This name HE WHO IS is the name of God more properly than this name "God," as regards its source, namely, existence; and as regards the mode of signification and co-signification, as said above.

just in the same way as this name "sun" would be transferable according to the opinion of those who say there are many suns.

For instance this name "lion"

To see this we must learn that some have said that relation is not a reality, but only an idea

On the contrary,

And since that expressed by the name is the definition

nothing could be known or demonstrated about God at all

o the perfections flowing from God to creatures, which perfections preexist in God unitedly and simply, whereas in creatures they are received and divided and multiplied.

our knowledge of God is derived from the perfections which flow from him to creatures,

is above all that we understand about God and signify in word.

In this way therefore he can be named by us from creatures, yet not so that the name that signifies him expresses the divine essence in itself.

For everything is named by us according to our knowledge of it

Therefore existence must be compared to essence, if the latter is a distinct reality, as actuality to potentiality. Therefore, since in God there is no potentiality, as shown above (Article 1), it follows that in him essence does not differ from existence. Therefore his essence is his existence.

holy scripture puts before us spiritual and divine things under the comparison of corporeal things.

can be proved in five ways.

When an effect is better known to us than its cause, from the effect we proceed to the knowledge of the cause.

The very hiding of truth in figures is useful for the exercise of thoughtful minds and as a defense against the ridicule of the impious, according to the words “Give not that which is holy to dogs” (Matt. 7:6).

But the knowledge proper to this science comes through revelation and not through natural reason. Therefore it has no concern to prove the principles of other sciences, but only to judge of them.

whereas this derives its certitude from the light of divine knowledge, which cannot be misled:

color is the formal object of sight.

For every science proceeds from self-evident principles.

it was necessary that humanity should be taught by a divine revelation

Objection 1: I

Do not hope that, after this chapter, you will hear from me even a single word about this subject, be it as an explicit statement or in a flashlike allusion.

fter Ezekiel, peace be on him, had set forth the description of the Chariot J-l. as given in the beginning of the book,

For only the bodies adhered to one another, whereas their faces and their wings were separated, but only from above

It is according to the shapes that tend to have a likeness to those of animals that people are nicknamed.

For in the preceding verses there is no mention of their being tired in any way, so that even if they were tired, the term reposed would be quite extraneous to the story

He said, He said-the term to rest [shebithah] is derivatively used with reference to the Sabbath as there was no creation on that day. It is accordingly said: And He rested on the seventh day.1 For refraining from speech is likewise called rest.

This name is not indicative of an attribute but of simple existence and nothing else.

may He be exalted,

or what names you may hear from them or may find in their stupid books,

he greatness of this name and the prohibition against pronouncing it are

This is a very subtle speculation; understand it.

Now there is no multiplicity in the true reality of the existence of God, may He be exalted, so that one thing pertaining to Him might be understood while another remains unknown.

if you deny that they have a likeness to the attributes known to us, it follows that they do not belong to the same species as the latter.

w that the three words to see [ra'oh], to look at [habbit], and to vision .l~ [~azoh] are applied to the sight of the eye and that all three of them are also used figuratively to denote the grasp of the intellect.

eriving from the verb

With regard to what is of necessity, there is no good and evil at all, but only the false and the true.

latter's ultimate perfection,

It was because of this something, I mean because of the divine intellect conjoined with man, that it is said of the latter that he is in the image of God and in His likeness, not that God, may He be exalted, is a body and possesses a shape.

image

keen-sighted observer looks at it with full attention,

My speech in the present Treatise is directed, as I have mentioned, to one who has philosophized 2+ and has knowledge of the true sciences,25 but believes at the same time in the matters pertaining to the Law and is perplexed as to their meaning because of the uncertain terms and the parables.

This, in its turn, cannot come about except through divine science, and this divine science cannot become actual except after a study of natural science.

I mean to say that the subject matter will appear, flash, and then be hidden again,

degrees of the perfect vary

mean the legalistic study of the Law. For the purpose of this Treatise and of all those like it is the science of Law in its true sense.

Thebody is a dense substance; it does not (naturally) move upward.

ence, whatever rational con-cepts that the intellect wishes to convey to the senses, it does so by mean

nd he or she is aided by all theSupernals

It is provided as an advisor of human beings for the rational soul,which is (also) called the Holy Spirit[rub-iqudsi]and pure soul

ot fall into harm and destruction, for then it would not function.

ationality

brought each from a different worl

rational way

Thus, the cause of [that one] is the possible existence of this [one], whereas the possible existence of this [one] is not caused by that [other]. As such, the two cannot be equivalent — I mean, that whose causality is essential and that which is essentially caused.

If [it occurs] through another, then [this] other is the cause.

Necessary Existen

circular.

in the soul

infinite regress or to circularity.

impossible to know whatever is known through them

rdered in ranks,

not a principle merely because all the questions depend on it for their demonstrative proofs,

For just as [the former] is a principle for the existence of these [latter sciences], knowledge of [the former] is a principle for validating the knowledge of these [latter sciences].

from evil

His existence

Moreover, you used to hear that there is here

chosen priests

your mental comprehension is laid to rest, to strain so far as you can towards a union with him whom neither existence nor mental comprehension can contain. For, by the unceasing and absolute renunciation of yourself and all things, you will cast all things aside in purity, and be released from all things, and will thus be led upwards to the ray of that divine darkness that surpasses all existence.

But in this I have fallen wretchedly short not only of the theologians, their hearers and their followers but even of my own peers. So if what I have said is right and if, somehow, I have correctly understood and explicated something of the names of God, the work must be ascribed to the Cause of all good things for having given me the words to speak and the power to use them well.

The name “One” means that God is uniquely all things through the transcendence of one unity and that he is the Cause of all without ever departing from that oneness. Nothing in the world lacks its share of the One. Just as every number participates in unity — for we refer to one couple, one dozen, one-half, one-third, one-tenth-so everything, and every part of everything, participates in the One. By being the One, it is all things. The One cause of all things is not one of the many things in the world but actually precedes oneness and multiplicity and indeed defines oneness and multiplicity. For multiplicity cannot exist without some participation in the One. That which is many in its parts is one in its entirety. T

me, the inferior of many good people,

you will find no part of the world without its share of smallness

He is Power insofar as he exceeds all power.

Before there are angels he has knowledge of angels

transcends all reason, all intelligence, and all wisdom.

To antiquity this looked to be contrary to nature,

participate

sun contains within itself as a unity the causes of all the things which participate in it.

Existence precedes the entities which participate in it

knowledge far beyond perception and reason

non-existing things

Providence even makes good use of evil effects to turn these or others to good use individually and collectively.

Not even the devils are evil by nature, since if they were, then they would not owe their origin to the Good.

then no existence comes from evil.

“the motherland” by “the fatherland,”

Even what is not still there exists transcendentally in the Beautiful and the Good.

“sun” for it makes all things a “sum”

Light comes from the Good, and light is an image of this archetypal Good

Life.

Source.

We are told not to busy ourselves with what is beyond us, since they are beyond what we deserve and are unattainable.

not even by the leaders among the front ranks of the angels.

the Threefold Unity

when the tide of unholiness is tossing them about