists in rebuking the devil, and in forgiving those who offend us, as men themselves suffering Satan’s assaults, with silence, long-suffering and prayer for them. They spit upon Him, strike Him, mock and deride Him — by this He heals the love of glory; they give Him vinegar to drink and gall to eat, and pierce Him with a spear — this is the healing of love of pleasure. Being nailed naked on a cross in the open air, despised as a pauper — this is the abolition of the inclination to love money. So the Saviour showed twice how to treat the outward and the inward passions: when He appeared to the world in the body, and when He was to depart from the world. Whoever looks upon Him, upon His teaching and upon the cross, and imitates Him so far as possible — wisely and righteously, wholeheartedly and courageously — will halt the evil working of these passions, and through them of all the rest, and will use them rightly; and he will become a truly active man, fit to contemplate and to reach out toward God, and ready to look upon Him noetically.
In this way his intellect, beginning from perceptible creatures and seeing how beautifully they are ordered, and having understood the noetic creatures, has passed on to the noetic uncreated beings, as though it had already climbed four steps. After that comes the divine speechlessness beyond the intellect, and silence, and wonder beyond wonder — in a word, the vision and contemplation of the supernatural One, and union with Him, incomprehensible to thought. This is the summit of stillness, the greatest and highest desire that can be laid hold of in this life, the limit of truth, the increase of faith, the bright radiance of the glory for which we hope, the foundation of love, the rule of the intellect, the standing still of its constant mobility, and incomprehensible rest, and a uniform disposition, as it were the pledge of the activity of the age to come, the cause of inconceivable joy, the treasure of peace, the requital of carnal wisdom, the turning away from the present age, the desire of the age to come, the departure from a life of passion, close communion with dispassion, the glad joy of the soul and its gathering, the calm and the guarding of its own movements and powers — and, in general, divine knowledge and dispassion.
It befits the soul, even when listlessness overtakes it or some outward circumstance affects it, to return again to the beauty of contemplation proper to it, casting off the passion that holds it back and does not let it go straight to what it desires. It must be aware of how far it has departed from its desire and why. Is it contemplating something among perceptible creatures, or among noetic creatures, or among the noetic uncreated? Do vain thoughts, or some necessity, separate it from what lies ahead, and from the One who is truly above the world? Then it must remove this obstacle, so that it may once again return in due order to the vision and contemplation of the transcendent One. For if the intellect is somewhere outside the transcendent Uncreated, who is beyond the intellect, then it is divided and does not abide in the truly beautiful, even if it moves beautifully; for the highest beauty is the One who is beyond being, uncreated and simply one, surpassing the intellect — and this is truly the utmost opposite limit of the intellect. When the intellect moves rightly, then it goes there by the right path and perceives the unity that is beyond the intellect. Therefore it is to be desired that we go with all our strength toward the infinite, to search out what surpasses the intellect, and to see the invisible One, and to lay hold of the immeasurable, so as to be able to receive the sole inheritance of the one supreme God by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and of the life-giving Spirit. They enlighten us, and thanks to them we are made worthy of the grace of contemplation and, having received deification according to our condition, we become gods by the gift of God.
37. The intellect that has entered the place of the divine hiddenness has recourse, of course, to silence, having been unified by simplicity and thereby joined to the One who alone is above every thought, illumined by communion with the Spirit. And what could it say, having gone beyond its own spiritual capacities, having stood outside every thought and become wholly naked, since it now stands above thought? For if thought still remains in it, then plainly it also thinks. Every thought comes after reflection; and if it thinks something, how can it abide in the place of hiddenness? For what is truly hidden is not simply what the intellect sees and no one else sees. In that case a great many things might be called hidden, since much — or one might say everything — that the intellect sees is unknown to anyone else. If we thought thus, the hidden would come close to the boundless, which is absurd. For the truly hidden is that One to whom the intellect ascends after all else, and from whom all else proceeds, whether visible or contemplated. The intellect itself, having ascended to Him who is above everything visible, everything uttered and everything made manifest through thought, loses the power to reflect, to see, to speak. And it has not yet risen to such a height as to attain the divine hiddenness so long as it can speak, for then it is still reflecting. But the hidden is inconceivable, and therefore above understanding; and then the intellect, having entered the place of the divine hiddenness and been unified, falls silent not by its own will but naturally, illumined naturally and singly by the One who is above thought.
38. If words have the power to make the intellect go forward and make progress, then they lead it successfully to where the word does not reach, that is, to the work that is accomplished in silence. If, for instance, words could always be proper to the intellect and the soul always needed them, then I do not see what progress the intellect gains from discourse. For discourse is unprofitable not only for activity but likewise for contemplation, since the intellect passes over from words, which are the image of beings, to what is simple and above the word, formless and exclusively and truly one; and thus every word is not the principal object but rather, to speak more precisely, an obstacle. For words are generally used in passing, when there is need, from one thought to another; in what way, then, will the simple and perfect, the endless and unbounded, that which is truly one above the word, have need of words in order to pass somewhere? For how can it be encompassed by a word? A word in a certain way contains within itself the scope of a concept; but the transcendent One is uncontainable, as unlimited and formless. And if the word cannot correspond to the one hidden Reality that surpasses the intellect, as uncontainable and formless, then for the One only silence is fitting. Let those who have made progress in silence cease to use words, for they have already before this attained simple contemplation without the aid of images.
39. If words belong to what is known, and the hidden is unknown, then one may hold that the hidden lies beyond the word. For if the unknowing of the hidden is higher than knowledge, and the highest knowledge does not require so much knowing, then still less does it need the word. Therefore the intellect that has ascended to the hidden and simply One clearly falls silent; and if it does not fall silent naturally and without constraint, then in its ascent it has not yet attained the hidden and utterly simple One.
40. Just as those who practise stillness sometimes leave their cell and learn by experience the difference between sitting in the cell and going out of it, so those who come to know silence and then begin to speak again draw near by contemplation to the glory of God, and know themselves — in what disposition silence finds them, by nature and not by their own wish, and what they are like when they feel an inclination to talk: whether they pray when silence comes upon them, or whether at times they cannot even open their lips. For they, like angels on earth, touch the truth in a single form, formlessly, without eyes, without image, and simply, by the unceasing gaze of the intellect, feeling within themselves only awe and wonder, reflecting on nothing, but rather beholding without eyes the beginningless and divine illuminations. But when the intellect comes out from there, since it is changeable, then they are able to speak and to pass noetically to many and varied changes. And so that the state of silence, being far better than discourse, may return to them again, they gladly embrace stillness and guard their senses together with their impressions, and strive in every way to avoid both discourse and reflection, so as to be able to repeat with David: «I was dumb and humbled, and kept silence even from good» (Ps 39:2). For even good words stand lower than silence joined with discernment.
41. The Godhead is neither wholly manifest nor wholly hidden. That He is has been revealed openly and clearly; but what His essence is remains hidden. To know that He exists is one thing; to know what He is, quite another. That He exists is seen from His activity; what He is depends on His essence, and not even the angels know this of God. God is infinitely, an infinite number of times, higher than all being and every intellect and thought. Therefore, when the intellect attains what proves the existence of God, it can say much and philosophize excellently; it may be called a lover of wisdom and a theologian. But when, having risen above and surpassed the certainty that the Godhead is, it is seized by the divine hiddenness and is set in motion, conceiving that He is — then, as is natural, by the action of grace it becomes wholly formless, uncontainable and eyeless; then every word that could say anything about God is left without work, and the intellect, unified and immersed in the inconceivable, abides without motion; and then, having become part of what is beyond all things, where neither word nor thought nor intention is distinguished, but simplicity reigns, and incomprehensibility and stillness and wonder, the formless, the endless, the unlimited — then in a wondrous way it sees the vision of the invisible and the formless form; and it becomes itself detached and formless in its own rightness, and imprints within itself what it invisibly contemplates and beholds without eyes — in a word, the divine and supernatural beauty; and it glorifies God, who created it such.
42. God, who is above all union, is called one not only because He is simple, but also because He alone truly exists among all those things which, as has been said, exist and have their being from Him. What is not true and not simply existent is also not truly and simply one. And as the One who is, He is in the same manner everywhere uncontainable; and as the One, He is like none of the rest, and abides wholly outside all things. As eternal, He has neither beginning nor end of His being, and in all things alike He shines with the most pure divine rays of His providence. Besides this, as one who can be known without hindrance by all creatures — in order to be visible everywhere, in a single form above noetic union — He requires an intellect that is whole, formless, imageless, colourless, untouched by any beings, wholly detached from everything, ascending upward toward the infinity of boundlessness, of time, of place, of nature and of all that pertains to nature.
43. When there is a spiritual union between God and the intellect, which comes about through noetic perception, then, as has been said, the intellect wholly receives the imprint of the supernatural hidden One, who surpasses the intellect’s own nature, through the noetic sense. Yet the perceptions of the intellect itself are in accord with its nature, purified by grace, for thinking means the same to the intellect as seeing does to the eye. Thus he who looks into darkness sees nothing there but the darkness itself, and perceives that he does not see; whereas had he closed his eyes, he might have supposed there was light and various things around him. As it is, seeing, he clearly sees what he does not see; and for the power of sight to penetrate the darkness and know what is hidden lies beyond the nature of the eye — yet this does not mean that the eye fails to understand that it does not see. So it is with the intellect: having ascended to the divine shelter and come to be above thinking, it truly contemplates nothing — indeed, how could it? — but it sees what it does not see, and sees that what it does not see is the One alone, as though covered by a kind of darkness, from which, in whatever manner, everything that exists comes forth: whether visible, or contemplated by the intellect, whether belonging to creatures or eternally existing and uncreated. And if it did not contemplate, it would not see how it stretches out beyond itself. As it is, contemplating, it contemplates most clearly that it is not itself that contemplates, being above contemplation, and that it is impossible to arrive at the contemplation of that which it does not contemplate.
It surpasses the nature of the intellect to enter within and see the divine single shelter that is higher than the intellect. Only a very pure intellect, contemplating in the Spirit, is able to look into the divine darkness of this concealment and to conceive the ineffable oneness that lies above all things in ineffable mystery, and to see that it contemplates nothing within the divine darkness. For an open, unsullied and inactive noetic gaze arises in the intellect when it sees that it contemplates nothing but the divine and simple shelter of the One. And this is a sign of unknowing. But when it begins to contemplate more clearly, then it will come down to what surpasses the intellect, and then it will contemplate its own blindness while contemplating in the shelter of the simplest One. And although it sees very clearly that the One is that from which everything originates and that He is hidden, yet it does not see what He is. That is why it is said that the intellect is directed toward what exceeds its own nature when it contemplates the utterly simple hiddenness of God. And the possibility of this comes to it by nature when it becomes pure; and one may say that for it to be so by nature means to enter blindly into a supernatural state, that is, to move inconceivably toward the divine and simplest single shelter that is above the intellect. For in such a case the intellect has no cognitive perception except the thought of the One, which is not disclosed. But having arrived there by the movement proper to it, it ends that movement in a halt and a stillness.
I do not say that it ceases from contemplation, for that would be a grievous state of senselessness; I say that it halts and rests from passing from thought to thought or from contemplation to contemplation. For the intellect, having flowed thither and fallen into the depth of infinity and boundlessness, having laid hold in the light of thought of the immeasurable in this divine unfathomable shelter, grows dark, so to speak, and halts, perceiving nothing else save wonder in the midst of the light of thought. And although the intellect does not pass from thought to thought, it is moved by the light of thought; and it, gazing without motion at the hiddenness beyond being, falls into amazement in one and the same manner and is adorned by the unapproachable inwardness of an enlightenment that does not disclose itself. And if it were idle with respect to contemplation, how would it feel wonder at the illumination? But it is said that the intellect, having arrived there, halts. This means that it does not move from one thought to another, contemplating the One and tasting the beauty of the One who is above all; ravished by it and enlightened, it halts without movement — yet not in such a way as to lessen its own delight in contemplation, for that would be a weakness that must be avoided, a weakness that is not praiseworthy and is full of the darkness of ignorance, namely not to contemplate at all or anywhere. Rather, the so-called halting of the intellect comes after the unapproachable illumination of the light. And contemplation hastens not toward the transition from one thought to another but toward the ceasing of the intellect’s movement, because the supernatural and hidden One beyond all is infinite and immeasurable for every intellect, and does not allow the intellect, while it contemplates — since it undergoes due purification and divine help — to contemplate Him in any other direction. And from this divine contemplation, from the inimitable beauty and infinity, the intellect turns aside in no other way than if it is diverted by something that fascinates it, or receives something from outside, or as a result of some natural changeability into which it falls.
44. The nature of the intellect is thinking. And thinking means movement and the passing of thoughts. But when the intellect abides in God, it comes to be above thinking and movement; and so it will be right to say that the intellect, perfectly conceiving God, comes to be above its own nature. For every thought by its nature derives from some thing. And where there is no sight of a thing, there no thought is born and there is no thought at all. But God, who can in no way be seen with natural eyes, naturally grants to the intellect the images of the things that surround Him, among which He plainly acts and which take the place of the power that proceeds from one who is powerful. So, since the intellect is accustomed in everything else to see powers together with the powerful one, it seeks this in God too and does not find it — for what the intellect sees around God surpasses the nature of every created intellect — and it conceives God, as has been said, by a thought at once simple and gathered. Having passed into the space of stillness, it receives the divine friendship. The intellect, when the divine and worshipful Spirit Himself acts within it, is often caught up from thought into a formless, propertyless and simple state; very swiftly it enters the midst of the heart by the supernatural power of the Spirit, conceiving God and reflecting on nothing, but coming to be above thinking. And through this — that is, through the contemplation of what surrounds God — the intellect ascends to the conception of the Godhead, having become, as has been said, simple. That is why it is said of it that it abides in a state surpassing its own nature, for it comes to be above thinking.
45. Everything that is called hidden must have something through which it is made manifest, from which it may be seen that it is hidden. Otherwise it is more like something that does not exist. For almost anything that in no way manifests its own being by some means accessible to knowledge may be equivalent to what nowhere and in no way exists. Undoubtedly, the hiddenness of God also has certain manifestations. Following these, the intellect acquires a perception of the divine hiddenness, ascending from what is comprehensible in God to what is incomprehensible. Having come to the incomprehensible, it understands that there surely is something that escapes its own natural grasp, something that surpasses every capacity to comprehend, even that of the angels; for it is beyond light, it is the cause, the beginning and the end of every nature, every being and every essence, being itself beyond nature and beyond being, abiding above every essence, unbegotten, without beginning, unlimited, simply uncontainable by nature, place or time — and this is the hidden One who is above the intellect. From this understanding there naturally follows the capacity to grasp divine things, which is of course very great and again stretches us upward toward itself, encompassing us as it were with noetic indications, turnings and yearnings toward the originative, hidden, supernatural One, uniting us with Him so far as one can understand that He exists and that He is one, and also that it is in any case inaccessible to thought to know what the hidden One is in essence. But in what way could a word penetrate into what is above the intellect and does not yield to knowledge? A word cannot penetrate even into what is comprehensible to the intellect; but the intellect is able, voicelessly, ineffably, in silence, beyond understanding and in a single form, to contemplate the hidden One and to delight in Him — as the causal and provident beginning of being — and, quite consistently with the rational nature of the intellect, to be struck with wonder at the One beyond being, as higher than light and goodness, higher than wisdom and power, and through this to delight in divine gladness, and to marvel in general at everything in which the hidden One beyond being is manifested, as endless and unbounded. But it would be inconsistent if the intellect, abiding in such conditions, were to use words and to seek a way out, passing from thought to thought. Therefore he who uses not silence but speech is far from the high state of the intellect; for this high state of his, as those who prefer the truth can unanimously confirm, consists in attaining the highest in its activity. And the highest in that activity is the contemplation of the Highest, which is accomplished, as they say, unseen, and therefore far more rarely and in silence.
46. When the intellect invisibly gazes upon the more divine, single, superoriginative and most supreme hiddenness, then the impression of what is seen descends invisibly from there upon the intellect, single-formed and one, filled with an extraordinary, most radiant and ineffable beauty, drawing the intellect in silence into the depth of amazement and wonder. First, spiritual activity and sweet joy seize the heart, and it becomes for the intellect a noetic light, an illumination and, accordingly, divine love and radiant gladness; its source is in God, from whom comes every good gift, through the purity of the intellect; and its content, one may say, it receives now from the divine indications of Scripture, now from the rational and right contemplation of beings in stillness and prayer. For the hidden inward One, the Godhead higher than thought, becomes visible not in some accidental way but in the single-formed light that proceeds from there and fills the intellect’s seeing and contemplation. But he who has not experienced this ascends rationally and consciously from outside toward the supernatural hidden and simple One, without being moved in heart or grasping with the intellect.
47. The clearest, uniform and single-formed contemplation of the intellect in God, pressing toward the one divine hiddenness and toward the light that shines from it, having received divine illumination from the beginningless and endless outpouring of light, requires the silence not only of the lips but also of the intellect. For it is possible that, while the lips are silent, the intellect settles within itself, passes over into thoughts and reflections, and diversifies its impressions. This would be an expression of the inward disposition, beyond which the intellect ascends to the utterly simple, inconceivable hiddenness of the divine Unity. For the contemplative state of the intellect is one thing, and the disposing and reflecting that pertain to the expression of the intellect’s inward mood is another. Therefore the intellect, moving among created and composite things, or among things differing in other respects, first contemplates them and then in that state reflects upon them, diversifying its impressions. And if it can happen that about some one thing there are many thoughts in the intellect, then, when turning toward that single, single-formed, most inward divine hiddenness, it does indeed strain and stretch out its contemplative eye and is enlightened by the simplicity of the divine light — but in such a state it cannot reflect at all. For the single simplicity evades every noetic transition or varied disposition, and the hiddenness does not permit one who has reflected upon what it is to disclose this either by inward conception or by the lips. It is precisely for this reason that a man who has risen noetically to the one most glorious divine hiddenness of course keeps silence both with the lips and with the intellect.
48. When the intellect directs its turning wholly toward God, and its contemplative power is exhausted by the most radiant rays of divine beauty; when it descends formlessly into the simplicity and boundlessness of the hidden formless One, and becomes one for itself through its own pressing toward the One, and contemplates in the inspiration of the Spirit — then it is in a state of stillness, like an infant in its manner of thinking, and it experiences the ineffable and supernatural Kingdom of God, according to the word of the Lord: «Unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven» (Mt 18:3). For then the intellect becomes free, and nothing anywhere restrains it; it surpasses the limits of all knowledge, of all possible thinking, of all union and all diversity, pressing upward toward the unutterable and unknowable One who is above the intellect. And through this the intellect keeps silence, for such is its state, higher not only than the word but also than noetic activity; and together with the hidden and formless it contains within itself the supernatural, pleasant and sweet, in the measure needed for the intellect’s delight.
49. Contemplative intellects, seeing God in a formless form, in the most radiant, immaterial and uncompounded beauty, in the simplest Person, as the single-formed One, crowned with endless blessings, adorned with countless beauties, illumining every intellect as with rays and with light-formed streams of beauty — they see in Him an unutterable and inexplicable blessedness, an inexhaustible fount of what is good and beautiful, endlessly flowing and never drying up, an inexhaustible, endless, immeasurable treasury of glory, overflowing the invisible intellects with the greatest delight, joy, sweetness of heart and pure gladness, which passes mysteriously in an ever-flowing stream from that divine and supernatural Unity which lies on high in inaccessible hiddenness. Contemplative intellects also see how great and how unsearchable and uncontainable is the sea that pours forth from that unutterable goodness and incomprehensible love, from that unfathomable providence, in unbounded power and inexpressible wisdom; they see what is inconceivable to angels and to the seraphim themselves, as being above every intellect. They see even that which at the present time is, as it were, conceived within us in an ineffable manner, and which in the future will come into a renewed state and be, as it were, reborn and brought to completion — something that astounds even the cherubic intellect, if it ventures to think of it even a little. O the goodness and counsel of God, His love and mercy! O the power, the wisdom and the providence of God! Truly, «blessed are those whose transgressions are forgiven and whose sins are covered» (Ps 32:1), and «blessed is the man whom You instruct, O Lord, and teach out of Your law» (Ps 94:12).
50. In Spirit and in truth the invisible is revealed to those who cannot receive the Holy Spirit while they live in the world, as the Lord said. But the eyes of the heart of those for whom it would be better to withdraw and settle as far as possible from the world and from what is in the world have been overshadowed by divine grace with noetic light, the rising of the noetic sun from on high, and their help is in God. So in their hearts they make their ascents and are enlightened by God-beholding illuminations as befits them; and in them there is very clearly discerned both what is greatly divine and noetic and worthy of the spiritual gaze, and, still more, the future eternal and unfailing state of renewal of those who have lived righteously — not only in the form in which it will be accessible to the senses, but even beyond the intellect. For then those who have become heirs of what is above the intellect will be wholly changed, and partakers of that life and delight beyond all thought, becoming as gods by adoption and rejoicing before Him who by nature truly is God, in supernatural blessings that come from the God who is on high and one by nature, standing around Him and celebrating in all sanctity the divine feast above the intellect with ever greater purity, and making one most joyful delight of the heart out of this blessed gladness, and keeping festival with all the spiritual orders of angels. This is a great and incomprehensible stream of pure rapture in what is supremely beautiful. For if perceptible beauty, which the intellect receives through the senses, though limited and passing, not simple and not uncreated, nevertheless brings the soul a certain delight, then for men who think rightly it is not hard to notice and to understand what they may become when they attain not only noetic things but what is above the intellect: the unlimited and unpassing, the uncreated, which has no beginning but comes from God, from whom comes everything beautiful and good — and this through the joy, rapture and divine life worthy of the age and the order to come.
51. Having separated itself from the extension of time and place, from distances and the limited properties of nature, and having swiftly passed through them, the intellect truly becomes naked through single-formed simplicity and an uncompounded and formless life; for without any covering or partition, by reason of the repose of thoughts and of stillness, it supernaturally attains beginninglessness, incomprehensibility, unlimitedness and infinity in that spiritually moving divine power and illumination of the heart which, as it seems, stretch out into infinity together with the very contemplation of the intellect. Then the peace of God descends upon the soul, and ineffable joy and inexpressible rapture from the Holy Spirit are poured out upon it, and wonder beyond the intellect takes hold of it amid a hidden hymn. Not made manifest, yet already discerned, is the God of gods in Zion, in the intellect that soars high and is turned upward. «O Lord of hosts, blessed is the man who hopes in You» (Ps 84:12).
52. When the intellect, being enlightened, falls into wonder at an inconceivable stillness, seeing itself between God and divine things, then it tastes, so far as possible, the true fruits of spiritual understanding; it is deified, rejoices, is immersed in divine love, saying nothing at all, penetrating neither into its own depth nor beyond itself in its condition, and not even reflecting, but seeing noetically in a single manner in the light of truth and of the Spirit, and making for itself out of what it sees an unpassing delight.
53. When the gaze of the intellect is directed within the heart, it sees the illumination of the Spirit flowing unceasingly from it — and it is precisely then that the time of silence comes.
54. When the whole gaze of the intellect beholds God, or rather, when the whole intellect is in God, or when God is in the whole intellect — then above all, and most fittingly, comes the time of silence.
55. When the intellect, in communion with the Spirit, stands contemplatively in very truth before God and delights, as it ought, in the glory and radiance from the face of God, then it will be wholly right to keep silence and to gaze calmly and without speech. But if between the intellect and God there should chance to pass, in whatever manner, some dark gloom, then one must at once cast against the darkness something like a fire, by nature light-formed and burning: a word, short indeed, yet having the divine power of expression, so that in this way the murk may be destroyed the sooner by light and the fog dispersed by warmth, the intellect being likewise enlightened and warmed by this, so that once again, as before, it may be with God, and contemplate His beauty, and delight in it as is fitting, and be adorned by it and perceive it — and in general perceive all that is accomplished in the intellect’s ascent after it has received the life-giving Spirit from God, and, of course, become simple in the process, and consequently be detached in truth and in spirit, in God, from everything, and even from what is around God. To such a state, rightly and fittingly, the contemplative intellect comes. But he who labours only in the active way is still very far from such a state, for he has not yet been united with himself, nor through himself with God. It is no wonder, then, that he hymns divine things so far as he can and speaks of them so much and so often, in this way as it were frightening, driving off and repelling by his assaults the one who is our enemy and wars strongly against us. For his own time too will come, under the influence of a spiritual visitation, when the spark-like illumination of many divine hymns, chants and words will as it were be fused into a single lamp; then he will strike the enemy more surely, even with a mortal blow, burning up and destroying, or rather annihilating, his darkness, while enlightening himself with fiery radiance, warming himself and inspiring himself so far as possible to divine love, raising up to God Himself in silence the song of the heart and its wonder, and conceiving for himself the most wondrous marvels of the mysteries. Not without reason are those glorified who hope in the Lord; but of course this is because, when the time comes, they will inherit, as the meek, the promised spiritual land in Christ Jesus our Lord.
56. When the intellect, illumined by every outpouring of the light of the Spirit, is confounded, wonders, and notices that it is itself stretching out toward the infinite and unbounded and is being changed — then comes the time of silence.
57. But when the intellect feels that it is, as it were, wearied by the clearest contemplations and wishes to come out of that state, so as to relax the strain and rest a little, then of course it is time to speak — yet to speak briefly and in accordance with the divine illumination.
58. When the intellect, amid the waters, escaping the noetic Pharaoh, passes the whole night by the enlightenment of fire and its day beneath the cloud, then after rational silence there comes also a time of rest, and truly the beginning of purification for the soul. But when the fearsome noetic Amalek rises up against it, and the hostile regiments that follow him and do not let it enter the promised land, then for it comes the time to speak; yet even so it is raised up to God in noetic activity and fitting vision, just as Moses once raised his hands with the help of Aaron and Hur.
59. When from the abyss of the divine fount and from the noetic gaze there flows generously out of the heart a spiritual power, then naturally comes the time of silence. For then service and true worship of God by the intellect are ineffably accomplished in truth and in spirit, and moreover by a true spiritual perception.
60. When, through the noetic contemplation of God, the rational power of the soul is wholly filled with divine wonder, and the contemplative power with vision, and the soul besides with rapture, then beyond doubt it is the time of silence. For in the Spirit the intellect sees very clearly the gathered truth, and, bowing down in wonder, it honours God who shines within it.
61. Those who worship God as they ought, in spirit and in truth, and serve Him as is fitting, worship and serve not only apart from any particular place but also without the uttering of words. For just as the spiritual sense, having been raised up through righteousness, does not at all dare to worship in a place the Unbounded One, for whom there is no particular place of rest, so likewise, being united with truth and naturally preserving what is due, it does not at all permit one to worship — and therefore to serve — the endless and unbounded, the beginningless and formless, the wholly simple and in general Him who is above the intellect, by a variety of words and the narrowness of utterance; and this whenever, of course, one comes to be enlightened in a single form by the outpouring and visitation of the Spirit with the knowledge of divine truth. At just this time the intellect, having been wholly freed from everything and having in some manner even come out of itself, finds itself, quite understandably, beyond the capacity not only to speak but even to think; for with joy and wonder, by the help of the spiritual light, it directs its attention and contemplation toward what is above word and understanding, and in the union that surpasses it becomes in a certain way unmoving and unpassing through an invisible ascent.
62. It befits the intellect that watches over itself to govern its own spiritual state attentively, rationally and wisely; and when it notices that it is contemplating the simple and inconceivable mysteries of theology, it must at once come calmly to a halt in silence, not without wonder, and moreover not far from its own heart, which acts in the Spirit and receives illumination from Him. For then it is time for the senses to rest not only from everything in general that is accessible to them, but it is also the time of silence, whatever word may be seeking an outlet. Therefore for those who understand, the occasion is then more convenient for the intellect to abide in rest and unknowing, even if something needed to be said. Then one must attain complete immobility in the senses, in words and in thoughts, so that the intellect, directly and as it should, being wholly one, may in uniform and single-formed contemplation freely behold, so far as possible, the infinity and beginninglessness that are above thought, and likewise the incomprehensibility and in general the other divine, unchanging and perfect properties of the one and only tri-hypostatic God, and may be united with Him, changed by contemplation, simplified and made godlike by divine grace with joy and wonder. And since the intellect would wish to preserve such a state if that were possible, but of course cannot do so at all, being itself changeable and living among changeable creatures and in a certain way joined to the body and to surrounding things, it should for good reason not separate itself by going far from uniform contemplation, nor should it be talkative, but should speak little and moreover out of divine illuminations — so that not only may it more quickly turn again to union with God, which is above the intellect, but also that it may perceive that union more clearly and, moreover, for a longer rather than a shorter time. For to the degree that the intellect somehow preserves its gatheredness and attentiveness within itself, to that degree its turning toward the divine union takes place more swiftly, and it is united with brighter radiances, inasmuch as it becomes more accustomed to divine things.
63. When the intellect is changed under the influence of the divine uniform manifestation through noetic contemplation, and is illumined by the incomprehensible One who is above all knowledge, and becomes undivided, simple and unlimited, it is illumined as it were in a single manner within the gloom, and contemplates a beauty unlimited because it surpasses simplicity, formless because it surpasses every form, beginningless because it is set above every beginning — an incomprehensible beauty that contains within itself the limits of all things, and all that is contained in it, and fills all things, since it is itself overfilled with all, while itself remaining endless. Or rather: when, having disdained everything that exists, the intellect, gazing upon the One, sees all things in an ineffable manner by the power of the intellect above thinking, then it is time to keep silence and mysteriously and transcendently — or, so to speak, unseen and indistinctly — to taste the single-formed delight in the more divine mystical teaching of truth. But when what has been described is not present in the intellect and an empty space is noticeable around it, then it is time to speak — yet to speak what is able to direct one toward silence. For timely silence, which is above the word, may quite rightly be called something that incomparably surpasses every word. Therefore the wondrous Solomon, who valued this very silence very highly, says: «A time to keep silence and a time to speak» (Eccl 3:7). The best and most important thing, of course, is to keep timely silence. But if for some reason it has not yet come, and the intellect has not yet attained in a uniform way what is above the word, then let timely discourse at least be a secondary work. And so that speech may be akin to silence and close to it, let both silence and discourse take place in their season, and let the intellect strive to arrive at the ceasing of discourse by speaking and reflecting unceasingly on divine things, examining created things and contemplating in them, as in a mirror, their Creator, since so far as they can they speak of Him. This is what it means to speak in season. And if in season, then also fittingly.
64. When the intellect has passed through everything that is here and, having surpassed all things in a natural manner, keeps silence with joy, then it is the time to delight in the transcendent and ineffable; the time of illumination and noetic light, of the union of the intellect and the vision of simplicity, boundlessness, infinity and most radiant knowledge — in a word, the time of receiving and partaking of that spiritual wisdom by which the intellect is made perfect in withdrawal and silence, having received in wonder an ineffable joy.
65. When the soul, by the perception of truth, feels itself to be the finest cup that gives drink (cf. Ps 23:5) and becomes as one beside herself, then the time has come to keep silence.
66. When the disposition of the inner man wishes to cry out: «Lord, how they have increased who trouble me! Many rise up against me» (Ps 3:1) — then the time has come to speak, but to speak as one ought: not to utter anything empty against the enemies, but what is fitting and measured.
67. When the light of the Lord’s countenance is signed upon the soul (cf. Ps 4:6), so that through this it begins to be adorned and enlightened, and the outpouring of divine gladness is poured out upon it, then truly the time has come to keep silence.
68. When the soul sees unjust witnesses rising up against her (cf. Ps 35:11), questioning her about what she does not know and troubling her, then truly the time has come to speak and even to contradict.
69. In all that exists and that the intellect can contemplate, the most supreme and, so to speak, the highest and greatest beauty, and likewise the good, is God. Of all visible creatures the best creature is man; by his very nature he differs from other creatures and beyond doubt surpasses them, and by grace he truly surpasses the angels. It is the contemplative intellect that, among the many things that lie between God and men, drawing near to what is above thought, is put beside itself, when it has not yet richly tasted the illuminating grace. Having experienced that grace by the spiritual power in the heart — if one may put it so — it ascends to the highest beauty and good, that is, to God; it enters into Him by a more divine gift and gazes in a uniform way and marvels, immersed in silence in a depth that surpasses reason. And this truly is — as someone might call it — the pledge of the first keeping of the Sabbath, whose image is God’s rest from the creation of beings. And a second, great and somewhat different keeping of rest, whose unerring model is the honouring of the Sabbath among the people of God, is plainly enjoyed by him who turns from himself to God and knows himself as an image according to the archetype and, in general, as a mediator between God and men — when he fittingly penetrates not only into what is above intellect and thought, in wondrous amazement, but is also filled with joy inexpressible and with spiritual rapture, being truly caught up in silence by God-beholding illuminations and by divine activities upon him and above him, being united in Christ Jesus with that divine Unity and supernatural Godhead.
70. When the intellect notionally separates itself from everything that exists, as though it did not exist, then it ineffably conceives Him who truly is, above noetic activity and union, contemplating Him in truth and in spirit through the endless superabundance of the divine properties that surround Him who is and are visible in whatever manner. And it becomes uniform or one, so to speak; it is ineffably seized by stillness, becomes full of love, full of joy — yet these are not simple love and joy, but such as proceed from the activity of the Spirit and resemble the delight the angels have.
71. In no way whatever, and absolutely no one, can grasp You, Lord, in Your essence: no noetic, thinking or in general created intellect, not even a cherubic one; but You stand infinitely higher than all intelligence. Yes, Lord — and what surrounds You is likewise wholly endless and unbounded. Thus, for example, You entrusted to the lawgiver of the Old Testament, Moses, Your incomparable care, that he should announce that You truly are, as You say; and yet again, in this too, You, the most unerring and only supreme truth, said of certain of Your elect that although You appeared to them, You did not reveal to them Your name. For that name is incomparably higher than every name, not only those on earth but also those in heaven. For those who are filled with Your light conceive You as Being, yet they have no knowledge of Your essence; and so You consistently appear as the One beyond being and as an object of reflection who has no essence at all, in order that You may be known clearly beyond thinking and above all things, You who can be known as the infinitely Incomprehensible and Most High.
You are wholly beyond time, without beginning, life-giving and endless. You are in no way subject to place, for You are present everywhere and above all things, as the Creator of everything in its totality and moreover the only Creator, being at the same time the container and the abiding dwelling-place of the thoughts of Your creatures. You surpass the swiftness of the intellect and anticipate its thinking, for You hold all things above all and in an unsearchable way with an all-powerful hand; and moreover You are not subject even incidentally to the limits of nature. For You are limitless, being immeasurable not only by nature but as it were above nature, and immeasurable also in what surrounds You, in Your natural properties: in wisdom that is wise beyond all wisdom, in overwhelming power, in love and goodness beyond every conception of love and goodness.
What shall we call You? Shall we call You light? But that light is not unapproachable; therefore You are higher than light. A judge, perhaps? But does a judge know all things, even before they come to be? Where is that to be found in a judge? Therefore You are incomparably higher than a judge. How shall we call You maker, when You create many and various material things by a single movement of will? And in the midst of the immaterial — O depth of Your excellence! — by one movement, so to speak, of the Spirit, You build creatures that are the same in nature, since they are spiritual, and yet many, indeed very many, with different inclinations; and if You will, You also create individuals, creations exceedingly strange. But that which in its excellence surpasses every notion of the one who ponders it — is this the work of a builder? By no means. It turns out that You are higher than a builder. Should You be called a builder and proclaimed a craftsman? But what builder builds even the smallest thing without a foundation and without a support, as You do, Lord, who built out of nothing so vast an earth with so many mountains and rocks, with various plants, and set it unshakeable? What craftsman brings forth out of nothing and out of what does not exist, in a single moment by his word, such masterly creations as You bring forth? Is he right who calls Your creations the work of a builder or a craftsman? By no means. So then, O God, You stand infinitely higher than builder and craftsman.
Could anyone ever have known or heard, or in any way conceived, such a kind of love as Your all-wondrous goodness showed us with great favour in accepting, in a manner most loving toward man and beyond all hope, what is proper to us? Of course, those to whom it is granted by grace to contemplate this enter straightway into the space of the abyss of love and strange providence, and under the influence of the most ardent impulses of love on their part they come truly to be outside themselves, and do not know how fittingly to name the works of this ordering providence. For the intellect, and the word, and every hearing, and the thought of the ordinances of Your presence, most good God, are surpassed by the highest excellence!
You are the Father of all and are called Father. But You indescribably surpass all fatherhood and reason, and power, and providence, and building, and generosity, and patience. They call You King. But You are King in relation to the present, and in relation to the future, and no less — a hundredfold — in relation to the past. What then? You are wondrous, detached and simple. For Your kingdom is the kingdom of all ages together, present, past and future, and Your power is in every kind and manner. Thus, in everything and wholly beyond everything, You are simply and decidedly infinitely higher than all wisdom, being Yourself carried and bearing all — in short, equally exalted and infinite: You, the immeasurable Lord, and all that is around You. The intellect, conceiving this in whatever way it may, is enraptured by the reach of the vision of You and, wholly united by the inspiration of the Spirit, plunges as it were into a mysterious darkness, unable to see You perfectly because of the infinity and inaccessibility of Your glory. In this way, through the peace of peace, You indescribably give life to those who look upon You and moreover love You in a strange manner. On the other hand, the intellect is not made perfect when it does not see You. And after this You give them rest again with divine and supernatural repose. You are Unspeakable, Inconceivable, Boundless, Unfathomable — in a word, Infinite in essence, of course, and in activity. Amen.
72. Then the intellect, having withdrawn from its many thoughts and shaken off diversity and multipartite reflections, will find itself above noetic distraction in the breathing and communion of the Holy Spirit, who unifies it and breathes upon the heart continuously and unceasingly; and it will constantly and willingly abide in divine places, as though overflowing with conceptions of God, so that with a single noetic glance it will at once behold in a single form, as in a mirror, all that surrounds God — and this with ineffable love. Then it will plainly attain divine rest, delighting, as is its custom, in the deep and divine peace, in the heartfelt, holy, untroubled repose in Christ Jesus our Lord.
73. When the intellect converses with God as a son with a father most loving of his children, prays with the perceptions of the soul and, seeing the light of Jesus, rejoices ineffably, marvelling with great love, sensing clearly in its heart the divine love and the supernatural activity of the Holy Spirit, and wishes mysteriously and transcendently to fly up above the divine manifestations and perfections — then it truly rests from all its works, coming after thinking to be above thinking, sensing a wondrous delight and truly resting in the peace of the life-giving Spirit of Christ.
74. «God rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made» (Gen 2:2) — but only after the fulfilment of everything that had been created by the Word and the Spirit. In the same way the godlike intellect rests from all its own works, which it began to perform for the completing of the noetic world according to its own marks; but having examined and, as it were, recreated by the Word of God and the life-giving Spirit the whole world together with the noetic beings within it, it then ascended again from them by the Word of God and the Spirit to what some call «metaphysics», that is, what comes after nature, and penetrated into the simple and independent mysterious wonders of theology. There, in repose, stillness and peace, it delights greatly in noetic truth, and is moreover deified by the light of reason and by communion with the life-giving Spirit in Christ Jesus our Lord.
75. When God rested, He rested not from all His works but only from those which He had begun to make. He did not rest from the works that are without beginning and uncreated and proper to Him. So too the intellect that imitates God, having passed through and come to know all visible creatures by the divine Word and the life-giving Spirit and having penetrated into them, does not at all rest from the works proper to it, in particular from those that have neither beginning nor end; but it rests from visible works, which have a beginning and an end. For one who has finished labouring, rest follows the ceasing of activity; but it is not so with the intellect, because of its constitution. For if it did not become ever-moving through the life-giving unceasing breath of the Spirit in its cognitive gaze upon the visible, it would not even know that there is a spiritual rest, which exists ever-moving and in a single form only around God, and which deifies the one who partakes of it in an ineffable and unutterable repose in Christ.
76. «Do not be hasty with your mouth», says Solomon, «to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth» (Eccl 5:2). Thus he clearly and precisely defines and explains what the time of silence is. For he says plainly: since you are on earth, before the face of the Lord who is above in the heavens, and you have received such grace that, being a soul, you can think of the things above and contemplate them, and, contemplating noetically, stand before the face of the Lord, then «do not be hasty with your mouth to utter a word», because this is a time of silence. Do not wish to utter a word when you are spiritually under the influence of the truth, both visible and divine. This is what it means to be before the face of the Lord: when the intellect contemplates the many things that surround God in a simple and single direction toward Him. Therefore, feeling this and standing before the face of the Lord, do not be hasty to utter a word, for otherwise you will willingly, like an ignorant man, hasten to go down and descend.
But those who explain the meaning of these words might also say the following. Once human nature was undamaged and therefore rightly kept at a distance from evils; it was close to God, contemplated God and enjoyed with gladness the beauty of His face in the forefather Adam, experiencing an earthly, spiritual, heavenly, imperishable pleasure with amazement. At that time great grace was poured out upon the soul of the first man, and his godlike intellect was surrounded by numerous cognitive contemplations and orientations toward God, so that in the paradise that can be grasped by the senses he enjoyed the spiritual paradise, the so-called blessed life, being truly united in himself and in God, abiding in himself and, as it pleased God, in God, keeping an identical and true godlike structure — and this is right, for man was created in the image of God. In short, we may say that such were the blessings from God around us. And the evil demon, who warred against us because of our good fortune and glory, struck with envy, could not bear it. How is this evident? This all-destroyer has already many times been a deceiver, raising our hopes with supposedly good advice, arousing a desire for even greater deification than what we had; and he was the first cause of vice, for he slandered the righteousness of God’s commandment. Because of him we suffered the loss that deception brings; we were driven away from God and from divine pleasure, and from a single-minded spiritual life, from the desire to see the face of God; and we fell from the glory that enlightened us when we were changed under the rays of divine beauty. And we became — which ought not to be — divided and torn as it were into many parts, and began to find satisfaction in various kinds and diversity of life; and so, instead of the one Triune Godhead, we began to honour many gods, even far removed from one another, that is, in truth not gods at all but deluding demons, perishable and vain. We lost the true single, unified life and its structure and were torn into many different parts, and our proper strength and tension, or rather our upward direction, disappeared not without cause.
We reached the immeasurable depth of evil; our thoughts moved willingly to lowly things, even though we are the image of God and are worthy of a higher, heavenly life. Yet our condition is not irreversible and not unchangeable; it is entirely possible, and moreover for good reasons, that just as we wretchedly dragged ourselves down from that great glory to the lowest infamy, so we shall return again, head upward, and again see the more glorious face of God — of course not as closely as before, but from a greater distance we shall see and feel the radiance of His beauty. Therefore the most divine Moses and all the prophets, as many as there were, and the fathers who were before them — Abraham and those like him — saw very clearly, so far as it was possible, and enjoyed the brightness of the beauty of God’s face. Struck by His unapproachable glory, some of them reproached themselves, others considered themselves and called themselves earth and dust, and still others were not even able to open their mouths from the excess of glory of Him whom they saw. Then they knew the limitations of their speech and the slowness of their tongue, and together with the glory they experienced many more blessed perceptions.
That is why the divine David, longing for the brightness of the beauty of the Lord’s face, cries out to God in prayer: «When shall I come and appear before the face of God?» (Ps 42:2); and, wishing to show the state of the soul in which she saw the face of the Lord, he says: «The righteous shall dwell before Your face» (Ps 140:13). Wisely showing what strength the contemplation of God’s face gives the soul, he says: «You turned away Your face, and I was troubled» (Ps 30:7). If God turns His face away and the soul is then troubled, then from the presence of God and from the contemplation of God there comes spiritual peace in the soul — so great a gift that after divine love and joy there come either the gifts of the Spirit or His fruits. And David shows that those who live in holiness and righteousness walk in the light of the Lord’s face, saying: «In the light of Your face they shall walk, and in Your name they shall rejoice all the day» (Ps 89:15-16) — that is, in that spiritual day, while the noetic and ineffable sun sends its pure and life-giving rays to the inner man, and the senses are enlightened by the transcendent intellect. At that time all the memory of the soul is taken from the earth and transferred to heaven, and such a man rejoices and is consoled, sings songs and exults with joy and beauty and spiritual delight that no one can express, shining and radiant with the light of the Lord’s face. Therefore in another place David prays to God, saying: «Do not turn away Your face from me, lest I become like those who go down to the pit» (Ps 143:7). For the cause of darkness is the turning away of the Lord’s face, and His turning toward us is the cause of all noetic light and therefore, of course, of spiritual joy, as he says of himself: «The light of Your face has been signed upon me», adding: «You have put gladness in my heart» (Ps 4:6-7). And again he testifies that after the light of the Lord’s face was marked upon him he felt within himself the spiritual gift of divine grace; and as to precisely what kind of men stand before the face of the Lord and pray to Him — that these are only those who are noetically gods among God’s people.
Indeed, there are many saints and men of God, but not all of them can see the face of God and live an angelic life while they are still living on earth. This is possible only for those who recognize that God must be served with divine wisdom and knowledge and worshipped in truth and in spirit. These are rightly called the rich among God’s people, for they are enlightened by the mysteries of numerous contemplations, and their wealth is the depth of spiritual wisdom and knowledge, which, as the apostle Paul says, not everyone has. That is why, as it is said, the wondrous David says to God: «The rich among the people of the earth shall entreat before Your face» (Ps 45:12). And that is why the wise Solomon, being filled with divine wisdom more than anyone else and knowing this better than anyone, says, instructing us most wisely: «Do not be hasty with your mouth to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth.» When by a divine gift you stand before the divine face of the Lord — that is, when the contemplation of the intellect ascends — then the time for silence has come. Therefore do not hasten to utter even one word, recklessly carried away by the habit of speaking, for then it is not the time to speak. For while you are still on earth you become a god and, imitating the angels, you contemplate the face of the heavenly God. Yes, the Saviour said: «Their angels in heaven always behold the face of my heavenly Father» (Mt 18:10). And since you also hear how Solomon says in another place, «Light always shines for the righteous», then, having reflected on this, understand that they naturally feel it from the light that pours out from the Lord’s unveiled face, seeing endlessly, by divine grace, the face of the Lord, from which, as from a spring, light pours forth. For a man becomes and is on earth the same as an angel — not to say, a god. Undoubtedly you return to a gift that corresponds to the conception of the grace of the Lord, becoming below, on earth, what God is above — a thing worthy of wonder. At the same time you do not penetrate into it with a curious intellect, you do not traverse it even with a thought, nor do you move your own thought as though dividing your condition; rather you direct yourself in a single manner and look upon the likeness of God without eyes and without motion, with a simple and single gaze, and moreover you delight in the clearest and unapproachable light that comes from the face of the Lord.
This, in fact, is the highest disposition of the intellect toward God, a worthy contest for the prudent; one might say, the flower of spiritual purity, the desired unity of faith which is accomplished in communion with the Spirit, the glorious fruit of divine and God-worshipping wisdom, the foundation of spiritual peace, the abode of indescribable joy, the door of God’s love, the shoot of enlightenment, the cause of the flowing of the inexhaustible waters of the Spirit from the heart, the true sustenance and delight of the soul, the manna that transforms the soul, the increase and transformation of the soul, the beginning of divine and ineffable mysteries and revelations, the certainty of the one and first truth, the destruction of all reasonings, the ceasing of all thoughts, the mastery of thinking, the very first cause of wonder, the highest transformation of the intellect and its change into the simple, the boundless, the unlimited on every side, the immeasurable, the invisible and formless, without attributes, indivisible, uniform, untouchable and supernatural — and a wholly new godlike state. Therefore, having come into such a state and in some manner deified according to the manly love of grace, do not hasten through ignorance to utter even one word before the face of the Lord; for to Him be the only and simple glory for ever.
77. The intellect that desires to contemplate spiritual things higher than itself, if it does not find in its heart the co-operation of divine grace, sees only what is inactive, unenlightened and blurred, and therefore loses its own sweetness as well. Yet through ignorance it thinks it has that sweetness, because it has never tasted any greater. Just as a man who eats barley bread — though it has no such taste — thinks it tastes good to him, because he does not know the taste of wheaten bread.
78. After the noetic unification of the heart by grace, the intellect sees without error in the spiritual light and presses on toward its desire — and its desire is God — having come to be outside sense-perception, colourless, without properties and without conceptions, since it has been freed from them.
79. The intellect that grace directs toward contemplation is truly nourished always with spiritual manna. The perceptible manna that Israel ate had in it a sweet and wondrous power to nourish the body. But what it was in its essence is unknown. That is why it was called manna, which means «the unknown»; the word means «what is this?» And those who did not know the essence of what they saw and ate asked in wonder: «What is this?» So too he who contemplates comes all the time to the rapture of the intellect and asks himself: «What is this that in contemplation gladdens and nourishes the intellect when it is eaten spiritually, and yet itself surpasses the bounds of thinking, as divine and supernatural, and in an unaccustomed manner nourishes and gives drink to the intellect, and does not submit to the intellect’s ordering, not only as incomprehensible in essence but also as endless and unlimited?»
80. There are three things that bear witness to the truth, and I would name them thus: creation, the Scriptures, and the testimony in the spirit. Through the Scriptures and creation, when these are contemplated spiritually, one simple truth becomes visible, and from it a composite one. And whoever through these three has reached the other two, then, standing upon them, the unerring intellect will find its way by the grace of Christ; for through the simple truth it will reach the height and depth of thought, and likewise its endless breadth, and through them, coming to comprehension, it sings with fear. Through the composite truth it acquires, in addition to what has already been said, peace of heart, love and joy; and therefore in wonder it sings with love.
But a man needs more time, labour and persistence, so that, laying aside the senses in some manner and severing what is perceptible from the intellect, he may come to be among noetic things, after which the contemplation of the truth shines in the soul. I do not say that the truth, in order to be grasped, needs such means as time or labour or endurance; I said that a man needs them, for the truth itself is one and simple, though it appears twofold when contemplated, and calls loudly from almost everywhere to be looked upon, bearing witness of itself to those who desire it. And since man is composite, joined to the senses, and undergoes changes and alterations, sometimes he somehow goes beyond himself and, not knowing how, turns against himself; through excessive attachment to the senses he acts craftily and falls sick with unbelief. Because of these three faults — excessive sensuality, craftiness and unbelief — he wretchedly falls away from the truth to which these three witnesses, that is, Scripture, creation and the spirit, bear testimony.
Therefore, in order to be freed from excessive sensuality, a man needs that other thing of which I spoke earlier: that the intellect, humbled, must believe in what is simple; and then in this way, at once with the help of the Scriptures and of creation, a man in the spirit will recognize not only the simplest truth but also the truth composed from it, and besides this will also see what once separated him from contemplation in the truth and what — I would say — separated him from delight. For the first truth is one, and only that one is simple by nature. After it comes the composite truth that arises from it through us who are composite. And this is the utmost limit of our intellect and its best content, toward which the whole life and asceticism of those who are guided by the power of the Spirit is directed: that the intellect, in a state of nakedness so far as possible, may see the light and delight in the light from the first and only truth and in the strange way it is composed from it.
And this will never come about otherwise than through humility and simplicity in faith, through the testimony of the Scriptures, of creation and of the witness in the spirit. When the intellect, as in a mirror, sees the truth in its three modes through the testimony of the three things mentioned, then again, as though returning from that vision, it becomes within itself much humbler and simpler, and its faith becomes stronger. Because of this it walks with glad feet to the contemplation of the truth, and moreover the truth shines in it more brightly with its rays. Turning to itself through the contemplation of the truth, in consequence of the greatness of the glory it has seen within itself, it descends to greater humility and simplicity and is amazed, overcome by faith; and thus ascending again, as if upon some divine circle, and walking along it with humility, simplicity and faith, rising and seeing the truth — and the radiance of the truth leads it to greater humility — and becoming yet simpler in faith, the intellect does not cease from this movement. For the present it moves in just this way, in humility, simplicity and faith, thanks to the testimony of the Scriptures and of creation, contemplating the truth in the spirit and returning again to the place from which it set out. And in this way, always adorned by grace and enlightened by what is above the intellect, leading a life full of all joy in Christ our Lord, it experiences, as in a betrothal, the enjoyment of the eternal blessings to come.
81. The contemplative life becomes complete and flawless thanks to three things: faith, clear communion of the life-giving Spirit, and the knowledge of wisdom. For contemplation, to speak precisely, is the knowledge of noetic things within those things that we perceive with the senses, and sometimes it is the knowledge of noetic things proper, separated from the senses, in those who have made progress. For this reason men need faith, since it is said: «Unless you believe, you will not understand.» The Spirit is needed too, for «the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God» (1 Cor 2:10). That is why the divine Job said: «The breath of the Almighty gives him understanding» (Job 32:8). Therefore it is natural that the divine activity of the Spirit should seethe or, so to speak, live in the heart, and thus supernaturally quicken the intellect and indescribably draw it to itself, gather it and keep it from all wandering, and give it strength in stillness — with great spiritual pleasure and joy, and moreover with divine love — to see the best of divine things and to move around them, to conceive God in an unaccustomed way, as it pleases Him, and likewise to rejoice in Him, feeling a great irresistible inclination toward Him and a fitting delight.
This state also requires wisdom, as I have already said. For, according to the Scriptures, wisdom enlightens a man’s face; it enlightens him so that he may easily pass from sensing to thinking, may ascend from what is perceived by the senses to what is understood by the intellect and to divine visions, and, in order to see the incomprehensible in noetic revelation, it enlightens him so that in clear contemplation he may see and conceive in a single way the presence of God beyond him. Indeed, «blessed is the man whom You instruct, O Lord, and teach out of Your law» (Ps 94:12); for truly wise is such a man, who comes to faith through instruction and learns the ineffable mysteries of God through the teaching of the Spirit. This is a great thing! Truly wise is he who walks by faith in union and supernatural communication with the Spirit. And indeed there are three things that cannot be restrained: God, an angel, and a man of free will. Such a man is like an angel of the earth, a wondrous observer of visible creation, a true student of God’s uncreated ways — or one might say, of God’s gifts — who, like the angels, in some manner catches with a single glance the knowledge of God Himself, who can in no way be seen. Such is he who is wise by faith in the Holy Spirit, and in this way he is blessed.
But it would probably be enough to recall what the evangelist Luke says in the Gospel about the Lord Jesus; then there would be no need to explain what wisdom and goodness are, or to praise them. In one place the evangelist says that «Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in grace», and in another: «the child grew and became strong in spirit, filled with wisdom» (Lk 2:52, 40). And now, intending to speak more clearly about these matters, I shall also recall what holy Solomon says to God: «Who could have known Your will, had You not given wisdom and sent down Your Holy Spirit from on high? Thus the paths of those who live on earth were made straight, and thus men learned what pleases You, and by wisdom they were saved» (Wis 9:17-18). Do you see how much power wisdom acquires through the activity of the Spirit, and how far from salvation is he who has not gathered wisdom and the Spirit from God and does not even listen to the counsel of the wise and of the partaker of the Spirit? If this is written about the Saviour, in whom all the fullness of the Godhead dwelt, then it will not be hard to understand, with respect to the whole human race, how necessary wisdom is with the co-operation of the Holy Spirit, and how much strength and progress the spiritual sage receives from God, who loves the souls of men. By God’s grace the sage searches out the heavens and reaches knowledge for the sake of the Most High — a strange thing, but truly so.
But since we have said so much about contemplation, it would be worthwhile not to be idle but to say at least something more about it, and in part to direct the thinking of a devoted listener and, as it were, to give him sustenance. For God decisively commands rational beings that superiors should give generously, and that inferiors should receive reverently from their superiors what is available from divine enlightenment and from the treasuries of these states; and that we should treat our equals kindly and speak with them, not vainly, about noetic things and about God. In this way not only would righteous inerrancy shine clearly in the Church of the living God, but the venerable and beautiful face of love, the mark of Christ’s disciples, would shine unceasingly in our hearts, ready to be poured out through the Holy Spirit upon us for the perfect and simple love of God and of men; and thus we would live on earth in an angelic manner, truly blessed and most pleasantly, as those attached to that divine and godly twofold love on which the law and the prophets rest. There is nothing sweeter to the soul than this, especially when it comes directly from the contemplation and knowledge of God, in other words from illuminating grace.
Therefore whoever considers it a good and worthy work to intend to go to God so as to be joined with Him and truly receive deification — in other words, he intends to be saved; for according to the theologian teachers a man cannot be saved without the deification of the intellect. Fulfilling the Lord’s commandments so far as he has strength, a man reaches the contemplation that is possible for him; and there is neither blind action detached from contemplation, nor soulless contemplation, which is what contemplation is without action. As a result of this, with wisdom, according to the intellect and the content of the recorded sacred knowledge, he begins, as they say, with a good movement, to look at the world rightly, understanding what is perceived by the senses at the direction of the infinitely strong and infinitely wise Creator; and he successively reaches a distinction infinite in power and universal in scope, so far as is possible to his gaze, and delights in it, and in like manner lives with his intellect secretly through what is secret.
And when time has passed, having lived a life free of care in stillness, knowing only of divine things thanks to the Scriptures and the visible world, he tries, so far as possible, to look spiritually at creation according to the Scriptures and to see the signs of truth. When this happens, then the intellect, by the good pleasure and activity of the Spirit worthy of worship, is raised to the contemplation and knowledge of sacred truth — as the great Dionysius says, to the sacred degree of contemplation, or rather to the second degree, that is, divine visions and thoughts without veils and images. As a result, the intellect, as though on fire, goes straight to naked thoughts and, setting above all else its own purity and desire for God, imprints in itself, as in a clear mirror, divine phenomena that give off light brighter than the sun. The activity of grace nourishes the intellect with the impressions available to it, and it reaches, as it were, the third degree: those very many blessed visions; and uniformly and concisely it successfully raises the divine manifestations from their numerous varieties to the ineffable love of the unchanging and hidden Unity, turning with all its perceptions into fire, and into the heart’s God-worshipping unceasing love for God, as one who contemplates under the influence of truth by the inspiration of the Spirit the Illuminator. And again, according to the great Dionysius, this is the divine communion of the most uniform One, so far as He can be apprehended.
Therefore, blissfully flying up to such degrees of communion with the tri-hypostatic One, clearly and brightly enjoying the unbearable languors of divine rapture and, in the midst of them, the enthusiastic gusts of love, seeing itself struck and as though burnt by love, the thrice-blessed and God-bearing intellect is stirred — and this is very noticeable from the mood that comes upon it — and truly comes into ecstasy, having entered with shining face into the indescribable mysteries of the word of God, with eyeless eyes enjoying the beginningless and endless, the immeasurable and wholly ineffable and incomprehensible; and at the same time it conceives for itself a kind of infinite and impassable sea of God’s essence, which is beyond all thought, together with its season and its coming, according to the Theologian who spoke of it. «This», says holy Dionysius, «is a feast for the eyes, which noetically nourishes and deifies everyone who hastens up to it, and yet begins from the contemplation and knowledge of beings» — as this teacher of sacred mysteries says when explaining the sacred signs of our priesthood.
Basil the Great tells us the same, saying: «When someone has contemplated all the beauty of the visible, he will stand before God Himself, whose vision usually appears only in pure hearts. Then, having made progress in the higher spheres of theology, he can also become a contemplative.» And again, on the words of David, who says in the Spirit, «Before dawn I will stand before You and keep watch», this great teacher says: «When I stand before You and draw my intellect nearer to contemplating You, then I shall receive contemplation in the light of knowledge.» The same may be heard from holy Maximus, who for his part says the same and directly indicates what and how great is the progress that lies in the contemplation and knowledge of God through the Scriptures and creation, and that it is of course from there that the light of knowledge comes, thanks to which there is blessed deification during contemplation — a thing rare even in ancient times and hard to find among those who kept stillness, and what can we say of the present time, when there is no one who could teach from his own experience the gleaned content of grace, as the great teacher of stillness, Saint Isaac the Syrian, says in the Discourse in which he begins to speak of spiritual perception and the contemplative faculty.
This is what holy Maximus says: «We call the teaching of the saints a divine light, because it transmits the light of knowledge and deifies those who listen»; and these words of his agree with the words of the all-holy Dionysius, who says: «How many other divine lights were clearly given to us by the hidden transmission of our divinely inspired mentors, following the instructions of enlightened men — and that is how we learned»; and in another place he says: «Divine knowledge directs upward those who turn to it, according to their capacity and the measure of their understanding, and unites them by virtue of a simple self-unification.» And also: «Every manifestation of revelation that descends from the Father comes to us beneficently, as a unifying power that raises us up again, simplifies us and directs us to the unity and godlike simplicity of the Father who gathers us. For all things are from Him and through Him» (Rom 11:36). Do you understand in what way he who has directed himself wisely, stretching upward as a result of turning, that is, of the divine contemplation of God, either sees God, stretching upward from creatures, or is united with God and worships through the Scriptures — whether symbolically or in a certain divine manner — and how such a man may even be called a god? For all, he says, who among thinking and intelligent beings are directed wholly toward the unity of the divine mystery are directed in an immeasurable way, so far as possible, to its divine illuminations by the help of a powerful, if one may say so, following after God, and are honoured with the single name of God. As the theological tongue of the great Gregory clearly states: «A living being, built here below, is directed and passes into another state, as to a higher step of the mystery, and is deified by its inclination toward God.» And holy Maximus says: «The spiritual meaning of the Divine Scripture, through wisdom, transforms unto deification those thinkers who know; for through transformation
Note: In the Discourse on the Nativity of Christ, folio 181.
of their intellect they behold with unveiled face, as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord.» This contemplative life requires the three conditions already mentioned: faith, communion of the Spirit, and the wisdom of knowledge in Christ Jesus our Lord.
82. The contemplative life, with the life-giving Spirit, fills the contemplative in secret with certain great and most wondrous noetic visions — not at once, not suddenly, but when some time has passed, through long pursuit of wisdom, in order and as it were by degrees. Sometimes you might hear the contemplative say, out of an excess of stillness and of withdrawal from everything save God: «I am alone until I pass by» (Ps 141:10); and sometimes, since in turning to beings he comes to know them, he says: «How magnificent are Your works, O Lord; in wisdom You have made them all» (Ps 104:24), and «the fragrance of Your garments» (Song 4:10) is «like the fragrance of a field which the Lord has blessed» (Gen 27:27). Sometimes, compelling him to contemplate with a stronger impulse and teaching him to rise to spiritual ascents, God persuades him to say: «The fragrance of Your ointments is most fragrant… draw me after You» (Song 1:3-4), to God; and again: «I will praise You, my God and my King, and I will bless Your name for ever and ever. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised, and of His greatness there is no end» (Ps 145:1, 3). «Your knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is firm, I cannot attain it» (Ps 139:6). And again he says: «But You, O Lord, are most high for ever (Ps 92:8), and Your remembrance is from generation to generation (Ps 102:12); You are exalted far above all gods (Ps 97:9)» — thereby preparing contemplatives who stretch upward to sing of what they see as beyond being in their visions. And sometimes He teaches contemplatives to express their rapture with the cry: «There is none like You among the gods, O Lord, and there is nothing like Your works!» (Ps 86:8); and further He shows those who contemplate spiritually the noetic mountain to which they ascend, and the holy place of God on which stand those who have innocent hands and a pure heart. And besides this He also lets them see the ways of ascent to the height of heaven and of descent to the depth of the abyss, that is, to the mysteries of the Spirit; and sometimes in a wondrous manner He sets even the Persons of the Trinity before their contemplation. Sometimes with wonder He brings them to the contemplation of Jesus, of His providence in the flesh, and teaches them to contemplate the supernatural mysteries that follow from it. And after many blessed visions He does not leave the contemplative until He has brought him, wondrously enlightened — O the marvel of grace! — into the very bosom of God, into the true and ineffable rest and supernatural spiritual delight, not to say the intoxication with the beauty of God, and into divine rapture; into that most blessed bosom which contains within itself the great depth of divine mysteries and brings one sufficiently near to the perception of God’s superessentiality — that bosom which Abraham also received as an inheritance from on high, when God Himself became Abraham’s portion, according to the words «I am the God of Abraham» (Mt 22:32). Since God is the God of Abraham, the bosom of God is also the bosom of Abraham. So then, the contemplative life in the Spirit, raising a man up, leads him into the bosom of God, or, as one may otherwise say, into the bosom of Abraham, in all simplicity and most joyful gladness; it truly deifies, and amid the sweetness of the soul and a wholly ineffable delight it brings to the state of blessedness the intellect that shares in wisdom, and that perhaps takes itself the more to contemplation upward toward Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.
83. Since both creation and the Scriptures are enlightened by the Word of God, and since everything we contemplate, being seen spiritually, strengthens the intellect and all its powers for the contemplation and understanding of God — and moreover first tests spiritually their action and the influence of the heart — therefore, teaching most wisely, holy David says in one place that by the word of the Lord the intellects, which in this instance he calls heavens, are established, and all their power is established by the Spirit of His mouth. And when is this? When the spiritual earth, that is, our heart, is perceptibly and plainly found full of the mercy of the Lord, that is, of the Spirit-moved power, activity and movement. But before our intellect perceives in the heart that activity, power and movement, it will not only have no firmness from the contemplative and spiritual examination of creatures and of the Divine Scripture and from summing up what is contained in them, but besides this it will also feel great fear lest it perish through the impropriety of its own conceptions. Precisely for this reason, if we should think of undertaking the contemplation of God from Scripture and from creatures, gathering in a uniform and single-formed way the many meanings and contemplations of beings into one content and spirit, seeing the uniform, simple and formless contemplation in unlimitedness, boundlessness and beginninglessness, then let us first try to find the treasure in our own heart and pray to the holy God to fill our earth with His mercy; and then, if it be possible, let us freely direct the intellect upward to the understanding of God who is, as has been said, uniform and single-formed, simple, formless, eternal, endless and unbounded, with the contemplation and co-operation of the Word and the Spirit.
84. When a man, with the senses and the simple dispositions of the soul, walks the path of the virtues according to the commandments with humility of thought, in patience and in hope resting upon faith, and when there is established in the heart the life-giving and ever-flowing power and activity of the Holy Spirit, which truly enlightens the powers of the soul by its natural and manifest movement and, consoling him, directs the activity of the intellect toward itself as swiftly as possible and is ineffably united with it — then indeed the intellect and grace are beyond doubt united at that time into one spirit. It is precisely then that the intellect of itself, with the help of the breath of grace, passes over to contemplation; for the activity and light of the life-giving and Holy Spirit puts an end to the scattering and wandering of the intellect, and it comes to the revelation of divine noetic mysteries, and by the deepest silence and by its own natural silent gaze becomes able to enter into supernatural ineffable mysteries; and the more it sees, the more it becomes God-containing and stretches upward, so as to see God so far as possible with the knowledge of divine things gathered from sacred readings, and the more it remains in stillness, humbling itself and praying, since God helps it in the Holy Spirit. Therefore it is not then outside theology; rather, at that very time it truly becomes a theologian and cannot but theologize unceasingly. But alas! All that the intellect sees without the heavenly gift mentioned, and therefore without the Spirit who breathes clearly and always in motion within the heart, is only daydreams; and however much it may theologize, these are empty words poured out into the air, stirring up the perceptions of the soul, since the intellect is under the influence of hearing and of words that come from outside — whence comes the all-cruel seduction of those who consider themselves noetic and theologians — and not from a heart inspired by the Spirit the Illuminator, from whom comes the uniform and unerring truth of theology. For in general, if in the heart of one who partakes there is no manifest life-giving and illuminating power of the Spirit, and if His power does not flow out or, as one might say, does not breathe, then there is no noetic unity there but rather division; there is no strength and no standing, but weakness and changeableness; nor is there light and the contemplation of truth, but rather darkness and empty conceptions, and in general the road of irrationality and delusion. For the fathers teach that the intellect can pass through contemplation in three orders or in three ways: naturally, supernaturally and contrary to nature. When the intellect sees something spiritual in some thing, it sees according to nature, yet by the supernatural activity of the Spirit. But if it sees a demon or an angel as a person, then, if the intellect is unified in peace and the illumination of the Spirit burns the more strongly, it sees supernaturally and, as is evident, is not mistaken. But if the intellect, looking at what is visible, is divided and darkened, and the life-giving power is extinguished, then it sees contrary to nature, and such contemplation of its own is delusion. Therefore, if we wish our intellect to be healthy and chaste, we must neither seek the contemplation of persons with the intellect nor trust what is seen, if the heart does not direct its activity and movement by the power of the Holy Spirit.
85. Some strive to heal the inflammation of their passions with the heavenly dew of grace, and this is very good. It is truly of them that it is written: «For Your dew is a dew of healing» (Is 26:19). But in some this dew is somehow joined with a greater divine protection and is turned into manna, and from a kind of wheat becomes bread through the humble contrition of the heart, the water of tears and the fire of spiritual knowledge; and moreover in a worthy and wholly natural manner it comes under this action of grace and becomes true angel-like food. Of them it is rightly said: «Man ate the bread of angels» (Ps 78:25). But there are those who, the more progress they make, the more their nature is transformed and becomes manna for themselves. Of them it is said in the Gospel: «What is born of the Spirit is spirit» (Jn 3:6). The first order is that of the wise hesychasts; after it comes the order of those who struggle in silence with divine knowledge; and the third is that of those who are stretched out toward all things and changed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
86. Having spiritually escaped by grace, as is fitting, from Pharaoh and Egypt, and from the sorrow there and the burdens, and from bodily life, which stirs up the passionate waves of bitterness and salt malice, the intellect passes over to the noetic desert, that is, to a place free of Pharaoh’s noetic warriors; and, having noetically endured hardships and been freed from the troubles that then weighed perceptibly upon the Hebrews, it eats with the perception of the soul the noetic manna, whose image Israel once ate perceptibly. And at first, remembering, it sometimes desires the spiritual fleshpots of Egypt, as Israel desired meat; for the most part it desires them cautiously and uncertainly, and feels at that time that God is turning away from it, until it turns back again and by the prayer of repentance propitiates God. And whoever more often satisfies himself with manna in stillness will in time, when grace grants him help and strength, clearly see how his noetic body is in some way, one may say, transformed by its very nature into manna. Such an intellect that eats manna has a spiritual scale that serves it as a measure for the manna: it gathers no more than is needed for the day, so that, gathered beyond measure, it may not breed worms and be wholly lost, and so that together with it the immoderate intellect may not perish for lack of food. It would be evident that the intellect which eats manna alone and is nourished by nothing else lives better than another that eats anything and anyhow — that is, spiritually. And the sign that it too, according to the properties of its food, passes in some manner, so to speak, into the properties of manna, is the absence of impulses toward anything superfluous that it desired before, and the state in which it can everywhere eat manna and become an infant, having cleaved to piety. And it is no wonder that someone should acquire the properties of the food on which he is fed over a long time. Nor can the transformation of the intellect into the properties of manna be improbable, for food that we eat constantly and continuously in a natural manner has the power to transform into itself what it nourishes. Then the intellect not only plainly occupies the position of an angel but also becomes a partaker of divine adoption, worthily passing from spiritual glory to glory, not only gazing upon the One but becoming one with itself; and in Him it lives, delights transcendently and, so to speak, experiences unutterable mysteries in a godlike and God-loving manner in the Holy Spirit — and truly it becomes in some way as it is seen and hymned, and thus sees itself as manna. In this state it is far higher and more honoured than one who knows that he eats manna but has not been transformed into some state of manna. For the first state may sometimes be experienced at the initial gathering of the intellect into noetic unity with itself, while the second state is the clear manifestation of a more evident union, the revelation of noetic mysteries, a high remoteness from everything, and the simplest contemplation.
87. The intellect is by nature simple, for simple too is that whose image it is, namely the Godhead. And if it is simple, it also loves to act simply. For all things love what is close to them by nature. But the intellect receives varied impressions not of itself, but through the senses and through what can be grasped by the senses, with whose help it apprehends noetic things. And when it sets between itself and the senses, with the things they apprehend, its own understanding, which by its capacity skilfully clarifies and judges, and neither makes the senses weaker than they ought to be, nor lightly darkens or ungratefully exaggerates the beauty of sensible things, contemptuously debasing the power of the intellect before them, but with discernment gives each its due — then the intellect at once becomes one with itself, coming to that fitting state of simplicity which it had by nature, turning away from what is divided; and again it naturally begins to love the one and simple, and an activity that is one and simple; and, loving precisely this, it seeks, and in seeking it soars above every union, until it finds the truly and properly simple One, who is God. Then indeed the intellect is now covered by His wings alone, now raised up and made glad, as it is natural for it to be glad when it is kept by God and bears God.
88. The cloud of the passions that has come upon the discerning power of the soul, like a kind of dark solidity of the passions, forces it to see something other than what really is. But when by frequent prayer, by the fulfilling of the commandments and by pressing upward toward the contemplation of God the intellect, with the help of grace, destroys that dark solidity which has formed, then of itself it sees clearly that it contemplates God, and there is no need at all to explain this to it — just as one who has good sight need not have it explained to him that he sees, unless there is something on his pupils that irritates and dims his gaze. For as what the senses apprehend is also assimilated by the senses, if they are healthy, so what the intellect apprehends becomes the possession of thoughts that are pure of the cloud of the passions; and as through sense-perception the apprehension of sensible things normally comes about, so through noetic contemplation comes the seeing of noetic things, after which, by the grace of God, there comes the formless, propertyless, inconceivable and simple contemplation of God, which, holding the intellect fast, makes it free from everything whatsoever that can be grasped by sense or by intellect, seizing it into the depth of infinity, incomprehensibility and boundlessness, in a wonder and amazement that cannot be uttered in words.
89. O Master, Almighty, Beginning of all that is visible and of all that the intellect contemplates; Uncreated, whose beginning is beginninglessness; Endless, whose limit is the limitless; Incomprehensible, whose nature is the supernatural; Unoriginated, whose essence is the pre-eternal; Invisible, whose appearance is the formless; Incorruptible, whose property is ever-being; Unsearchable, whose image is the imageless; Unbounded, whose place is boundlessness; Unapproachable and Inconceivable, whose knowledge and contemplation are the unseen and the unknown; Unconfessable, whose word is voicelessness; Unutterable, whose explanation is the inexplicable; Incomprehensible, whose thought is what is inaccessible to the intellect; and in general such as is above all things. O most blessed One! You are wholly wonder and calm, boldness and love, sweetness and gladness of soul, and hope in all together; truly freedom from care and joy in the Persons, a single glory and kingdom, wisdom and power. Therefore You, unutterable God, naturally become the withdrawal from everything visible, the repose from everything the intellect contemplates; and in You those who contemplate You with communion of Your Holy Spirit find a wondrous rest. O unutterable God!
90. «That at which we most wonder, namely the divine, most attracts us; and when it becomes desirable, then it purifies», says the theologian voice of Gregory. «Purifying, it makes us godlike, and with the godlike it converses as with its own.» But it is not only God who is thus disposed toward them; those who are purified are likewise disposed toward God and toward divine things as toward their own, in spirit and in truth. Therefore the Theologian goes on to say: «God, who is united with gods, and they know Him.» Do you see the wonder of union? For holy Gregory says: «God, who is united with gods.» If in some way one and the same can be united, then in like manner there come to be the same dispositions and satisfactions of soul. That is why holy Gregory says: «…and they know Him.» So then, in the same way the godlike, and gods by grace, converse with divine things and with God as with their own, and know how God in like manner contemplates, converses and abides in union with those who, according to what has been said, become godlike and gods. Therefore the great Gregory rightly adds, the better to explain: «Perhaps these pure ones and these gods know God as far as He already knows them, as is fitting — as God by nature knows gods by adoption.» How far might you conceive this likeness, if you reflect rightly? Truly blessed are those who, as they ought, with all the power of the soul and with spiritual knowledge stretch out toward visions and contemplations, when, beholding God’s incomprehensibility, they wonder with a great wonder at His beginninglessness, incomprehensibility, unlimitedness and moreover His ever-being and endlessness. From that time their souls cleave to God with love and greatly long to contemplate Him; and when they see the divine countenance and His incomparable beauty, they melt in blessedness. Then they are gradually purified further and, coming under the divine influence, become godlike and gods and are truly united with God. Such a man, having gained the advantage of the deified according to their supernatural gift of deification and union with God, understands in a wondrous way every spiritual perception and every desire by reason of the surpassing excellence of their beauty; and around him are those who with delight, like the angels, sing unceasingly and most sweetly: «God has stood in the assembly of gods, and will judge gods openly» (Ps 82:1); and again: «The God of gods, the Lord, has spoken and called the earth» — that is, those born of earth — «from the rising of the sun to its setting» (Ps 50:1). Therefore also «the princes of the peoples are gathered together with the God of Abraham» (Ps 47:9); they have taken their places in order around God and stand around Him as the seraphim stand, receiving the divine illumination of transcendent mysteries, and hold fast without turning aside to God, who surpasses them an infinite number of times. And if the pure in heart are blessed, according to the word of the Lord, for they shall see God, then are contemplatives not among the manifestly blessed, whom the amazement that comes from the knowledge of God purifies, so that they successfully ascend to the dignity of God? Therefore those who desire blessedness should experience deification and thus stand immovably around God, as the cherubim stand, and hold as diligently as possible to contemplative knowledge and activity in Christ Jesus our Lord.
91. I greatly desire to see You, and then to hymn You, O Life of those who live and see You, wherever they may be, Lord my God. But though I desire it, I do not know how to call upon You worthily, and I am truly amazed and languish. How the intellect longs for You, Lord, Creator, all-wise; and, seeing You alone, it enjoys the peace and rest proper to it. Moreover, as is natural, the intellect, freed and withdrawn from outward and visible commerce with the world, tries even to think about itself and, above all, to think of higher things with its natural swiftness, and in fact to turn toward things subtler than its own immateriality. Undoubtedly, in its own way, it ascends swiftly, as though of itself, to the best of all and the highest of all immaterial things — evidently to You — and of course it receives help in this chiefly by the co-operation of the Holy Spirit through faith, and in this way it spreads upward; or rather, as actually happens, the intellect, drawn by the spiritual things that surround You and that seem somewhat akin to it, languishes with a great desire to see You with all the zeal of the soul.
But what strange and blessed impressions it naturally experiences! For its nature, being, as I said, spiritual and of course swift and soaring above all creatures, hastens naturally toward spiritual things and feels the need to think, just as animals endowed with senses feel the need to eat; for thinking is to the intellect in a certain way what food is to animals endowed with senses. Through thinking the intellect acquires the property of living, growing, delighting and rejoicing, and animals endowed with senses acquire the same properties through eating. A similar state the intellect experiences through activity, that is, through thinking, especially when its desire ineffably reaches You through Your spiritual goodness, united in the delight of Your ineffable glory. For what can a creature naturally feel, one especially eager for anything, when it meets something attractive — and in particular with such as You are, and moreover, through the co-operation of Your providence, with something so desirable as You are? For You, all-wise King, all-powerful, most good Lord, having created a thinking being unlike others — the intellect — make it able naturally to find great joy in Your perfection, feeling indescribable delight with amazement in divine love for You and, as it were, a kind of mad quickening toward You from such rapturous inspiration. And the intellect, created so that it should love the beautiful, is precisely in this state; and since it greatly loves the beautiful, which is natural and consistent, it has a conscious impulse to think the best, always to desire the highest and the farthest, and to have a joyful sense from what really is toward the better.
How You appear to it, and how wisely You captivate it, at the time when it delights in the desire to contemplate You and with the whole structure of its soul resolves to avoid everything except You alone! For You, most sweet One, are neither exclusively varied, nor simple, nor comprehensible, nor immeasurable, neither terrible nor gentle, but now the one and now the other, so that in this way the movement from one side or the other, and likewise the change of the intellect, could in no way deviate to something outside You — whether by reason of variety and simplicity, or by reason of the urge toward the immensity of comprehensibility, or by reason of fear or meekness. And just as You, most good and most beautiful, contain in Yourself the wholly single good and beauty and the creative beginning of all good things and beauties, so the intellect cannot be in anything else but You, whom it wholly contemplates, in whom it dwells and in whom it delights in various ways and in many. For You contain everything in Yourself as the intelligent cause of everything, and You are above everything, as the infinitely, an infinite number of times, beautiful Creator of all.
Therefore, since You are one in essence, You, O God, are viewed in different ways because of the multitude of Your works and their greatness. For the strangest thing of all is that in whatever You happen to be, You on the other hand appear again to be without it. For as You are wholly immeasurable in essence and in activity, so You are in no way measurable in power. Who has found the measure of Your power? Who has known Your wisdom? Who has explored the abyss of Your goodness? And in general, who has perfectly grasped even one thing that is Yours? And yet You can still be understood in some other way. But of course the intellect, beginning to contemplate from the spiritual things contained in what is manifested, going forward step by step, ascends to the one and unfathomable that surrounds You, Saviour; and because of the pleasure and great delight of what it has grasped, and as a result of love for the beautiful, it zealously hastens and in some manner rushes to ascend as high as possible. And if it is unable to penetrate further, recognizing, as it must, that what eludes it, because it lies above, certainly surpasses it, it is possessed by some great passion of love, and at the same time it is inspired with enthusiasm by You and stirs up ardent desires in its soul, making of what it can grasp a means of inflaming divine love for the immeasurable, and turning its amazement into a weapon for acquiring various degrees of love.
Since what is incomprehensible about You does not so much delight the intellect, All-wise One, as inflame it with what escapes it, and because of the immensity of knowledge prepares both great wonder and a special desire, I might even add that it compels one to seek something wholly other than what You are in essence — for no one can in any way understand this. What we contemplate around You, O God, and what is the subject of theology, is therefore, as has been said, infinite in extent and unsearchable in multiplicity. Moreover, although it is impossible to reach the limits of these things, being infinite, yet by drawing near to You through purification and through the contemplation of Your beauty, one can attain clearer and brighter visions of what surrounds You, and thus be deified.
That is why You wound with the wound of love the intellect that properly abides in You, enlightening it more and more and truly introducing it to certain inaccessible hidden heavenly visions. O bottomless depth of strength and surpassing power! From the very beginning, or from the very end, as one might say, You lead the lawfully purified intellect into Your divine darkness and carry it from glory to glory, though it often dwells within this most luminous darkness into which Moses was once brought. I do not know — You alone know — whether this darkness was a prototype of that one, or that one of this; I know for certain only that it is a noetic darkness, and that in it there is something divine and supernatural in the hidden soul of the mystery of spiritual union and love. Those who enter there with the enlightenment of the illuminating Spirit understand this very well.
92. Who does not rejoice, O Lord and Trinity, when he looks upon You with love, upon the King and the unceasing Governor and Giver of all the gifts and blessings that You pour forth? Who will not rejoice with true joy, seeing Your all-embracing dominion? Plainly no one, in no way. Therefore truly «blessed are the pure in heart», for with the eye of the soul they see You, the spiritual joy of Him who alone truly is. They rejoice with great joy, with sweetness of soul and with unbearable impulses of love, often struggling with bodily circumstances and enduring the assaults of demons. For the spiritual light of the beauty of Your countenance, O Lord, is an infinite number of times infinitely higher than any touch of worldly sorrow, if it is given to anyone by grace to be sanctified by it. Therefore You are perfect delight, perfect desire, the object of holy longing and of ineffable love. Therefore Your love wounds with unbearable supernatural stings those who in some way see You. Therefore, following after Your fragrance, the hearts of those who see You press on after You, unutterable God; and they strive in every way to draw You to themselves, being wholly overcome and wondrously melting with longing for You. Therefore, not forgetting, they hold You in the intellect, being enraptured by Your supernatural beauty. Or rather, it is You who unceasingly and spiritually hold their hearts both day and night, and sleep flies from their eyelids.