Perception of God: Beauty and the soul, according to Plotinus
Gregory of Nyssa - Apokatastasis (Pt 5)
Part 5:
Apokatastasis
Gregory uses a word related
to apokatastasis, which is anakephalaiosis
("recapitulation", "summary"), to describe the final
reintegration of all things in Christ at the end of
time. The implicit consequence is that individual
beings will not return to God isolated from each other,
but all together, as one. Just as we all fell as one in
Adam, we will return as one in Christ — it is worth
noting that the same idea is a major theme of Martines de
Pasqually’s Treatise on the reintegration of
beings. Gregory refers to the following passage
of he Scriptures as the proper definition of
apokatastasis:
“For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead also came through a man. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ will all be made alive.” (1Cor 15:21-22)
As we have seen with Origen, Gregory considers that evil has no existence of its own, and that even hell’s fires are purifying and educational, and not eternal. Interestingly, the Byzantine position up until the end of the Renaissance was that nothing evil can come from God, not even punishment. Hell and all suffering, are the result of our own actions, and are inflicted on us by ourselves. Materiality and hell are quite simply varying degrees of severity in our education resulting from an essentially benevolent energy of God: divine judgement “operates by separating good from evil and pulling the soul towards the fellowship of blessedness.” (On the soul and the resurrection, 7). Therefore, no spiritual being will be denied the possibility of redemption:
"When, over long periods of time, evil has been removed and those now lying in sin have been restored to their original state, all creation will join in united thanksgiving, both those whose purification has involved punishment and those who never needed purification at all." (Catechetical Oration 26).
Important points are to be made here about how difficult it is to rejoin our original state: it will only happen “over long periods of time”; note the future tense used in 1Cor 15:22. Indeed, according to Gregory, there is no blanket forgiveness of all our sins, contrary to what universalism is sometimes accused of; although everyone can recognise the path to salvation, that walk has to be walked. Nobody will be saved without going through repentance, cleansing and forgiveness, although everyone is given the possibility of doing it, specifically since Jesus-Christ. Moreover, as one may understand from the infinite desire and migration expected of us, there is no such thing as a saved / damned duality, or at least not until the end of times, given the permanent possibility of yet another prevarication. Indeed, recognising Christ as our saviour is only the first step towards salvation, which is our reintegration. For Gregory, the process leading to our restoration is far more progressive. As detailed earlier, every stage reached on the way is part of an ongoing journey:
“The final goal of our journey is restoration [apokatastasis] to our original state or likeness to God. Just as the corn grows and puts forth green shoots which include the husk, grain, stem and the plant’s various segments without our assistance, the edible fruit attains maturity through all these stages. In a similar fashion we await the goal of blessedness.” (Concerning Those Who Have Died, J.51).
The same principles apply on a more cosmological level:
“Creation consists of a spatial extension; the succession of phenomena which constitutes time is contained in the aeons, but the anterior nature to these aeons escapes any opposition composed of a before or after… One might say that creation in its entirety is produced according to a regular succession is measured by the extension of aeons. If anyone elevates his spirit through the succession of aeons all the way to the principle of engendered things, his search will be circumscribed by the condition of these same aeons.” (Against Eunomius, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers).
Gregory acknowledges no real existence to either evil or matter, in a position misleadingly reminiscent of modern day mereological nihilism. Matter will therefore cease to be a reality, albeit subjective, at the final reintegration. The resurrected body is thus one made “from the same elements, but not with its present coarse and heavy texture, but subtler and lighter.” One may paraphrase his wording by saying that matter as we experience it is only the temporary manifestation of “subtler and lighter” essences. At the end of time, the physical – and animal – generation of humans will simply end with time:
“Now seeing that the full number of men pre-conceived by the operation of foreknowledge will come into life by means of this animal generation, God, Who governs all things in a certain order and sequence, since the inclination of our nature to what was beneath it (which He Who beholds the future equally with the present saw before it existed) made some such form of generation absolutely necessary for mankind, therefore also foreknew the time co-extensive with the creation of men, so that the extent of time should be adapted for the entrances of the pre-determined souls, and that the flux and motion of time should halt at the moment when humanity is no longer produced by means of it; and that when the generation of men is completed, time should cease together with its completion, and then should take place the restitution of all things, and with the World-Reformation humanity also should be changed from the corruptible and earthly to the impassible and eternal.” (On the Making of Man, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, p.412).
The theory of generation of souls that Gregory presents here in which all souls are emanated once and for all, and then the passage of time slowly ticks by like a count-down must be taken for nothing more than for illustrative purposes, since in Gregory’s mind, as we have seen, the concept of time is specific to diastema:
Nonetheless, the final restoration is ineluctable. It is only due to our exile and prevarications that the end of times may seem overdue or highly remote. In God’s eye, however, the end is nigh:“And He Who made all these things is the Only-begotten God Who made the ages. For if the interval of the ages has preceded existing things, it is proper to employ the temporal adverb, and to say “He then willed” and “He then made”: but since the age was not, since no conception of interval is present to our minds in regard to that Divine Nature which is not measured by quantity and by interval is present to our minds in regard that Divine Nature which is not measured by quantity or by interval, the force of temporal expressions must surely be void.” (Against Eunomius, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, p.211).
“So keep on watching, because you don't know on what day your Lord is coming.” (Matthew 24:42);
“The end of everything is near; so be sensible and clear-headed for the sake of your prayers.” (1Peter 4:7)
Gregory of Nyssa - Migration and Virtues (Pt 4)
Part 4:
Migration and Virtues
The tension caused by our
awareness of our entrapment in time and space, and by
our glimpses of a spiritual life beyond and above it,
give us the desire to seek further, and urges the soul
to set on a journey towards eternal goodness:
“Because true goodness is clearly opposed to that which is not good, we are faced with a contradiction. It follows that persons who separate themselves from that which is not beautiful become attached to true beauty which constantly and at all times remains good. Such a gesture has nothing to do with the temporal order; rather, the good always preserves its own integrity. The human soul migrates towards this good from its corporeal existence after it has exchanged the present good for another one that is impossible to see clearly because we are burdened by this fleshly existence. However, we can have a notion [of this change] and draw a certain parallel between it and a possible withdrawal from that knowledge which pertains to this present life. No longer does corporeal existence weigh us down nor are we influenced by the weight of opposing elements, for this struggle within our human constitution is equally distributed and maintains our health.” (Concerning Those Who Have Died, J.34. )
Indeed, St Gregory likens the movement of the soul towards God to an upwards migration, leaving behind the weight of its present, “fleshy existence”:
“Let us now attend to the words ‘Vanity of vanities, all is vanity,’ and ‘What advantage is to man in his labor under the sun?’ In my opinion these words represent a soul stripped of its present condition here below when it migrates to the life it yearns after. If a person pursues life’s nobler aspects, he views his earlier condition in a harsh light and despises his present experience in comparison to what he has discovered.” (Commentary on Ecclesiastes, J.291).
The return of our human nature to its original state, as St Gregory writes, can only be accomplished if his desire of things more spiritual is greater than his enjoyment of his present state:“Persons who believe their origin lies in heaven call themselves heavenly. As Paul says, they have migrated to the heavenly way of life and resemble the heavenly [Christ].” (Against Apollinarius, J. 145).
“Although the stage attained [of letting the Word enter one’s heart] is indeed greater than what a person had earlier, this stage does not limit his good; rather, the limit of his achievement becomes a beginning for the discovery of higher blessings. The person rising never stands still. He moves from one beginning to another, for the beginning of even greater blessings is never limited. The desire of a soul thus rising never remains in its knowledge, but by an ever greater desire, it moves onwards. The soul thus progresses through higher realms towards the unbounded.” (Commentary on the Song of Songs, J.247).
An important aspect of Man’s migration to God is that it is a perpetual process, in which previous experiences are less important than those ahead. Indeed, when guided well, our reconciliation with God is a gradual and directional evolution towards God:
“All heavenly bodies that receive a downward motion [...] are rapidly carried downwards of themselves, provided that any surface on which they are moving is graded and sloping and that they meet no obstacle to interrupt their motion. Similarly, the soul advances in the opposite direction lightly and swiftly moving upwards once it is released from the sensuous and earthly attachments, soaring from the world below up towards the heavens. And if nothing comes from above to intercept its flight, seeing that it is of the nature of Goodness to attract those who raise their eyes towards it, the soul keeps rising ever higher and higher, stretching with its desire for heavenly things ‘to those that are before,’ as the Apostle tells us, and thus it will always continue to soar ever higher. Because of what it has already attained, the soul does not wish to abandon the heights that lie beyond it. And thus the soul moves ceaselessly upwards, always reviving its tension for its onward flight by means of the progress it has already realised. Indeed, it is only spiritual activity that nourishes its force by exercise; it does not slacken its tension by action but rather increases it. This is the reason why we say that the great Moses, moving ever forwards, did not stop in his upward climb. He set no limit to his rise to the stars. But once he had put his foot upon the ladder of which the Lord had leaned, as Jacob tells us, he constantly kept moving to the next step; and he continued to go ever higher because he always found another step that lay beyond the highest one that he had reached.” (The life of Moses, in From Glory to Glory, Jean Danielou and Herbert Musurillo, New York, 1961, pp.57-8).
This spiritual evolution stands in contrast with evolution in the material realm, in which its directionality is necessarily cryptic. Why cryptic? Extrapolating from Origen’s and St Gregory’s theosophy, it appears to me that the motor of apokatastasis is man’s soul. Thus, if the root of evolution in its material and spiritual manifestations is immaterial, this cause will remain entirely hidden from the material eye. Yet, the spatial imagery that St Gregory uses in order to describe spiritual growth rests upon a moral implication. As such, behavioural implications of spiritual evolution must arguably influence evolution in every realm, in time. Indeed, the practice in our everyday lives of virtues is, according to Gregory, the true essence of our migration:
“Everything considered earthly, dumb, and speechless joins the sound of its own chords to the great voice of the heavenly choruses. The stretched chords in such an instrument are steadfastness and immovability before evil in every virtue. The virtues unite the cymbal’s pleasing harmony with chords when the sound of cymbals arouses our eagerness for the divine choir. To me this signifies the union of our nature with the angels. ‘Praise the Lord with the sound of cymbals.’ I understand this as the union of the angelic [nature] with the human when our human nature attains its original state and gives forth that sweet sound in union with others in thanksgiving.” (Commentary on the Inscriptions of the Psalms, J.66).