Solitude and Silence: Pseudo-Dionysius on the Divine Darkness

The anonymous 5th-century writer known as Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite introduced the concept of apophatic theology -- knowing God by recognizing what God is not. In "The Mystical Theology," he wrote: "Into this darkness which is beyond light we pray that we may come. Through not seeing and not knowing, we may see and know that which is above seeing and knowing." Silence, for Dionysius, is not the absence of God but the presence of a God who transcends all our concepts.

Dionysius influenced virtually all subsequent Christian mysticism, East and West. His teaching on divine darkness suggests that the deepest silence in prayer is not emptiness but encounter with a God too vast for our thoughts to contain.

Practical application: Sit in silence and deliberately release each thought or image of God that arises. "God is not this thought. God is not this image. God is greater." Rest in the "not-knowing" that follows. Dionysius teaches that when we exhaust our concepts of God, we are closer to God, not further away.