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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.
1And denotes the time when the triple cross does open and declare itself in the voice of Enoch, as a manifestation of the holy Trinity, to make known the same in the figure and similitude in all visible things. Moreover, it denotes the conquest of the sword of the Cherub in Babel, when the force and violence of the city, Babel, turns its sword with the point downwards. Thirdly, it denotes the great rod and punishment upon Babel, which rod does mightily advance its power on high. Fourthly, it denotes the wrathful enkindled fire of God's anger, which shall devour the sword and rod. This will be the end of the sixth time. The threefold cross does betoken the time when this shall come to pass [or be fulfilled]. When the kingdom of Christ shall attain such a number, then is the sixth time wholly past. 45. The seventh time begins with Enoch, [Read the 35th question of the Forty Questions of the Soul] viz. with the prophetical mouth, who declares the secret wonders of God under all the six times;
2laying open what should be [and have been] done, and brings itself all along quite from under the veil of Noah, Abraham, and Moses, even into the kingdom of Christ, where this same prophetical spirit is translated in Christ's spirit, till the end of the sixth time; then he manifests himself in the number of the triple cross. When the triple cross does manifest itself then stands the right triple crown upon the cross. And even then the Enochian prophet's mouth does express and speak forth the great wonders of the triple cross; that is, he speaks no more magically [viz. in types and parables], but shows the holy Trinity in the figure, viz. the formed word of God in all visible things, and reveals all mysteries, within and without. 46. And even then is the time when Enoch, and the children under his voice, do lead a divine life, of which the first life of Enoch was a type. And then there is a blessed and golden year, till Enoch's last translation comes. And then the turba is born, which, when it shall enkindle its fire, the floor shall be purged, for it is the end of all time.
347. Enoch begat Methuselah, who was the man of the longest age, and was translated three hundred years after. This intimates and declares, that the spirit which in Enoch did bring forth a twig, viz. Methuselah, who attained the highest age, shall rule in the last and highest age [of the world], and in the meanwhile hide itself before that time, and remain as it were translated; as Enoch was translated, and was no more seen. 48. His translation was not a dying, or a putting off of nature and creature, but he went into the Mystery, between the spiritual and the outward world, viz. into Paradise; and is the prophetical root, out of the stem of Adam, in the line of the Covenant, out of which spirit the prophetical mouth afterwards spoke. 49. This spirit was translated in Christ's living voice, when it spoke in the flesh, and must be silent till the voice of Jared is finished; then he proceeds forth again from his first root, through all voices, viz. through the voice of Noah, who denounces the deluge of anger to come upon Babel, and through the stock of Noah, and the whole forth- spreading propagation of his tree through all the lines, viz. through the Heathenish [Ham's], Japhetical, and Sem's line, and through Abraham's, and Nimrod's children in Babel, through Moses, and the prophets; and lastly through the voice of the manifested Word in the spirit of Christ; and reveals the whole mystery of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
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.
1And denotes the time when the triple cross does open and declare itself in the voice of Enoch, as a manifestation of the holy Trinity, to make known the same in the figure and similitude in all visible things. Moreover, it denotes the conquest of the sword of the Cherub in Babel, when the force and violence of the city, Babel, turns its sword with the point downwards. Thirdly, it denotes the great rod and punishment upon Babel, which rod does mightily advance its power on high. Fourthly, it denotes the wrathful enkindled fire of God's anger, which shall devour the sword and rod. This will be the end of the sixth time. The threefold cross does betoken the time when this shall come to pass [or be fulfilled]. When the kingdom of Christ shall attain such a number, then is the sixth time wholly past. 45. The seventh time begins with Enoch, [Read the 35th question of the Forty Questions of the Soul] viz. with the prophetical mouth, who declares the secret wonders of God under all the six times;
2laying open what should be [and have been] done, and brings itself all along quite from under the veil of Noah, Abraham, and Moses, even into the kingdom of Christ, where this same prophetical spirit is translated in Christ's spirit, till the end of the sixth time; then he manifests himself in the number of the triple cross. When the triple cross does manifest itself then stands the right triple crown upon the cross. And even then the Enochian prophet's mouth does express and speak forth the great wonders of the triple cross; that is, he speaks no more magically [viz. in types and parables], but shows the holy Trinity in the figure, viz. the formed word of God in all visible things, and reveals all mysteries, within and without. 46. And even then is the time when Enoch, and the children under his voice, do lead a divine life, of which the first life of Enoch was a type. And then there is a blessed and golden year, till Enoch's last translation comes. And then the turba is born, which, when it shall enkindle its fire, the floor shall be purged, for it is the end of all time.
347. Enoch begat Methuselah, who was the man of the longest age, and was translated three hundred years after. This intimates and declares, that the spirit which in Enoch did bring forth a twig, viz. Methuselah, who attained the highest age, shall rule in the last and highest age [of the world], and in the meanwhile hide itself before that time, and remain as it were translated; as Enoch was translated, and was no more seen. 48. His translation was not a dying, or a putting off of nature and creature, but he went into the Mystery, between the spiritual and the outward world, viz. into Paradise; and is the prophetical root, out of the stem of Adam, in the line of the Covenant, out of which spirit the prophetical mouth afterwards spoke. 49. This spirit was translated in Christ's living voice, when it spoke in the flesh, and must be silent till the voice of Jared is finished; then he proceeds forth again from his first root, through all voices, viz. through the voice of Noah, who denounces the deluge of anger to come upon Babel, and through the stock of Noah, and the whole forth- spreading propagation of his tree through all the lines, viz. through the Heathenish [Ham's], Japhetical, and Sem's line, and through Abraham's, and Nimrod's children in Babel, through Moses, and the prophets; and lastly through the voice of the manifested Word in the spirit of Christ; and reveals the whole mystery of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
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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