Reflections on the Nothingness of God
Keywords:
Nothingness of God, John Scottus Eriugena, Meister Eckhart, Nicholas of CusaAbstract
There is a long tradition in Christian history that prizes negative or apophatic approach to the divine. The Cappadocians, especially Gregory of Nyssa, promulgated a rigorous apophatic theology. The fifth-century Eastern monk who wrote under the pseudonym of Dionysius the Areopagite was a true heir of the Cappadocians. John Scottus Eriugena in the ninth century; Meister Eckhart, the Dominican preacher of the early fourteenth century; and Nicholas Cusanus, the Renaissance cardinal of the mid-fifteenth century are prominent figures in this often probed trend of thought or approach to the divine which was shaped by the marriage of Platonic thought and Christian belief that went back to Origen in the third century. After a period of neglect, recent decades have seen a definite “apophatic turn,” on account of the deconstruction trend that swept across various academic avenues.
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