Emanation: Traditional and Heretical
You ask what Schuon may have meant (in Logic and Transcendence) when he distinguished between “the traditional theory of emanation” and “the emanationist heresy, which has nothing metaphysical about it and which reduces the Principle to the level of manifestation or Substance to the level of accidents” (p. 58, note 11 of my edition).
As you know, Schuon always specified that “God is in things and things are in God” essentially, not substantially. Since it is in the very nature (or essence) of the Good to communicate itself, God cannot but “radiate”, and this radiation constitutes what we call manifestation or creation. Nonetheless this manifestation involves no division or extrusion of God, as if He were some sort of extended “thing” or “substance”, quod absit. He remains, His self-communication notwithstanding, completely transcendent, hence absolutely other than everything else.
Thus, as I understand the passage in question, “the traditional theory” points to God’s essential presence in manifestation, while “the heresy” makes the mistake of supposing that God is substantially present. It’s the difference, in other words, between panentheism and pantheism.
Perhaps the following observations, coming from two Christian Platonists living several centuries apart, would be helpful here:
“In a super-substantial manner, above the category of origin, the Godhead is the Origin of all origin and the good and bounteous Communication (so far as such may be) of hidden mysteries; and, in a word, It is the Life of all things that live and the Being of all that are, the Origin and Cause of all life and being through Its bounty, which both brings them into existence and maintains them. These mysteries we learn from the Divine Scriptures, and thou wilt find that, in well-nigh all the utterances of the Sacred Writers, the Divine Names refer in a Symbolical Revelation to Its beneficent Emanations” (Dionysius the Areopagite, On the Divine Names, Chapter 1, my italics).
“I know that to create is defined as ‘to make out of nothing’, ex nihilo. But I take that to mean ‘not out of any pre-existing material’. It can’t mean that God makes what God has not thought of, or that He gives His creatures any powers or beauties which He Himself does not possess. Why, we think that even human work comes nearest to creation when the maker has ‘got it all out of his own head’. Nor am I suggesting a theory of ‘emanations’. The differentia of an ‘emanation’—literally an overflowing, a trickling out—would be that it suggests something involuntary. But my words—‘uttering’ and ‘inventing’—are meant to suggest an act” (C. S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, Chapter XIV).
It seems to me clear that the Areopagite is espousing “the traditional theory”, whereas Lewis is referring (at the end of this passage) to “the emanationist heresy”. Notice that Lewis adds one other important qualification: namely, that the heresy in question construes the creative process as mechanical or automatic, while Schuon and other “traditionalists”, though they underscore the inevitability of manifestation, do not divorce it from the Divine Will.
February 11th, 2013 at 2:51 am
The understanding of emanation present in St Dionysius can also be found in St Gregory Palamas. St Thomas, though he does speak about “emanation”, tends to suppress the idea. Western Christianity is generally opposed to emanationism because it seems to deny God’s simplicity and to require a “Platonic” interpretation of Christianity, which has been largely rejected by the West since the 13th century or so.
February 12th, 2013 at 11:53 am
Michael Sudduth, a philosopher of religion at San Francisco State University, recently announced his departure from Orthodox Christianity and conversion to Gaudiya Vaishnavism. In Mr. Sudduth’s conversion testimony, he states, “I now accept a panentheistic metaphysics in which the universe and human souls are, to put it roughly, in the being of God.”
A fellow Christian philosopher, James Anderson, responded quite critically to this position as a fundamental contradiction of creatio ex nihilo. But as I understand it, Sudduth’s statement is not in violation of Christian orthodoxy at all. Anderson disagrees, stating:
On the subject of creation, it would seem that Anderson is insisting that unity and separation must be a matter of “either/or” and cannot be “both/and”. Does the essence-energies distinction resolve this perceived problem “higher up”?
February 13th, 2013 at 4:29 am
It may be of interest that even Thomas Aquinas—considered by many as an Aristotelian pure and simple—interpreted the Biblical notion of creation by means of Neo-platonist concepts, which had come to him through Dionysius the Areopagite. So we read for example in the Summa Theologica (I, 45, i, ad 1):
There is a German book that proves convincingly the often overlooked deep-rootedness of Thomas in Neo-platonism: Klaus Kremer, Die neuplatonische Seinsphilosophie und ihre Wirkung auf Thomas von Aquin (Leiden 1966).
February 14th, 2013 at 9:16 am
The Angelic Doctor never departs from concepts derived from an Aristotelian-Platonic framework. I think the descent into modernity begins when Platonic essences and universals are called into question. The question is why? Why does realism give way ultimately to nominalism?
The problem seems to have its root in the matter of Divine will. Aquinas took the view that “will follows upon intellect”, that reason is more fundamental than volition. The Thomistic philosopher, Edward Feser, tells us:
I’m not sure, but I think these shifts in theology may correspond to an alternating predominance between emanationism and creationism.
February 20th, 2013 at 2:04 pm
I’m puzzled by the distinction between essence and substance that Schuon makes, and wonder what Greek terms he has in mind. Both terms are used to translate ousia, as in “consubstantial” or “essence vs. energies”. But perhaps Schuon has in mind eidos for essence? Without definition of these terms, the distinction does not yet have content for me.
March 15th, 2013 at 10:17 am
It may be of interest to note that Gaudiya Vaishnavism (see Christopher’s February 12th post), although considered intrinsically orthodox by Schuon and his followers, doctrinally reverses the levels of Divinity and considers the personal God to be the ultimate Reality. Typical expressions of this are: “Impersonal Brahman is nothing but the bodily effulgence of Krishna,” and “A pure devotee considers the mukti of the jnanins to be worse than hell.” This branch of Hinduism is 100% bhakti-oriented, which it can afford to be since it exists side-by-side with Advaita Vedanta. Although Hinduism is not a world religion, it does seem to provide within itself as many distinct spiritual paths as there are human types.
March 25th, 2013 at 11:09 am
Joshua Robinson asks for the meaning Schuon gives to the terms “essence” and “substance”. In search of an answer to this question, I found the following passage in Logic and Transcendence (“The Argument from Substance”):
Schuon continues elsewhere in the same book, discussing the question of pantheism:
So the difference between traditional and heretical emanationism would be that the latter “understands emanation in a physical sense”, whereas the former “acknowledges that it [emanation] is purely causal while at the same time implying a certain consubstantiality since reality is one”.