The Forty Questions of the Soul

1 Dan. ii. 27—30. And such an answer Joseph gave to the King of Egypt. Gen. xli. 16.

2 according to the reason of the outward man.

5. Seeing, also, we are the Mystery of God, we ought not to suppose, that we must not meddle with such Mysteries, as Antichrist teacheth; for none taketh unto himself anything of God's Mysteries, unless it be given him: and St James saith,

1 Every good and perfect gift cometh from above, from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change nor alteration.

6. And seeing you seek so eagerly after such things, you become thereby even the cause of finding them; for God giveth his Mysteries both by means, and also without means; but that no man might boast, he often maketh use of very mean people about them, that it might be acknowledged that they come from his hand.

7. You shall be answered with a very sound and deep answer, yet briefly comprised, not according to outward reason, but according to the spirit of knowledge.

8. And although I could sufficiently shew and demonstrate these things in a larger description; yet seeing they are all described, and explained at large in my other writings, at present I set them down but briefly, for the ease and delight of the Reader, and that it may serve for a short Memorial of the great Mysteries.

9. But he that desireth to know these things fully and fundamentally, let him seek them in my former writings, especially in the 2 third part, and there he hath the whole ground of the * divine essence; and also of the creation of all things; of that which is eternal, and of that which is corruptible; and how every thing was made, and is come to be as it is, and act as it doth, and what it shall be in the end.

10. And therein also lieth the Key of the Mysterium magnum, the great Mystery, so far forth as a creature is able to comprehend or bear, and thither we refer you for further explanation; and so I commend me to you, into the brotherly love in Christ. Anno 1620.

JACOB BCEHMEN.

1 James i. 17.

2 The Threefold Life.

* Note, that by the words divine essence, substance, or essentiality in the writings of this author, he meaneth not that essence which is God himself, but whatsoever is besides God, which taketh its original form from God, as the eternal ideas in the wisdom of God do. And that which is essential according to the form or figure of the idea, and that wherein all ideas lie, he calleth Mysterium magnum and Cozleste Arcanum.

THE FIRST QUESTION
Whence proceeded the Soul Originally at the beginning of the World?

1. WE have, both in our second and third book, sufficiently laid open the mysteries of the soul, according to the three Principles of the divine * essence; where also we have set down, by many circumstances, the eternal centre of the eternal nature; and also the Ternary of the divine essence; and moreover, what eternity hath ever been, and how the beginning of the creation 1 was brought forth; and what an angel, and what a soul is: Also we have laid open the heavy fall of Lucifer; and moreover, both the mothers which have so brought it forth, fthe one 2 procreating the heavenly essentiality, and the other the hellish, where also we have written of light and darkness.

1 Or came to be.

2 engendering.

* "Essence" (Wesen), often translated with equal correctness "substance" or "being."

f "The one procreating the heavenly essentiality," etc. Lit. "for the one generateth the heavenly essentiality, and the other, hellish abomination." Applying here to mother-principles which only develop in opposed directions a common life-impulse, the words "procreate" and "engender" do not appropriately render the original term [(gebieret)]. The process indicated is one of gestation and bringing forth.

2. Therefore we shall not be very well understood by the Reader, in this treatise, unless he hath read over, and well * l comprehended, the third 2 part of our writings.