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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.
111. For he said, blessed be the God of Shem, and let Canaan be his servant: God enlarge Japheth, and let him dwell in the tents of Shem. The God of Shem was he who had espoused or incorporated himself with the Covenant in the seed of the woman; the figure and type of this (in the spirit) was Shem; and Japheth was the figure of the poor soul captivated in the monster; God should let this Japhethical (or soul's) property, dwell in the tents of Shem, and enlarge it in Shem's figure. 12. But Ham's figure (according to the monstrous spirit) should not have any dominion or reign in the life of the new birth, but be only as a servant or as an instrument, without self-will or any peculiar life of selfness, [and] must serve and administer to the use of the spiritual kingdom; in manner as the night is hidden in the day, and yet 'tis really there, and yet so as if it were not; and it is the handmaid to the day's operation and power. 13. Thus in like manner the spirit did express how the three properties of the humanity, viz. the woman's seed, and the creatural soul's seed, and the earthly seed in Ham's figure, should stand in their place order and rule in the regeneration in the spiritual kingdom; and thereby it did declare and point at the kingdoms of the world, intimating that this same figure would all along put forth itself in
2the kingdom and dominion of the humanity 1 upon the earth, and thus keep its figure externally, so long as mankind should live in the dominion of the four elements; as it has thus fallen out. 1 Or mankind. 14. For Shem's figure passed in the Covenant upon Abraham and Israel, among whom the Word of the Covenant was manifested and spoken forth; and Japheth's figure went along in nature, viz. through the wisdom of nature in the kingdom of nature; whence the Gentiles arose, who looked upon the light of nature, and Shem's lineage looked upon the light in the Covenant. Thus Japheth, that is, the poor captive soul which is of the eternal nature, dwelt in Shem's tent, viz. under the Covenant; for the light of nature dwells in the light of grace, and is a tenant or inhabitant of the light of grace, viz. of God's light, it is even as a form of framed substance of the unformed uncomprehended light of God. 15. And Ham's line passed upon the animal bestial man, proceeded from the limus of the earth, in which was the curse; whence the Sodomitical and almost wholly brutish people did arise; who esteemed neither the light of nature, nor the light of grace in the Covenant.
316. This signifies and points out the outward part of the soul from the spirit of this world; which, in the regeneration in the spiritual world, shall be a formed and very fixed will; which may not or desires not to rule in the manner and condition of a selfish peculiar spirit; but shall be as a servant and minister of the creatural soul and God's spirit in the holy light's image; it shall not be manifest in any self-full arrogative understanding of selfhood, but remain hidden, as the night is hidden in the day; and yet it is really there. 17. For the animal soul shall not inherit the kingdom of light; although it shall and will be therein; yet it has no dominion [or predominant virtue of its selfness]. As an instrument is a dead senseless thing in reference to the master, and yet it is the master's tool wherewith he makes what he pleases; the same in like manner we are to understand concerning the animal soul in the regeneration. 18. But in the time of the four elements it will have the upper hand and sway, for it has brought itself into a proper selfhood and imaginative life of selfish propriety; and therefore God has accursed it, and condemned it to death, so that it must die to selfhood. 19. For when Adam in his desire did awaken the earthly properties out of the limus of the earth, so that they went forth out of their just accord and mutual harmony, each of them into its own self-will and lust, to behold and look upon its selfas a peculiar selflife;
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.
111. For he said, blessed be the God of Shem, and let Canaan be his servant: God enlarge Japheth, and let him dwell in the tents of Shem. The God of Shem was he who had espoused or incorporated himself with the Covenant in the seed of the woman; the figure and type of this (in the spirit) was Shem; and Japheth was the figure of the poor soul captivated in the monster; God should let this Japhethical (or soul's) property, dwell in the tents of Shem, and enlarge it in Shem's figure. 12. But Ham's figure (according to the monstrous spirit) should not have any dominion or reign in the life of the new birth, but be only as a servant or as an instrument, without self-will or any peculiar life of selfness, [and] must serve and administer to the use of the spiritual kingdom; in manner as the night is hidden in the day, and yet 'tis really there, and yet so as if it were not; and it is the handmaid to the day's operation and power. 13. Thus in like manner the spirit did express how the three properties of the humanity, viz. the woman's seed, and the creatural soul's seed, and the earthly seed in Ham's figure, should stand in their place order and rule in the regeneration in the spiritual kingdom; and thereby it did declare and point at the kingdoms of the world, intimating that this same figure would all along put forth itself in
2the kingdom and dominion of the humanity 1 upon the earth, and thus keep its figure externally, so long as mankind should live in the dominion of the four elements; as it has thus fallen out. 1 Or mankind. 14. For Shem's figure passed in the Covenant upon Abraham and Israel, among whom the Word of the Covenant was manifested and spoken forth; and Japheth's figure went along in nature, viz. through the wisdom of nature in the kingdom of nature; whence the Gentiles arose, who looked upon the light of nature, and Shem's lineage looked upon the light in the Covenant. Thus Japheth, that is, the poor captive soul which is of the eternal nature, dwelt in Shem's tent, viz. under the Covenant; for the light of nature dwells in the light of grace, and is a tenant or inhabitant of the light of grace, viz. of God's light, it is even as a form of framed substance of the unformed uncomprehended light of God. 15. And Ham's line passed upon the animal bestial man, proceeded from the limus of the earth, in which was the curse; whence the Sodomitical and almost wholly brutish people did arise; who esteemed neither the light of nature, nor the light of grace in the Covenant.
316. This signifies and points out the outward part of the soul from the spirit of this world; which, in the regeneration in the spiritual world, shall be a formed and very fixed will; which may not or desires not to rule in the manner and condition of a selfish peculiar spirit; but shall be as a servant and minister of the creatural soul and God's spirit in the holy light's image; it shall not be manifest in any self-full arrogative understanding of selfhood, but remain hidden, as the night is hidden in the day; and yet it is really there. 17. For the animal soul shall not inherit the kingdom of light; although it shall and will be therein; yet it has no dominion [or predominant virtue of its selfness]. As an instrument is a dead senseless thing in reference to the master, and yet it is the master's tool wherewith he makes what he pleases; the same in like manner we are to understand concerning the animal soul in the regeneration. 18. But in the time of the four elements it will have the upper hand and sway, for it has brought itself into a proper selfhood and imaginative life of selfish propriety; and therefore God has accursed it, and condemned it to death, so that it must die to selfhood. 19. For when Adam in his desire did awaken the earthly properties out of the limus of the earth, so that they went forth out of their just accord and mutual harmony, each of them into its own self-will and lust, to behold and look upon its selfas a peculiar selflife;
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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