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whatever the mind contemplates through itself is fashioned». If someone, therefore, were to be persuaded by this philosopher, he will also suppose the heavenly dominions and powers to be an ecstasy of the intellect, oh, the wonder!, suffering for the worse and their visions to be corporeal according to their imagination, and not only their visions, but also their very hypostases and essential existences to happen to be similar to an image. For the same saint says in the eighth [chapter] of the Celestial Hierarchy, praising the revelatory appellation of the holy dominions, that their dominion desires the truly dominant dominion, 'fashioning itself and those after it in a good-like manner toward its own dominant likeness'. If, therefore, nothing that the mind contemplates through itself is fashioned, and all fashioned things are imaginary or also perceptible and for this reason much worse than the things conceived by us, then the dominions and powers do not have an intelligible likeness to God, but a corporeal and imaginary one, and one worse than human intellection, since it is fashioned. But if they have such a likeness to God, how could they be intellectual in nature?

But the philosopher again infers the same thing from another saying of the same [saint]; for having heard of the vision of an angel imprinting, according to its power, its own sacred knowledge upon the theologian, 'how,' he says, 'would the imprinted vision not be an imaginary thing?' But we shall again divert him from the Celestial choir. 'For the holy,' he says, 'orders of the celestial substances, intelligibly imprinting themselves toward the God-imitating and desiring to form their intelligible aspect toward the divine likeness, rightly partake more abundantly of the divine communion'. Do you see intelligible types too? How then from these names did you suppose the prophets to suffer a worse ecstasy? For from these names I am led to believe the prophetic visions are not worse than human thought (p. 530), but better than our mind, and I am taught to know their contemplations to be equal to the angels'. For having made themselves suitable for angelic union through purity and being joined to them by their elevation to the divine, they are both fashioned and imprinted by them as those [angels] are by the angels who have gone before according to rank, and their intelligible aspect is transformed toward a God-like formation, and through this sacred formation they, as it were, cultivate within themselves the sacred knowledge sown from there. And what wonder is it, if prophetic purity happens to have fashionings of types equal to the angels, being a fellow minister of them according to theology, when it is testified that it is able to receive even the very types of God? 'For a pure heart,' he says, 'is that which has presented the mind to God completely without form and ready to be impressed with His types, through which He is wont to become manifest'.

But Zacharias the son of Barachias taught that even the Spirit in us is fashioned by God, whether showing that the bringing forth of our spirit from non-being into being is from God, or its refashioning for the better and its remaking into well-being; for 'an oracle,' he says, 'of the word of the Lord concerning Israel: Thus says the Lord, who stretches out the heaven and lays the foundation of the earth and fashions the spirit of man within him'. What then? Is the spirit in us also a body, because it is fashioned, being brought forth or transformed? But he who is himself a good fashioner and who prays for those who desire it, saying that his beloved companion was fashioned while still a child by the common teacher of Pontus, 'a fashioning most excellent and most pure,' does he then praise the plastic art of bodies and consider it desirable and pray for it? And how does God understand all our works, according to the divine David, because he fashioned our hearts one by one, unless we understand here by a heart (p. 532) fashioned by him the inner man? And Moses, spending the day and

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ὅσα ὁ νοῦς δι᾿ ἑαυτοῦ θεᾶται διαπέπλασται». Τούτῳ τοίνυν εἴ τις πεισθείη τῷ φιλοσόφῳ, καί τάς οὐρανίους ὑπολήψεται κυριότητάς τε καί δυνάμεις ἔκστασιν νοήσεως, ὤ τοῦ θαύματος, ἐπί τό χεῖρον πάσχειν καί σωματοειδεῖς κατά φαντασίαν αὐτῶν εἶναι τάς ὁράσεις, καί μή μόνον τάς ὁράσεις τούτων, ἀλλά καί αὐτάς τάς ὑποστάσεις αὐτῶν καί οὐσιώδεις ὑπάρξεις φαντασίᾳ τυγχάνειν ἐμφερεῖς. Φησί γάρ ὁ αὐτός ἅγιος ἐν ὀγδόῳ τῆς Οὐρανίας Ἱεραρχίας, τήν τῶν ἁγίων κυριοτήτων ἐκφαντορικήν ἐπωνυμίαν ἐξυμνῶν, ὡς τῆς ὄντως κυριαρχίας ἡ κυριότης αὐτῶν ἐφίεται «πρός τήν αὐτῆς κυρίαν ἐμφέρειαν ἑαυτήν τε καί μεθ᾿ ἑαυτήν ἀγαθοειδῶς διαπλάττουσα». Εἰ τοίνυν μηδέν ὅσα ὁ νοῦς δι᾿ ἑαυτοῦ θεᾶται διαπέπλασται καί τά διαπλαττόμενα πάντα φανταστά ἐστιν ἤ καί αἰσθητά καί κατά τοῦτο πολλῷ χείρῳ τῶν νοουμένων ὑφ᾿ ἡμῶν, οὐ νοητήν λοιπόν ἔχουσιν αἱ κυριότητές τε καί δυνάμεις τήν πρός τόν Θεόν ἐμφέρειαν, ἀλλά σωματοειδῆ καί φαντασιώδη καί ἀνθρωπίνης χείρονα νοήσεως, ὡς διαπεπλασμένην οὖσαν. Εἰ δέ τήν πρός Θεόν ἐμφέρειαν τοιαύτην ἔχουσι, πῶς ἄν εἶεν ἐκεῖναι νοεραί τήν φύσιν;

Ὁ δέ φιλόσοφος καί ἐξ ἑτέρας αὖθις τοῦ αὐτοῦ ρήσεως συνάγειν τό αὐτό˙ τοῦ τυποῦντος γάρ ἀκούσας τήν ὅρασιν ἀγγέλου, κατά δύναμιν τῷ θεολόγῳ μεταδιδόντος τῆς οἰκείας ἱερογνωσίας, «πῶς», φησίν, «ἡ τυπωθεῖσα ὅρασις οὐκ ἄν εἴη φανταστόν»; Ἀλλ᾿ ἡμεῖς πάλιν ἐκ τῆς Οὐρανίου χορείας ἐκτρέψομεν αὐτόν. «Αἱ γάρ ἅγιαι», φησί, «τῶν οὐρανίων οὐσιῶν διακοσμήσεις, νοητῶς ἐπί τό θεομίμητον ἑαυτάς ἀποτυποῦσαι καί πρός τήν θεαρχικήν ἐμφέρειαν μορφοῦν ἐφιέμεναι τό νοερόν αὐτῶν εἶδος, ἀφθονωτέρας εἰκότως μετέχουσι τῆς θείας κοινωνίας». Ὁρᾷς καί τύπους νοητούς; Πῶς οὖν ἀπό τῶν ὀνομάτων τούτων τήν χείρω πάσχειν ἔκστασιν ὠήθης τούς προφήτας; Ἐγώ γάρ ἀπό τῶν ὀνομάτων τούτων οὐκ ἀνθρωπίνης χείρω διανοίας τά προφητικά θεάματα ἐνάγομαι (σελ. 530) νομίζειν, ἀλλά νοῦ τοῦ καθ᾿ ἡμᾶς κρείττω, καί ἰσαγγέλους εἰδέναι διδάσκομαι τάς αὐτῶν θεωρίας. Πρός γάρ ἀγγελικήν ἕνωσιν ἐπιτηδείους ἑαυτούς ἐκεῖνοι διά καθαρότητα ποιήσαντες καί τῇ πρός τό θεῖον ἀνατάσει συνημμένοι τούτοις, διαπλάττονται καί αὐτοί τυποῦνται ὑπ᾿ αὐτῶν ὡς ἐκεῖνοι ὑπό τῶν προβεβηκότων ἀγγέλων κατά τάξιν καί τό νοερόν αὐτῶν εἶδος πρός θεοειδῆ μόρφωσιν μετασκεύαζονται καί διά τῆς ἱερᾶς μορφώσεως ταύτης τήν ἱερογνωσίαν ὥσπερ ἑαυτοῖς ἐγγεωργοῦσιν ἐκεῖθεν καταβεβλημένην. Καί τί θαυμαστόν, εἰ τῶν ἰσαγγέλων τύπων διαπλάσεων ἡ προφητική τυγχάνει καθαρότης, συλλειτουργός κατά τήν θεολογίαν ὑπάρχουσα αὐτῶν, ὅτε καί αὐτούς τούς τοῦ Θεοῦ τύπους αὕτη δέχεσθαι μαρτυρεῖται δύνασθαι; «Καρδίαι» γάρ, φησί, «καθαρά ἐστιν ἡ παντάπασιν ἀνείδεον τῷ Θεῷ παραστήσασα τόν νοῦν καί τοῖς αὐτοῦ ἕτοιμον ἐνσημαίνεσθαι τύποις, δι᾿ ὧν ἐμφανής πέφυκε γίνεσθαι».

Ζαχαρίας δέ ὁ Βαραχίου καί αὐτό τό ἐν ἡμῖν Πνεῦμα πλάττεσθαι ὑπό Θεοῦ ἐδίδαξεν, εἴτε τήν ἐκ τοῦ μή ὄντος εἰς τό εἶναι προαγωγήν ἐκ Θεοῦ εἶναι τοῦ καθ᾿ ἡμᾶς Πνεύματος δεικνύς, εἴτε τήν ἐπί τό κρεῖττον ἀνάπλασιν καί εἰς τό εὖ εἶναι μεταποίησιν˙ «λῆμμα» γάρ, φησί, «λόγου Κυρίου ἐπί τόν Ἰσραήλ˙ λέγει Κύριος, ὁ ἐκτείνων τόν οὐρανόν καί θεμελιῶν τήν γῆν καί πλάσσων πνεῦμα ἀνθρώπου ἐν αὐτῷ». Τί οὖν; Καί τό ἐν ἡμῖν πνεῦμα σῶμα, ἐπειδή πλάττεται προαγόμενον ἤ μετασκευαζόμενον; Ὁ δέ πλάστης μέν ἀγαθός αὐτός εἶναι καί τοῖς ποθοῦσι εὐχόμενος, διαπλασθῆναι δέ φάσκων ἔτ᾿ ὄντα παῖδα τόν φίλον ἑταῖρον ὑπό τῷ κοινῷ παιδευτῇ τοῦ Πόντου, «πλάσιν τήν ἀρίστην τε καί καθαρωτάτην», ἆρα τήν πλαστικήν τῶν σωμάτων τέχνην ἐγκωμιάζει καί ποθεινήν ἡγεῖται καί εὔχεται; Πῶς δέ καί συνίησιν ὁ Θεός εἰς πάντα τά ἔργα ἡμῶν κατά τόν θεῖον ∆αυίδ διά τό πλάσαι κατά μόνας τάς καρδίας ἡμῶν, εἰ μή καρδίαν ἐνταῦθα (σελ. 532) παρ᾿ αὐτοῦ πλασθεῖσαν τόν ἔσω νοήσομεν ἄνθρωπον; Καί ὁ Μωϋσῆς δέ, διημερεύων τε καί