This monograph revisits one of the most debated aspects of Dionysian scholarship: the enigma of its authorship. To establish the identity of the author remains impossible. However, the legitimacy of the attribution of the corpus to Dionysius the Areopagite should not be seen as an intended forgery but rather as a masterfully managed literary device, which better indicates the initial intention of the actual author. The affiliation with Dionysius the Areopagite has metaphorical and literary significance. Dionysius is the only character in the New Testament who is unique in his conjunction between the apostle Paul and the Platonic Athenian Academy. In this regard this attribution, to the mind of the actual author of the corpus, could be a symbolic gesture to demonstrate the essential truth of both traditions as derived essentially from the same divine source. The importance of this assumption taken in its historical context highlights the culmination of the formation of the civilized Roman-Byzantine Christian identity.

N eoplatonism begins explicitly with Plotinus in the third century of our era. The later Neoplatonism of the fifth and six century schools at Athens and Alexandria was both the continuation of the philosophy of Plotinus and also a pagan ideology. When these schools were closed, despite attempts at compromise at Alexandria and as a result of direct and indirect political pressures and actions, pagan ideology died. Many philosophers, such as Isidore, Asclepiodotus, Damascius, and Olym piodorus, must have foreseen the danger to philosophy, and their extant writings are sprinkled with forebodings. Would the death of pagan ideology, in the form of pagan worship and the Homeric and Orphic traditions, bring about the death of all genuine philosophy as well? One answer to this great question is found in the enigmatic writings of Ps. -Dionysius the Areopagite. Purposing to be the writings of the Athenian convert of St. Paul, they fall within the province of a multitude of so-called "pseudepigraphic" Christian writings. 1. GENERAL ARGUMENT I embarked on the study of Ps. -Dionysius' Letters with two goals in mind: (r) to grasp in clear detail the unknown author's philosophic intentions in writing his famous Corpus and the way in which he set about writing, and (2) to attempt to see with precision the reason for the absence of a political philosophy in Christian Platonism. The Letters provided a richness of detail and information bearing on the first subject which was wholly unexpected.

Here are the complete works of the enigmatic fifth- and sixth-century writer known as the Pseudo Dionysius, prepared by a team of six research scholars.

This book uses Pseudo-Dionysius and his mystic theology to explore attitudes and beliefs about images in the early medieval West and Byzantium. Composed in the early sixth century, the Corpus Dionysiacum, the collection of texts transmitted under the name of Dionysius the Areopagite, developed a number of themes which have a predominantly visual and spatial dimension. Pseudo-Dionysius’ contribution to the development of Christian visual culture, visual thinking and figural art-making are examined in this book to systematically investigate his long-lasting legacy and influence. The contributors embrace religious studies, philosophy, theology, art, and architectural history, to consider the depth of the interaction between the Corpus Dionysiacum and various aspects of contemporary Byzantine and western cultures, including ecclesiastical and lay power, politics, religion, and art.

This book casts light on the figure of John of Scythopolis, the sixth-century theologian who composed a series of annotations to the works attributed to Dionysius the Areopagite (whose conversion by St Paul is mentioned in Acts 17: 34). It surveys John's sources, methods, and doctrinal concerns in the context of the important theological debates that wracked the eastern churches in the aftermath of the Council of Chalcedon.

Dionysius the Areopagite (or Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite) remains one of the most enigmatic figures of the early Christianity. He was a Greek author, Christian theologian and Neoplatonic philosopher of the late 5th to early 6th century, who wrote a set of works known as the Corpus Areopagiticum or Corpus Dionysiacum. The author pseudonymously identifies himself in the corpus as "Dionysios", portraying himself as Dionysius the Areopagite, the Athenian convert of Paul the Apostle mentioned in Acts 17:34. This attribution to the earliest decades of Christianity resulted in the work being given great authority in subsequent theological writing in both the East and the West. The Dionysian writings and their mystical teaching were universally accepted throughout the East, amongst both Chalcedonians and non-Chalcedonians, and also had a strong impact in later medieval western mysticism, most notably Meister Eckhart. Its influence decreased in the West with the fifteenth-century demonstration of its later dating, but in recent decades, interest has increased again in the Corpus Areopagiticum.

Dionysius the Areopagite, the early sixth-century Christian writer, bridged Christianity and neo-Platonist philosophy. Bringing together a team of international scholars, this volume surveys how Dionysius’s thought and work has been interpreted, in both East and West, up to the present day. One of the first volumes in English to survey the reception history of Dionysian thought, both East and West Provides a clear account of both modern and post-modern debates about Dionysius’s standing as philosopher and Christian theologian Examines the contrasts between Dionysius’s own pre-modern concerns and those of the post-modern philosophical tradition Highlights the great variety of historic readings of Dionysius, and also considers new theories and interpretations Analyzes the main points of hermeneutical contrast between East and West