God is to all things as sight is to visible things

*

Last night I was reading the book Seeing Silence by Mark C. Taylor, and at the end of chapter 2, after thinking through the light art of James Turrell, Taylor offers a quote from “medieval mystic and negative theologian Nicolas of Cusa (1401-1464)”. I read this quote that I am about to copy once last night, and then again very slowly, before pausing and attempting to allow the insight to occur in my mind – I felt a mental shifting in a sort of formal or structural way – deconstructive, reconstructive. Then last night while I slept, I dreamt of this passage, and in the dream I was referencing and explaining the passage to others. And now I’ve woken up & feel that I understand it. In any case, I’m going to copy the passage from Taylor & his reference of Cusa here:

“The work of art – true art – makes us human because it is the ceaseless quest to hear silence by seeing the invisible. To “go inside to greet the light” with Turrell is to see seeing, and to see seeing is to see the silence of what once was named “God.” Medieval mystic and negative theologian Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464) might well have been commenting on Turrell’s remarkable art when he wrote on his “Dialogue on the Hidden God,”

The name “God” comes from thero, which means “I see.” For God is in our realm as sight is in the realm of color. For color is attained in no other way than by sight, and in order that sight can freely attain every color, the center of sight is without color. Therefore, because sight is without color, sight is not found in the realm of color. And so to the realm of color sight is nothing rather than something. For the realm of color does not attain any being outside its realm, but it maintains that everything that exists is in its realm. But sight is not found there. Therefore, sight, because it exists without color, is unnameable within the realm of color, for no color’s name corresponds to it. But sight has given a name to every color through its differentiating judgment. Hence, in the realm of color all naming depends on sight, but sight’s name, the derivation of every color’s name is discovered to be nothing rather than something. God, therefore, is to all things as sight is to visible things.

*

We are the substance of sight of God. Because God sees us, we do not see God. Color is to the human eye as the human life is to the vision of God. “God, therefore, is to all things as sight is to visible things.” It took me a full night to digest this thought, and now I find it remarkably beautiful. The center of the vision is given to God, it is God seeing, & is therefore our blindness.