Of learned ignorance - De docta ignorantia

Written by Nicolas de Cues

1440

Son of a rich boatman from Bernkastel-Kues (Rhineland-Palatinate), he first studied law, philosophy, mathematics and mechanics. It is in the first place in Deventer, ? to the famousSchool of the Brothers of Common Life, then in Cologne where he became acquainted with the works of Bonaventure and Gerson. He then studied liberal arts in Heidelberg in 1416 and went to Padua in 1417 where he remained for a time to continue his studies. There, he became attached to the future cardinals Giuliano Cesarini and Domenico Capranica, became a doctor of canon law in 1423 and came into contact with theItalian humanism. After that, he resumed his studies in theology in Cologne in 1425 where his teacher was Heymeric de Campo who put him in contact with Albert and Lull .

L. — HOW “KNOWING” IS “IGNORING”

We see that, by divine grace, all things have within them a spontaneous desire to exist in a better way, as much as the natural condition of each permits; and that, moreover, those beings in whom judgment is innate act for this purpose and have the instruments they need: this corresponds to the aim of knowledge, so that the need for it is not in vain and that , where the tendency of his own nature leads him, he can find rest. If by chance this is not the case, it necessarily comes from an accident: for example, illness distorts taste or simple opinion, reasoning. This is why the healthy and free intelligence, which, without rest, from an innate search within itself, desires to reach the truth by exploring everything, knows it, we say, when it has apprehended it with an embrace. loving, because we do not doubt the perfect truth of what requires the assent of all healthy minds. Now, all those who research judge the uncertain, comparing it to a certain presupposition through a system of proportions. All research is therefore comparative, and it uses the means of proportion: if the object of the research can be compared to the presupposition by a small proportional reduction, the judgment of apprehension is easy; but if we need many intermediaries, then difficulty and trouble arise. This is well known in mathematics: the first propositions are easily reduced to the very well-known first principles, while the following ones, because they require the intermediary of the first, have more difficulty. Therefore all research consists of an easy or difficult comparative proportion, and this is why the infinite which escapes, as infinite, from all proportion, is unknown. Now, the proportion which expresses agreement in a thing on the one hand and otherness on the other cannot be understood without number. This is why number encloses everything that is capable of proportions. Therefore, he does not create a proportion in quantity only, but in everything which, in any way, by substance or by accident, can agree and differ. Also Pythagoras vigorously judged that everything was constituted and understood by the force of numbers. Now, the precision of combinations in material things and the exact adaptation of the known to the unknown are so far above human reason that Socrates felt that he knew nothing but his ignorance; at the same time as the very wise Solomon affirms that all things are difficult and that language cannot explain them. And another inspired by the Spirit of God says that wisdom is hidden, and that there is no man living who can see the seat of understanding. If then it is so, as the most profound Aristotle affirms in his First Philosophy, for the things which are most manifest in nature, if we encounter such a difficulty,like owls trying to see the sun, while the desire we have within us is not in vain, we must know our ignorance. If we completely achieve this goal, we will achieve learned ignorance. In fact, the man whose zeal is the most ardent cannot arrive at a higher perfection of wisdom unless he is found very learned in the ignorance itself, which is his own, and we will be all the more learned, that we will know better than we are ignorant. This is my goal: learned ignorance, it is to speak a little about it that I have devoted my efforts.

7 - OF THE THREE AND ONE ETERNITY

There was never a nation that did not serve God and recognize Him to the absolute maximum. We know that Minar in his Antiquities noted: “The Sissenes worshiped unity above all else. » Now, the very illustrious Pythagoras, whose authority was unshakeable in his time, believed that this unity is triune. Exploring the truth of this judgment, while raising our minds higher, let us reason in accordance with the premises. What precedes all otherness is eternal, no one doubts it: otherness in fact is mutability, but everything that naturally precedes mutability is immutable, therefore eternal. But otherness is composed of both, and this is why otherness, like number, is posterior to unity. Therefore unity is, by nature, prior to otherness, and, since it naturally precedes it, unity is eternal.

Furthermore every inequality consists of an equality plus a surplus. So inequality is, by nature, posterior to equality, which can be proven very solidly by resolution. In fact, every inequality resolves into an equality; for the equal is found between the greater and the lesser. If therefore we remove what exceeds we will have the equal; and if, on the contrary, we had a smaller one, remove from the rest what exceeds and we will obtain an equal. And this we can do until, through reductions, we have arrived at simple elements [ The simple element is the one that does not contain any inequality within it. it is absolute equality. See the rest. ]. It is therefore obvious that all inequality is reduced, through reductions, to equality. Therefore equality naturally precedes inequality. But inequality and otherness go together by nature. Indeed, where there is inequality, in the same place there is necessarily otherness and vice versa. It is in fact between at least two things that there will be otherness. Now, these things, in relation to one of them, will be a double, which is why there will be inequality. Therefore, otherness and inequality will go together by nature, especially since duality is the first otherness and the first inequality; but it has been proven that equality precedes inequality by nature, and therefore at the same time otherness; this is why equality is eternal.

Furthermore, if, of two causes, one was prior to the other, the effect of the first will by nature be prior to the effect of the second; now, unity is either connection or cause of connection. This is why we say certain things “related” because they are united. Duality is either division or the cause of division. Duality in fact is the first division. If unity is the cause of connection, duality is the cause of division. Therefore, as unity is prior by nature to duality, so connection is prior by nature to division. But division and otherness go together, by nature, and this is why connection, like unity, is eternal, since it is prior to otherness. It has therefore been proven, since unity is itself eternal and equality is eternal, that in the same way connection is eternal. But there cannot be several eternals. If in fact there were several eternals, then, since unity precedes all plurality, there would be something, prior by nature to eternity, which is impossible. Furthermore, if there were several eternals, one would be lacking in the other, so none of them would be perfect, and there would thus be one eternal, who would not be eternal, since he would not be perfect. ; this being impossible, it cannot be that there are several eternals; but because unity is eternal, equality is eternal, and likewise connection: therefore unity, equality and connection, are one thing. And here is this triune unity that Pythagoras, the first of all philosophers, the honor of Italy and Greece, taught to our adoration. But let us add a few more specific words about generating equality through unity.

11 - OF THE POWERFUL ASSISTANCE OF MATHEMATICS IN THE APPREHENSION OF VARIOUS DIVINE TRUTHS

All our wisest, most divine and holiest teachers agree that visible things are truly images of invisible things and that our Creator can be seen and known by creatures as in a mirror and in a mirror. enigma. Now, the fact that we can symbolically explore spiritual truths, which are in themselves impossible for us to reach, has its root in what was said above, because all things are in a relationship with each other, hidden for us without doubt and incomprehensible, but such that from them all comes a one universe, and that all are unity itself in the maximum one. And, although every image seems to rise to the likeness of the model, yet, apart from the maxima image, which is this model itself in the unity of nature, there is no image so similar or even equal to the model, that there cannot be one infinitely more similar and more equal: we understand this well now. Now, when we carry out research by means of an image, it is necessary that there be nothing doubtful about the image in proportion to which, by transsuming, we explore the unknown, because it There is no path to uncertainty except through presupposition and certainty. Now, all sensible things are in a continual instability because of the material possibility which abounds in them. On the contrary, if we take images more abstract than these, where things are considered in such a way that, without completely lacking the material means without which they could not be imagined, they are no longer completely subject to the fluctuation of the possible, we see that these images are very solid and very certain for us. Mathematics is like this; this is why the wise have looked with finesse among them for examples to follow the trail of things through intelligence, and none of the great minds of antiquity tackled difficult things by means of another resemblance. than that of mathematics: thus Boethius, the most learned of the Romans, affirmed that no man, who was completely foreign to the practice of mathematics, could attain the science of divine things. Didn't Pythagoras, the first of the philosophers, in title and in fact, place the whole search for truth in numbers? Now, the Platonists and even the first of our thinkers followed it so well that Saint-Augustine and Boethius, after him, affirmed that number was undoubtedly, in the mind of the Creator, his main model for the creation of things. How was Aristotle, who wanted to stand out by refuting his predecessors, able, in mathematics, to reveal to us the difference between species if not by comparing them themselves to numbers? And the same author, while he wanted to deliver his science on natural forms, which shows how each is understood in another,had to pounce on the mathematical forms, saying: "As the triangle is in the tetragon, so the lower form is in the higher form." I pass over in silence countless examples similar to this one. Even the Platonist Aurelius Augustine, when he did his research on the quantity of the soul, on its immortality and all other very profound subjects, threw himself into mathematics to help himself. This path seemed to please our Boethius to the point that he constantly affirmed that the whole doctrine of truth was understood in plurality and magnitude. And, to put it briefly, did not the theory of the Epicureans on atoms and the void, a theory which denies God and undermines all truth, die from a mathematical demonstration, that of the Pythagoreans and the Peripatetics? They established that obviously we cannot arrive at indivisible and simple atoms: but this is the principle that Epicurus posed. It is therefore on this path that we advance, concurrently with them and we affirm, because no path is open which accesses divine things except through symbols, that we will now be able to choose the mathematical signs to because of their incorruptible certainty.

22 - GOD’S PROVIDENCE UNITES THE CONTRADICTORIES

Now, to seek how we are led to a profound understanding, let us apply our inquiry to the providence of God, by means of what we already know. And because it is manifest from the above that God embraces everything, even the contradictory, nothing can escape his providence; whether we did something, or the opposite of it, or nothing, it was all involved in the providence of God. Therefore, nothing will happen except according to the providence of God. No doubt God could have foreseen many things, which he did not foresee and will not foresee, no doubt he also planned many things which he could not have foreseen, but nothing can be added to the divine providence, nor be taken away from him; thus human nature is simple and one: if a man is born, even whose birth was not expected, nothing is added to human nature and nothing would be taken away from him, if he were not born; it is just like death and this because human nature encloses within itself those who are, as well as those who are not and will not be, whatever they may have been. So even if something happened that will never happen, nothing would be added to divine providence, because it itself encloses both what happens and what does not happen but can happen. Therefore, as there are many possibilities in matter which will never come true, so, conversely, the things which will not happen, if they can happen, if they are in the providence of God, are not there. a possible way, but in act, and it does not follow from this that these things are in act. As we say that human nature encloses and embraces an infinity of things, because it is not only men who have been, are and will be, but those who can be, even though they will never be, so it embraces the mutable in an immutable way. As infinite unity encloses all number, so God's providence encloses things in infinite number: those which will happen, those which will not happen but can happen, and their opposites, just as gender encloses contrary differences, and what 'she knows, she does not know it with the difference of times, because she does not know the future as future, nor the past as past, but she knows eternally and immutably mutable things.

Also it is inevitable and immutable, and nothing can exceed it, and everything which is related to providence itself is said to have the character of necessity; and rightly so, because everything is in God, who is absolute necessity. And we thus see that the things which will never happen, are in the providence of God in the way that we have said, even if they were not foreseen to happen, and it is necessary that God had foreseen this which he has foreseen, for his providence is necessary and immutable; and this, even though he could have foreseen the opposite of what he planned; in fact if we posit that God embraces everything, we do not posit, by the same token, what is embraced, but if we posit development we posit that God embraces everything: in fact I will be able, tomorrow, to read or not reading, whatever I may have done, I do not escape providence, because it embraces opposites; and whatever I have done will come to pass according to the providence of God.

Thus we see how, according to our first principles which teach us that the maximum is before all opposition, because it embraces, that it encloses all things in all ways, we apprehend the truth about the providence of God and other similar things.

26 - NEGATIVE THEOLOGY

Because the worship of God, which is to be worshiped in spirit and truth, is necessarily based on positive assertions about God, all religion necessarily rises in its worship by means of affirmative theology, worshiping God as one and triune, as infinitely wise, good, inaccessible light, life, truth and so on; always directing her worship by a faith which she attains more truly through learned ignorance; believing that he whom she worships, being one, is all things, and that he to whom she worships as the inaccessible light, is not like the material light to which darkness opposes, but the most simple and infinite in which darkness is infinite light; she believes that infinite light itself will always shine in the darkness of our ignorance, but that darkness cannot understand it. Thus the theology of negation is so necessary to achieve that of affirmation, that, without it, God is not worshiped as infinite God, but rather as a creature; However, this cult is an idolatry attributing to the image what only suits the truth.

It will therefore be useful to add to the above a few words on negative theology. Sacred ignorance has taught us an ineffable God; and this, because it is infinitely greater than anything that can be counted; and this, because it is at the highest degree of truth. We speak of him with more truth by dismissing and denying; thus the very great Denis wanted it to be neither truth, nor intelligence, nor light, nor anything that can be said; but Rabbi Solomon and all the wise men follow him. Therefore, according to this negative theology, he is neither Father, nor Son, nor Holy Spirit, but he is only infinite. But infinity, like infinity, does not generate, is not generated, does not proceed. This is why Hilary of Poitiers said with great subtlety, distinguishing between persons: “Infinity in eternity, species in image, execution in gift. » By this he means that, without doubt, we can only see infinity in eternity; however, infinity itself, which is eternity itself, because it is negative, cannot be understood as engendering, but rather as eternity, because eternity is affirmative of unity, or of the presence maxima, that is why it is the beginning without beginning. “Species in image” expresses a beginning from the beginning; “gifted execution” means the procession of both. This is well known to us now; for although eternity is infinity, so that eternity is not the cause of the Father rather than infinity, yet, according to the way of considering, eternity is attributed to the Father, and not to the Son, or to the Holy Spirit. But infinity does not belong to one person rather than to another, because infinity itself is Father according to the consideration of unity, Son according to the consideration of the equality of unity , Holy Spirit according to the consideration of the connection; neither Father, nor Son, nor Holy Spirit according to the simple consideration of infinity, although it itself is the infinity and eternity of any of the three persons; that conversely any person is infinity and eternity, not, however, according to any consideration whatsoever, as has been shown; because, according to the consideration of infinity, God is neither one nor many, and we do not find in God, according to negative theology, anything other than infinity. This is why, according to her, it is not knowable neither in this century nor in the future century, because every creature is darkness in relation to it, because it cannot understand the infinite light, but it is not known only to her.

And it is therefore evident how negations are true and affirmations insufficient in theology; and the negations which remove from the perfect what is more imperfect are all the more true than the others. It is truer to say that God is not a stone than to say that he is not life or intelligence, to say that he is not drunkenness, that he is not the virtue ; however, it is the opposite in the affirmations: for it is more true to affirm that God is intelligence and life, than to affirm that he is earth, stone or body.

After what we have said above, this is all very clear. We conclude that the precision of truth shines in an incomprehensible way in the darkness of our ignorance. And here is this learned ignorance that we sought, by means of which, alone, we showed that we could access the God of infinite goodness, the maximum, the unitrine, according to the degrees of the very doctrine of ignorance, so that we may have enough vigor to praise Him forever with all our strength, He who is blessed, above all things, for ever and ever.