(4) We praise you, nonbeing, reality before realities, first being before beings, father of divinity and life, creator of mind, donor of goodness, donor of blessedness.

(84) 'Blessed be Thou, O Lord, King, Great and mighty in Thy greatness, Lord of the whole creation of the heaven, King of kings and God of the whole world. And Thy power and kingship and greatness abide for ever and ever, And throughout all generations Thy dominion; And all the heavens are Thy throne for ever, And the whole earth Thy footstool for ever and ever.

(1) PRAISE to the Holy Creator, who has placed his throne upon the waters, and who has made all terrestrial creatures. To the Heavens he has given dominion and to the Earth dependence; to the Heavens he has given movement, and to the Earth uniform repose.

(2) Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: as thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.

(4) Saved by Thy Power divine, let us rejoice that Thou hast shown Thyself to us in all Thy Fullness. Let us rejoice that Thou hast deigned to consecrate us, [still] entombed in bodies, to Eternity. For this is the sole festival of praise worthy of man,—to know Thy Majesty. We have known Thee; yea, by the Single Sense of our intelligence, we have perceived Thy Light supreme,—O Thou true Life of life, O Fecund Womb that giveth birth to every nature!

(29) We praise you eternally, we praise you, we who are saved, who are perfect beings, who are perfect because of you, who have become perfect with you.

(16) "I shall offer up the praise in my heart as I invoke the end of the universe and the beginning of the beginning, the god of the human quest, the immortal discovery, the producer of light and truth, the sower of reason, the love of immortal life. No hidden word can speak of you, lord. My mind wants to sing a song to you every day. I am the instrument of your spirit, mind is your plectrum, and your guidance makes music with us. I see myself. I have been strengthened by you, for your love has reached us."

(31) Holy art Thou, O God, the universals' Father. Holy art Thou, O God, whose Will perfects itself by means of its own Powers. Holy art Thou, O God, who willeth to be known and art known by Thine own. Holy art Thou,who didst by Word (Logos) make to consist the things that are. Holy art Thou, of whom All-nature hath been made an image. Holy art Thou, whose Form Nature hath never made. Holy art Thou, more powerful than all power. Holy art Thou, transcending all pre-eminence. Holy Thou art, Thou better than all praise. Accept my reason's offerings pure, from soul and heart for aye stretched up to Thee, O Thou unutterable, unspeakable, Whose Name naught but the Silence can express.

(6) This is the Lord of all. This is All-knowing. This is the controller within. This is the source of all and, surely, That which is the beginning and end of all living beings.

(11) Thou art the first of gods, the ancient Soul; Thou art the supreme Resting-place of the universe; Thou art the Knower and That which is to be known and the Ultimate Goal. And by Thee is the world pervaded, Ο Thou of infinite form.

(10) He is the God beyond all name; He the unmanifest, He the most manifest; He whom the mind [alone] can contemplate, He visible to the eyes [as well]; He is the one of no body, the one of many bodies, nay, rather He of every body. Naught is there which he is not. For all are He and He is all. And for this cause hath He all names, in that they are one Father's. And for this cause hath He Himself no nome, in that He's Father of [them] all. Who, then, may sing Thee praise of Thee, or [praise] to Thee? Whither, again, am I to turn my eyes to sing Thy praise; above, below, within, without? There is no way, no place [is there] about Thee, nor any other thing of things that are. All [are] in Thee; all [are] from Thee, O Thou who givest all and takest naught, for Thou hast all and naught is there Thou hast not.

(6) We praise you, maker of perfection, donor of eternal realms.

(10) Him in the Yasnas of our Piety we seek to praise with homage, who in His persistent energy was famed to be (in truth) the Lord Ahura Mazda, for He hath appointed in His kingdom, through His holy Order and His Good Mind, both Weal and Immortality, to grant the eternal mighty pair to this our land (and the creation).

(119) So that the holy angels cannot sufficiently enough rejoice themselves, nor sufficiently enough converse, walk and most lovingly sport therein, nor sufficiently enough sing that beautiful Te Deum Laudamus, We praise thee, O God, as to each quality of the great God, according to his wonderful revelation, and wisdom, and beauty, and fruit, and form.

(1) SEEING we are now to speak of God, what he is, and where he is, we must say, that God himself is the Essence of all Essences; for all is generated or born, created and proceeded from him, and all Things take their first Beginning out of God; as the Scripture witnesses, saying, Through him, and in him are all Things. Also, The Heaven and the Heaven of Heavens are not able to contain him: Also, Heaven is my Throne, and the Earth is my Footstool: And in Our Father is mentioned, thine is the Kingdom and the Power; understand all Power.

(11) ... all [...] angels [...] word and the sound of a trumpet, he will proclaim the great complete amnesty from the beauteous east, in the bridal chamber, which is the love of God the Father [...], according to the power which [...] of the greatness [...], the sweetness of the [...] of him, since he reveals himself to the greatnesses [...] his goodness [...] the praise, the dominion, and the glory through [...] the Lord, the Savior, the Redeemer of all those belonging to the one filled with Love, through his Holy Spirit, from now through all generations forever and ever. Amen.

(73) And thus we can truly say, Immanuel, God with us, God in us. In the Language of Nature it sounds right; but our Tongue [we have] from this World does but stammer it, and cannot name it according to our Understanding. For Im is the Heart of God in the holy Ternary, for it is conceived [or comprehended,] as thou mayest understand it in the Conception [or Comprehending, or Expressing] of the Word. Ma is his entering into the Humanity in the Soul; for that Word [or Syllable) presses out from the Heart; and we understand that he conceived [or comprehended] the Heart (viz. the Virtue of the Father) in the Soul, and goes with the Word [or Syllable] nu, aloft, which signifies his Ascension into Heaven, as to his Soul. El is the Name of the great Angel, which with the Soul triumphs above the Heaven, not only in the Heaven, but in the Trinity.

(147) In this rising up the armies or companies of all the angels of the whole heaven become triumphant and joyful, and that melodious TE DEUM LAUDAMUS (WE PRAISE THEE O GOD) riseth up.

(4) This, then, according to my science, is the first rank of the Heavenly Beings which encircle and stand immediately around God; and without symbol, and without interruption, dances round His eternal knowledge in the most exalted ever-moving stability as in Angels; viewing purely many and blessed contemplations, and illuminated with simple and immediate splendours, and filled with Divine nourishment,--many indeed by the first-given profusion, but one by the unvariegated and unifying oneness of the supremely Divine banquet, deemed worthy indeed of much participation and co-operation with God, by their assimilation to Him, as far as attainable, of their excellent habits and energies, and knowing many Divine things pre-eminently, and participating in supremely Divine science and knowledge, as is lawful. Wherefore the Word of God has transmitted its hymns to those on earth, in which are Divinely shewn the excellency of its most exalted illumination. For some of its members, to speak after sensible perception, proclaim as a "voice of many waters," "Blessed is the glory of the Lord from His place" and others cry aloud that frequent and most august hymn of God, "Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord of Sabaoth, the whole earth is full of His glory." These most excellent hymnologies of the supercelestial Minds we have already unfolded to the best of our ability in the "Treatise concerning the Divine Hymns," and have spoken sufficiently concerning them in that Treatise, from which, by way of remembrance, it is enough to produce so much as is necessary to the present occasion, namely, "That the first Order, having been illuminated, from this the supremely Divine goodness, as permissible, in theological science, as a Hierarchy reflecting that Goodness transmitted to those next after it," teaching briefly this, "That it is just and right that the august Godhead -- Itself both above praise, and all-praiseworthy--should be known and extolled by the God-receptive minds, as is attainable; for they as images of God are, as the Oracles say, the Divine places of the supremely Divine repose; and further, that It is Monad and Unit tri-subsistent, sending forth His most kindly forethought to all things being, from the super-heavenly Minds to the lowest of the earth; as super-original Origin and Cause of every essence, and grasping all things super-essentially in a resistless embrace. Next: Caput VIII. Sacred Texts | Christianity « Previous: The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite: On the Heavenly Hi... Index Next: The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite: On the Heavenly Hi... » Sacred Texts | Christianity

(112) This is now the true birth or geniture of the Deity, which has been so from eternity in all corners and places whatsoever, and abideth so in all eternity.