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KABALA
[Transcript of a MS. in H.P.B.’s handwriting, in the Adyar Archives. Bracketed queries are to indicate that the word immediately before it is illegible in the MS. and may not be so; some blank spaces with queries in them indicate that the word or words are for the present entirely illegible.—Compiler.]
The origin of the Kabala has been placed by some authors later than Christianity—but it goes a great deal more[?] in antiquity. The book of Daniel lacks all traces of it. The idea of Emanation is, so to speak, the soul, the essential element of the Kabala; it is as Zoroastrians, they took their ideas from Persia.
According to Kabala and Zoroaster all that exists has emanated from the source of the Infinite Light.
This King of Light is all. He is the real cause of all existence; He is the infinite Ensoph. He alone is He. There is in him no Thou, but he cannot be known, he is “a closed Eye.” The universe is the revelation of the King of Light and only subsists in him. His qualities are manifested in it variously modified and in various degrees, it is therefore his holy splendour, a mantle wherewith he must be clad in silence. All is an emanation from his being, the nearer to him the purer, the farther the more impure. Before the creation the Primal Light filled all, so that there was no void at all; but when the Supreme Being, residing within this light, resolved to display his perfections in the worlds; he retired within himself and formed around him a void space. Into this void he let fall his 1st Emanation, a ray of Light which is the cause and principle of all existence 352uniting in itself the generative and conceptive force (hermaphrodite the reason why) being father and mother in the sublimest secrecy pervading, without which nothing can subsist.
From this double form, designated by the two first letters of the name of Jehovah, emanated the first form[?] of God, the Tikkun, the universal form[?] and idea and the general container of all beings united with the Infinite by means of the primal ray. He is the Creator, the Preserver, the prime animator of the world. He is the Light of Light possessing the three primitive forces of the divinity; the light, the spirit and the life. Inasmuch as he has received what he gives, this light and the life, he is considered as equally a generative and a conceptive principle, as the primitive man Adam Kadmon, and so man is called the world “or Microcosm of the Macrocosm.” Adam Kadmon has manifested himself in ten emanations, which are not indeed actual beings, but forms[?] of life, vessels of almighty power, types of the creation. They are the Crown, Wisdom, Prudence, Magnificence, Severity, Beauty, Victory, Glory, Foundation, Empire. To Wisdom they gave the name Jah, to Prudence Jehovah, to Magnificence El; to severity, Elohim; to Victory and Glory, Zabaoth; to Empire Adonai. These are all the attributes of Supreme Being displayed in his works by which it is possible to know and to conceive Him. The Kabalists give them other titles besides. The synonym of Crown is Oa, Light-Wisdom, Nous and Logos, Gnostic Sophia. She takes also Four[?] ? ? ? Eden anger according to passions which actuate her. Prudence is the river flowing out of Paradise the source of the oil of unction. Magnificence? Severity: bad and black fire; Beauty: colour green and yellow. Beauty’s emblem is illuminating mirror and its title Husband[?] of the Church. Victory is Jehovah Zabaoth, its symbol, right column (the pillar Jochin); Glory, left column (the pillar Boaz) called too the old serpent, also Cherubim and Seraphim, correspond with ? ophis [of his?] and later systems. Foundation and Severity are the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Noah, Solomon, Messiah; all terms effecting [?] ? the eternal 353alliance subsisting between the Supreme Being and all that emanates from him. — He brought ? into himself the souls that have lost their original purity. Empire is the consuming fire, the wife, the Church. The relations of the Sephiroth or Aeons, to one another the Cabalists represent by a number of circles intersecting in a mysterious manner ad infinitum, or else[?] by the figure of a man or a tree formed out of such circles. This figure of man, Sin Anpin, consists of 2 4 3 numbers, the numerical value. The Assyrian armies were always accompanied by the Magi carrying the Fire, the visible presence of the Deity in which the idols of the conquered nations were consumed “smoke or fire pillars preceded the Assyrian armies” says Movers,[1] and in the Exodus from Egypt the Lord went before the Israelites “a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.”
Idea of ancient Creator took up his abode in the Sun. As Sun God his portion was Osiris. Earth Goddess ? the moon. ? ? God of Heaven (Berith) and his goddess Berouth (Isis), but in higher philosophical conception knows himself god, male and female. Moses took up this idea and euhemerizing it put it in Adam and Eve, Heaven and Earth, Adam (Ahot) and Eve (Hoh) “Thou says ? the stages to the one Great King above all gods are passed through and no goddess remains to impart the aspect of Modern ? There is Æther Matres and Æther Light (the Spirit).
? also taught sorcery (Enoch Book ? See Deuteron., (V. VI. 22-26) [prob. chapter V is meant!]
Moses Exodus, XXIV, 17.
It’s both fire philosophy and fire theology.
Moses sees God in the burning bush. The lower orders addicted to the Apis-worship. Moses was engaged in the fire worship on the Mount. “The Lord spoke to you in Horeb out of the midst of the midst of the fire.” Deut., IV, 15.
“Did ever people hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou hast heard, and live?” Deut., 354IV, 33. “The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire” (?) “The Lord said unto Moses, Take all the heads of the people, and hang them up before the Lord AGAINST THE SUN (?), that the fierce anger of the Lord may be turned away from Israel.” Numbers, XXV, 4. The Jews at heart kept no images of gods and? embodied splendid symbols and conceptions and the Christians have idols without any meaning to them.
Iao, Abraxas, Adonai Holy Name Holy Powers, defend from every Evil-Spirit: ΑΒΛΑΝΑΘΑΒΛΕ “Thou art my father—СЕМЕС ЄΙΛΑΜ Sun. CABAW— Glory unto thee IAWABPACAE
Footnotes
- ↑ [Franz Carl Movers, (1806-1856) German Roman Catholic divine, and Orientalist.]