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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.
125. For as Isaac took hold of his son Jacob in his hairy skin, and felt whether he was his first-born son to whom the blessing belonged, so God the Father reached into the essence of his Son, Christ, and felt whether the humanity of Christ were the first image created in Adam; whence the agony seized on him in the Mount of Olivet, that he sweat bloody sweat, of which Isaiah speaks plainly, He took on him our grief. 26. And as Isaac found outwardly only Esau's skin on jacob, and inwardly heard Jacob's voice, and yet blessed him instead of Esau, as if he were Esau; so likewise God the Father found our rugged human property on Christ, and yet inwardly he heard that the voice of God sounded in him; that the divine heavenly ens was within, under his assumed humanity. Therefore also his voice did, in his Baptism in Jordan, rest upon him, when he blessed our humanity, in that he said, This is my beloved son, hear you him.
227. So likewise Isaac heard indeed the voice of Jacob uoder the hairy skin, and understood that it was not Esau; but the spirit in his blessing did yet forcibly pass upon him; for he proved in him the incorporated ground of the Covenant, viz. the line of the new humanity. For he said, The voice it Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau (v. 22). In which the spirit intimates, that in Jacob, and all the children of God in flesh and blood, there is even the first depraved bestial Adamical man, with his hairy skin, which God does not look upon; but only the divine voice, which is one spirit with God, does inhabit in the inward soulish man. 28. And then we see in this figure that our beast's skin in flesh and blood, wherewith we do so pride ourselves and make devout shows before God, is only a deceit; as Jacob in this beast's hide stood as a deceiver before his father, and would blind his father with the beast's skin. So likewise the earthly man comes in his bestial property before God, and desires God's blessing: but he may not obtain it, unless he has Jacob's, viz. Christ's, voice in him, under this beast's skin.
329. For, as Jacob was smooth and pure under this beast's skin, so must we be smooth, pure and holy in our inward ground 1 under this our beast's skin, if we will have the blessing of God to light and rest upon us. For we see very well in this figure that the blessing would not rest upon Esau, who had by nature a rugged hairy beast's skin in his essence, although he was the first-born to whom the blessing belonged by right of inheritance. For the first man was become depraved in his nature and had lost the inheritance of God. The blessing and the filial inheritance rests only upon the Second New Adam. 1 Of the heart and soul. 30. Further, this figure denotes, that the new man in Christ should take away the sceptre and might from the devil, and also from the man of sin; and in this blessing rule over him in power, as Jacob was made lord over his enemies: This figure points wholly at Christ. 31. For as Jacob took a strange form on him, and came in strange attire before his father, and desired the blessing of him, and also obtained it; so Christ, viz. the eternal Word, took on him also a strange form, viz. our humanity, and brought the same before his Father to bless it.
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.
125. For as Isaac took hold of his son Jacob in his hairy skin, and felt whether he was his first-born son to whom the blessing belonged, so God the Father reached into the essence of his Son, Christ, and felt whether the humanity of Christ were the first image created in Adam; whence the agony seized on him in the Mount of Olivet, that he sweat bloody sweat, of which Isaiah speaks plainly, He took on him our grief. 26. And as Isaac found outwardly only Esau's skin on jacob, and inwardly heard Jacob's voice, and yet blessed him instead of Esau, as if he were Esau; so likewise God the Father found our rugged human property on Christ, and yet inwardly he heard that the voice of God sounded in him; that the divine heavenly ens was within, under his assumed humanity. Therefore also his voice did, in his Baptism in Jordan, rest upon him, when he blessed our humanity, in that he said, This is my beloved son, hear you him.
227. So likewise Isaac heard indeed the voice of Jacob uoder the hairy skin, and understood that it was not Esau; but the spirit in his blessing did yet forcibly pass upon him; for he proved in him the incorporated ground of the Covenant, viz. the line of the new humanity. For he said, The voice it Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau (v. 22). In which the spirit intimates, that in Jacob, and all the children of God in flesh and blood, there is even the first depraved bestial Adamical man, with his hairy skin, which God does not look upon; but only the divine voice, which is one spirit with God, does inhabit in the inward soulish man. 28. And then we see in this figure that our beast's skin in flesh and blood, wherewith we do so pride ourselves and make devout shows before God, is only a deceit; as Jacob in this beast's hide stood as a deceiver before his father, and would blind his father with the beast's skin. So likewise the earthly man comes in his bestial property before God, and desires God's blessing: but he may not obtain it, unless he has Jacob's, viz. Christ's, voice in him, under this beast's skin.
329. For, as Jacob was smooth and pure under this beast's skin, so must we be smooth, pure and holy in our inward ground 1 under this our beast's skin, if we will have the blessing of God to light and rest upon us. For we see very well in this figure that the blessing would not rest upon Esau, who had by nature a rugged hairy beast's skin in his essence, although he was the first-born to whom the blessing belonged by right of inheritance. For the first man was become depraved in his nature and had lost the inheritance of God. The blessing and the filial inheritance rests only upon the Second New Adam. 1 Of the heart and soul. 30. Further, this figure denotes, that the new man in Christ should take away the sceptre and might from the devil, and also from the man of sin; and in this blessing rule over him in power, as Jacob was made lord over his enemies: This figure points wholly at Christ. 31. For as Jacob took a strange form on him, and came in strange attire before his father, and desired the blessing of him, and also obtained it; so Christ, viz. the eternal Word, took on him also a strange form, viz. our humanity, and brought the same before his Father to bless it.
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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