Wataru HAKAMADA: The Dionysian Doctrine of Love

 This paper examines Pseudo-Dionysius’ doctrine of love (eros), by analyzing its context and significance in his texts of the Divine Names (Chapter 4). His understanding of eros is not only based on the agape-eros theory of Origenian tradition, but also has a revolutionary idea concerning the divine Creation. According to Dionysius, eros does not only mean a sexual love: in God, it is the cause of the Creation and the love to all things in the universe, and in human beings, the love to God and a power of our mutual salvation. This eros, moreover, is the motive of deification, because its ‘ec-static’ power causes a union of God and man. In the argument, Dionysius quotes Apostle Paul’s statement “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” (Gal. 2: 20), as an expression of ‘ec-static lover’, and as this phrase conveys both the significance of eros and the actual state of deification.