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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.
123. And under the other son, Javan, he sets four names, viz. Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim; and he says, that of these fourteen names all the isles and languages of the Gentiles were filled, and that they had their rise and original from hence. These four names do intimate out of the properties of nature, thus much, viz. by the first a good half-angelical will; by the second an introduction of the good will into the wrath of nature, from whence an evil warlike selfness arises; by the third a false understanding, whereby the angelical good will is brought in the selfhood of reason even to be a fool, and sets forth itself with a strange outside lustre; and it signifies the heathenish idolatry whereinto they brought themselves through reason, without God's light, and thereby did set up heathenish idols, and made themselves great kingdoms; so that the spirit of nature has brought them under its power and might, into its own form. And under the name DODANIM the spirit intimates the kingdom of nature in selfhood with its selfly divine service, viz. an external visible God, which may be shown by the pointing of the finger.
224. And under these fourteen names in ]apheth's line the human kingdom of nature is wholly portrayed and typified; and we are in an especial manner to observe, that the angelical will is therein concluded, betokening the wise and deep understanding heathen in the light of nature, in whom the inward holy kingdom did behold itself who (notwithstanding they lay shut up in the true divine understanding, and saw by an external light [or reflex]), in the restitution of all beings, shall, when the covering is taken away, live in Shem's tent, viz. in the formed word of nature, yet in their property. 25. Out of this fourteenth number of the fourteen names of ]apheth came the prophetical and apocaliptical numbers. From which the spirit prophesied how the wonders of nature should open themselves one after another, and what should happen in each degree of their manifestation; which we will here pass over in silence, and mention it in its due place. 26. Under Ham, the spirit brings the greatest intimation of the kingdom of nature, for he fully sets forth the external form of reason, for he says, Ham begat Cush, Mizraim, Put and Canaan. CUSH gives, in the ens of the pregnant generating nature, a signification of a form of sudden conceived, swift ascending lust in selfhood, like to a running, or far and wide domineering and reigning might; and it is the root of the princely government according to the third Principle;
3but Japheth is the same ground [or work] according to the first Principle. 27. MIZRAIM signifies a forth-driving power, which does forthwith comprehend itself again in the lust, in which the centre of nature does go forth all along in a strong through-breaking lust and desire, and breaks open the form of the lust. Intimating unto us the original of the divided tongues, and how the power of the only formed word of the understanding should be divided. 28. The name PUT shows forth, even from the ens of nature, a high city or place whereby the will [of these men] would advance itself on high, in contriving and framing how to build them a high tower. CANAAN signifies a land of lowliness and humility; showing that God would be found in the lowly and humble; and it especially signifies, that this high-flown aspiring will shall be overthrown and cast down. 29. Although the Reader may not be able to understand us in this tongue, yet I set this down only to the end that he may learn to consider and meditate on the great mystery which the spirit of God has signified under these names, from whence such a purpose of a few men did arise, that it is even wholly a mere wonder whence the tongues and speeches do take their rise and original: for the spirit in Moses does set down afterwards, that Cush begat Nimrod, who hegan to be a mighty lord upon the earth; and war a mighty hunter before the Lord.
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.
123. And under the other son, Javan, he sets four names, viz. Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim; and he says, that of these fourteen names all the isles and languages of the Gentiles were filled, and that they had their rise and original from hence. These four names do intimate out of the properties of nature, thus much, viz. by the first a good half-angelical will; by the second an introduction of the good will into the wrath of nature, from whence an evil warlike selfness arises; by the third a false understanding, whereby the angelical good will is brought in the selfhood of reason even to be a fool, and sets forth itself with a strange outside lustre; and it signifies the heathenish idolatry whereinto they brought themselves through reason, without God's light, and thereby did set up heathenish idols, and made themselves great kingdoms; so that the spirit of nature has brought them under its power and might, into its own form. And under the name DODANIM the spirit intimates the kingdom of nature in selfhood with its selfly divine service, viz. an external visible God, which may be shown by the pointing of the finger.
224. And under these fourteen names in ]apheth's line the human kingdom of nature is wholly portrayed and typified; and we are in an especial manner to observe, that the angelical will is therein concluded, betokening the wise and deep understanding heathen in the light of nature, in whom the inward holy kingdom did behold itself who (notwithstanding they lay shut up in the true divine understanding, and saw by an external light [or reflex]), in the restitution of all beings, shall, when the covering is taken away, live in Shem's tent, viz. in the formed word of nature, yet in their property. 25. Out of this fourteenth number of the fourteen names of ]apheth came the prophetical and apocaliptical numbers. From which the spirit prophesied how the wonders of nature should open themselves one after another, and what should happen in each degree of their manifestation; which we will here pass over in silence, and mention it in its due place. 26. Under Ham, the spirit brings the greatest intimation of the kingdom of nature, for he fully sets forth the external form of reason, for he says, Ham begat Cush, Mizraim, Put and Canaan. CUSH gives, in the ens of the pregnant generating nature, a signification of a form of sudden conceived, swift ascending lust in selfhood, like to a running, or far and wide domineering and reigning might; and it is the root of the princely government according to the third Principle;
3but Japheth is the same ground [or work] according to the first Principle. 27. MIZRAIM signifies a forth-driving power, which does forthwith comprehend itself again in the lust, in which the centre of nature does go forth all along in a strong through-breaking lust and desire, and breaks open the form of the lust. Intimating unto us the original of the divided tongues, and how the power of the only formed word of the understanding should be divided. 28. The name PUT shows forth, even from the ens of nature, a high city or place whereby the will [of these men] would advance itself on high, in contriving and framing how to build them a high tower. CANAAN signifies a land of lowliness and humility; showing that God would be found in the lowly and humble; and it especially signifies, that this high-flown aspiring will shall be overthrown and cast down. 29. Although the Reader may not be able to understand us in this tongue, yet I set this down only to the end that he may learn to consider and meditate on the great mystery which the spirit of God has signified under these names, from whence such a purpose of a few men did arise, that it is even wholly a mere wonder whence the tongues and speeches do take their rise and original: for the spirit in Moses does set down afterwards, that Cush begat Nimrod, who hegan to be a mighty lord upon the earth; and war a mighty hunter before the Lord.
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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