Forty questions of the soul concerning its original, essence, substance, nature or quality and property, what it is from eternity to eternity : framed by a lover of the great mysteries, Doctor Balthasar Walter, and answered in the year 1620 / by Jacob Behme, called Teutonicus Philosophus ; Englished by John Sparrow ...

The Fourteenth Question. (Book 14)

Whether such New Soul be without Sin. (Book 14)

1. VVE understand here the Propagated Soul in a Child newly born; my beloved Friend, this is a very acute Que∣stion, but to you my beloved Friend, it shall be answered, that the time of the opening is born or generated, the day dawneth or breaketh, the night is passed away; praise and * 1.1 thanks be given to God for it, that hath generated us again to the Light, to an uncor∣ruptible or unfadable Inheritance, and hath received us for his beloved Children.

2. You my beloved Friend know well the heavy Fall of Adam; as we have exactly set it down in all our Writings, viz. that the Soul with its right Eye, hath turned it self away from God into the Spirit of this World, and is become disobedient to God, and hath destroyed its noble and pretious Image, and hath introduced a monstrous

Image, and let in the spirit of this world, whereas it should with its will, have strong∣ly ruled over it, and not at all, with the Soul, have eaten Evil and Good.

3. But now it hath done against God's Command, and put its Imagination into the Earthly Spirit, where suddenly the Tur∣ba captivated it, which hath introduced the Earthly Monster into the noble Image: And thus the Turba suddenly sought and found the Limit, in which the Image be∣came broken; and if the Word had not instantly set it self in the middle, it had Eternally remained broken.

4. And now also the Turba is become seated in the earthly Abyss, and hath cap∣tivated both Body and Soul, and bringeth the Body continually to the Limit, where then it breaketh it and casteth it away, and then the poor Soul remaineth raw and na∣ked without a body.

5. Therefore it is necessary that it con∣vert and turn with its right Eye into the Word again, and acquire again a Body generated or born of God, else it is raw or naked, and hath the Turba in it, which the Fire awakeneth in its great Anguish, for it is a vehement hunger, a seeker and a finder.

6. Thus it is now very apprehensible to us, that we are tyed and bound to the Spi∣rit of this World with the Soul, for the Turba holdeth us captive in the fierce wrathful Anger of God.

7. And though our Soul do go forth, and become generated in God, yet it hath the Turba belonging to the outward Body, which consumeth it, for it searcheth through it even into the Abyss, and there it findeth that it is only a Looking-Glass of the Eter∣nal: and then it goeth forth out of the Looking-Glass into the Eternal, and lets the Looking-Glass lye in the Nothing.

8. Thus you know very well, that the Soul with the Body in the Seed, is half earthly, for it is Sulphur, that is Phur and Sul, one among another, and the Tur∣ba is therein, which hath indeed might and power enough to break or destroy the Seed.

9. How then can a pure clean Soul be generated? It cannot be; It bringeth the Turba along with it into the world, and is sinful in the Mothers Womb.

10. But know, that God is become Man, or Incarnate, and hath put the word Fiat again into the Seed, though now the Turba be also in the earthly part, so that the Seed is not altogether free.

11. Yet it is in this manner with the Soul, so far as the Father and Mother are honest and vertuous, and in God, that the Soul is not left or forsaken of God, for it proceedeth out of the Fathers and Mothers Soul; and though a Child die in the Mo∣thers Womb, as it were without Baptism, yet it is baptised with the Fathers & Mo∣thers Spirit, viz. with the holy Spirit, which dwelleth in them, and the Turba will be broken off in death, for the Faiths part presseth into God.

12. But with wicked and ungodly Pa∣rents it is in another manner; The Soul, if the Child dyeth in the Mothers womb, falleth home to the Turba, and in Eternity reacheth not to God; also it know∣eth nothing of him, but is a Life accor∣ding to the Essence & Property of the Pa∣rents.

13. Where yet it doth not reach to the kindling or burning, for the Soul had not it self acted or committed sin, but is a foun∣tain-quality-Spirit, without self-desire and wonders, like the flame of Brimstone, and like an Ignis Fatuus, which cannot reach to God, but remain so between Heaven and Hell, in the Mystery, till the Judgment of God, which will gather in its harvest, and

give every thing its right and true place of Repository.

14. Though perhaps our learned Ma∣sters in this may have another kind of Phi∣losophy; but we enquire not after their Art, we have eyes, they have Arts, we speak what we see.

15. Thus we give you to understand, that no Soul is generated or born into this world, without sin, how honest vertuous and godly soever the Parents are, for it is conceived and bred forth or hatched in earthly Seed, and bringeth the Turba of the Body along with it, and that hath also sur∣rounded the Soul.

16. Therefore in the Old Testament God made a Covenant with the Children in Cir∣cumcision, and so * 1.2 orde∣red in the Covenant that they must shed their Blood, and drown the Turba of the the Soul therewith.

17. And in the New Testament there is the Baptism, wherein the holy Spirit with the Water of Life, washeth off the Turba of the Souls water, that it may come to God, and become God's Child.

18. But if any will say, that every one that hath not baptism, as Jews and Turks

and other People, with whom is not the knowledge thereof, who have not the Can∣dlestick among them, that they are all re∣jected of God, although they never so ve∣hemently press with their teaching, Life, and Death into the Love of God, that is a phancy and Babel-like spoken without knowledge.

19. Blessedness and Salvation lyeth not alone in the outward Word, but in the Pow∣er and Vertue: Who will exclude those that enter into God?

20. Is it not Babel who seduceth, and confoundeth the whole world; so that they have devided People into Opinions, and yet in their wills go but one way? who is the Cause of this, but the Antichrist, when he drew the Kingdom of God into his might, authority and power, and made fictions con∣cerning the Regeneration, of which when it comes to be day, the very Children will be ashamed of them?

21. A Man may say with good ground, that Antichrists Doctrine, is a fighting with a shadow as in a looking-glass, and a falshood and wickedness of the Serpent, which continually beguileth Eve.

22. Thus it is apprehensible to us, that no

Soul cometh into this world without Sin, every one bringeth the Turba along with it; for if it were without Sin, then it must dwell in a totally pure body, which hath no evil will or inclination at all, in which there is no earthly seeking or desire.

23. But thus indeed is every body and soul tyed and united together, till the Tur∣ba findeth the Limit of the Body; and then the Turba seeketh the works or actions of the Body; as hath been mentioned above.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Col. 1. 12.
• * 1.2

  Sich in Bund Gethan.