I thought I'd post something on the nature of the Transcendent, in the light of apophatic (affirmative) and kataphatic (negative) theology – as it's relevant to all the world's spiritual traditions.
In the Mystical Theology, Pseudo-Dionysius describes the kataphatic way as the "way of speech" – notably in the simple affirmations, through to the Litanies such as The Ninety-Nine Names of Allah in Islam, so we can say 'God is Love', 'God is Good' and so on. The apophatic way stresses God's absolute transcendence and unknowability in such a way that we cannot say anything about the divine essence because God transcends all categories.
The kataphatic way is the bhakti yoga in the Hindu Traditions, while jnana yoga corresponds to the apophatic way, summed up in Advaita Vedanta by the phrase neti-neti – 'not thus, and not thus'.
To 'define' something involves distinguishing it from other objects. Thus, to say that the Absolute is transcendent, or the Transcendent is absolute, or that it is infinite, the terms used should be understood in an apophatic sense neither to define nor characterise the Transcendent but to mark it off from all else. These qualities must be understood from an apophatic, unqualified viewpoint, namely of the double negation: neti, neti.
A well-known designation of the Transcendent in Advaita Vedanta is Sat-Cit-Ananda – 'Being-Consciousness-Bliss'. (Whether Shankara used these terms is questionable, but they are used by Suresvara, his direct disciple.) The apophatic logic of the double negation applies here for a correct understanding of the terms.
Sat, Being (or Reality), refers to 'that which is', as opposed to 'things that are.' So the 'Being' of God, inasmuch as God is, is not the same order of being as is in the world, which is differentiated, relative and contingent. Furthermore, God might well be said to be 'Undifferentiated Being', or 'the Being from which all things receive their Being' – and apophatically this is correct only if understood to mean that God, the Transcendent, transcends the term, so that God is not 'a being' but rather the Principle of being, that from and by which being receives its nature and, as such, is 'above' and 'prior to' being – God possesses being, and that which gives rise to being.
(Thus the ancients speak of God as 'Beyond Being'. The Greeks spoke of Arche Anarchos – the Principle without principle. In a vision of Jesus, St Catherine of Sienna was told, "I am He Who Is, you are she who is not."
And again, in the Christ-hymn of Colossians, He is firstborn (Colossians 1:15) in the sense that He is Logos, the all-encompassing principle by which all created nature manifests its own logoi (its unique, individuating principle).)
Likewise Cit, Consciousness, refers neither to any conditional nor collective state of consciousness, nor indeed of any order of conscious knowing of things, but designates transcendent Consciousness, consciousness in its undifferentiated state in which it is conscious of nothing because no 'thing' exists for it to be conscious of.
Lastly Ananda refers not to the effect of such-and-such an experience. Transcendent Bliss cannot not be equated to a bliss that is experiential and contingent on worldly (or even spiritual or un-worldly) circumstances. Transcendent Bliss is the sense that nothing is lacking, nor is there a susceptibility to suffering or deprivation.
In the application of the double negative, the first neti negates the opposite of the term, thereby in a relatively direct manner the intrinsic nature or quality intended by it; whilst the second neti acts as the denial of any commensurability with what appears to be similar to it, thus indirectly signifying the transcendent degree proper to the quality in question.
Again, the first negation is directed towards the three 'qualities' of the Transcendent, whilst the second eliminates any traces of relativity pertaining to the term when conceived on the plane of differentiated existence.
It sometimes helps to think of the three terms Being, Consciousness and Bliss as verbs, in the transcendent sense as dynamic operations by which being, consciousness and bliss come to be, and because they came to be, must be pre-conditioned in the undifferentiated Uncreate.
In the Mystical domain then, 'apprehension' or 'experience' of the transcendent is in the negative state and expressed, by the saints and sages of the Traditions, in negative terms which, at their apex or apogee, they speak in terms of 'all differentiation ceasing to exist' and the identification of the 'alone' with the 'alone', the 'one' with the 'All', the 'I' with the 'Thou', or, in the words of Advaita: Tat tvam asi, 'Thou art that'.
All attributes, qualities, forms and names of the Transcendent are so many symbols, in Buddhist terminology they are an upaya, a 'saving stratagem' or a provisional means of conveying a sense of the thing spoken of.
The great spokesperson of the Advaita Vedanta, Shankara, said, concerning such terms: "First let me put them on the right path, and then I will gradually be able to bring them round to the final truth afterwards." (A Shankara Source-Book trans. A.J. Alston, "Shankara on Enlightenment. Vol. VI"
In the Mystical Theology, Pseudo-Dionysius describes the kataphatic way as the "way of speech" – notably in the simple affirmations, through to the Litanies such as The Ninety-Nine Names of Allah in Islam, so we can say 'God is Love', 'God is Good' and so on. The apophatic way stresses God's absolute transcendence and unknowability in such a way that we cannot say anything about the divine essence because God transcends all categories.
The kataphatic way is the bhakti yoga in the Hindu Traditions, while jnana yoga corresponds to the apophatic way, summed up in Advaita Vedanta by the phrase neti-neti – 'not thus, and not thus'.
To 'define' something involves distinguishing it from other objects. Thus, to say that the Absolute is transcendent, or the Transcendent is absolute, or that it is infinite, the terms used should be understood in an apophatic sense neither to define nor characterise the Transcendent but to mark it off from all else. These qualities must be understood from an apophatic, unqualified viewpoint, namely of the double negation: neti, neti.
A well-known designation of the Transcendent in Advaita Vedanta is Sat-Cit-Ananda – 'Being-Consciousness-Bliss'. (Whether Shankara used these terms is questionable, but they are used by Suresvara, his direct disciple.) The apophatic logic of the double negation applies here for a correct understanding of the terms.
Sat, Being (or Reality), refers to 'that which is', as opposed to 'things that are.' So the 'Being' of God, inasmuch as God is, is not the same order of being as is in the world, which is differentiated, relative and contingent. Furthermore, God might well be said to be 'Undifferentiated Being', or 'the Being from which all things receive their Being' – and apophatically this is correct only if understood to mean that God, the Transcendent, transcends the term, so that God is not 'a being' but rather the Principle of being, that from and by which being receives its nature and, as such, is 'above' and 'prior to' being – God possesses being, and that which gives rise to being.
(Thus the ancients speak of God as 'Beyond Being'. The Greeks spoke of Arche Anarchos – the Principle without principle. In a vision of Jesus, St Catherine of Sienna was told, "I am He Who Is, you are she who is not."
And again, in the Christ-hymn of Colossians, He is firstborn (Colossians 1:15) in the sense that He is Logos, the all-encompassing principle by which all created nature manifests its own logoi (its unique, individuating principle).)
Likewise Cit, Consciousness, refers neither to any conditional nor collective state of consciousness, nor indeed of any order of conscious knowing of things, but designates transcendent Consciousness, consciousness in its undifferentiated state in which it is conscious of nothing because no 'thing' exists for it to be conscious of.
Lastly Ananda refers not to the effect of such-and-such an experience. Transcendent Bliss cannot not be equated to a bliss that is experiential and contingent on worldly (or even spiritual or un-worldly) circumstances. Transcendent Bliss is the sense that nothing is lacking, nor is there a susceptibility to suffering or deprivation.
In the application of the double negative, the first neti negates the opposite of the term, thereby in a relatively direct manner the intrinsic nature or quality intended by it; whilst the second neti acts as the denial of any commensurability with what appears to be similar to it, thus indirectly signifying the transcendent degree proper to the quality in question.
Again, the first negation is directed towards the three 'qualities' of the Transcendent, whilst the second eliminates any traces of relativity pertaining to the term when conceived on the plane of differentiated existence.
It sometimes helps to think of the three terms Being, Consciousness and Bliss as verbs, in the transcendent sense as dynamic operations by which being, consciousness and bliss come to be, and because they came to be, must be pre-conditioned in the undifferentiated Uncreate.
In the Mystical domain then, 'apprehension' or 'experience' of the transcendent is in the negative state and expressed, by the saints and sages of the Traditions, in negative terms which, at their apex or apogee, they speak in terms of 'all differentiation ceasing to exist' and the identification of the 'alone' with the 'alone', the 'one' with the 'All', the 'I' with the 'Thou', or, in the words of Advaita: Tat tvam asi, 'Thou art that'.
All attributes, qualities, forms and names of the Transcendent are so many symbols, in Buddhist terminology they are an upaya, a 'saving stratagem' or a provisional means of conveying a sense of the thing spoken of.
The great spokesperson of the Advaita Vedanta, Shankara, said, concerning such terms: "First let me put them on the right path, and then I will gradually be able to bring them round to the final truth afterwards." (A Shankara Source-Book trans. A.J. Alston, "Shankara on Enlightenment. Vol. VI"
