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On the Names of God

Ernesto Laclau

Eckhart asserts:

God is nameless for no one can either speak of him or know him.

... Accordingly, if I say that ‘‘God is good,’’ this is not true. I am
good, but God is not good! In fact, I would rather say that I am
better than God, for what is good can become better and what can
become better can become the best! Now God is not good, and so
he cannot become better, he cannot become the best. These three
are far from God: ‘‘good,’’ ‘‘better,’’ ‘‘best,’’ for he is wholly tran-
scendent.... Also you should not wish to understand anything
about God, for God is beyond all understanding.... If you under-
stand anything about him, then he is not in it, and by understand-
ing something of him you fall into ignorance, and by falling into
ignorance, you become like an animal since the animal part in crea-
tures is that which is unknowing.^1

If God is nameless, that is due to His absolute simplicity, which
excludes from itself all differentiation or representational image:

You should love God non-mentally, that is to say, the soul should

become non-mental and stripped of her mental nature. For as long

as your soul is mental, she will possess images. As long as she has

images, she will possess intermediaries, and as long as she has inter-

mediaries, she will have no unity or simplicity. As long as she lacks

simplicity, she does not truly love God, for true love depends upon

simplicity.^2

The only true attribute of God is Oneness, because it is the only
attribute that is not determinate. If I say that God is good, ‘‘goodness’’

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