The Life and Doctrines of Jacob Boehme · 47 of 159 · tr. Franz Hartmann
Chapter 5 (part 11)
Man must know evil for the purpose of becoming able to realise the good, after which he returns to the latter; but as everything seeks for its own corresponding principle, he in whom evil has become paramount will remain in evil.
p.
121 "Behold a thistle or a nettle.
The more sunshine and power they receive, the more stings will they produce.
Thus, if God pours His love into the devil, the products of the devil are anger and hate." (See Grace , iv.
37.) An end of the hellish torment 1 is inconceivable.
Such an end would involve either a change of Lucifer's pride into humility, or a destruction of the whole work of creation.
"If Lucifer were again to become an angel, to become such he would have to draw again from the unity and love of God; his fire-life would have to be consumed by love, and to be changed into humility; but this the hellish foundation (the will) in the devils refuses to permit." ( Theosophical Questions , vii.
5.) "The hellish essence, having an eternal foundation, the will cannot perish, unless the whole of creation would cease to exist and eternal nature in her own loveliness be extinguished.
But in this case the kingdom of joy would be equally lost." ( Theosophical Questions , v.
3.) 2 Footnotes 101:1 Whether we call them by those names, or whether we adopt the names by which they are called in other theologies, will be of no consequence, and not alter the fact that such powers exist.
102:1 Jehovah.
109:1 Therefore no man can resist, successfully resist the devil by fighting him on the same level, nor can any one overcome temptations in the end except by rising above them.
111:1 To "desire the Nothing" does not mean to become unconscious of everything, like a man when he goes to sleep, but it means "contentment," and a state of perfect rest and happiness found in the self-consciousness of being and possessing the All.
113:1 True humility does not consist in self-abasement, but in the entire sacrifice of one's lower self, whereby the power and the majesty of God become revealed in man.
114:1 Hell is created in man by the awakening of his lower qualities, whereby they attain self-consciousness and self-will, and refuse to obey the divine will in man.
115:1 The same is the case with every one who turns away from the light and seeks the darkness, until at last he becomes identified with the darkness, and can no longer separate himself from it.
117:1 It must not be supposed that the good angels "made up their minds" to fight Lucifer, but this separation was according to natural laws, in the same sense as water is opposed to fire.
118:1 The good which we receive is not recognised, because it causes no pain.
No one complains about receiving more blessings than he merits; but the deserved evil which we receive causes suffering, and the unmerited evil is keenly resented.
121:1 The word "torment" means here not necessarily "pain," but "consciousness." The "devil" does not suffer as long as he is in his own element.
121:2 That which has become self-conscious in evil cannot be changed into good without first becoming unconscious of its own evil self; but if the being is wholly evil, such a complete death would also prevent the possibility of its becoming conscious of good.
The transformation of base substance — outer matter or the inner soul — into a purified, perfected, or 'gold' state; the magnum opus as both laboratory practice and spiritual allegory.
The transformation of fire-life into humility and love is described as a necessary change for the devil to become an angel.
The Hermetic axiom that the structure of the cosmos is reflected at every scale — 'as above, so below; as within, so without' — making each level a legible map of the others.
The analogy of the thistle and nettle receiving sunshine to produce stings mirrors how divine love produces anger in the devil.
Eckhart's Abgeschiedenheit/Gelassenheit — radical letting-go of will, image, and grasping that opens the soul to God; distinct from inner_silence (quietness) and from material renunciation, and adjacent to Sufi tark and Buddhist non-grasping as a practice rather than a metaphysical claim.
True humility consists in the entire sacrifice of one's lower self to reveal God's power.
The human being as a small-scale image of the entire cosmos; the body, soul, and intellect mirroring the structure of the heavens and the divine — distinct from correspondence in that it makes the human the privileged mirror.
Human internal states (hell, divine will) are described as mirroring cosmic forces and natural laws.
Eckhart's radical reading of Matthew 5:3 — the saint as one who wants nothing, knows nothing, and has nothing, having emptied even the will and the self with which to receive God; distinct from renunciation_of_wealth (material poverty).
True humility involves the entire sacrifice of one's lower self.
The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive.
Lucifer is separated from the unity of God, and man turns away from the light to become identified with darkness.
The doctrine — central to Eastern Orthodox and Maximian theology — that the human person is progressively transformed into a partaker of the divine nature by grace, not merely justified or united in passing ecstasy.
True humility involves the sacrifice of the lower self whereby the power and majesty of God become revealed in man.