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the incorporeal nature of the super-cosmic powers names the divine with voice and tongue. 2.1.391 For in the case of the immaterial and intellectual nature, the activity according to the mind is speech, making no use of the material service of organs. For even in the case of human nature, we would have had no need for the use of verbs and names, if it were possible to show to one another the bare movements of the mind; but as it is, since the thoughts arising in us are unable to be revealed because our nature is confined by its fleshly covering, we necessarily, imposing the particular positions of names like signs for things, through 2.1.392 them publish the movements of the mind to one another. But if it were somehow possible to lay bare in another way the movements of the mind, having bid farewell to the roundabout service of words, we would commune with one another more clearly and more purely, revealing by the impulses of the mind the very nature of the things with which the mind is occupied; but as it is, for this reason we have given to one of the beings the name heaven, and to another earth, and to another something else, and being in some relation to something or acting or being acted upon, we signify all things with particular sounds, so that the 2.1.393 movement of the mind might not remain within us uncommunicated and unknown. But that super-cosmic and immaterial nature, being free and unconstrained by bodily confinement, needs neither names nor verbs for itself or for the nature which is above it, but if anywhere some speech by the intellectual nature, written in the holy books, is also mentioned, such a thing is said for our sake who hear, who are unable to learn in another way what is being 2.1.394 signified, if it is not announced through sounds and verbs. And if David says in the spirit that something is said to the Lord by the Lord, it is David who is speaking, unable to give us the teaching of what he has understood in another way, unless he should interpret through sounds and verbs the understanding of the mysteries that came to him from God. 2.1.395 Therefore, I think it is well to pass over all the words philosophized by him against invention, even if he invokes 20madness20 against those who think that the name of the Godhead, for the declaration of the transcendent nature, is spoken by men through invention. For what this man, in his mind, thinks it necessary to slander invention, it is possible for those who wish to learn from his own words; but what we suppose about the use of names, we have said in what follows: that since things have the nature they have, the <ἐν>placed in our nature by God 2.1.396 rational power has found the interpretive sounds of beings. If someone should refer the cause of these things to the one who gave the power, we too do not object, just as we also say that moving and seeing and the other activities through the senses come to be from him, from whom we have received such a power. So therefore also, of naming God who is by nature that which he is, the cause, according to the common account, has its reference to him himself, but the authority of naming all that is thought in such a way or otherwise lies in our nature; which, whether one should wish to call it invention or something else, we will not differ. 2.1.397 And as proof of this argument we make this point, that the divine is not named similarly among all, but what is understood is interpreted according to what seems best to each. Therefore, having passed over in silence all his trashy nonsense about invention, we will hold to the doctrines, noting only this much from certain things inserted by him in the midst of his empty talk, where he thinks that God, like some pedagogue or grammarian sitting beside them, dictates the teaching of verbs 2.1.398 and names to the first-formed; in which he says 2.1.398 20that the first people themselves, formed by God, or those born immediately from them, if they had not been taught how each of the things is spoken of and named, would live with speechlessness and voicelessness, and would not have20, he says, 20accomplished any of the things useful for life, the mind of each being unclear through a lack

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ἀσώματος τῶν ὑπερκοσμίων δυνάμεων φύσις φωνῇ καὶ γλώττῃ κατονομάζει τὸ θεῖον. 2.1.391 ἐπὶ γὰρ τῆς ἀΰλου καὶ νοερᾶς φύσεως ἡ κατὰ τὸν νοῦν ἐνέργεια λόγος ἐστὶν οὐδὲν τῇ ὑλικῇ τῶν ὀργάνων ὑπηρεσίᾳ συγχρώμενος. καὶ γὰρ ἐπὶ τῆς ἀνθρωπίνης φύσεως οὐδὲν ἂν ἐδέησεν ἡμῖν τῆς τῶν ῥημάτων καὶ ὀνομάτων χρήσεως, εἰ δυνατὸν ἦν γυμνὰ προδεικνύειν ἀλλήλοις τὰ τῆς διανοίας κινήματα· νυνὶ δὲ τῶν ἐγγενομένων ἡμῖν νοημάτων διὰ τὸ τῇ σαρκίνῃ περιβολῇ τὴν φύσιν ἡμῶν περιείργεσθαι φανε ρωθῆναι μὴ δυναμένων, ἀναγκαίως καθάπερ σημεῖα τοῖς πράγμασι τὰς ποιὰς τῶν ὀνομάτων θέσεις ἐπιβάλλοντες δι' 2.1.392 ἐκείνων τὰς τοῦ νοῦ κινήσεις ἀλλήλοις δημοσιεύομεν. εἰ δέ πως ἦν ἀπογυμνοῦν ἑτέρως τὰ τῆς διανοίας κινήματα, χαίρειν τὴν περιοδικὴν τῶν ῥημάτων ὑπηρεσίαν ἐάσαντες τηλαυγέστερον ἂν καὶ καθαρώτερον ἀλλήλοις συνεγινόμεθα, αὐτὴν τῶν πραγμάτων τὴν φύσιν περὶ ἣν ὁ νοῦς καταγίνεται ταῖς τῆς διανοίας ὁρμαῖς ἐκκαλύπτοντες· νυνὶ δὲ τούτου χάριν τῷ μέν τινι τῶν ὄντων ὄνομα οὐρανὸν ἐθέμεθα ἑτέρῳ δὲ γῆν καὶ ἄλλῳ ἄλλο τι καὶ τὸ πρός τί πως ἔχειν ἢ τὸ ἐνεργεῖν ἢ τὸ πάσχειν, πάντα ἰδιαζούσαις ἐπισημαινόμεθα ταῖς φωναῖς, ὡς ἂν μὴ ἀκοινώνητός τε καὶ ἄγνωστος ἡ 2.1.393 τοῦ νοῦ κίνησις ἐν ἡμῖν μένοι. ἡ δὲ ὑπερκόσμιος ἐκείνη καὶ ἄϋλος φύσις τῆς σωματικῆς περιοχῆς ἐλευθέρα οὖσα καὶ ἄνετος οὔτε ἐφ' ἑαυτῆς οὔτε ἐπὶ τῆς ὑπερκειμένης φύσεως ὀνομάτων δέεται ἢ ῥημάτων, ἀλλ' εἴ που καὶ μνη μονεύεται παρὰ τῆς νοερᾶς φύσεως λόγος τις ἐν ἱεραῖς βίβλοις ἀνάγραπτος, ἡμῶν ἕνεκεν τῶν ἀκουόντων τὸ τοιοῦτον λέγεται τῶν ἀδυνατούντων ἄλλῳ τρόπῳ μαθεῖν τὸ δηλού 2.1.394 μενον, μὴ διὰ φωνῶν καὶ ῥημάτων ἐξαγγελλόμενον. κἂν ὁ ∆αβὶδ ἐν πνεύματι λέγῃ τῷ κυρίῳ παρὰ τοῦ κυρίου τι λέγεσθαι, ∆αβὶδ ὁ λέγων ἐστὶν ὁ μὴ δυνάμενος ἑτέρως ἡμῖν τὴν τοῦ νοηθέντος διδασκαλίαν ποιήσασθαι, εἰ μὴ διὰ φωνῶν καὶ ῥημάτων τὴν ἐγγενομένην αὐτῷ θεόθεν τῶν μυστηρίων κατανόησιν ἑρμηνεύσειε. 2.1.395 Πάντα τοίνυν τὰ κατὰ τῆς ἐπινοίας αὐτῷ φιλοσοφη θέντα ῥήματα παραδραμεῖν οἶμαι καλῶς ἔχειν, κἂν 20μανίαν20 ἐπικαλῇ τοῖς τὸ τῆς θεότητος ὄνομα πρὸς δήλωσιν τῆς ὑπερεχούσης φύσεως παρὰ ἀνθρώπων οἰομένοις δι' ἐπινοίας λέγεσθαι. τί μὲν γὰρ οὗτος νοῶν διασύρειν οἴεται δεῖν τὴν ἐπίνοιαν, ἐκ τῶν ἐκείνου πάρεστι λόγων τοὺς βουλομένους διδάσκεσθαι· ἃ δὲ ἡμεῖς ὑπολαμβάνομεν περὶ τῆς τῶν ὀνο μάτων χρήσεως, ἐν τοῖς κατόπιν εἰρήκαμεν, ὅτι τῶν πραγ μάτων ἐχόντων ὡς ἔχει φύσεως τὰς ἑρμηνευτικὰς τῶν ὄν των φωνὰς ἡ <ἐν>τεθεῖσα παρὰ τοῦ θεοῦ τῇ φύσει ἡμῶν 2.1.396 λογικὴ δύναμις εὕρατο. ὧν εἰ μέν τις τὴν αἰτίαν εἰς τὸν δεδωκότα τὴν δύναμιν ἀναφέροι, οὐδὲ ἡμεῖς ἀντιλέγομεν, ὥσπερ καὶ τὸ κινεῖσθαι καὶ τὸ ὁρᾶν καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ διὰ τῶν αἰσθήσεων ἐνεργεῖν παρ' ἐκείνου λέγομεν γίνεσθαι, παρ' οὗ τὴν τοιαύτην ἐσχήκαμεν δύναμιν. οὕτως οὖν καὶ τοῦ ὀνομάζειν τὸν θεὸν τὸν ὄντα κατὰ τὴν φύσιν ὅπερ ἐστὶν ἡ μὲν αἰτία κατὰ τὸν κοινὸν λόγον εἰς αὐτὸν ἐκεῖνον τὴν ἀναφορὰν ἔχει, ἡ δὲ ἐξουσία τοῦ τὰ νοηθέντα πάντα τοι ῶσδε ἢ ὡς ἑτέρως κατονομάζειν ἐν τῇ φύσει κεῖται· ἣν εἴτε τις ἐπίνοιαν εἴτε ἄλλο τι βούλοιτο λέγειν, οὐ διοισόμεθα. 2.1.397 τεκμήριον δὲ τοῦ λόγου τοῦτο ποιούμεθα, τὸ μὴ παρὰ πᾶσιν ὁμοίως τὸ θεῖον κατονομάζεσθαι, ἀλλὰ κατὰ τὸ δοκοῦν ἑκάστοις τὸ νοηθὲν ἑρμηνεύεσθαι. οὐκοῦν πᾶσαν τὴν συρ φετώδη περὶ τῆς ἐπινοίας αὐτοῦ φλυαρίαν σιγήσαντες τῶν δογμάτων ἑξόμεθα, τοσοῦτον μόνον παρασημηνάμενοι ἔκ τινων τῶν κατὰ τὸ μέσον αὐτῷ τῆς κενοφωνίας παρεντε θέντων, ὅπου οἴεται τὸν θεὸν τοῖς πρωτοπλάστοις καθάπερ τινὰ παιδαγωγὸν ἢ γραμματιστὴν παρακαθήμενον ῥημάτων 2.1.398 τε καὶ ὀνομάτων ὑφηγεῖσθαι διδασκαλίαν· ἐν οἷς φησιν 2.1.398 20αὐτοὺς τοὺς πρώτους ὑπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ πλασθέν τας ἢ τοὺς προσεχῶς ἐξ ἐκείνων φύντας, εἰ μὴ ἐδιδάχθησαν ὡς ἕκαστα τῶν πραγμάτων λέ γεταί τε καὶ ὀνομάζεται, ἀλογίᾳ καὶ ἀφωνίᾳ συζῆν, καὶ οὐδὲν ἄν20, φησίν, 20τῶν βιωφελῶν κατε πράξαντο, ἀδήλου τῆς ἑκάστου διανοίας ὑπαρ χούσης δι' ἀπορίαν