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ii.) This Biblical riddle -- "the real sense of which no author has ever understood," as candidly confessed by Fourmont** -- can only be explained by the Occult doctrine, through the Zohar to the Western, and the Book of Dzyan to the Eastern. What the former says we have seen; what the Zohar tells us is this: B ' ne-aleim was a name common to the Malachim (the good Messengers) and to the Ischin ("the lower angels") ( Rabbi Parcha ). We may add for the benefit of the demonologists that their Satan, [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * Genesis vi ., v . 4. ** Reflections critiques sur l ' origine des anciens peuples. [[Vol. 2, Page]] 376 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. "the adversary," is included in Job among the sons of God or b ' ne-aleim who visit their father." ( Chapter i. ) But of this later on. Now the Zohar says that the Ischin, the beautiful B ' ne-aleim , were not guilty, but mixed themselves with mortal men because they were sent on earth to do so. ( Book of Ruth and Schadash ; fol. 63, col. 3; Amsterdam edition ) . Elsewhere the same volume shows these b ' ne-aleim belonging to the tenth sub-division of the "Thrones" ( Zohar, part iii., col. 113 . But see also 1st vol. 184). It also explains that the Ischin, "men-spirits," viri spirituales, now that men can see them no longer, help magicians to produce, through their science, homunculi which are not small men but "men smaller (in the sense of inferiority ) than men." Both show themselves under the form that the Ischin had then, i.e ., gaseous and ethereal. Their chief is Azazel. But Azazel, whom the Church dogma will associate with Satan, is nothing of the kind. Azazel is a mystery, as explained elsewhere, and it is so expressed in Maimonides, " In More Nevochim " ( chapter xxvi., p. 8). "There is an impenetrable mystery in the narrative concerning Azazel." And so there is, as Lanci, a librarian to the Vatican and one who ought to know, says -- we have quoted him before -- that "this venerable divine name ( nome divino e venerabile ) has become through the pen of Biblical scholars, a devil, a wilderness, a mountain, and a he-goat" ( Sagra Scrittura ). Therefore it seems foolish to derive the name as Spencer does, from Ajal (separated) and El (god), hence "one separated from God," the D EVIL. In the Zohar, Azazel is rather the Sacrificial victim than the "formal adversary of Jehovah," as Spencer would have it ( II., pp. 14, 29). The amount of malicious fancy and fiction bestowed on that "Host" by various fanatical writers is quite extraordinary. Azazel and his "host" are simply the Hebrew "Prometheus," and ought to be viewed from the same standpoint. The Zohar shows the Ischin chained on the mountain in the desert, allegorically; thus simply alluding to those "spirits" as being chained to the earth during the cycle of incarnation. Azazel (or Azaziel) is one of the chiefs of the "transgressing" angels in Enoch, who descending upon Ardis, the top of Mount Armon, bound themselves by swearing loyalty to each other. It is said that Azaziel taught men to make swords, knives, shields, to fabricate mirrors (?) to make one see what is behind him ( viz., " magic mirrors "). Amazarak taught all the sorcerers and dividers of roots; Amers taught the solution of magic; Barkayal, astrology; Akibeel, the meaning of portents and signs; Tamial, astronomy; and Asaradel taught the motion of the moon. "These seven were the first instructors of the Fourth man" ( i.e., of the Fourth Race). But why should allegory be always understood as meaning all that its dead-letter expresses? [[Vol. 2, Page]] 377 THE FALLACIES OF THE TWO CHURCHES. It is the symbolical representation of the great struggle between divine wisdom, nous, and its earthly reflection, Psuche, or between Spirit and Soul, in Heaven and on Earth. In Heaven --because the divine M ONAD had voluntarily exiled itself therefrom, to descend, for incarnating purposes, to a lower plane and thus transform the animal of clay into an immortal god. For, as Eliphas Levi tells us, "the angels aspire to become men; for the perfect man, the man-god, is above even angels." On Earth -- because no sooner had Spirit descended than it was strangled in the coils of matter. Strange to say, the Occult teaching reverses the characters; it is the anthropomorphous archangel with the Christians, and the man-like God with the Hindus, which represent matter in this case; and the Dragon, or Serpent, Spirit. Occult symbolism furnishes the key to the mystery; theological symbolics conceal it still more. For the former explains many a saying in the Bible and even in the New Testament which have hitherto remained incomprehensible; while the latter, owing to its dogma of Satan and his rebellion, has belittled the character and nature of its would-be infinite, absolutely perfect god, and created the greatest evil and curse on earth -- belief in a personal Devil. This mystery is opened with the key to its metaphysical symbolism now restored; while that of theological interpretation shows the gods and the archangels standing as symbols for the dead letter or dogmatic religions, and as arrayed against the pure truths of Spirit, naked and unadorned with fancy. Many were the hints thrown out in this direction in "Isis Unveiled," and a still greater number of references to this mystery may be found scattered throughout these volumes. To make the point clear once for all: that which the clergy of every dogmatic religion -- pre-eminently the Christian -- points out as Satan, the enemy of God, is in reality, the highest divine Spirit -- (occult Wisdom on Earth) -- in its naturally antagonistic character to every worldly, evanescent illusion, dogmatic or ecclesiastical religions included. Thus, the Latin Church, intolerant, bigoted and cruel to all who do not choose to be its slaves; the Church which calls itself the bride of Christ, and the trustee at the same time of Peter, to whom the rebuke of the Master "get thee behind me Satan" was justly addressed; and again the Protestant Church which, while calling itself Christian, paradoxically replaces the New Dispensation by the old "Law of Moses" which Christ openly repudiated: both these Churches are fighting against divine Truth, when repudiating and slandering the Dragon of esoteric (because divine ) Wisdom.