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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.
11 13. And though it cannot be denied, but that the Qates of Qrace still stand open, yet the false and dazzling Light of the outward Reason of the Soul so deceived and hindered such Men, that they suppose they have the Pearl , while they yet live to the Vanity of this World , and dance with the Devil after his Pipe. Chapter V. How a Man may call himself a Christian , and how not. c H ERE therefore a Christian should consider why he calleth himself a Christian , and examine truly whether he be one or not. For surely my learning to kMow and confess that I am a Sinner, and that Christ hath destroyed my Sins on the Cross , and shed His Bloody for me, doth not make me a Christian. 115. The Inheritance belongeth only to the Children. A Maid Servant in a House knoweth well enough what the Mistress would have to be done, and yet that maketh her not the Heiress of her Mistress’ Goods. The very Devils know that there is a Of ‘Regeneration . 79 - — — » God, ydt that doth not change them into Angels again. But if the Maid Servant in the House shall be married to the Son of her Mistress, then she may come to inherit her Mistress' Goods And so it is to be understood also in the Matter of being a Christian .
21 16. The Children of the History are not the Heirs of the Goods of Christ , but the legitimate Children, regenerated by the Spirit , of Christ are the only true Heirs . For God said to Abraham , Cast out the Son of the Bondwoman , he shall not inherit with the Son of the Free . For he was a Scorner , and but an Historical Son of the Faith and Spirit of Abraham ; and so long as he continued such a one, h^ was not a true Inheritor of the Faith of Abraham , and therefore God commanded he should be cast out from inheriting his Goods ; which was a Type of the Christen - was to come. 1 17. For*the Promise of Christendom was made to Abraham ; therefore the Type was therf also set forth by two Brethren, Isaac and IshTnael , in order to show how Christendom would behave itsejf, and that two Sorts of Men would be in it, vis,, true Christians and Lip- Christians. Which latter under the Title of Christianity would be but mockers , as Ishmael was and Esau , who also was a Type of the outward Adam , as facob was a Type of Christ , and His true Christendom. 1 18. Thut; every one who will call himself a Christian , must cast out from himself the Son of the Bond - Woman , that is, the earthly Will , and be ever-more killing and destroying it, and not settle it in the Inheritance .
31 19. Nor give the Pearl to the Bestial Man , for him to sport himself with in the outward Light , in the Lust of the Flesh ; but we must with our Father Abraham being the Son of the right Will to Mount Moriah, and be ready in Obedience to God to offer it up, ever in Will dying from Sin in the Death of Christ , giving no Place to the Beast of Vanity in the Kingdom of Christy not suffering it to grow wanton , proud, covetous , envious, and maliciqus. For all these are the Properties of Ishmael the Son of the Bond- Woman, whom Adam begat in his Vanity on the wanton Whore the false Bond-Woman , by the Devils Imagination * out of the earthly Property in Flesh and Blood . 120. This Mocker and Titular Christian is the Son of the false flond- Woman , anji must be cast out; for he shall not possess the Inheritance of Christ in the Kingdom of God. He is not fit, he is but Babel, a Confusion of that one Language into many Languages. He is but a Talker and a Wrangler about the Inheritance; he means to get it to himself by Talking and Wrangling, by the Hypocrisy of his Lips and seeming Holiness, although he is So The Way to Qhrist. no better than a hlood-thirsty^Murderer of his brother Abel, who is the right Heir.
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.
11 13. And though it cannot be denied, but that the Qates of Qrace still stand open, yet the false and dazzling Light of the outward Reason of the Soul so deceived and hindered such Men, that they suppose they have the Pearl , while they yet live to the Vanity of this World , and dance with the Devil after his Pipe. Chapter V. How a Man may call himself a Christian , and how not. c H ERE therefore a Christian should consider why he calleth himself a Christian , and examine truly whether he be one or not. For surely my learning to kMow and confess that I am a Sinner, and that Christ hath destroyed my Sins on the Cross , and shed His Bloody for me, doth not make me a Christian. 115. The Inheritance belongeth only to the Children. A Maid Servant in a House knoweth well enough what the Mistress would have to be done, and yet that maketh her not the Heiress of her Mistress’ Goods. The very Devils know that there is a Of ‘Regeneration . 79 - — — » God, ydt that doth not change them into Angels again. But if the Maid Servant in the House shall be married to the Son of her Mistress, then she may come to inherit her Mistress' Goods And so it is to be understood also in the Matter of being a Christian .
21 16. The Children of the History are not the Heirs of the Goods of Christ , but the legitimate Children, regenerated by the Spirit , of Christ are the only true Heirs . For God said to Abraham , Cast out the Son of the Bondwoman , he shall not inherit with the Son of the Free . For he was a Scorner , and but an Historical Son of the Faith and Spirit of Abraham ; and so long as he continued such a one, h^ was not a true Inheritor of the Faith of Abraham , and therefore God commanded he should be cast out from inheriting his Goods ; which was a Type of the Christen - was to come. 1 17. For*the Promise of Christendom was made to Abraham ; therefore the Type was therf also set forth by two Brethren, Isaac and IshTnael , in order to show how Christendom would behave itsejf, and that two Sorts of Men would be in it, vis,, true Christians and Lip- Christians. Which latter under the Title of Christianity would be but mockers , as Ishmael was and Esau , who also was a Type of the outward Adam , as facob was a Type of Christ , and His true Christendom. 1 18. Thut; every one who will call himself a Christian , must cast out from himself the Son of the Bond - Woman , that is, the earthly Will , and be ever-more killing and destroying it, and not settle it in the Inheritance .
31 19. Nor give the Pearl to the Bestial Man , for him to sport himself with in the outward Light , in the Lust of the Flesh ; but we must with our Father Abraham being the Son of the right Will to Mount Moriah, and be ready in Obedience to God to offer it up, ever in Will dying from Sin in the Death of Christ , giving no Place to the Beast of Vanity in the Kingdom of Christy not suffering it to grow wanton , proud, covetous , envious, and maliciqus. For all these are the Properties of Ishmael the Son of the Bond- Woman, whom Adam begat in his Vanity on the wanton Whore the false Bond-Woman , by the Devils Imagination * out of the earthly Property in Flesh and Blood . 120. This Mocker and Titular Christian is the Son of the false flond- Woman , anji must be cast out; for he shall not possess the Inheritance of Christ in the Kingdom of God. He is not fit, he is but Babel, a Confusion of that one Language into many Languages. He is but a Talker and a Wrangler about the Inheritance; he means to get it to himself by Talking and Wrangling, by the Hypocrisy of his Lips and seeming Holiness, although he is So The Way to Qhrist. no better than a hlood-thirsty^Murderer of his brother Abel, who is the right Heir.
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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