Manifestation of the divine, of divinity, of God.
One may say of metaphysical knowledge that it is an epiphany of the Spirit (cf. Jean Borella, in Qu’est-ce que la métaphysique? (What is Metaphysics?), L’Harmattan, 2010).
More specifically
An epiphany is not a “fabrication” of the subject, but the event of a presence that gives itself according to its own mode. It implies receptivity rather than conquest: purification of vision, availability of the heart, attunement of intelligence to what transcends it. Phenomenologically, it joins phainesthai (to appear) with logos (intelligibility): what appears is not reducible to its sensible image, but reveals order, meaning, a transparency of being. Thus, a rite, a symbol, or a figure — an angel, light, voice, beauty — may serve as mediations through which the Invisible is glimpsed without ceasing to be transcendent.
Within religious traditions, epiphany takes diverse configurations: biblical theophanies (the Burning Bush, the luminous cloud), Eastern Theophany (Trinitarian manifestation at the Jordan), epiphanies of the Upanishads (the splendor of Brahman), the Neoplatonic noûs (intellectual illumination), or the “birth of God in the soul” in Meister Eckhart. The authenticity of such experience bears a double signature: it elevates (peace, intellectual dilation) and it orders (conversion, charity).
Epiphany is therefore distinct from hallucination (imaginary projection) as well as from mere aesthetic emotion: it involves the objectivity of Spirit, attested by its fruits (truth, unity, goodness). Metaphysically, it manifests the analogy between the created intellect and the uncreated Intelligible: if Spirit can “show itself,” it is because the human mind is, by nature, capable of truth.
Further reading:
– Pseudo-Dionysius, Mystical Theology
– Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Moses
– Plotinus, Enneads VI
– Meister Eckhart, Sermons
– Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane
– Jean Borella, What is Metaphysics? (L’Harmattan, 2010)
– Bruno Bérard, Metaphysics for Everyone (Angelico Press), trad. of Métaphysique pour tous (Paris, L’Harmattan, 2022); It. Sui sentieri della metafisica; Sp. ¿Qué es la metafísica?; De. Was ist Metaphysik?