Goryachev Danil, priest

The naming of God: apophatic and antinomic approaches

Abstract

The article explores the issues of the naming of God: is it possible to name God, how the name and the Named are connected, does God have his own name, is the formula "the name of God is God" acceptable for the Christian worldview? The answers to these questions are given in the article using two methods: apophatic and antinomic. The objectives of the study are: firstly, to clarify the church's view of the phenomenon of the name of God, and secondly, to compare the two ways of this clarification, designated as apophatic and antinomic. The basis for understanding apophatic theology in the work is the writings of the Corpus Areopagiticum, where apophatic can be considered as a condition of spiritual vision and mystical theology, as well an intellectual cognitive path. The result of the apophatic approach in the article is called the principle of the unconfusedly and indivisible unity of the name and the Named. This principle, applied by Russian religious philosophers to express the connection of God and His name, is found in the priest Pavel Florensky, but his philosophy is associated by researchers primarily with the antinomic method. The unconfusedly and indivisible of the name and the Named in the antinomic reading acquires the paradoxical character of two mutually exclusive statements about the Divinity and non-divinity of the name of God. Also antinomy are statements taken at the same time and in the same relation, about the presence and absence of God's own name. The study concludes with the formulation of conclusions, among which the theological acceptability of the statement that «the name of God is God» is noted.

Keywords

antinomy, apophasa, imyaslavie, philosophy of the name, unconfusedly and indivisibly union, Divine essence and energies,

References

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Information about the author

Goryachev Danil, priest

Academic Degree: Candidate of Sciences* in Theology;
Student status: Graduate student;
Place of study: Belgorod Orthodox Theological Seminary;
Post: lecturer;
ORCID: 0000-0002-1632-9738;
Email: rasumihin@yandex.ru.

*According to the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) 2011, the degree of Candidate of Sciences (Cand.Sc.) belongs to ISCED level 8 — "doctoral or equivalent", together with PhD, DPhil, D.Lit, D.Sc, LL.D, Doctorate or similar.