I purposefully used vehicle negativa as distinct from via negativa, as the latter refers to a

rational mode and a form of kataphasis, while the former refers to a transrational
experience or participation, a form of apophasis, which does not proceed through
essentialist negations but, instead, through ineffable existential experiences or
REALizations. The latter are robustly relational in an interpersonal sense, experiences
beyond words. Such is the reality to which perichoresis vaguely refers without robustly
describing.
A vehicle negativa transports and trans-forms us, while a via negativa in-forms us, such
as the distinction between knowledge of and knowledge about, the latter a problem to be
solved, the former a lover to be loved. Both are necessary but one is a means, the other
an end.
To be more clear, some Orthodox theologians point out that both the via positiva and via
negativa are RATIONAL approaches, both sharing the same trajectory of increasing
descriptive accuracy, whether through afrmation of what something is, ontologically, or
is like, analogically, or through negation of what something is not or is not like. Thats
how kataphasis and apophasis are largely conceived in the West, often through radically
logo-centric lenses.
When Lossky employed an apophatic, perichoretic strategy, though, he referenced a
transrational mystical experience moreso in terms of ineffability. He aspires merely to a
successful relational reference but does not ambition a successful metaphysical
description. (This distinction applies, by the way, to so much of nondual teaching in
Buddhist & Hindu traditions, as they arent doing metaphysics as much as they are
leading us into experiences or real-izations).
The Orthodox priest, Dumitru Staniloae, according to some, was more rigorous and
nuanced than Lossky. He would refer to our ineffable experiences as transrational and
trans-apophatic. Thats why I prefer to refer to
trinito-logy vs trinito-phany. I would even call my own writings regarding Rohrs ouvre a
systematic theophany and not systematic theology.
vehicle negativa, via negativa, perichoresis, apophasis, kataphasis, transrational, Dumitru
Staniloae, Vladimir Lossky, trans-apophatic, trinitology, trinitophany