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CAPÍTULO VI

 

            NOW, the Mosaic synonyms for substance, whether in reference to the invisible “heavens” or the visible universe, are the “deep” and the “waters.” In man it is called the “woman” and also “water,” and implies the soul, this being the substance and “mother” of the real as distinguished from the apparent man. Hence the Church also, as representing the soul collective of man, is called the “woman.” And throughout the Bible, whenever Deity is exhibited as operating on behalf of any cosmic entity, be it the universe, a system, a planet, or an individual person, and whether for its physical generation or spiritual regeneration, the process is always described as, in some mode, the moving of the spirit, or energy, of God, upon the face of the waters, or substance, of God; the resultant, which completes their trinity and accomplishes their manifestation, being according to the plane of activity concerned. Of the various planes of activity, the last and lowest, the physical, occurs through the coagulation, exteriorly, of the substance assigned for that plane – namely, the astral ether – in such wise that it becomes in the outermost matter. And this is occultly indicated in the saying, “by the gathering together, or coagulation, of the waters, the dry land – earth or matter – appears”; though the same words are forthwith used in a different and more obvious sense. And inasmuch as energy and substance are, whatever the plane, modes of Deity in operation, and Deity in operation is called Holy Spirit, all things consist of Holy Spirit.

            According to the Bible cosmogony, the constitution of things is fourfold, whether for the macrocosm or the microcosm; and the four are, for the former, energy, substance, astral ether, and matter; and for the latter their organic correspondences, spirit, soul, mind, and

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body. This fourfold existence constitutes what is called the “vehicle” in which Deity descends into manifestation, and is implied in the fourfold river of Eden, the four men in the ark of Noah, the fourfold car of Ezekiel, the four living creatures of Ezekiel and the Apocalypse, and the number and character of the gospels, the four elements also being sometimes implied. And, in accordance with this manifold nature of existence, the mystical Scriptures have a manifold meaning and application which, when referring to the spiritual and intellectual only, is dual; when referring to the four divisions just enumerated, is quadruple; and when referring to the spheres of the seven actuating principles or “gods” by which the kosmos is elaborated, is septuple. Thus, when read with this key, the first chapter of Genesis, so far from dealing exclusively, or even primarily, with the physical world, proves to have a quadruple significance, in that it describes four orders of generation – that of the creative Elohim, sephiroth, gods, or principles subsisting in original being; that of the kingdom of heaven , or spiritual world; that of the visible universe; and that of the Church of Christ; all of which are necessarily described in terms derived from the physical plane.

            While fourfold as to composition, every kosmic entity – whether an individual or a universe – owes its elaboration to a sevenfold co-operation – that, namely, of the seven divine potencies just mentioned, who subsist in the original unity as the seven rays of the prism in light; and, like light, they find manifestation on their emergence from the prism constituted by the Trinity, on the passage of Deity into activity or procession of the Holy Ghost, of which they are the immediate differentiations. These are they who are represented in Genesis as saying, “Let us make man in our image,” after they have accomplished the earlier stages of his construction. And as each of them has a part to perform in the elaboration of man, and only when built up of them all is he made in the divine image, the work of each constitutes – whatever the actual period – a “day” or stage in his creation, and the whole a “week.”

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            It is from these that the number seven originally derives its sanctity, and it is to these that reference is made in the Bible whenever that number is used, as it frequently is used in describing the process of man’s spiritual elaboration under the name of Israel. They are at once the seven creative spirits of God, the seven judges of Israel, the seven angels of the churches, the seven golden candlesticks, the seven “planets” or stations of the solar system – those in excess of that number belonging to the second octave, like the notes in music – and the seven great gods of the mythologies. And concerning them the sacred mysteries of antiquity, the basis of the Bible, in a ritual now “miraculously” (1), but none the less orderly, recovered (2) – the method being the rare, but not unknown, one of intuitional or “psychic” recollection – discourse sublimely as follows: –

            “In the bosom of the Eternal were all the Gods comprehended, as the seven spirits of the prism, contained in the Invisible Light ...

            “Except by Three in One, the Spirits of the Invisible Light could not have been made manifest.

            “But now is the prism perfect, and the generation of the Gods discovered in their order ...

            “By the word of Elohim were the seven Elohim manifest:

            “Even the seven Spirits of God, in the order of their precedence:

            “The Spirit of Wisdom, the Spirit of Understanding, the Spirit of Counsel, the Spirit of Power, the

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Spirit of Knowledge, the Spirit of Righteousness, and the Spirit of Divine Awfulness.

            “All these are co-equal and co-eternal.

            “Each has the nature of the whole in itself: and each is a perfect entity.

            “And the brightness of their manifestation shineth forth from the midst of each, as wheel within wheel, encircling the White Throne of the Invisible Trinity in Unity.

            “These are the Divine Fires which burn before the presence of God: which proceed from the Spirit, and are one with the Spirit.

            “He is divided, yet not diminished: He is All, and He is One.

            “For the Spirit of God is as a flame of fire which the Word of God divideth into many: yet the original flame is not decreased, nor the power thereof nor the brightness thereof lessened.

            “Thou mayst light many lamps from the flame of one: yet thou dost in nothing diminish that first flame.

            “Now the Spirit of God is expressed by the Word of God, which is Adonai.

            “For without the Word the Will could have had no utterance.

            “Thus the Divine Will divided the Spirit of God, and the Seven Fires went forth from the bosom of God, and became seven spiritual entities.

            “They went forth into the Divine Substance, which is the substance of all that is.”

 

NOTES

 

(29:1) Defining miracles as the natural effects of exceptional causes, the causes being exceptional only because the persons are rare who have developed the powers to which miracles are due. – E.M.

(29:2) The story of the recovery of this and other rituals is told in The Life of Anna Kingsford. Edward Maitland there says: “In these wondrous chapters we found a synthesis and an analysis combined of the sacred mysteries of all the great religions of antiquity, and the true origines of Christianity as originally and divinely intended, together with the secret and method of its corruption and perversion into that which now bears its name.” (Vol. I, p. 293). – S.H.H.