cosmology
Pleroma
The divine fullness or totality of the highest realm, populated by aeons and divine attributes, contrasted with the deficient material world.
97 passages · 8 traditions
neoplatonism33
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter VIII-b
“Hence, through these things such a corporeal-formed division as you introduce, is demonstrated to be false.
It is, indeed, especially necessary not to propose any thing of this kind; but if this should appear to you to be requisite, yet yo…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter IX-a
“I consider you, therefore, as asking, for it is your inquiry, “ Why, since the Gods dwell in the heavens alone, there are invocations by theurgists of terrestrial and subterranean Gods?
” For 45 what you assert in the beginning is not true…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter XVIII-a
“Your next inquiry doubts, “ how some of the Gods are beneficent, but others malefic .” This opinion, therefore, is assumed from the predictors of nativities.
It is, however, entirely remote from the truth.
For all the Gods are good, and i…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter XIX-a
“In the next place, therefore, we shall answer your question, “ What it is which conjoins the Gods that have a body in the heavens with the incorporeal Gods.
” What this is, therefore, is evident from what has been before said.
For 72 if t…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter XIX-b
“And secondary genera, indeed, remain with invariable sameness in the one of such as are primary; but the primary impart from themselves union to the secondary genera, and all of them possess in each other the communion of an indissoluble co…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter VI
“Moreover, after it has conjoined the soul to the several parts of the universe, and to the total divine powers which pass through it; then it leads the soul to, and deposits it in, the whole Demiurgus, and causes it to be independent of all…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter VIII-g
“So that all things are full of divine natures; terrestrial natures receiving the plenitude of such as are celestial, but celestial of supercelestial essences; while every order of things proceeds gradually, in a beautiful descent, from the…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter VIII-j
“the connective, perfective, demiurgic, assimilative, and such others as are celebrated posterior to these; so that all are in all, and yet each is at the same time separate and distinct.
“Indeed we obtain this knowledge of their union and…”
Iamblichus: On the Mysteries | Chapter VIII-ac
“The nature of the one , as it is all-receptive , and all-productive ( πανδεχης και παντοφυης ) exhibits in itself a certain representation and indication of multitude; for it is all things prior to all.
40 .
For the Gods are essentialized…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 102
“Section 3 3. The truth may be resumed in this way: There is a lowest power of the Soul, a nearest to earth, and this is interwoven throughout the entire universe: another phase possesses sensation, while yet another includes the Reason whic…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 147
“Section 2 2. But we must enquire into Quality in itself: to know its nature is certainly the way to settle our general question. The first point is to assure ourselves whether or not one and the same thing may be held to be sometimes a mere…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 159
“Section 3 3. Ever illuminated, receiving light unfailing, the All-Soul imparts it to the entire series of later Being which by this light is sustained and fostered and endowed with the fullest measure of life that each can absorb. It may be…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 168 (part 1)
“Section 12 12.
And how does this image set to its task immediately after it comes into being?
By memory of what it has seen?
But it was utterly non-existent, it could have no vision, either it or the Mother they bestow upon it.
Another…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 168 (part 2)
“The theory, therefore, refers the entire process to pre-existing compulsions: the guilt inheres in the Primal Beings.…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 190
“Section 3 3. Nor would it be sound to condemn this Kosmos as less than beautiful, as less than the noblest possible in the corporeal; and neither can any charge be laid against its source. The world, we must reflect, is a product of Necessi…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 256
“Section 4 4. We must, however, avoid thinking of it as an accidental from outside grafted upon that Nature: it is native to it, integral to it. It is discerned as present essentially in that Nature like everything else that we can predicate…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 258 (part 1)
“Section 6 6.
Now the Principle this stated, all good and beauty, and everlasting, is centred in The One, sprung from It, and pointed towards It, never straying from It, but ever holding about It and in It and living by Its law; and it is i…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 263 (part 1)
“Section 11 11.
To this end we must go back to the state we affirmed of Eternity, unwavering Life, undivided totality, limitless, knowing no divagation, at rest in unity and intent upon it.
Time was not yet: or at least it did not exist fo…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 280 (part 1)
“Section 3 3.
(A)...
How, then, does Unity give rise to Multiplicity?
By its omnipresence: there is nowhere where it is not; it occupies, therefore, all that is; at once, it is manifold- or, rather, it is all things.
If it were simply an…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 424
“Section 8 8. This is the explanation of Plato's Triplicity, in the passage where he names as the Primals the Beings gathered about the King of All, and establishes a Secondary containing the Secondaries, and a Third containing the Tertiarie…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 456
“Section 3 3. Thus we have here one identical Principle, the Intellect, which is the universe of authentic beings, the Truth: as such it is a great god or, better, not a god among gods but the Godhead entire. It is a god, a secondary god man…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 488
“Section 10 10. This is why Zeus, although the oldest of the gods and their sovereign, advances first [in the Phaidros myth] towards that vision, followed by gods and demigods and such souls as are of strength to see. That Being appears befo…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 495
“Section 3 3. We will have to examine this Nature, the Intellectual, which our reasoning identifies as the authentically existent and the veritable essential: but first we must take another path and make certain that such a principle does ne…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 497 (part 1)
“Section 5 5.
This Intellectual-Principle, if the term is to convey the truth, must be understood to be not a principle merely potential and not one maturing from unintelligence to intelligence- that would simply send us seeking, once more,…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 509
“Section 1 1. Philosophy at a very early stage investigated the number and character of the Existents. Various theories resulted: some declared for one Existent, others for a finite number, others again for an infinite number, while as regar…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 512 (part 1)
“Section 4 4.
We are told that number is Quantity in the primary sense, number together with all continuous magnitude, space and time: these are the standards to which all else that is considered as Quantity is referred, including motion wh…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 594
“Section 4 4. But how explain beings by the side of Being, and the variety of intelligences and of souls, when Being has the unity of omnipresent identity and not merely that of a species, and when intellect and soul are likewise numerically…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 627
“Section 7 7. It is inevitably necessary to think of all as contained within one nature; one nature must hold and encompass all; there cannot be as in the realm of sense thing apart from thing, here a sun and elsewhere something else; all mu…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 636 (part 2)
“When you enumerate two things- say, animal and beauty- each of these remains one thing; the number is your production; it lay within yourself; it is you that elaborate quantity, here the dyad.
But when you declare virtue to be a Tetrad, yo…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 640 (part 2)
“If then the future is present, it must be present as having been foreconceived for later coming to be; at that divine stage therefore it lacks nothing and therefore can never lack; all existed, eternally and in such a way that at the later…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 642
“Section 3 3. What then is there to prevent man having been the object of planning There? No: all stands in that likeness, nothing to be added or taken away; this planning and reasoning is based only on an assumption; things are taken to be…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 649
“Section 10 10. But failure There? What can defensive horns serve to There? To sufficiency as living form, to completeness. That principle must be complete as living form, complete as Intellect, complete as life, so that if it is not to be o…”
Select Works of Plotinus | Select Works, Section 659
“Section 20 20. Since we are not entitled to make desire the test by which to decide on the nature and quality of the good, we may perhaps have recourse to judgement. We would apply the opposition of things- order, disorder; symmetry, irregu…”
← Collapsegnosticism23
The Secret Writing According to John (Apocryphon of John), Codex II, 1 | Barbelo
“This is because [we do] not [understand unspeakable things, and we] do not understand what [cannot be measured], apart from him who originated [from] him, that is, [the] Father, because he [alone] is the one
who [explained] it to us, given…”
The Secret Writing According to John (Apocryphon of John), Codex II, 1 | The Only-Begotten
“He also peered into Barbelo with the pure light that surrounds the unseen Spirit, and his spark, and from him she conceived. He begot a light- spark by means of a light similar to blessedness, but (the latter) is not equal to his greatness.…”
The Secret Writing According to John (Apocryphon of John), Codex II, 1 | The Four Lights
“[IV, 11] Eternal Life also <with> his Will, and Mind with Precognition, attended and extolled the unseen Spirit and Barbelo, given that they had come into being on her account. The holy Spirit also completed the self- generated God, his Son…”
The Secret Writing According to John (Apocryphon of John), Codex II, 1 | Pigera-Adamas and Seth
“Further, from the Precognition of Perfect Mind, by means of the revelation of the will of the unseen Spirit and the will of the self-generated one, (issued forth) <the> Perfect Man, the first revelation, even the truth.
He is the one whom…”
The Secret Writing According to John (Apocryphon of John), Codex II, 1 | The Mother Repents
“I, however, said: “Lord, what (is) ‘she moved back and forth’?”
And he grinned, and said: “Think not that it agrees with what Moses said, ‘above the waters,’ no!
Instead, when she had witnessed the evil that had occurred, and the theft he…”
The Secret Writing According to John (Apocryphon of John), Codex II, 1 | The Chief Archon Pollutes Eve
“I appeared in the shape of an eagle on the tree of knowledge, which is Reflection of Providence of Pure Light, so that I could instruct them and rouse them out of their deep sleep, because both of them were in a fallen condition, and they w…”
The Secret Writing According to John (Apocryphon of John), Codex II, 1 | The Savior Enters the Realm of Darkness
“Therefore, I, the perfect Providence of the all, transformed myself into my (own) seed, because I was the first to exist, traveling all paths, because I am the wealth of the light.
[IV, 47] I am the remembrance of the Fullness, but I enter…”
Gospel of Judas | Jesus Reveals Everything to Judas-a
“Jesus said, "[Come] and I'll teach you about the [mysteries that no] human [will] see, because there exists a great and boundless realm whose horizons no angelic generation has seen, [in] which is a [great] invisible Spirit, which no [angel…”
Show all 23 →christian_mysticism13
Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names | Chapter 12, Section 1a
“181 CHAPTER XII Concerning ” Holy of holies ,” ” King of kings ,” ” Lord of lords ,” ” God of gods .” 1.
Forasmuch as the things which needed to be said concerning this matter have been brought, I think, to a proper ending, we must praise…”
Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names | Chapter 13, Section 1b
“abundant and inexhaustible supple, whereby It perfects all perfect 498 498 “Perfect,” a term taken from the Mysteries expressing the final state of the initiated.
things and fills them with Its own Perfection.
2.
And the title “One” impl…”
Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names | Chapter 2, Section 1k
“Indeed, He is not an unity in this sense, and doth not participate in unity nor possess it; 224 224 These two phrases well express the meaning of the title “Beyond things and supernally infusing Unity” (ὑπερηνωμένη), which I have generally…”
Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names | Chapter 2, Section 1p
“224 These two phrases well express the meaning of the title “Beyond things and supernally infusing Unity” (ὑπερηνωμένη), which I have generally translated, like ἡνωμένη, as “Undifferenced.” 225 τῇ ἐξ αὐτοῦ θεώσει .
.
.
θεῶν πολλῶν γιγνομ…”
Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names | Chapter 4, Section 1q
“In this passage “Non-Existent” is used in three senses: (1) “Matter,” or force, cannot exist without some form (which is its complement) and therefore is technically called non-existent.
(2) Evil cannot exist at all on the ultimate plane o…”
Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names | Chapter 8, Section 1b
“From this Source come the Godlike Powers of the Angelic Orders; from this Source they immutably possess their being and all the ceaseless and immortal motions of their spiritual life; and their very stability and unfailing desire for the Go…”
Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names | Chapter 9, Section 1a
“162 CHAPTER IX Concerning ” Great ,” ” Small ,” ” Same ,” ” Different ,” ” Like ,” “ Unlike ,” ” Standing ,” ” Motion ,” ” Equality .” 1.
Now , since Greatness and Smallness are ascribed to the Universal Cause, and Sameness and Difference,…”
The Life and Doctrines of Jacob Boehme | Chapter 3 (part 8)
“Without it the form of the spirit would not be knowable; it is the corporeity of the spirit.
To be sure, it is not a bodily, tangible substance, like the bodies of men, but has nevertheless substantial and visible qualities which the spiri…”
Show all 13 →theosophy12
The Secret Doctrine | Page 3 (part 9)
“As may be judged, however, from the most important, as the best known of the Rosicrucians' symbols, there is one which has never been hitherto understood even by modern mystics.
It is that of the "Pelican" tearing open its breast to feed i…”
The Secret Doctrine | Page 5 (part 2)
“Even so of persons and things, which, dropping out of the to-be into the has-been, out of the future into the past -- present momentarily to our senses a cross-section, as it were, of their total selves, as they pass through time and space…”
The Secret Doctrine | Page 8 (part 6)
“The larger lumps coalesce and receive new spawn -- in fiery dots, triangles and cubes, which ripen, and at the appointed time some of the lumps detach themselves and assume spheroidal form, a process which they effect only when not interfer…”
The Secret Doctrine | Page 13 (part 2)
“And the Dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world." The Kabalistic version of the same story is given in the Codex Nazareus, the scripture of the Nazarenes, the real mystic Christians…”
The Secret Doctrine | Page 13 (part 3)
“It is already the outline of the two "Supremes" -- God and Satan.
But in the Stanzas no such idea exists.
Most of the Western Christian Kabalists -- pre-eminently Eliphas Levi -- in their desire to reconcile the Occult Sciences with Churc…”
The Secret Doctrine | Page 26 (part 2)
“Moreover, the modern symbologists and Orientalists -- from first to last -- [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * The Natural Genesis , by Gerald Massey, Vol.
1, p.
340.
[[Vol.
1, Page]] 406 THE SECRET DOCT…”
The Secret Doctrine | Page 27 (part 3)
“Anger, my son, is the destruction of [[Vol.
1, Page]] 416 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
all that man obtains .
.
.
and prevents the attainment of emancipation.
The sages shun wrath.
Be not thou, my child, subject to its influence.
Let not th…”
The Secret Doctrine | Page 29 (part 2)
“First from ONE emanated number TWO, or Air, the creative element; and then number THREE, Water , proceeded from the air; Ether or Fire complete the mystic four, the Arba-il.
(Ibid.) In the Eastern doctrine Fire is the first Element -- Ethe…”
Show all 12 →hermeticism7
Corpus Hermeticum 1: Poimandres | Section 1f
“All this befell me from my Mind, that is Man-Shepherd, Word (Logos) of all masterhood, by whom being God-inspired I came unto the Plain of Truth.
Wherefore with all my soul and strength thanksgiving give I unto Father-God.
31.
Holy art T…”
Corpus Hermeticum 6: The All-Father | Section 1b
“So then, Asclepius, the name alone of Good is found in men, the thing itself nowhere [in them], for this can never be.
For no material body doth contain It - a thing bound on all sides by bad, by labors, pains, desires and passions, by err…”
Corpus Hermeticum 9: The Decalogue | Section 1b
“But I return once more to the Discourse (Logos) on Sense.
That sense doth share with thought in man, doth constitute him man.
But 'tis not [every] man, as I have said, who benefits by thought; for this man is material, that other one subs…”
Corpus Hermeticum 10: The Sermon on the Mount | Section 1f
“But God is o'er them all, and God contains them all.
God's rays, to use a figure, are His energies; the Cosmos's are natures, the arts and sciences are man's.
The energies act through the Cosmos, thence through the nature-rays of Cosmos u…”
Corpus Hermeticum 12: The Prayer | Section 1d
“Now it is units that give birth to number and increase it, and, being decomposed, are taken back again into themselves.
Matter is one; and this whole Cosmos - the mighty God and image of the mightier One, both with Him unified, and the con…”
Corpus Hermeticum 13: The Discourse of Hermes to Tat | Section 1e
“Sing praise, my Self-control; sing thou through me, my Righteousness, the praises of the Righteous; sing thou, my Sharing-all, the praises of the All; through me sing, Truth, Truth's praises!
Sing thou, O Good, the Good!
O Life and Light,…”
Corpus Hermeticum 15: The Hymn of Hermes | Section 1c
“For there are many choirs of daimons round Him, like unto hosts of very various kinds; who though they dwell with mortals, yet are not far from the immortals; but having as their lot from here unto the spaces of the Gods, 2 they watch o’er…”
western_esoteric5
The Secret Teachings of All Ages (Manly P. Hall) | The Ancient Mysteries and Secret Societies Which Have Influenced Modern Masonic Symbolism-m
“Of these shoots one is manifested from above, which is the Great Power, the Universal Mind ordering all things, male, and the other, [is manifested] from below, the Great Thought, female, producing all things.
Hence pairing with each other…”
The Secret Teachings of All Ages (Manly P. Hall) | Fundamentals of Qabbalistic Cosmogony-f
“From C 2 came C 3, the third Understanding; the Hierarchy is the Thrones, Aralim , the Mighty Ones.
From C 3 came C 4, the third Mercy; the Hierarchy is the Dominations, Chashmalim , the Brilliant Ones.
From C 4 came C 5, the third Severi…”
Tertium Organum (P.D. Ouspensky) | Chapter XXII (part 7)
“Now we have established that illogicality (from our standpoint) is the necessary condition of the knowledge of truth or of the real world.
This does not mean that everything that is illogical is true and real, but it means absolutely, that…”
Tertium Organum (P.D. Ouspensky) | Chapter XXII (part 8)
“Permanency also suffers no change of its nature, because it is not mingled with the unstable.
And the beautiful there is beautiful, because it does not subsist in beauty (as in a subject).
Each thing too is there p.
280 established, not…”
Transcendental Magic I: The Doctrine (Éliphas Lévi) | 3. The Triangle Of Solomon-d
“Matthew, and in several Hebrew copies, as follows: “The sacred word MALKUTH substituted for KETHER, which is its kabalistic correspondent, and the equipoise of GEBURAH and CHESED, repeating itself in the circles of heavens called eons by th…”
biblical2
The Gospel According to John (American Standard Version, 1901) | 1:1-1:29
“[1:1] In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
[1:2] The same was in the beginning with God.
[1:3] All things were made through him; and without him was not anything made that hath been made.
[1:4]…”
The Revelation of John (American Standard Version, 1901) | 21:15-22:8
“[21:15] And he that spake with me had for a measure a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof.
[21:16] And the city lieth foursquare, and the length thereof is as great as the breadth: and he measured t…”
jewish_mysticism2
The Lesser Holy Assembly (Idra Zuta Qadisha) | Idra Zuta, Chapter 1 (part 1)
“CHAPTER VIII.
CONCERNING THE FOREHEAD OF MACROPROSOPUS.
87.
THE forehead of His skull is the acceptation of acceptations, whereunto is opposed the acceptation of Microprosopus, like as it is written, Exod.
xxviii.
38: "And it shall be…”
Sefer Yetzirah (The Book of Formation) | Section 1f
“The Third Path is the Sanctifying Intelligence, and is the basis of foundation of Primordial Wisdom, which is called the Former of faith, and its roots, Amen; and it is the parent of Faith, from which virtues doth Faith emanate.
The Fourth…”