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after the birth of Christ in Greek (probably sometime between the first and third centuries), mostly likely by Greek-speaking writers like Dionysius. 495 An intense interest in the occult has long been considered integral to Renaissance humanism, as well as a marked tendency to syncretize. Given the difficulties involved in justifying the desire to read the ancient heathen philosophers—Plato in particular—one solution (proposed by, for instance, Marsilio Ficino) was simply to declare that Plato was in fact a witness to Christ, but that he did so in secret, under the cover of paganism. 496 The various pagan integuments (Jewish, Greek, Roman and even Egyptian 497 ) served to conceal one single truth, which, conveniently, was the Gospel of the coming of Christ into the world. 498 Marsilius Ficino, a passionate reader of both Dionysius and the Corpus Hermeticum, wrote in a letter (entitled “Divine Providence has decreed the restoration of 495 The transmission history of the Hermetic writings is extremely complex, and is still disputed. Modern scholarship has suggested that there was, in fact, an Egyptian context for the Corpus, but one that dates back to the 3 rd and 2 nd centuries BCE rather than back to the Old Kingdom (3000 BCE). At this time, Egypt was occupied by Greeks and Romans successively, and so it might be more accurate to say that the Hermetic writings have a Greco-Egyptian heritage. Whatever the case, though, the important point is that the authorship of the Corpus Hermeticum was not what Ficino and other 15 th century writers believed it to be. For an overview of the transmission history debate see for instance Brian P. Copenhaver, Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin Asclepius (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992), xlv-lix; Tröger, Karl-Wolfgang, “Hermetica”, Vol. 18, in Theologische Realenzyklopädie (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1989), 749-752. 496 Ficino wrote that “...the ancient tradition of theologians was to shroud the divine mysteries in the numbers and forms of mathematics as well as in the images of poetry” (22). This is from a letter entitled “Concordia Mosis et Platonis”, where according to Ficino, all of the Academic philosophers, from Zeno to Plato (Dionysius included) preach essentially the same message—a message that is entirely consonant with Christianity. The following letter, entitled “Confirmatio Christianorum per Socratica” makes essentially the same point, that “Socrates was, so to speak, a forerunner of Christ, the author of salvation” (12). Marsilio Ficino, The Letters of Marsilio Ficino, trans. Members of the Language Department of the School of Economic Science, London, Vol. 7 (London: Shepheard-Walwyn, 2003). Hannaway describes Ficino’s project as an attempt to “construct a genealogy of...Gentile gnosis.” Owen Hannaway, The Chemists and the Word: The Didactic Origins of Chemistry (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975), 13. 497 Although, of course, the Egyptian writings were actually neo-Platonically influenced Greek writings, and so, with the exception of the Jewish writings (both the Old Testament and the kabbalistic writings), the real interest is in Platonism and neo-Platonism as it influenced Greek and Roman writers. 498 See for instance: Michael J. B. Allen and James Hankins, Introduction, Vol. 1, in Platonic Theology, trans. Michael J. B. Allen and James Hankins (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001), viii-ix. The Platonic Theology was Ficino’s “mature attempt to sketch out a unitary theologial tradition, and particularly a theological metaphysics. This he fervently believed stretched back to Orpheus and beyond, to Hermes Trismegistus and Zoroaster, even as it had culminated in the Christian revelation most luminously articularted for him by the Areopagite, Augustin, and Aquinas.” 182
the ancient teaching”) that “because divine Providence wills to recall all people to herself in a wonderful way according to their individual natures, it happened that a certain holy philosophy was born in times past both among the Persians under Zoroaster and among the Egyptians under Hermes, her sound true to herself in both peoples.” 499 From Persia and Egypt, this “holy philosophy” was “subsequently nurtured among the Thracians, under Orpheus and Aglaophemus, and soon grew to maturity, under Pythagoras, among the peoples of Greece and Italy.” 500 From this maturity, however, “it was by the divine Plato in Athens that she was finally brought to perfection.” 501 Where Luther, for instance, objected that there was too much Plato and not enough Christ in Dionysius, no such distinction would be possible for Ficino, there being an essential continuity between Platonism and Christianity. 502 And so, according to Ficino, because Hermes taught Plato (whose disciple Dionysius was), it is hardly surprising that Ficino detected similarities between the Dionysian and Hermetic writings. 503 In Ficino’s commentary on the Divine Names, for instance, he observes that “these mysterious sayings of Dionysius are 499 Ficino, 22. See also his comments on the subject from the preface to his translation of the Pimander: “At the time when Moses was born flourished Atlas the astrologer...whose grandson was Mercurius Trismegistus...he was the first to discuss with great wisdom the majesty of God, the order of demons and the transformations of souls. Thus he was called the first author of theology, and Orpheus followed him...In this way, from a wondrous line of six theologians emerged a single system of ancient theology, harmonious in every part, which traced its origins to Mercurius and reached absolute perfection with the divine Plato...He [Mercurius] foresaw the ruin of the old religion, the rise of the new faith, the coming of Christ, the judgement to come, the resurrection of the race, the glory of the blessed and the torments of the damned.” Ficino later revised this chronology to accomodate the dual originators Hermes and Zoroaster (as quoted in the main text, above). Quoted in Copenhaver, Hermetica, xlviii. 500 Ficino, 22. 501 Ibid. 502 See for instance his “On the life of Plato”, Ficino, 45. 503 Frances A. Yates devotes a chapter of Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition to how Ficino and Pico tie Dionysius into both the hermetic tradition and Kabbalah. Frances A. Yates, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1964), 117-129. 183
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MYSTICISM & CONFESSIONAL CONFLICT I
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ABSTRACT This dissertation investig
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INTRODUCTION • ES IST DIR NICHT B
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mostly undisturbed by his Lutheran
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yet have signalled his assent with
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in a context where action is expect
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Protestant Mysticism: Not a Contrad
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interest, 31 and praised the Theolo
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one can observe the texture of the
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discourse and reasoned debate, or t
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with fragments of Eckhart and Taule
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Dionysius and Eckhart (for differen
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movement, but also profound shifts
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schools, as well as universities wh
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allowed them to cooperate effective
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made clear, would result in dismiss
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and in these external dealings, the
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same laws of physics, but while the
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Tertullian’s De Fuga in Persecuti
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as a martyr. Moreover, Holy Scriptu
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Alternatively, the so-called four-f
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tzeyger und unterrichter ist ynn di
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fellow Lutherans in studying books
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provoked into action unnecessarily,
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masses for the dead (for instance)
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traditional proof texts about the o
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positive understandings of indiffer
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insofar as their imperfection is ra
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Of these forms of indifference, I f
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to Dionysius’ authority. Two grou
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PART I • VALENTIN WEIGEL AND MEIS
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investigating his early modern read
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was a devilish heretic to others (
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his neglect of Eckhart. 158 For ins
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“unheilvolle Kompliziertheit”).
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and Jerome (wearing what looks like
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title page, as mentioned above, des
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of a respectable though not fanatic
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himself, but rather cultivated part
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church that Luther, Melanchthon and
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kan”), and specifically the role
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soul become convinced that nothing
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that salvation can be attained thro
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more importantly, a theology that a
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Mit Recht der Meister genannt: Mode
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These role-reversal dialogues were
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As this chapter has shown, Eckhart
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philosophers from Hegel and Schopen
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CHAPTER 2 • GELASSENE GELASSENHEI
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the relationship between Tauler and
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e “as it was when it was not.”
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Eckhart agree that spiritual povert
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one-of-a-kind thing, or the best ki
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einvaltig stille), an uncreated lig
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e as free of willing and desiring a
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nestling inside the soul, but rathe
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Gelassenheit, das ist, das er nicht
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(necessarily inferior) knowledge pr
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context is that he picks up on Eckh
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he begins to steer the discussion a
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further proof for Weigel’s theory
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understood that the mind cannot pos
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wait in stiller Gelassenheit, recei
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truth as an educated theologian or
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ungewisser”) and finds that his f
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die Blinden an ein ander gehetzett,
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gesagett das ist er selber und ist
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Page 143 and 144: Weigel gives the passage an unexpec
Page 145 and 146: Murren”)—and they do this “in
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Page 149 and 150: the strength of the intellectual re
Page 151 and 152: CHAPTER 3 • DIONYSIUS, WHOEVER HE
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Page 155 and 156: destroyer that Dionysius is most of
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Page 159 and 160: points out, with a purification, a
Page 161 and 162: served as cornerstones in defences
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Page 167 and 168: Outside the universities, Dionysius
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Page 171 and 172: other leaders of the Protestant Ref
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Page 179 and 180: The primary piece in the compilatio
Page 181 and 182: It is hardly surprising that Cochla
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Page 191 and 192: Aristotle would have been glad to h
Page 193 and 194: enlightens all great thinkers in ev
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Page 197 and 198: nine distinct editions of Dionysius
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Page 207 and 208: Weigel concludes that, precisely be
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Page 213 and 214: Names, as the title suggests, is ba
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Page 217 and 218: of being.” 580 As we will see lat
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Page 221 and 222: This is admittedly a nonsensical as
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Page 225 and 226: Dionysius to show that, just as God
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Page 231 and 232: dicitur una.” 616 The stress that
Page 233 and 234: Weigel suggests will allow the soul
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Melanchthon’s Defence of the Augs
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alternative—namely prayer. 643 We
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Dionysius writes that the summit of
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leibet er illimitatus.” 658 Weige
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work, Weigel had written explicitly
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Luther did not ever use the exact p
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as opposed to an office-holder, an
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writing. By calling his Layman der
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Others are loyal to mere men (the P
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zuerzeigen einen rechtschaffen vnd
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and ceremonial ones at that. 694 Th
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himself returning gloriously from H
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all being. In relinquishing any cre
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improve appearances but, because it
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than resolve it, because the proble
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parcels God, who by rights is supre
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Appendix • The Works of Valentin
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BIBLIOGRAPHY Abad, J. M. (1999). Th
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Chenu O.P., M.-D. (1968). In M.-D.
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Eckhart, M. (1993). Werke I (Vol. 1
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Israel, A. (1888). M. Valentin Weig
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MacCulloch, D. (2010). Christianity
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Payne, R. J. (Ed.). (1981). Meister
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Schindling, A., & Ziegler, W. (1990
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Verkamp, B. J. (1975). The Limits u
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