Miklos Vassanyi

In this paper, I depart from a philosophical analysis of the opening chapter of part 3 of On the Divine Names, which encapsulates a theory of prayer that has been pegged as ‘ontological’. On account of this chapter I first look into how it specifies the relationship between the divine facet designated as the Good and the other processions or energies. Then I proceed to search for potential prefigurations of an ontological theory of prayer among relevant early Syriac source texts, in search of further evidence for the thesis that Denys’ cultural and ecclesiastic background is a bilingual Greek and Syriac Christian community. In so doing, I look over some of ’Aphrahaṭ’s discourses, then the so-called Book of Steps, and, finally, St Ephrem’s Hymns on Faith. I conclude that although several significant momenta of what has been labelled as the ontological prayer are found in these sources—thus certainly foreshadowing Denys’ idea of prayer—they are nevertheless probably only second to the influence of the Desert Father Evagrius Ponticus, a grand theoretician of prayer.

Chapter 1 of Part 3 of On the Divine Names opens with the compound imperative that 1. research into the divine names must start with the ‘Good’ because as a kind of universal revelatory term it best uncovers all the rest of the divine outpourings; and that 2. before embarking upon that investigation, a prayer must be addressed to the Trinity because it is the highest ranking source of revelation of all the processions, including even the Good.