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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 Abraham was now in the spirit, and spoke from his faith's ens in Christ's humanity, and before him stood the type and image of Christ's Deity; and said, in the great humility of the humanity of Christ, Let a little water be fetched, and wash your feet. This is the great humility of Christ, who washed his disciples', viz. his children's, feet (as these three men here were washed), signifying and pointing out that Christ should wash with his blood the feet of God's children, who should be born of these three men, viz. of the Trinity of the Deity; whereby they might come to God. 12. And he bade the three men rest under the tree. This now signifies the Tree of Life, under which God's children should sit down; and then he would bring them a morsel of bread to refresh and comfort their hearts; and afterwards they should go, that is, when Christ has washed his children's feet with his blood, whereby they are able to go to God, viz. the holy Trinity, then he gives them a morsel of bread, that so they may recreate and strengthen their hearts; that is, he gives them the bread of life, viz. his heavenly flesh for food, so that they wax strong, and are able, in the divine power, to go from Abraham's earthly tent through this world in God's anger, to meet the Lord, and bow themselves before him, as this figure signifies.
213. And he says further: for you are therefore come to your servant. Understand it thus: The Holy Trinity was here at this time represented in an image of our humanity, and Abraham stood in the type of the humanity of Christ, even as Christ and his children are in reference to each other; the holy Trinity leads the children of Christ in the divine drawing to the humanity of Christ; and now these three men stood there in our stead before Christ, viz. before the figure; for the Father draws them to Christ, and through Christ to [or in] the Father; they are washed and atoned in Christ, therefore now said Christ to the three men, which God represented to him in his person: Even therefore are you come to your servant. 14. For Christ must be our, viz. these three men's, servant; and God brings his three men, viz. us, who approach unto him, in himself; viz. into the will of the holy Trinity, unto his servant the Man Christ; that so he may wash and feed them; and then they are able with boldness and confidence to come unto the holy triune Deity.
315. And the men said to Abraham, Do as you have said. That is, Christ offers himself to his Father, viz. to the three-one God, for a Servant. Understand, the Word, which the three-one God did inspire into Adam concerning the Bruiser of the Serpent's head, offers itself for a servant unto the three-one God, viz. unto the children who should possess the kingdom of heaven. Now, the triune God says, Do with these, your and my children, as you have said. That is, with these children which are now set before you, for they shall be angels, and you shall thereunto help them, for I am therefore come in them unto you: now do as you have said. 16. Here God fully gave the Man Christ to accomplish the consummation with them, as he had said. And the whole, entire, excellent and holy figure of the new birth is therein emphatically and lively set forth. And it shows how the holy Trinity does delight itself with figures concerning the Word incorporated and inspoken into Adam, and now opened in Abraham's ens of faith; and sets it forth with types, and plays in figures with this Christ, who was to come; where
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 Abraham was now in the spirit, and spoke from his faith's ens in Christ's humanity, and before him stood the type and image of Christ's Deity; and said, in the great humility of the humanity of Christ, Let a little water be fetched, and wash your feet. This is the great humility of Christ, who washed his disciples', viz. his children's, feet (as these three men here were washed), signifying and pointing out that Christ should wash with his blood the feet of God's children, who should be born of these three men, viz. of the Trinity of the Deity; whereby they might come to God. 12. And he bade the three men rest under the tree. This now signifies the Tree of Life, under which God's children should sit down; and then he would bring them a morsel of bread to refresh and comfort their hearts; and afterwards they should go, that is, when Christ has washed his children's feet with his blood, whereby they are able to go to God, viz. the holy Trinity, then he gives them a morsel of bread, that so they may recreate and strengthen their hearts; that is, he gives them the bread of life, viz. his heavenly flesh for food, so that they wax strong, and are able, in the divine power, to go from Abraham's earthly tent through this world in God's anger, to meet the Lord, and bow themselves before him, as this figure signifies.
213. And he says further: for you are therefore come to your servant. Understand it thus: The Holy Trinity was here at this time represented in an image of our humanity, and Abraham stood in the type of the humanity of Christ, even as Christ and his children are in reference to each other; the holy Trinity leads the children of Christ in the divine drawing to the humanity of Christ; and now these three men stood there in our stead before Christ, viz. before the figure; for the Father draws them to Christ, and through Christ to [or in] the Father; they are washed and atoned in Christ, therefore now said Christ to the three men, which God represented to him in his person: Even therefore are you come to your servant. 14. For Christ must be our, viz. these three men's, servant; and God brings his three men, viz. us, who approach unto him, in himself; viz. into the will of the holy Trinity, unto his servant the Man Christ; that so he may wash and feed them; and then they are able with boldness and confidence to come unto the holy triune Deity.
315. And the men said to Abraham, Do as you have said. That is, Christ offers himself to his Father, viz. to the three-one God, for a Servant. Understand, the Word, which the three-one God did inspire into Adam concerning the Bruiser of the Serpent's head, offers itself for a servant unto the three-one God, viz. unto the children who should possess the kingdom of heaven. Now, the triune God says, Do with these, your and my children, as you have said. That is, with these children which are now set before you, for they shall be angels, and you shall thereunto help them, for I am therefore come in them unto you: now do as you have said. 16. Here God fully gave the Man Christ to accomplish the consummation with them, as he had said. And the whole, entire, excellent and holy figure of the new birth is therein emphatically and lively set forth. And it shows how the holy Trinity does delight itself with figures concerning the Word incorporated and inspoken into Adam, and now opened in Abraham's ens of faith; and sets it forth with types, and plays in figures with this Christ, who was to come; where
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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