ABSTRACT
Dionysius used language from the Parmenides to describe how a unified, simple God could give rise to a complex universe, but with a very significant difference. By attributing both hypotheses to God, Dionysius is able to describe God as simultaneously unified and complex, as both containing creation and transcending it. Dionysius considers God simultaneously as simple unity and as a complex plurality, involving a cosmogonic process of remaining, procession and return. The importance of where Dionysius steers away from Proclus' representation of the One underscores the peculiarity of the Dionysian One. Dionysius describes God as consisting of a series of divine unities, which form the hidden and permanent aspect of God, as well as differentiations, which are the processions or revelations of God. This distinction between the henosis and diakrisis of the divine Trinity is at the heart of Dionysius' doctrine of Trinitarian theology and the theology of the divine names.
