Concerning the Three Principles of the Divine Essence

Gate passedSeeker and aboveModern transcription — not a facsimileJacob Boehme (1575–1624)PUBLIC DOMAIN as published. Boehme d. 1624; the Sparrow translation is 1656. Per-part determination MADE 2026-08-29: the eight front-matter segments carrying the 2009 electronic edition own introductory apparatus were withheld (three excised in full, five redacted in part where a public-domain title block or Boehme text shared the page). The remaining 5,022 segments are public domain and are open at seeker tier.905 of 1000 segments carry a modern register · 343 pp

Jacob Boehme — the works in English, and one in Frencheditor’s preface to the volume

Eleven books by a shoemaker of Görlitz who wrote, by his own account, because he could not help it. Ten of them stand here in the seventeenth-century English of John Sparrow, who translated Boehme within a generation of his death and whose prose is itself now four hundred years old; where that English has drifted out of reach, the facing pane carries a modern register — the same text with archaic inflection and spelling normalised by rule, never paraphrased. Nothing is reworded, and where no register appears beside a passage it is because the rules found nothing to change.

The eleventh book is not in English at all, and it is the reason this note exists.

Des trois principes de l'essence divine, printed at Paris in 1802, is the same work as Concerning the Three Principles of the Divine Essence, which stands here as the second book — the same twenty-seven chapters in the same order, opening `Du premier principe de l'essence divine` against Sparrow's `Of the first Principle of the Divine Essence`. Its translator was Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin, who gave the last years of his life to putting Boehme into French, and who has a shelf of his own in this Lycaeum.

That makes a closed circuit inside this archive, and it is worth naming plainly. Saint-Martin translates Boehme. La Iniciación, printed in Montevideo a hundred and forty years later, traces its own descent through Saint-Martin. A reader can therefore follow one thread from a German mystic of 1619, through the French philosopher who carried him into another language, to a Spanish-language monthly of the 1940s that claimed them both — and read every step of it in the original.

The two are shelved as one work rather than two because that is what they are. They are not set as facing panes: an English translation of 1619 and a French translation of 1802 are two independent readings of a lost German original, and pairing them line by line would assert a correspondence neither translator ever claimed.

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1go into its l ether, and nothing else - shall remain l Or recepof it besides the figure. Now this was the tree which stood in the midst of the garden in Eden, whereby Adam must be tempted in all essences ; for his spirit should rule powerfully over all essences, as the holy angels, and God himself doth. 40. Besides, he was created by the Word, or Heart of God, that he should be his image and similitude, very powerfully in all the three Principles, [and be] as great as a prince or throne-angel. But this tree standing thus in the garden, and of all the trees that only did bear earthly fruit, therefore Adam looked so often upon it, because he knew that it was the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and the virtue of the tree pressed him to it so very hard (which virtue was also in him) that the one lust infected [poisoned or mingled with] the other : And the spirit of the great world pressed Adam so very hard, that he became infected, and his virtue [or power] was overcome. Here the paradisical man was undone, and then said the Heart of God, It is not good that man [should] be alone, we will make him a help [or consort] to be with him. 41. Here God saw his fall, and that he could not stand, because Adam's imagination and lust was so eager after the kingdom of this world, and after the earthly fruit, and that Adam would not generate a perfect paradisical man out of himself, 196 THE THREE PRINCIPLES [Ch. 11

2but an infected [poisoned man], according to the lust, and would fall into corruptibility. And the text in Moses soundeth further very right, thus, And God let a deep sleep fall upon man, and he slept \orfelLasleep}. THE TWELFTH CHAPTER Of ike Opening of the Holy Scripture, that the Circumstances may be highly considered. The Golden Gate, which God affordeth to the last World, wherein the LUy shall flourish [and blossom]. 1. ~T~ OVING Reader, I had need have an -J — J angelical tongue for this description, and thou an angelical mind, and then we should well understand one another : But seeing we have them not, therefore we will express the great deeds of God with the earthly tongue, according to our [received] gift and knowledge, and open the Scripture to the Reader, and give him occasion to consider further, whereby the Pearl might be sought and found at last ; therefore we will work in our day-labour, l according to our duty, till the 2 Pearl i and lead Of the lily be found. come after us 2. Reason asketh : How long was Adam in paradise before his fall, and how long did the temptation last? I cannot tell thee that, out of Moses' description of the creation, for it is for great cause concealed : Yet I will shew thee the * Or search wonders of God, and 3 expound them, according to into them. 197 198 THE THREE PRINCIPLES [Ch. 12 1 Or understand. 2 Or fire flaming. 8 in the spirit of the great world. 4 in the law. 8 the law. his chosen.

3the knowledge that is given me, whereby thou mayest the better learn to * consider the temptation and the fall of Adam. 3. Beloved reason, look into the glass of the actions and deeds of God. When God appeared to Moses in the 2 burning bush, he said, Pull off thy shoes ; for here is a holy place : What was that? Answer: God shewed [Moses~\ thereby his earthly birth. For he would give him a law, wherein man should live (if it were possible), and attain salvation : But who was it that gave the law, and commanded man to live therein ? Answer : It was God the Father, out of his centre, and therefore it was done with fire and thunder ; for there is no fire and thunder in the Heart of God, but kind love. 4. Hereupon reason will say, Is not God the Father one [and the same] essence with the Son ? Answer : Yes, [they are] one essence and will. By what means then did he give the law ? Answer : By the spirit of the great world ; because Adam after the fall, and all men, lived 3 therein, therefore it must be tried, whether man could live 4 therein, in confidence towards God. Therefore he established it with great wonders [or miracles], and gave 6it clarity [shining brightness or glory] ; as may be seen in Moses, who had a [glorious bright] shining face. And when he had chosen to himself this people, he destroyed the children of unbelief, and brought 6them out with wonders into theT wilderCh. 12] OPENING OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE 199

The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.

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Commentary

whole issue ·

Cross-estate[P-V]translated_asboehme:2:1:003

This English 'Concerning the Three Principles of the Divine Essence' and boehme:11 are the same work in two languages — and the French is not just any translation. It is Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin's own: 'Des trois principes de l'essence divine', issued by the Périsse brothers of the rue Mercière. Saint-Martin learned German in his fifties expressly to read Boehme, and spent his last years translating him. The estate therefore holds, side by side, the text that formed the Unknown Philosopher and the form in which he gave it to France — the single most direct documentary link between the two founders of this corpus.

→ boehme:11