The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite/Ecclesiastical Hierarchy/Caput II

by Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite

I. Concerning things done in Illumination.

  We have, then, reverently affirmed that this is the purpose of our
  Hierarchy, viz., our assimilation and union with God, as far as
  attainable. And, as the Divine Oracles teach, we shall attain this only
  by the love and the religious performance of the most worshipful
  Commandments. For He says: "He [1]that loveth Me will keep My Word,
  and My Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and will make
  Our abode with him." What, then, is source of the religious performance
  of the most august commandments? Our preparation for the restitution of
  the supercelestial rest, which forms the habits of our souls into an
  aptitude for the reception of the other sacred sayings and doings,[2] 
  the transmission of our holy and most divine regeneration.[3]
  For, as our illustrious Leader used to say, the very first movement of
  the mind towards Divine things is the willing reception of Almighty
  God, but the very earliest step of the religious reception towards the
  religious performance of the Divine commandments is the unutterable
  operation of our being from God. For if our[4] being from God is the
  Divine engendering, never would he know, and certainly never perform,
  any of the Divine instructions, who had not had his beginning to be in
  God. To speak after the manner of men, must we not first begin to be,
  and then to do, our affairs? Since he, who does not exist at all, has
  neither movement nor even beginning; since he, who in some way exists,
  alone does, or suffers, those things suitable to his own nature. This,
  then, as I think, is clear. Let us next contemplate the Divine symbols
  of the birth in God. And I pray, let no uninitiated person approach the
  sight;[5] for neither is it without danger to gaze upon the
  glorious rays of the sun with weak eyes, nor is it without peril to put
  our hand to things above us. For right was the priesthood of the Law,
  when rejecting Osias, because he put his hand to sacred things; and
  Korah, because to things sacred above his capacity; and Nadab and
  Abihu, because they treated things, within their own province,
  unholily.

II. Mysterion of Illumination.

Section I

  The Hierarch, then, wishing that all men whatsoever should be saved by
  their assimilation towards God, and come to recognition of truth,
  proclaims to all the veritable Good News, that God being compassionate
  towards those upon earth, out of His own proper and innate goodness,
  deigned Himself to come to us with outstretched arms, by reason of
  loving-kindness towards men; and, by the union with Him, to assimilate,
  like as by fire, things that have been made one, in proportion to their
  aptitude for deification. "For as many as received Him, to them gave He
  power to become children of God--to those who believe on His Name, who
  were begotten, not of bloods, nor of will of flesh, but of God."[6]

Section II

  He, who has felt a religious longing to participate in these truly
  supermundane gifts, comes to some one of the initiated, and persuades
  him to act as his conductor to the Hierarch. He then professes wholly
  to follow the teaching that shall be given to him, and prays him to
  undertake the superintendence of his introduction, and of all his after
  life. Now he, though religiously longing for his salvation, when he
  measures human infirmity against the loftiness of the undertaking, is
  suddenly seized with a shivering and sense of incapacity, nevertheless,
  at last, he agrees, with a good grace, to do what is requested, and
  takes and leads him to the chief Hierarch.

Section III

  He, then, when with joy he has received, as the sheep upon his
  shoulders, the two men, and has first worshipped, glorifies with a
  mental thanksgiving and bodily prostration the One beneficent Source,
  from Which, those who are being called, are called, and those who are
  being saved, are saved.

Section IV

  Then collecting a full religious assembly into the sacred place, for
  co-operation, and common rejoicing over the man's salvation, and for
  thanksgiving for the Divine Goodness, he first chants a certain hymn,
  found in the Oracles, accompanied by the whole body of the Church; and
  after this, when he has kissed the holy table, he advances to the man
  before him, and demands of him, what has brought him here?

  Section V ===

  When the man, out of love to God, has confessed, according to the
  instruction of his sponsor, his ungodliness, his ignorance of the
  really beautiful, his insufficiency for the life in God, and prays,
  through his holy mediation, to attain to God and Divine things, he (the
  Hierarch) testifies to him, that his approach ought to be entire, as to
  God Who is All Perfect, and without blemish; and when he has expounded
  to him fully the godly course of life, and has demanded of him, if he
  would thus live,--after his promise he places his right hand upon his
  head, and when he has sealed him, commands the priests to register the
  man and his sponsor.

Section VI

  When these have enrolled the names, he makes a holy prayer, and when
  the whole Church have completed this with him, he looses his sandals,
  and removes his clothing, through the Leitourgoi. Then, when he has
  placed him facing the west and beating his hands, averted towards the
  same quarter, he commands him thrice to breathe scorn upon Satan, and
  further, to profess the words of the renunciation. When he has
  witnessed his threefold renunciation, he turns him back to the east,
  after he has professed this thrice; and when he has looked up to
  heaven, and extended his hands thitherward, he commands him to be
  enrolled under Christ, and all the Divinely transmitted Oracles of God.
  When the man has done this, he attests again for him his threefold
  profession, and again, when he has thrice professed, after prayer, he
  gives thanks, and lays his hand upon him.

Section VII

  When the Deacons have entirely unclothed him, the Priests bring the
  holy oil of the anointing. Then he begins the anointing, through the
  threefold sealing, and for the rest assigns the man to the Priests, for
  the anointing of his whole body, while himself advances to the mother
  of filial adoption, and when he has purified the water within it by the
  holy invocations, and perfected it by three cruciform effusions of the
  altogether most pure Muron,[7] and by the same number of injections
  of the all holy Muron, and has invoked the sacred melody of the
  inspiration of the God-rapt Prophets, he orders the man to be brought
  forward; and when one of the Priests, from the register, has announced
  him [8]and his surety, he is conducted by the Priests near the water
  to the hand of the Hierarch, being led by the hand to him. Then the
  Hierarch, standing above, when the Priests have again called aloud near
  the Hierarch within the water the name of the initiated, the Hierarch
  dips him three times, invoking the threefold Subsistence of the Divine
  Blessedness, at the three immersions and emersions of the initiated.
  The Priests then take him, and entrust him to the Sponsor and guide of
  his introduction; and when they, in conjunction with him, have cast
  over the initiated appropriate clothing, they lead him again to the
  Hierarch, who, when he has sealed the man with the most Divinely
  operating Muron, pronounces him to be henceforward partaker of the most
  Divinely initiating Eucharist.

Section VIII

  When he has finished these things, he elevates himself from his
  progression to things secondary, to the contemplation of things [9]first, as one, who, at no time or manner, turns himself to any other
  thing whatever than those which are peculiarly his own, but from things
  Divine to Divine,--is persistently and always ranging himself under the
  banner of the supremely Divine Spirit.

III. Contemplation.

Section I

  This initiation, then, of the holy birth in God, as in symbols, has
  nothing unbecoming or irreverent, nor anything of the sensible images,
  but (contains) enigmas of a contemplation worthy of God, likened to
  physical and human images. For how should it appear misleading? Even
  when the very divine meaning of the things done is passed over in
  silence,[10] the divine Instruction might convince, religiously
  pursuing as it does the good life of the candidate, enjoining upon him
  the purification from every kind of evil, through a virtuous and Divine
  life, by the physical cleansing through the agency of water in a bodily
  form. This symbolic teaching then of the things done, even if it had
  nothing more divine, would not be without religious value, as I think,
  introducing a discipline of a well-regulated life, and. suggesting
  mysteriously, through the total bodily purification by water, the
  complete purification from the evil life.

Section II

  Let this, then, be, for the uninitiated, a conducting guidance of the
  soul, which separates, as is meet things sacred and uniform from
  multiplicity, and apportions the harmonious elevation to the Orders
  severally in turn. But we, who have ascended by sacred gradations to
  the sources of the things performed, and have been religiously taught
  these (sources), shall recognize of what moulds they are the reliefs,
  and of what invisible things they are the likenesses. For, as is
  distinctly shewn in the Treatise concerning "Intelligible and
  Sensible," sacred things in sensible forms are copies of things
  intelligible, to which they lead and shew the way; and things
  intelligible are source and science of things hierarchical cognizable
  by the senses.

Section III

  Let us affirm, then, that the goodness of the Divine Blessedness is
  always in the same condition and manner, unfolding the beneficent rays
  of its own light upon all the intellectual visions without grudging.
  Should, then, the self-choosing self-sufficiency of the contemplators
  either turn away from the light contemplated, by closing, through love
  of evil, the faculties for enlightenment naturally implanted within it,
  it would be separated from the light present to it, not turned away,
  but shining upon it when shortsighted and turning its face from light
  generously running to it; or should it overstep the bounds of the
  visible given to it in due proportion, and rashly undertake to gaze
  upon the rays superior to its vision, the light indeed will do nothing
  beyond its proper functions, but it, by imperfectly approaching thing's
  perfect, would not attain to things unsuitable, and, by stupidly
  disregarding the due proportion, would fail through its own fault.

  But, as I said, the Divine Light is always unfolded beneficently to the
  intellectual visions, and it is possible for them to seize it when
  present, and always being most ready for the distribution of things
  appropriate, in a manner becoming God. To this imitation the divine
  Hierarch is fashioned, unfolding to all, without grudging, the luminous
  rays of his inspired teaching, and, after the Divine example, being
  most ready to enlighten the proselyte, neither using a grudging nor an
  unholy wrath for former back-slidings or excess, but, after the example
  of God, always enlightening by his conducting light those who approach
  him, as becomes a Hierarch, in fitness, and order, and in proportion to
  the aptitude of each for holy things.

Section IV

  But, inasmuch as the Divine Being is source of sacred order, within
  which the holy Minds regulate themselves, he, who recurs to the proper
  view of Nature, will see his proper self in what he was originally, and
  will acquire this, as the first holy gift, from his recovery to the
  light. Now he, who has well looked upon his own proper condition with
  unbiassed eyes, will depart from the gloomy recesses of ignorance, but
  being imperfect he will not, of his own accord, at once desire the most
  perfect union and participation of God, but little by little will be
  carried orderly and reverently through things present to things more
  forward, and through these to things foremost, and when perfected, to
  the supremely Divine summit. An illustration of this decorous and
  sacred order is the modesty of the proselyte, and his prudence in his
  own affairs in having the sponsor as leader of the way to the Hierarch.
  The Divine Blessedness receives the man, thus conducted, into communion
  with Itself, and imparts to him the proper light as a kind of sign,
  making him godly and sharer of the inheritance of the godly, and sacred
  ordering; of which things the Hierarch's seal, given to the proselyte,
  and the saving enrolment of the priests are a sacred symbol,
  registering him amongst those who are being saved, and placing in the
  sacred memorials, beside himself also his sponsor,--the one indeed, as
  a true lover of the life-giving way to truth and a companion of a godly
  guide, and the other, as an unerring conductor of his follower by the
  Divinely-taught directions.

Section V

  Yet it is not possible to hold, conjointly, qualities thoroughly
  opposed, nor that a man who has had a certain fellowship with the One
  should have divided lives, if he clings to the firm participation in
  the One; but he must be resistless and resolute, as regards all
  separations from the uniform. This it is which the teaching of the
  symbols reverently and enigmatically intimates, by stripping the
  proselyte, as it were, of his former life, and discarding to the very
  utmost the habits within that life, makes him stand naked and barefoot,
  looking away towards the west, whilst he spurns, by the aversion of his
  hands, the participations in the gloomy baseness, and breathes out, as
  it were, the habit of dissimilarity which he had acquired, and
  professes the entire renunciation of everything contrary to the Divine
  likeness. When the man has thus become invincible and separate from
  evil, it turns him towards the east, declaring clearly that his
  position and recovery will be purely in the Divine Light, in the
  complete separation from baseness; and receiving his sacred promises of
  entire consort with the One, since he has become uniform through love
  of the truth. Yet it is pretty evident, as I think, to those versed in
  Hierarchical matters, that things intellectual acquire the
  unchangeableness of the Godlike habit, by continuous and persistent
  struggles towards one, and by the entire destruction and annihilation
  of things contrary. For it is necessary that a man should not only
  depart from every kind of baseness, but he must be also bravely
  obdurate and ever fearless against the baneful submission to it. Nor
  must he, at any time, become remiss in his sacred love of the truth,
  but with all his power persistently and perpetually be elevated towards
  it, always religiously pursuing his upward course, to the more perfect
  mysteries of the Godhead.

Section VI

  Now you may see the distinct illustrations of these things in the
  religious rites performed by the Hierarch. For the Godlike Hierarch
  starts with the holy anointing, and the Priests under him complete the
  Divine service of the Chrism, summoning in type the man initiated to
  the holy contests, within which he is placed under Christ as Umpire:
  since, as God, He is Institutor of the awards of contest, and as wise,
  He placed its laws, and as generous, the prizes suitable to the
  victors. And this is yet more Divine, since as good, He devotedly
  entered the lists with them, contending, on behalf of their freedom and
  victory, for their power over death and destruction, he who is being
  initiated will enter the contests, as those of God, rejoicing, and
  abides by the regulations of the Wise, and contends according to them,
  without transgression holding fast the hope of the beautiful rewards,
  as being enrolled under a good Lord and Leader of the awards: and when
  after following in the Divine footsteps of the first of athletes,
  through goodness, he has overthrown, in his struggles after the Divine
  example, the energies and impulses opposed to his deification, he dies
  with Christ--to speak mystically --to sin, in Baptism.

Section VII

  And consider attentively, I pray, with what appropriateness the holy
  symbols are presented. For since death is with us not an annihilation
  of being, as others surmise, but the separating of things united,
  leading to that which is invisible to us, the soul indeed becoming
  invisible through deprivation of the body, and the body, through being
  buried in earth in consequence of one of its bodily changes, becoming
  invisible to human ken, appropriately, the whole covering by water
  would be taken as an image of death, and the invisible tomb. The
  symbolical teaching, then, reveals in mystery that the man baptized
  according to religious rites, imitates, so far as Divine imitation is
  attainable to men, by the three immersions in the water, the supremely
  Divine death of the Life-giving Jesus, Who spent three days and three
  nights in the tomb, in Whom, according to the mystical and secret
  teaching of the sacred text, the Prince of the world found nothing.

Section VIII

  Next, they throw garments, white as light, over the man initiated. For
  by his manly and Godlike insensibility to contrary passions, and by his
  persistent inclination towards the One, the unadorned is adorned, and
  the shapeless takes shape, being made brilliant by his luminous life.

  But the perfecting unction of the Muron makes the man initiated of good
  odour, for the holy perfecting of the Divine birth unites those who
  have been perfected to the supremely Divine Spirit. Now the
  overshadowing which makes intelligibly of a good savour, and perfect,
  as being most unutterable, I leave to the mental consciousness of those
  who are deemed worthy of the sacred and deifying participation of the
  Holy Spirit within their mind.

  At the conclusion of all, the Hierarch calls the man initiated to the
  most Holy Eucharist, and imparts to him the communion of the perfecting
  mysteries.

Footnotes

1. John xiv. 23.
2. Ibid. i. 13.
3. Ibid. iii. 5.
4. See Baptismal Offices.
5. C. 2. s. 62.
6. Captic Con. II. 40; Ap. C. lib. viii. c. 38.
7. mupos is the unguent prepared from myrrh, mupothenges is shining with such unguent, and murostages (mupos and stazo) dripping with ditto. Ap. Con. lib. ii. c. 14.
8. Syr. Doc. p. 60. Clark.
9. From outward signs to inward grace
10. Catechism.