On the Divine Names

Dionysius the Areopagite

On the Divine Names

Dionysius the Areopagite

Περὶ θείων ὀνομάτων

On the Divine Names (De divinis nominibus) is the chief theological treatise of the Christian Neoplatonist writing under the name Dionysius the Areopagite, probably in the late fifth or early sixth century. Addressed to Timothy, it unfolds the names predicated of God — Good, Light, Beauty, Love, Being, Life, Wisdom, Power, Justice, and the rest — through thirteen chapters, grounding each name in Scripture and in the tradition of Hierotheus. Its account of divine procession, participation, and the beautiful-and-good became foundational for Byzantine and medieval Latin theology, and it is among the authorities Aquinas cites most. Schola presents the Greek text with the Latin translation of Balthasar Corderius and the English translation of John Parker (1897).


CAPUT I. Quis libri finis, et quae e divinis nominibus prodita tandem esse, et ex rebus sensibilibus non posse cognosci

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CAPUT II. unio et distinctio.

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CAPUT III. Quae sit vis orationis, et de beato Hierotheo, de religione et conscriptione theologica.

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CAPUT IV. De bono, luce, pulchro, amore, exstasi, zelo; et quod malum neque ens sit, neque ex entibus, neque in entibus.

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§ XXVII

§ XXVIII

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§ XXXV

CAPUT V. De ente, in quo etiam de exemplaribus.

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The Pre-existing then is beginning and end of existing things; beginning indeed as Cause, and end as for whom; and term of all, and infinitude of all infinitude; and term, especially, of things that are, as it were, opposed. For in One, as we have often said, He both pre-holds and sustains all existing things, being present to all, and everywhere, both as regards the one, and the same, and as the every same, and issuing forth to all, and abiding in Himself; and standing and moving, and neither standing nor moving; neither having beginning, or middle, or end; neither in any of the existing things, nor being any of the existing things. And neither does any of the things eternally existing, or those temporarily subsisting, entirely come up to Him, but He towers above time and eternity, and all things eternal and temporal. Wherefore also, He is Eternity itself, and things existing, and the measures of things existing, and things measured through Him and from Him. But let us speak of these things more opportunely on another occasion.

CAPUT VI. De vita.

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CAPUT VII. De sapientia, mente, ratione, veritate, fide.

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CAPUT VIII. De potentia, justitia, salute, redemptione; ubi etiam de inaequalitate.

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CAPUT IX. De magno, parvo, eodem, alio, simili, dissimili, statu, motu, aequalitate.

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CAPUT X. De omnitenente, antiquo dierum; in quo etiam de aevo seu aeternitate et tempore.

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CAPUT XI. De pace, quidque sibi velit ipsum per se esse, quae sit per se vita, quae vis ipsa per se, et quae illa coordinat atque conciliat, et quinam sint ejus effectus.

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CAPUT XII. De Sancto sanctorum, Rege regum, Domino dominantium, Deo deorum.

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CAPUT XIII. De perfecto et uno.

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