the mystical theology of valentin weigel - DataSpace at Princeton ...

defiled the “sacred things” by inviting an impure penitent into the inner sanctuary. The
monk’s insurgency was unjustified, writes Dionysius, because those ranking lower in the
hierarchy have no authority over those above: “Even if disorder and confusion should
undermine the most divine ordinances and regulations, that still gives no right, even on
God’s behalf, to overturn the order which God himself has established.” 443 This sentiment
is the reverse of Luther’s claim that he has the authority to rebuke the Pope himself on
God’s behalf, regardless of the consequences. 444 The purpose here is not to adjudicate
between these divergent interpretations, but rather to describe how Dionysius could be
interpreted (and was interpreted) in a “conservative” fashion, in addition to the “radical”
position that is also ascribed to him.
From serving as the heavy artillery in a papal bull or in the Summa, however,
Dionysius had much to lose should his pseudonymity be discovered—after all, it was his
presumed proximity to the Apostles that made him an authoritative source, rather than the
content of his works alone. Dionysius’ first successful debunkers were the humanists
Lorenzo Valla and Desiderius Erasmus, whose commitment to philology inclined them
not to take Dionysius’ claims about his identity at face value. 445 Valla pointed out that the
Areopagites were not philosophers at all, but rather judges. Moreover, he queried some of
the details that Dionysius had presumably added to his text to reinforce his
443 Dionysius, Letter 8, 1088C.
444 See Introduction, p. 47, n. 131.
445 Valla’s most famous feat of debunking was proving that the so-called Donation of Constantine was a
fraud (1440). The Donation was said to be a document in which the Emperor Constantine, who first
established Christianity as a tolerated religion in the Roman Empire, turned the control of the Church over
to the Roman pope Sylvester I (4 th century). Valla established that it was in fact not written until the 9 th
century. Such a document was extremely useful to those who defended the authority of the Roman Church,
and Valla was even brought before the Inquisition in 1444 for his scandalous claim, rescued only by the
intervention of his patron. "Valla, Lorenzo," in The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, Ed. F. L.
Cross and E. A. Livingstone (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 1689; Laurentius Valla, Laurentii
Vallensis, Patritii Romani, de Falso credita & ementita Constantini donatione Declamatio, in Vol. 1,
Opera Omnia (Torino: Bottega d'Erasmo, 1962), 781-795.
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