REVELATION OF THE TRUE SATAN

INTRODUCTION

These dreams are presented exactly as written in my journals. At the time I had these dreams, I had not studied any of the scholarly works included below. When I told these dreams to Joe, his eyes grew wide with recognition of the symbology.

The symbol of the donkey (ass) represents Typhon-Set whose name Helena Blavatsky stated was later changed to Satan. Satan/Lucifer is said to be the most beautiful of all the angels which is one of the sons of God. The Father in the dream represents God and the credit card represents 'karma', a debt to be paid later. Lucifer is associated with the morning star (Venus) which arises in the East.

Typhon-Set killed his brother Osiris who is pictured sometimes as a 'black' God. Typhon-Set is said to be 'the opponent force" or the 'accuser" ...not evil.

The reason Jesus decided to ride the ass into Jerusalem, was because symbolically it showed the overcoming of the opponent force.

Neither Joe nor I were raised with any religion, my own  reading of the Bible minimal. Together, through my dreams and our study of new materials being brought forth by other  scholars, we are learning a great deal of what 'truth' is and desire to share it with others.

Dee

Date: 08/24/1999
From: (P.C.)

snips...

>I am having a bit of difficulty with the two Biblical verses below. It seems to me that these two verses would indicate that Jesus and Lucifer are one and the same being. Can this be possible? I'm hoping you Christians out there can help me with this.>

Revelation 22:16 - I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star. (English-KJV)

The 'bright and morning star' is supposed to represent the gift of immortality promised to the faithful, those who believe in and adhere to his teachings. Therefore to those who believe in him, Jesus is the gift of immortality, the gift of light and understanding. Whether we are talking about his actual teachings, the teachings of the 'Church'(not!), or the spirit behind The Word, I am still happy to question, but I think its the Spirit....

Isaiah 14:12 - How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! (English-KJV)

This passage refers to the downfall of the tyrants of the Babylonian kingdom. Originally, 'Light Bringer' or 'Shining one' was translated 'Lucifer', but because of the association of that name with Satan it is not now used. 'Lucifer, the Light-bringer' is the latin equivalent of the Greek word, 'Phosphoros' which is used as a title of Christ in II Peter. As you can see the chemical element Phosphorous, which burns extremely brightly when lit, is derived from this Greek word. The passage in Revelation quoted above also uses the title of 'light-bringer' in describing Jesus, actually in place of the title 'Lucifer'...

The writer of the pasage in Isaiah is describing the tyrants mockingly as a 'light-bringer' and son of the morning, where in fact they were the opposite.....

Not trying to preach, just trying to be humanly accurate....

Respectfully,

P

WHO IS THE BLACK MAN?

10-22-97 - DREAM - Our house was in an apartment building. The Internic (controller of domain names) was installed on the 6th floor. All of the cable connections were on the elevator.The Internic box looked like a rainbow colored jukebox.

I went up to the 9th floor to begin collecting my mail. I had a mailbox on every floor. The same key opened all the boxes.

After that I was in the car with my Father. He drove...I was in the back seat. He pulled up to the curb on 15th and Center Streets. Two men came along the street... a man dressed in a brownish coat followed by a man in a black trench coat who put his hand in the window. I could not see what they looked like because they were so tall. My Father handed the man my credit card. The men went up some steep stairs to a house there. The men were very mysterious and scary. The man in the black trench coat didn't show his face to anyone and wore a black slouch hat. However, I did catch a glimpse of his profile when he got to the door and turned his head. He was really handsome, actually the most beautiful male face I had ever seen and had pure white skin. He was being protected by the black man wearing an orangish brown coat.

My Father and I went back to the apartment building and I met some other mysterious people. They seemed like welfare investigators or some other social workers. I had a short conversation with them. I was trying to pump them for information. I can't remember what was said.

I went back to my own apartment and knew that those two men had been in the building before and were expected back. I was concerned that they might be into the drug scene or something.

I was taking care of other people's kids as well as my own and I allowed my baby daughter and another kid to hide in the bottom dresser drawer so the guy in black wouldn't kidnap her.

I met a guy in the hall who said there had been complaints about a donkey braying in that house on 15th Street where I saw the tall man in black go into. A little later, I confronted my Father about the mysterious men on 15th Street and I told him I knew about the donkey braying there. He acted like he didn't know what I was talking about, but I knew he did. I kept telling him that the house was East of ours. I kept saying..."It's East...It's East."

End of Dream

********

A BLACK MAN HELPS ME

5-15-99 - DREAM - I was in a hospital. I wasn't feeling very well. My lower abdomen was starting to ache. I was going into labor. I went to the bathroom and checked myself and the bloody plug had come loose from the cervix. I hunted through some drawers and found a clean pad to put on. Knowing myself well, I could easily deliver this baby with no further pain.

There were other women working here and I was helping them make the transition between jobs, helping them clean the unneccesary things from their purses and desk drawers...helping them decide what was really important.

A young boy was there. He was playing with a set of tinker toys. He was building a tower as high as he could. It was way taller than himself. He almost let it fall. I told him to build it strong or I'd have to pick up the pieces and he wouldn't have them anymore.

I went home to to my 16th Street house and it was full of teenagers. A tall, handsome, good looking blonde kid came in. He was waving a shotgun around, trying to show how tough he was. I told him the basic survival history of mankind and about how the ancient men didn't need to own shotguns to survive and how real tough men didn't need guns. He turned on me and aimed the shotgun right at my heart. His face had a look or pure rage on it.

I told the boy that being tough wasn't what was important anymore, and that I knew he really was a good kid and that I liked him.  

The look on his face turned from pure rage to pure embarrassment and turned red. He walked away looking like he was thinking. "Oh man! Maybe she really does like me!"

I knew that wouldn't be the end of him though and I knew I needed to get away from him. He hadn't been permanently changed by what I said to him.

I saw that his Father came to visit him. They sat in the livingroom...in the same chair...he sat on his Father's left side. He was a beautiful blonde kid, but I knew how dangerous he was.

I sneaked out the back door. I could see through the windows back into the house. I looked into the windows until I saw that the blonde kid was still sitting in the chair with his Father. His Father had his left arm around the kid's shoulders.

Seeing that, I ran like hell up the alley to get away from him.  But, he must have seen me running away. I ran across the alley to sneak through a yard to the next street over.

I could hear him calling my name... "Linda!"  (means beautiful)  (That's not my name)

In front of me, a young girl was coming out of the house and I didn't want her to see that I was there so I had to hesitate a moment until she left. I went inside the house and it looked like it was a woman's dormitory.  I ran inside and sneaked off into a side room.

He came rushing into the building, pushing other girls aside, looking for me, calling, "Linda! Linda! Linda!"

Seeing that he was only after me, I attempted to leave the building by a side garden door. It was really snowy out with deep snow drifts that weren't there when I had come in.

I saw that the blonde kid was running down the sidewalk, really angry, still looking to kill "Linda"  but he ran into a woman who had asthma. I knew he hated weakness even more than beauty, and he jumped on her and knocked her down.

He took a knife and stabbed the girl in the chest over and over over, yelling, "Die! Die! Die!" over and over and over.

I ran towards him. I took a brownish leather jacket I got from out of nowhere and threw it over his head and jumped on him. I wrestled him to the ground. He was strong but I knew I had to beat him. Everything depended on it and I used every bit of strength I had and subdued him.

As I was laying on top of him in the cold and dark, there was nobody else around and I couldn't figure out what to do next because I couldn't let him get back up.

Then a tall black man came along, carrying a shotgun. I told him to hold the gun on the blonde kid so I could call for help. The black man stood there with the shotgun, shaking so hard, I didn't know if he'd even be able to hold the gun up, much less use it if necessary.

As soon as the black man stopped shaking and got himself under control, I got up off the blonde kid. He was still covered over with the brownish leather jacket over his head so he couldn't see.

I got up to go get help and woke up.

End of Dream

**********

IT DOESN'T GET ANY BETTER THAN THIS

10-16-97

I had a wonderful dream of freeing mankind from imprisonment from religious dogma. 20th St. school was my elementary school in real life, and the Father figure represents God.

Love, Light, and Joy

Dee

10-15-97 - THE DREAM

I was at 20th St. school in the basement. It was dark down there and there was a man imprisoned down there by my Father.

We were all so afraid of my Father, we all perpetuated the imprisonment. But, in my heart I knew that it wasn't right for the man to be imprisoned and I planned to make it possible for the man to escape by the coming weekend.

My Father was out somewhere taking care of some business and while he was out I turned on the light in the basement and discovered how filthy dirty everything had become after years and years of being in the dark.

I began to give my children small tasks to do to clean up their favorite things.

My son Tom had a 5 gallon glass jug full of smaller jugs each with a colored rock in it. It was dirty inside. I asked him, "What do you think it would look like if you ran water in there and washed the dirt out?" A gleam of understanding came into his eyes and he set about to do as I suggested.

My sister saw some flat rubber animal toys on a bookcase shelf full of grime. To me they were dumb toys, but she treasured them so I told her to take them and wash them off.

Other people began to come in and see things in the basement that they wanted to take care of and clean up that my Father had laid claim to but had been neglected in the dark. Now that the light was on, the people would clean the treasures up now that they could see what treasures there were.

Very soon, there wasn't much left for my Father to hoard and we could see that the man's imprisonment was so wrong. I was determined to set the man free.

I knew my Father would come in any moment and when he did, he was in a dark visage. I lured him up to the second floor and he undressed to his nightclothes of white. I could see his old age was showing and his hair was white.

I pretended to make nice-nice with Him and when he thought everything was going to be wonderful...I put Him on hold... I said, "Hang on just a second", and bolted for the door.

I ran down the stairs to the basement. My fear of my Father was gone. I knew we all deserved to be imprisoned ourselves for having long term knowledge of the man's imprisonment, but I was determined to set the man free "NOW" and unlocked the door to his cage.

In seeing that I wasn't afraid of my Father, all the other's began to lose their fear and started to do what was right on their own.

Then my Father appeared in the doorway, again in His dark visage. He had discovered my ploy and began acting like He was going to kill me. I started to act defensive in my old response and soon discovered he didn't really intend to harm me because his weapon was blunted and soft on the end and we merely foisted and parried in a pretend duel.

Everyone else has stood by in fear while this was going on. My Father stopped parrying with me and left to take care of some other business, and as soon as he took His eyes off of us, I picked up my Father's old bent up rods of iron, and His limp yellow measuring tape and ran out into the darkness outside the building to find the nearest trash can to put them in.

Immediately, when I broke free, everyone else bolted free too and started hauling out of the basement their favorite treasures and took them out into the light of day to take them home. My son Tom brought out a black horse tied down on top of a red wagon.

I discovered that as soon as I lost my fear of my Father and in setting the man free, I had set "everyman" free as well. EOD.

Love, Light, and Joy

Dee

**************

EXCERPTS FROM JIM A. CORNWELL'S SCHOLARSHIP

" Biblical Information of Giants (8,850 B.C. to 1,300 B.C.) "

Genesis 6:4 "There were giants in the earth in those days..., when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men (Nephilim) which were of old, men of renown."

"Sons of God appears to refer to angels (Job 1:6, 2:1 "a day when they came before the Lord, and Satan was among them"):

Job 38:7 "When the morning stars sang together, and they all shouted for joy";

Psalms 89:6 "… who among them can be likened unto the Lord?"). Genesis 6:1-2 may likewise involve angels (in this case they are fallen ones) or they may be demon-possessed individuals, but others view these "sons of God" as kings/rulers/princes.

Author W. Raymond Drake states that in the Kabalistic Book of Enoch the Giants engendered by the Fallen Angels and daughters of men turned against mankind before the Flood.

Noah and the Giants (Anakim or Annunaki) after the Flood.

Noah's three sons may have brought with them wives, who were not pure descendants of Adam but those of the Anakim (Heb. ‘anaqim, sons of Anak, Heb. ‘anaq, long-necked) or possibly the Canaanites. Or else after Ham and Japheth eventually became the ancestors of the "goyim," where they combined with the Anakim who survived the Flood. The early Sumerian texts called them Anunaki, "those who came from heaven to earth." The Anakim as in Genesis 6:4 they are the sons of the sons of God, they are called the Nephilim (uncertain etymology) or giants (Heb. rapha, raphah, Heb. gibbor, mighty, Rephaim of Canaan ancestor of Og, king of Bashan, Emims of the Moabites, Zamzummims of Ammonites, Heb. murmurers, Zuzites (Zuzim) in Gen. 14:5) who were of old, men of renown. This crossbreeding may be the reason why the ancestors believe that sexual relations could affect one's health. One might even suspect that the Anakim were possibly the Greek Gods of mythology "fallen angels" the original Hebrew "B’nai Elohim" some who did not survive the Flood.

Some Talmudic commentaries stated that the Anakim were the sons of Enoch. Enoch (Heb. hanokh, consecrated, Gr. Henoch). Genesis and the Talmud both suggest that the Giants, who resented God for destroying their ancestors, meddled in the affairs of mankind.

" Biblical Information of Giants (8,850 B.C. to 1,300 B.C.) "

**************
EXCERPTS FROM HELENA BLAVATSKY'S SCHOLARSHIP

Excerpted from Isis Unveiled
"Dignities," "Powers," "Dominions," Explained
by Helena Blavatsky
Vol II - Page 206

The Biblical Paul, believing in all such occult powers in the world "unseen', but ever "present," says: "Ye walked according to the Aeon of this world according to the Archon (Ialdabaoth, the Demiurge) that has the domination of the air," and "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against the dominations, the powers; the lords of darkness, the mischievousness of spirits in the upper regions." This sentence, "ye were dead in sin and error," for "ye walked according to the Archon," of Ialdabaoth, the God and creator of matter of the Ophites, shows unequivically that: 1st, Paul, notwithstanding some dissension with the more important doctrines of the Gnostics, shared more or less their cosmogonical views on the emanations; and 2nd, that he was fully aware that this Demiurge, whom Jewish name of Jehovah, was not the God preached by Jesus. And now, if we compare the doctrine of Paul with the religious views of Peter and Jude, we find that, not only did they worship Michael, the Archangel, but that also they reverenced SATAN, because the latter was also, before his fall, an angel! This they do quite openly, and abuse the Gnostics for speaking "evil" of him. NO one can deny the following: Peter, when denouncing those who are not afraid to speak evil of Dignities," adds immediately, "whereas angels, which are greater in power and might, bring not railing accusation against them (the dignities) before the Lord". Who are the dignities? Jude, in his General Epistle, makes the word as clear as day. The dignities are the DEVILS!! Complaining of the disrespect shown by the Gnostics to the powers and dominions, Jude argues in the very words of Peter: "Yet Michael the Archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee" Is this plain enough? If not, then we have the Kabala to prove who were the dignities.

Considering that Deuteronomy tells us that the "Lord" Himself buried Moses in a valley of Moab, "but no man knoweth of this sepulchre unto this day," this Biblical lapsus linguae of Jude gives a strong coloring to the assertions of some of the Gnostics. They claimed but what was secretly taught by the Jewish kabalists themselves; to wit: that the highest supreme God was unknown and invisible; "The King of Light is a closed eye"; that Ialdabaoth, the Jewish second Adam, was the real Demiurge; and that Iao, Adonai, Tsabaoth, and Eloi were the quarternary emanation which formed the unity of the God of the Hebrews - Jehovah. Moreover, the latter was also called Michael and Samuel by them, and regarded but as an angel, several removes from the Godhead. In holding to such a belief, the Gnostics countenanced the teachings of the greatest Jewish doctors, Hillel, and other Babylonian divines. Josephus shows the great deference of the official Synagogue of Sura, Pumbeditha, and Hahardea were considered the headquarters of esoteric and theological learning by all the schools of Palestine. The Chaldean version of the Pentateuch, made by the well-known Babylonian divine, Onkelos, was regarded as the most authoritative of all; and it is according to this learned Rabbi that Hillel and other Tannaim after him held that the Being who appeared to Moses in the burning bush, on Mount Sanai, and who finally buried him was the angel *of the Lord, Memra, and not the Lord Himself; and that he whom the Hebrews of the Old Testament mistook for Iahoh was but His messenger, one of His sons, or emanations. All this establishes but on logical conclusion...namely, that the Gnostics were by far the superiors of the disciples, in point of education and general information; even in a knowledge of the religious tenets of the Jews themselves. While they were perfectly well-versed in the Chaldean wisdom, the well-meaning, pious, but fanatical as well as ignorant disciples, unable to fully understand or grasp the religious spirit of their own system, were driven in their disputations to such convincing logic as the use of "brute beats," "sows," "dogs," and other epithets so freely bestowed by Peter.

* Other sources state that the 'being' who gave the laws to Moses was Jethro ...the Lord of the Mountain. He was not a 'god' merely a person who was the ruler of that area.

Excerpted from THE SECRET DOCTRINE
Vol. 2, Page 477
THE GENESIS OF THE DEVIL.

May we not then be permitted to drag the deep rivers of the Past, and thus bring to the surface the root idea that led to the transformation of the Wisdom-God, who had first been regarded as the creator of everything that exists, into an Angel of Evil -- a ridiculous horned biped, half goat and half monkey, with hoofs and a tail? We need not go out of the way to compare the pagan demons of either Egypt, India, or Chaldea with the devil of Christianity, for no such comparison is possible. But we may stop to glance at the biography of the Christian Devil, a piratical reprint from the Chaldeo-Judaean mythology: --

The primitive origin of this personification rests upon the Akkadian conception of the cosmic powers -- the Heavens and the Earth -- in eternal feud and struggle with Chaos. Their Silik-Muludag, "the God amongst all the Gods," the "merciful guardian of men on Earth," was the Son of Hea (or Ea) the great God of Wisdom, called by the Babylonians Nebu. With both peoples -- as in the case of the Hindu gods -- their deities were both beneficent and maleficent. As Evil and punishment are the agents of Karma, in an absolutely just retributive sense, so Evil was the servant of the good (Hibbert Lect. 1887, pp. 101-115). The reading of the Chaldeo-Assyrian tiles has now demonstrated it beyond a shadow of doubt. We find the same idea in the Zohar. Satan was a Son, and an Angel of God. With all the Semitic nations, the Spirit of the Earth was as much the Creator in his own realm as the Spirit of the Heavens. They were twin brothers and interchangeable in their functions, when not two in one. Nothing of that which we find in Genesis is absent from the Chaldeo-Assyrian religious beliefs, even in the little that has hitherto been deciphered. The great "Face of the Deep" of Genesis is traced in the Tohu-bohu, "Deep," "Primeval Space," or Chaos of the Babylonians. Wisdom (the Great Unseen God) -- called in Genesis chap. i. the "Spirit of God" -- lived, for the older Babylonians as for the Akkadians, in the Sea of Space. Toward the days described by Berosus, this sea became the visible waters on the face of the Earth -- the crystalline abode of the great mother, the mother of Ea and all the gods, which became, still later, the great Dragon Tiamat, the Sea Serpent. Its last stage of development was the great struggle of Bel with the Dragon -- the Devil!

Whence the Christian idea that God cursed the Devil? The God of the Jews, whomsoever he was, forbids cursing Satan. Philo Judaeus and Josephus both state that the Law (the Pentateuch and the Talmud) undeviatingly forbid one to curse the adversary, as also the gods of the gentiles. "Thou shalt not revile the gods," quoth the god of Moses (Exodus xxii. 28), for it is God who "hath divided (them) unto all nations" (Deut. iv. 19); and those who speak evil of "Dignities" (gods) are called "filthy dreamers" by Jude. For even Michael the Archangel durst not bring against him (the devil) a railing accusation, but said: "The Lord rebuke thee". Finally the same is repeated in the Talmud. "Satan appeared one day to a man who used to curse him daily, and said to him: 'Why dost thou this?' Consider that God himself would not curse me, but merely said: 'The Lord rebuke thee, Satan.' "

This bit of Talmudic information shows plainly two things: (a) that St. Michael is called "God" in the Talmud, and somebody else "the Lord"; and (b) that Satan is a God, of whom even the "Lord" is in fear. All we read in the Zohar and other Kabalistic works on Satan shows plainly that this "personage" is simply the personification of the abstract evil, which is the weapon of Karmic law and KARMA. It is our human nature and man himself, as it is said that "Satan is always near and inextricably interwoven with man." It is only a question of that Power being latent or active in us.

It is a well-known fact -- to learned Symbologists at all events -- that in every great religion of antiquity, it is the Logos Demiurge (the second logos), or the first emanation from the mind (Mahat), who is made to strike, so to say, the key-note of that which may be called the correlation of individuality and personality in the subsequent scheme of evolution. The Logos it is, who is shown in the mystic symbolism of cosmogony, theogony, and anthropogony, playing two parts in the drama of Creation and Being, i.e., that of the purely human personality and the divine impersonality of the so-called Avatars, or divine incarnations, and of the universal Spirit, called Christos by the Gnostics, and the Farvarshi (or Ferouer) of Ahura Mazda in the Mazdean philosophy. On the lower rungs of theogony the celestial Beings of lower Hierarchies had each a Farvarshi, or a celestial "Double." It is the same, only a still more mystic, reassertion of the Kabalistic axiom, "Deus est Demon inversus"; the word "demon," however, as in the case of Socrates, and in the spirit of the meaning given to it by the whole of antiquity, standing for the guardian Spirit, an "Angel," not a devil of Satanic descent, as theology will have it. The Roman Catholic Church shows its usual logic and consistency by accepting, as the ferouer of Christ, St. Michael, who was "his Angel Guardian," as proved by St. Thomas, while he calls the prototypes of Michael and his synonyms, such as Mercury, for example, devils. 


GOD AND DEVIL, BOTH METATRONS.

The Church accepts positively the tenet that Christ has his Ferouer as any other god or mortal has. Writes de Mirville: "Here we have the two heroes of the Old Testament, the Verbum (?), or the second Jehovah, and his face ('Presence,' as the Protestants translate) forming both but one, and yet being two, a mystery which seemed to us unsolvable before we had studied the doctrine of the Mazdean ferouers, and learnt that the ferouer was the spiritual potency, at once image, face, and the guardian of the Soul which finally assimilates the ferouer." (Memoires a l'Academie, Vol. v., p. 516.) This is almost correct.

Among other absurdities, the Kabalists maintain that the word metatron being divided into [[meta, thronon]], means near the throne. It means quite the reverse, as meta means "beyond" and not "near." This is of great importance in our argument. St. Michael, then, the quis ut Deus, is the translator, so to speak, of the invisible world into the visible and the objective.

They maintain, furthermore, along with the Roman Catholic Church, that in the Biblical and Christian theology there does not exist a "higher celestial personality, after the Trinity, than that of the Archangel or the Seraphim, Michael." According to them, the conqueror of the Dragon is "the archisatrap of the sacred militia, the guardian of the planets, the King of the Stars, the slayer of Satan and the most powerful Rector." In the mystic astronomy of these gentlemen, he is "the conqueror of Ahriman, who having upset the sidereal throne of the usurper, bathes in his stead in the solar fires"; and, defender of the Christ-Sun, he approaches so near his Master, "that he seems to become one with him . . . . Owing to this fusion with the WORD (Verbum) the Protestants, and among them Calvin, ended by losing sight entirely of the duality, and saw no Michael but only his Master," writes the Abbe Caron. The Roman Catholics, and especially their Kabalists, know better; and it is they who explain to the world this duality, which affords to them the means of glorifying the chosen ones of the Church, and of rejecting and anathematizing all those Gods who may be in the way of their dogmas.

Thus the same titles and the same names are given in turn to God and the Archangel. Both are called Metatron, "both have the name of Jehovah applied to them when they speak one in the other" (sic) as, according to the Zohar, the term signifies equally "the Master and the Ambassador." Both are the Angel of the Face, because, as we are informed, if, on the one hand, the "Word" is called "the face (or the Presence) and the image of the substance of God," on the other, "when speaking of the Saviour to the Israelites, Isaiah (?) tells them that "the angel of his presence saved them in their affliction" -- "so he was their Saviour."* Elsewhere he (Michael) is called very plainly "the Prince of the Faces of the Lord, the glory of the Lord." Both (Jehovah and Michael) are "the guides of Israel** . . . chiefs of the armies of the Lord, Supreme Judges of the souls and even Seraphs."

The whole of the above is given on the authority of various works by Roman Catholics, and must, therefore, be orthodox. Some expressions are translated to show what subtle theologians and casuists mean by the term Ferouer, a word borrowed by some French writers from the Zend Avesta, as said, and utilized in Roman Catholicism for a purpose Zoroaster was very far from anticipating. In Fargard XIX. of the Vendidad it is said (verse 14), "Invoke, O Zarathustra! my Farvarshi, who am Ahura Mazda, the greatest, the best, the fairest of all beings, the most solid, the most intelligent, . . . and whose soul is the Holy Word" (Mathra Spenta). The French Orientalists translate Farvarshi by "Ferouer."

Now what is a Ferouer, or Farvarshi? In some Mazdean works (e.g., Ormazd Ahriman, it is plainly implied that Farvarshi is the inner, immortal man (or that Ego which reincarnates); that it existed before its physical body and survives all such it happens to be clothed in. "Not only man was endowed with the Farvarshi, but gods too, and the sky, fire, waters, and plants." (Introduction to the Vendidad, by J. Darmesteter). This shows as plainly as can be shown that the ferouer is the "spiritual counterpart" of whether god, animal, plant, or even element, i.e., the refined and the purer part of the grosser creation, the soul of the body, whatever the body may happen to be. Therefore does Ahura Mazda recommend Zarathustra to invoke his Farvarshi and not himself (Ahura-Mazda); that is to say, the impersonal and true Essence of Deity, one with Zoroaster's own Atman (or Christos), not the false and personal appearance. This is quite clear.

Now it is on this divine and ethereal prototype that the Roman Catholics seized so as to build up the supposed difference between their god and angels, and the deity and its aspects, or the gods of the old religions. Thus, while calling Mercury, Venus, Jupiter (whether as gods or planets) DEVILS, they yet make of the same Mercury the ferouer of their Christ. This fact is undeniable.

**** That which is called in the Vendidad "Farvarshi," the immortal part of an individual, that which outlives man -- the Higher Ego, say the Occultists, or the divine Double.


FRAUDULENT TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE.

Michael is the Mercury of the pagans, and Maury and other French writers corroborate this, and add that "according to great theologians Mercury and the Sun are one," (?) and no wonder, they think, since "Mercury being so near the Wisdom of the Verbum (the Sun), must be absorbed by and confounded with him."

This "pagan" view was accepted from the first century of our era, as shown in the ORIGINAL Acts of the Apostles (the English translation being worthless). So much is Michael the Mercury of the Greeks and other nations, that when the inhabitants of Lystra mistook Paul and Barnabas for Mercury and Jupiter -- "the gods have come down to us in the likeness of men," -- verse 12 (xiv.) adds: "And they called Barnabas Zeus, and Paul, Hermes (or Mercury), because he was the leader of the WORD (Verbum)," and not "the chief speaker," as erroneously translated in the authorized, and repeated even in the revised, English Bible. Michael is the angel in the Vision, the Son of God, "who was like unto a Son of Man." It is the Hermes-Christos of the Gnostics, the Anubis-Syrius of the Egyptians, the Counsellor of Osiris in Amenti, the Michael leontoid [[ophiomorphos]] of the Ophites, who wears on certain Gnostic jewels a lion head, like his father Ialdabaoth.

Now to all this the Roman Catholic Church consents tacitly, many of her writers avowing it publicly. And, unable to deny the flagrant "borrowing" of their Church, who "spoilt" the symbols of her seniors, as the Jews had "spoilt" the Egyptians of their jewels of silver and gold, they explain the fact quite coolly and as seriously. Thus the writers who were hitherto timid enough to see, in this repetition by Christian dogmas of old Pagan ideas, "a legendary plagiarism perpetrated by man," are gravely assured that, far from such a simple solution of the almost perfect resemblance, it has to be attributed to quite another cause: "to a prehistorical plagiarism, of a superhuman origin."

If the reader would know how, he must kindly turn to the fifth volume of de Mirville's work. Please note that this author was the official and recognised defender of the Roman Church, and was helped by the learning of all the Jesuits. On page 518 we read: --

"We have pointed out several demi-gods, and also very historical heroes of the pagans, who were predestined from the moment of their birth, to ape while dishonouring it, the nativity of the hero, who was quite God, before whom the whole earth had to bow; we traced them being born as he was, from an immaculate mother; we saw them strangling serpents in their cradles, fighting against demons, performing miracles, dying as martyrs, descending to the nether world and rising again from the dead. And we have bitterly deplored that timid and shy Christians should feel compelled to explain all such identities on the ground of coincidence of myth and symbol. They forgot apparently these words of the Saviour: 'ALL THAT CAME BEFORE ME ARE THIEVES AND ROBBERS,' a word which explains all without any absurd negation and which I commented in these words 'The Evangel is a sublime drama, parodied and played before its appointed time by ruffians.' "

The "ruffians" (les droles), are of course demons whose manager is Satan. Now this is the easiest and the most sublime and simple way of getting out of the difficulty! The Rev. Dr. Lundy, a Protestant de Mirville, followed the happy suggestion in his "Monumental Christianity," and so did Dr. Sepp of Munich in his works written to prove the divinity of Jesus and the Satanic origin of all other Saviours. So much greater the pity that a systematic and collective plagiarism, which went on for several centuries on the most gigantic scale, should be explained by another plagiarism, this time in the fourth Gospel. For the sentence quoted from it, "All that ever came before me, etc.," is a verbatim repetition of words written in the "Book of Enoch" lxxxix. In the Introduction to Archbishop Lawrence's translation of it from an Ethiopic MS. in the Bodleian Library, the editor, author of the "Evolution of Christianity," remarks: --

"In revising the proof-sheets of the Book of Enoch . . . . . the parable of the sheep, rescued by the good Shepherd from hireling guardians and ferocious wolves, is obviously borrowed by the fourth Evangelist from Enoch, lxxxix., in which the author depicts the shepherds as killing . . . the sheep before the advent of their Lord, and thus discloses the true meaning of that hitherto mysterious passage in the Johannine parable -- 'All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers' -- language in which we now detect an obvious reference to the allegorical shepherds of Enoch."

It is too late in the day to claim that it is Enoch who borrowed from the New Testament, instead of vice versa. Jude (14-15) quotes verbatim from Enoch a long passage about the coming of the Lord with his 10,000 saints, and naming specifically the prophet, acknowledges the source. This "parallelism between prophet and apostle, have placed beyond controversy that, in the eyes of the author of an Epistle accepted as divine revelation, the Book of Enoch was the inspired production of an antediluvian patriarch . . . " and further " . . . the cumulative coincidence of language and ideas in Enoch and the authors of N.T. Scripture, . . . clearly indicates that the work of the Semitic Milton was the inexhaustible source from which Evangelists and Apostles, or the men who wrote in their names, borrowed their conceptions of the resurrection, judgment, immortality, perdition, and of the universal reign of righteousness under the eternal dominion of the Son of Man. This Evangelical plagiarism culminates in the Revelation of John, which adapts the visions of Enoch to Christianity, with modifications in which we miss the sublime simplicity of the great Master of apocalyptic prediction, who prophesied in the name of the antediluvian Patriarch."

"Antediluvian," truly; but if the phraseology of the text dates hardly a few centuries or even millenniums before the historical era, then it is no more the original prediction of the events to come, but, in its turn, a copy of some scripture of a prehistoric religion. . . . . "In the Krita age, Vishnu, in the form of Kapila and other (inspired sages) . . . imparts to the world true wisdom as Enoch did. In the Treta age he restrains the wicked, in the form of a universal monarch (the Chakravartin or the 'Everlasting King' of Enoch*) and protects the three worlds (or races). In the Dwapara age, in the person of Veda-Vyasa, he divides the one Veda into four, and distributes it into hundreds (Sata) of branches." Truly so; the Veda of the earliest Aryans, before it was written, went forth into every nation of the Atlanto-Lemurians, and sowed the first seeds of all the now existing old religions. The off-shoots of the never dying tree of wisdom have scattered their dead leaves even on Judaeo-Christianity. And at the end of the Kali, our present age, Vishnu, or the "Everlasting King" will appear as Kalki, and re-establish righteousness upon earth. The minds of those who live at that time shall be awakened, and become as pellucid as crystal. "The men who are thus changed by virtue of that peculiar time (the sixth race) shall be as the seeds of other human beings, and shall give birth to a race who shall follow the laws of the Krita age of purity"; i.e., it shall be the seventh race, the race of "Buddhas," the "Sons of God," born of immaculate parents.

THE GODS OF LIGHT PROCEED FROM THE GODS OF DARKNESS

Thus it is pretty well established that Christ, the Logos, or the God in Space and the Saviour on Earth, is but one of the echoes of the same antediluvian and sorely misunderstood Wisdom. The history begins by the descent on Earth of the "Gods" who incarnate in mankind, and this is the FALL. Whether Brahma hurled down on Earth in the allegory by Bhagavant, or Jupiter by Kronos, all are the symbols of the human races. Once landed on, and having touched this planet of dense matter, no snow-white wings of the highest angel can remain immaculate, or the Avatar (or incarnation) be perfect, as every such Avatar is the fall of a God into generation. Nowhere is the metaphysical truth more clear, when explained esoterically, or more hidden from the average comprehension of those who instead of appreciating the sublimity of the idea can only degrade, than in the Upanishads, the esoteric glossaries of the Vedas. The Rig-Veda, as Guignault characterized it, "is the most sublime conception of the great highways of Humanity." The Vedas are, and will remain for ever, in the esotericism of the Vedanta and the Upanishads, "the mirror of the eternal Wisdom."

For over sixteen centuries the new masks, forced on the faces of the old gods, have screened them from public curiosity, but they have finally proved a misfit. Yet the metaphorical FALL, and as metaphorical atonement and crucifixion, led Western Humanity through roads knee-deep in blood. Worse than all, they led it to believe in the dogma of the evil spirit distinct from the spirit of all good, whereas the former lives in all matter and pre-eminently in man. Finally it created the God-slandering dogma of Hell and eternal perdition; it spread a thick film between the higher intuitions of man and divine verities; and, most pernicious result of all, it made people remain ignorant of the fact that there were no fiends, no dark demons in the Universe before man's own appearance on this, and probably on other earths. Henceforth the people were led to accept, as the problematical consolation for this world's sorrows, the thought of original sin.

The philosophy of that law in Nature, which implants in man as well as in every beast a passionate, inherent, and instinctive desire for freedom and self-guidance, pertains to psychology and cannot be touched on now. To show the feeling in higher Intelligences, to analyse and give a natural reason for it, would necessitate, moreover, an endless philosophical explanation for which there is no room here. Perhaps, the best synthesis of this feeling is found in three lines of Milton's Paradise Lost. Says the "Fallen One": --

"Here we may reign secure; and in my choice,
To reign is worth ambition, though in hell!
Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven . . . ."

Better be man, the crown of terrestrial production and king over its opus operatum, than be lost among the will-less spiritual Hosts in Heaven.

We have said elsewhere that the dogma of the first Fall rested on a few verses in Revelation; these verses being now shown a plagiarism from Enoch by some scholars. These grew into endless theories and speculations, which gradually acquired the importance of dogma and inspired tradition. Every one wanted to explain the verse about the seven-headed dragon with his ten horns and seven crowns, whose tail "drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth," and whose place, with that of his angels, "was found no more in heaven."

From Newton to Bossuet speculations were incessantly evolved in Christian brains with regard to these obscure verses. . . . . "The star that falls, is the heresiarch Theodosius" . . . . explains Bossuet. "The clouds of smoke, are the heresies of the Montanists. . . . . The third part of the stars, are the martyrs, and especially the doctors of divinity. . . . ."

Bossuet ought to have known, however, that the events described in Revelation were not original, and may, as shown, be found in other and pagan traditions. There were no scholastics nor Montanists during Vedic times, nor yet far later in China. But Christian theology had to be protected and saved.

This was only natural. But why should truth be sacrificed in order to protect from destruction the lucubrations of Christian theologians?

The princeps aeris hujus, the "prince of the air" of St. Paul, is not the devil, but the effects of the astral light, as Eliphas Levi correctly explains. The Devil is not "the God of this period," as he says, for it is the deity of every age and period, since man appeared on earth, and matter, in its countless forms and states, had to fight for its evanescent existence against other disintegrating Forces.

The "Dragon" is simply the symbol of the cycle and of the "Sons of Manvantaric Eternity," who had descended on earth during a certain epoch of its formative period. The "clouds of smoke" are a geological phenomenon. The "third part of the stars of heaven" cast down to the earth -- refers to the divine Monads, (the Spirits of the Stars in Astrology) that circumambulate our globe; i.e., the human Egos destined to perform the whole cycle of incarnations. This sentence, qui circumambulat terram, however, is again referred to the DEVIL in theology, the mythical father of Evil being said to "fall like lightning." Unfortunately for this interpretation, the "Son of Man," or Christ, is expected, on the personal testimony of Jesus, to descend on earth likewise, "As the lightning cometh out of the East,"* just in the same shape and under the same symbol as Satan, who is seen "as lightning to fall from heaven." All these metaphors and figures of speech, pre-eminently Oriental in their character, must have their origin searched for in the East. In all the ancient cosmogonies light comes from darkness. In Egypt, as elsewhere, darkness was "the principle of all things." Hence Pymander, the "Thought divine," issues as light from DARKNESS. Behemoth* [[(see JOB below)]] is the principle of Darkness, or Satan, in Roman Catholic Theology, and yet Job says of him that "Behemoth is the chief (principle) of the ways of God" (xl. 19) -- "Principium viarum Domini Behemoth!"

Consistency does not seem to be a favourite virtue in any portion of divine Revelation, so-called -- not as interpreted by theologians, at any rate.

The Egyptians and the Chaldeans referred the birth of their divine Dynasties to that period when creative Earth was in her last final throes, in giving birth to her prehistoric mountain ranges, which have since disappeared, her seas and her continents. Her face was covered with "deep Darkness and in that (Secondary) Chaos was the principle of all things" that developed on the globe later on. And our geologists have ascertained that there was such a terrestrial conflagration in the early geological periods, several hundred millions of years ago. As to the tradition itself, every country and nation had it, each under its respective national form.

It is not alone Egypt, Greece, Scandinavia or Mexico, that had their Typhon, Python, Loki and its "falling" Demon, but China, also. The Celestials have a whole literature upon the subject. In King, it is said that in consequence of a rebellion against Ti of a proud Spirit who said he was Ti himself, seven choirs of celestial spirits were exiled upon earth, which "brought a change in all nature, heaven itself bending down and uniting with earth."

And in the "Y-King," one reads: "The flying Dragon, superb and rebellious, suffers now, and his pride is punished; he thought he would reign in heaven, he reigns only on the earth."

Again, the Tchoon-Tsieoo says allegorically: "one night the stars ceased shining in darkness, and deserted it, falling down like rain upon the earth, where they are now hidden." These stars are the Monads.

Chinese cosmogonies have their "Lord of the Flame" and their "Celestial Virgin," with little "Spirits to help and minister to her; and big Spirits to fight those who are the enemies of other gods." But all this does not prove that the said allegories are presentments or prophetic writings which all refer to Christian theology.

The best proof one can offer to Christian Theologians that the esoteric meaning in the Bible -- in both Testaments -- was the assertion of the same idea as in our Archaic teachings -- to wit, that the "Fall of the Angels" referred simply to the incarnation of angels "who had broken through the Seven Circles" -- is found in the Zohar. Now the Kabala of Simeon Ben Iochai is the soul and essence of its allegory, as the later Christian Kabala is the "dark cloaked" Mosaic Pentateuch. And it says (in the Agrippa MMS.):

"The wisdom of the Kabala rests in the science of the equilibrium and Harmony."

"Forces that manifest without having been first equilibrized perish in space" ("equilibrized" meaning differentiated).

"Thus perished the first Kings (the Divine Dynasties) of the ancient world, the self-produced Princes of giants. They fell like rootless trees, and were seen no more: for they were the Shadow of the Shadow"; to wit, the chhaya of the Shadowy Pitris. (Vide about the "Kings of Edom.")

"But those that came after them, who shooting down like falling stars were enshrined in the shadows -- prevailed and to this day": Dhyanis, who by incarnating in those "empty shadows," inaugurated the era of mankind.

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* The Protestant Bible defines Behemoth innocently -- "The elephant as some think" (See marginal note in Job xl. 19) in the authorised versions.

** Astronomy, however, knows nothing of stars that have disappeared unless from visibility, never from existence, since the Science of Astronomy became known. Temporary stars are only variable stars, and it is believed even that the new stars of Kepler and Tycho Brahe may still be seen.


Every sentence in the ancient cosmogonies, unfolds to him who can read between the lines the identity of the ideas, though under different garbs.

The first lesson taught in Esoteric philosophy is, that the incognizable Cause does not put forth evolution, whether consciously or unconsciously, but only exhibits periodically different aspects of itself to the perception of finite Minds. Now the collective Mind -- the Universal -- composed of various and numberless Hosts of Creative Powers, however infinite in manifested Time, is still finite when contrasted with the unborn and undecaying Space in its supreme essential aspect. That which is finite cannot be perfect. Therefore there are inferior Beings among those Hosts, but there never were any devils or "disobedient Angels," for the simple reason that they are all governed by Law. The Asuras who incarnated (call them by any other name), followed in this a law as implacable as any other. They had manifested prior to the Pitris, and as time (in Space) proceeds in Cycles, their turn had come -- hence the numerous allegories (Vide "Demon est Deus inversus," Part II., Vol. I.). The name of Asura was first given by the Brahmans indiscriminately to those who opposed their mummeries and sacrifices, as the great Asura called "Asurendra" did. It is to those ages, probably, that the origin of the idea of the demon, as opposer and adversary, has to be traced.

The Hebrew Elohim, called in the translations "God," and who create "light," are identical with the Aryan Asuras. They are also referred to as the "Sons of Darkness" as a philosophical and logical contrast to light immutable and eternal. The earliest Zoroastrians did not believe in Evil or Darkness being co-eternal with Good or Light, and they give the same interpretation. Ahriman is the manifested shadow of AHURA-MAZDA (Asura-mazda), himself issued from Zeruana Akerne "boundless (circle of) Time" or the Unknown Cause. "Its glory," they say of the latter, "is too exalted, its light too resplendent for either human intellect or mortal eye to grasp and see." Its primal emanation is eternal light, which, from having been previously concealed in DARKNESS was called to manifest itself and thus was formed Ormazd, the "King of Life." He is the "first-born" in BOUNDLESS TIME, but, like his own antitype (pre-existing Spiritual idea), has lived within darkness from all eternity. The six Amshaspends (seven with himself, chief of all), the primitive Spiritual Angels and Men are collectively his Logos. The Zoroastrian Amshaspends create the world in six days or periods also, and rest on the Seventh; whereas that Seventh is the first period or "day," in esoteric philosophy, (Primary creation in the Aryan cosmogony). It is that intermediate AEon which is the Prologue to creation, and which stands on the borderland between the uncreated eternal Causation and the produced finite effects; a state of nascent activity and energy as the first aspect of the eternal immutable Quiescence. In Genesis, on which no metaphysical energy has been spent, but only an extraordinary acuteness and ingenuity to veil the esoteric Truth, "Creation" begins at the third stage of manifestation. "God" or the Elohim are the "Seven Regents" of Pymander. They are identical with all the other Creators.

But even in Genesis that period is hinted at by the abruptness of the picture, and the "darkness" that was on the face of the deep. The Alahim are shown to "create" -- that is to say, to build or to produce the two or "double heaven" (not Heaven and Earth); which means, in so many words, that they separated the upper manifested (angelic) heaven, or plane of consciousness, from the lower or terrestrial plane; the (to us) eternal and immutable AEons from those periods that are in space, time and duration; Heaven from Earth, the unknown from the KNOWN -- to the profane. Such is the meaning of the sentence in Pymander, which says that: "THOUGHT, the divine, which is LIGHT and LIFE (Zeruana Akerne) produced through its WORD, or first aspect," the other, operating THOUGHT, which being the god of Spirit and Fire, constructed seven Regents enclosing within their circle the world of Senses, named "fatal destiny." The latter refers to Karma; the "seven circles" are the seven planets and planes, as also the seven invisible Spirits, in the angelic spheres, whose visible symbols are the seven planets, the seven Rishis of the great Bear and other glyphs. As said of the Adityas by Roth: "they are neither sun, nor moon, nor stars, nor dawn, but the eternal sustainers of this luminous life which exists as it were behind all these phenomena."

It is they -- the "Seven Hosts" -- who, having "considered in their Father (divine Thought) the plan of the operator," as says Pyrnander, desired to operate (or build the world with its creatures) likewise; for, having been born "within the sphere of operation" -- the manifesting Universe -- such is the Manvantaric LAW. And now comes the second portion of the passage, or rather of two passages merged into one to conceal the full meaning. Those who were born within the sphere of operation were "the brothers who loved him well." The latter -- the "him" -- were the primordial angels: the Asuras, the Ahriman, the Elohim -- or "Sons of God," of whom Satan was one -- all those spiritual beings who were called the "Angels of Darkness," because that darkness is absolute light, a fact now neglected if not entirely forgotten in theology. Nevertheless, the spirituality of those much abused "Sons of Light" which is Darkness, must be evidently as great in comparison with that of the Angels next in order, as the ethereality of the latter would be, when contrasted with the density of the human body. The former are the "First-born"; therefore so near to the confines of pure quiescent Spirit as to be merely the "PRIVATIONS" -- in the Aristotelian sense -- the ferouers or the ideal types of those who followed. They could not create material, corporeal things; and, therefore, were said in process of time to have refused to create, as commanded by "God" -- otherwise, TO HAVE REBELLED.

Perchance, this is justified on that principle of the Scientific theory which teaches us about light and sound and the effect of two waves of equal length meeting. "If the two sounds be of the same intensity, their coincidence produces a sound four times the intensity of either, while their interference produces absolute silence."

Explaining some of the "heresies" of his day, Justin Martyr shows the identity of all the world religions at their starting points. The first beginning opens invariably with the unknown and PASSIVE deity, from which emanates a certain active power or virtue, the Mystery that is sometimes called WISDOM, sometimes the SON, very often God, Angel, Lord, and LOGOS. The latter is sometimes applied to the very first emanation, but in several systems it proceeds from the first androgyne or double ray produced at the beginning by the unseen. Philo depicts this wisdom as male and female. But though its first manifestation had a beginning, for it proceeded from Oulom (Aion, time), the highest of the AEons when emitted from the Father, it had remained with him before all creations, for it is part of him. Therefore, Philo Judaeus calls Adam Kadmon "mind" (the Ennoia of Bythos in the Gnostic system). "The mind, let it be named Adam.

As the old Magian books explain it, the whole event becomes clear. A thing can only exist through its opposite -- Hegel teaches us, and only a little philosophy and spirituality are needed to comprehend the origin of the later dogma, which is so truly satanic and infernal in its cold and cruel wickedness. The Magians accounted for the origin of evil in their exoteric teachings in this way. "Light can produce nothing but light, and can never be the origin of evil"; how then was the evil produced, since there was nothing co-equal or like the Light in its production? Light, say they, produced several Beings, all of them spiritual, luminous, and powerful. But a GREAT ONE (the "Great Asura," Ahriman, Lucifer, etc., etc.) had an evil thought, contrary to the Light. He doubted, and by that doubt he became dark.

This is a little nearer to the truth, but still wide of the mark. There was no "EVIL thought" that originated the opposing Power, but simply THOUGHT per se; something which, being cogitative, and containing design and purpose, is therefore finite, and must thus find itself naturally in opposition to pure quiescence, the as natural state of absolute Spirituality and Perfection. It was simply the law of Evolution that asserted itself; the progress of mental unfolding, differentiated from spirit, involved and entangled already with matter, into which it is irresistibly drawn. Ideas, in their very nature and essence, as conceptions bearing relation to objects, whether true or imaginary, are opposed to absolute THOUGHT, that unknowable ALL of whose mysterious operations Mr. Spencer predicates that nothing can be said, but that "it has no kinship of nature with Evolution" (Principles of Psychology,*** 474) -- which it certainly has not.

The Zohar gives it very suggestively. When the "Holy One" (the Logos) desired to create man, he called the highest host of Angels and said to them what he wanted, but they doubted the wisdom of this desire and answered: "Man will not continue one night in his glory" -- for

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* An AEon is a division indicative of time.

** Sanchoniathon calls time the oldest AEon, Protogonos, the "first-born."

*** It is suggestive of that spirit of paradoxical negation so conspicuous in our day, that while the evolution hypothesis has won its rights of citizenship in science as taught by Darwin and Haeckel, yet both the eternity of the Universe and the pre-existence of a universal consciousness, are rejected by the modern psychologists. "Should the Idealist be right, the doctrine of evolution is a dream," says Mr. Herbert Spencer.

Excerpted from ISIS UNVEILED
by Helena Blavatsky
VOL 2 - page 473

CHAPTER X.

"Get thee behind me, SATAN" (Jesus to Peter). -- Matt. xvi. 23.
"Such a deal of skimble-skamble stuff
As puts me from my faith. I tell you what --
He held me, last night, at least nine hours
In reckoning up the several devils' names." -- King Henry IV., Part i., Act iii.
"La force terrible et juste qui tue eternellement les avortons a ete nommee par les Egyptiens Typhon, par les Hebreux Samael; par les orientaux Satan; et par les Latins Lucifer. Le Lucifer de la Cabale n'est pas un ange maudit et foudroye; c'est l'ange qui eclaire et qui regenere en tombant." -- ELIPHAS LEVI: Dogme et Rituel.
"Bad as he is, the Devil may be abus'd,
Be falsely charg'd, and causelessly accus'd,
When Men, unwilling to be blam'd alone,
Shift off those Crimes on Him which are their Own." -- Defoe, 1726.

SEVERAL years ago, a distinguished writer and persecuted kabalist suggested a creed for the Protestant and Roman Catholic bodies, which may be thus formulated:

Protevangelium.
"I believe in the Devil, the Father Almighty of Evil, the Destroyer of all things, Perturbator of Heaven and Earth;
And in Anti-Christ, his only Son, our Persecutor,
Who was conceived of the Evil Spirit;
Born of a sacrilegious, foolish Virgin;
Was glorified by mankind, reigned over them,
And ascended to the throne of Almighty God,
From which he crowds Him aside, and from which he insults the living and the dead;
I believe in the Spirit of Evil;
The Synagogue of Satan;
The coalition of the wicked;
The perdition of the body;
And the Death and Hell everlasting. Amen."

Does this offend? Does it seem extravagant, cruel, blasphemous? Listen. In the city of New York, on the ninth day of April, 1877 -- that is to say, in the last quarter of what is proudly styled the century of discovery and the age of illumination -- the following scandalous ideas were broached. We quote from the report in the Sun of the following morning:

"The Baptist preachers met yesterday in the Mariners' Chapel, in Oliver Street. Several foreign missionaries were present. The Rev. John W. Sarles, of Brooklyn, read an essay, in which he maintained the proposition that all adult heathen, dying without the knowledge of the Gospel, are damned eternally. Otherwise, the reverend essayist argued, the Gospel is a curse instead of a blessing, the men who crucified Christ served him right, and the whole structure of revealed religion tumbles to the ground.

"Brother Stoddard, a missionary from India, indorsed the views of the Brooklyn pastor. The Hindus were great sinners. One day, after he had preached in the market place, a Brahman got up and said: 'We Hindus beat the world in lying, but this man beats us. How can he say that God loves us? Look at the poisonous serpents, tigers, lions, and all kinds of dangerous animals around us. If God loves us, why doesn't He take them away?'

"The Rev. Mr. Pixley, of Hamilton, N. Y., heartily subscribed to the doctrine of Brother Sarles's essay, and asked for $5,000 to fit out young men for the ministry."

And these men -- we will not say teach the doctrine of Jesus, for that would be to insult his memory, but -- are paid to teach his doctrine! Can we wonder that intelligent persons prefer annihilation to a faith encumbered by such a monstrous doctrine? We doubt whether any respectable Brahman would have confessed to the vice of lying -- an art cultivated only in those portions of British India where the most Christians are found.*

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* So firmly established seems to have been the reputation of the Brahmans and Buddhists for the highest morality, and that since time immemorial, that we find Colonel Henry Yule, in his admirable edition of "Marco Polo," giving the following testimony: "The high virtues ascribed to the Brahman and Indian merchants were, perhaps, in part, matter of tradition . . . but the eulogy is so constant among mediaeval travellers that it must have had a solid foundation. In fact, it would not be difficult to trace a chain of similar testimony from ancient times down to our own. Arrian says no Indian was ever accused of falsehood. Hwen T'sang ascribes to the people of India eminent uprightness, honesty, and disinterestedness. Friar Jordanus (circa 1330) says the people of Lesser India (Sindh and Western India) were true in speech and eminent in justice; and we may also refer to the high character given to the Hindus by Abul Fazl. But after 150 years of European trade, indeed, we find a sad deterioration. . . . Yet Pallas, in the last century, noticing the Bamyan colony at Astrakhan, says its members were notable for an upright dealing that made them greatly preferable to Armenians. And that wise and admirable public servant, the late Sir William Sleeman, in our own time, has said that he knew no class of men in the world more strictly honorable than the mercantile classes of India." (1)

The sad examples of the rapid demoralization of savage American Indians, as soon as they are made to live in a close proximity with Christian officials and missionaries, are familiar in our modern days.

-------------------------------------

(1) The "Book of Ser Marco Polo, the Venetian," translated by Colonel Henry Yule, vol. ii., p. 354.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 475 THE DEVIL IN ALL HIS ASPECTS.

But we challenge any honest man in the wide world to say whether he thinks the Brahman was far from the truth in saying of the missionary Stoddard, "this man beats us all" in lying. What else would he say, if the latter preached to them the doctrine of eternal damnation, because, indeed, they had passed their lives without reading a Jewish book of which they never heard, or asked salvation of a Christ whose existence they never suspected! But Baptist clergymen who need a few thousand dollars must devise terrifying sensations to fire the congregational heart.

We abstain, as a rule, from giving our own experience when we can call acceptable witnesses, and so, upon reading missionary Stoddard's outrageous remarks, we requested our acquaintance, Mr. William L. D. O'Grady,* to give a fair opinion upon the missionaries. This gentleman's father and grandfather were British army officers, and he himself was born in India, and enjoyed life-long opportunities to learn what the general opinion among the English is of these religious propagandists. Following is his communication in reply to our letter:

"You ask me for my opinion of the Christian missionaries in India. In all the years I spent there, I never spoke to a single missionary. They were not in society, and, from what I heard of their proceedings and could see for myself, I don't wonder at it. Their influence on the natives is bad. Their converts are worthless, and, as a rule, of the lowest class; nor do they improve by conversion. No respectable family will employ Christian servants. They lie, they steal, they are unclean -- and dirt is certainly not a Hindu vice; they drink -- and no decent native of any other belief ever touches intoxicating liquor; they are outcasts from their own people and utterly despicable. Their new teachers set them a poor example of consistency. While holding forth to the Pariah that God makes no distinction of persons, they boast intolerably over the stray Brahmans, who, very much "off color," occasionally, at long intervals, fall into the clutches of these hypocrites.
"The missionaries get very small salaries, as publicly stated in the proceedings of the societies that employ them, but, in some unaccountable way, manage to live as well as officials with ten times their income. When they come home to recover their health, shattered, as they say, by their arduous labors -- which they seem to be able to afford to do quite frequently, when supposed richer people cannot -- they tell childish stories on platforms, exhibit idols as procured with infinite difficulty, which is quite absurd, and give an account of their imaginary hardships which is perfectly harrowing but untrue from beginning to end. I lived some years in India myself, and nearly all my blood-relations have passed or will pass the best years of their lives there. I know hundreds of British officials, and I never heard from one of them a single word in favor of the missionaries. Natives of any position look on them with the supremest contempt, although suffering chronic exasperation from their arrogant aggressiveness; and the British Government, which continues endowments to Pagodas, granted by the East India Company, and which supports unsectarian education, gives them no countenance whatever. Protected from personal violence, they yelp and bark at natives and Europeans alike, after the fashion of ill-conditioned curs. Often recruited from the poorest specimens of theological fanaticism, they are regarded on all sides as mischievous. Their rabid, reckless, vulgar, and offensive propagandism caused the great Mutiny of 1857. They are noisome humbugs.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* At the present moment Mr. O'Grady is Editor of the "American Builder," of New York, and is well known for his interesting letters, "Indian Sketches -- Life in the East," which he contributed under the pseudonym of Hadji Nicka Bauker Khan, to the Boston "Commercial Bulletin."


"WM.  L.D. O 'GRADY.
"NEW YORK, June 12, 1877."

The new creed therefore, with which we opened this chapter, coarse as it may sound, embodies the very essence of the belief of the Church as inculcated by her missionaries. It is regarded as less impious, less infidel, to doubt the personal existence of the Holy Ghost, or the equal Godhead of Jesus, than to question the personality of the Devil. But a summary of Koheleth is well-nigh forgotten. Who ever quotes the golden words of the prophet Micah, or seems to care for the exposition of the Law, as given by Jesus himself? The "bull's eye" in the target of Modern Christianity is in the simple phrase to "fear the Devil."

The Catholic clergy and some of the lay champions of the Roman Church fight still more for the existence of Satan and his imps. If Des Mousseaux maintains the objective reality of spiritual phenomena with such an unrelenting ardor, it is because, in his opinion, the latter are the most direct evidence of the Devil at work. The Chevalier is more Catholic than the Pope; and his logic and deductions from never-to-be and non-established premises are unique, and prove once more that the creed offered by us is the one which expresses the Catholic belief most eloquently.

"If magic and spiritualism," he says, "were both but chimeras, we would have to bid an eternal farewell to all the rebellious angels, now troubling the world; for thus, we would have no more demons down here. . . . And if we lost our demons, we would LOSE OUR SAVIOUR likewise. For, from whom did that Saviour come to save us? And then, there would be no more Redeemer; for from whom or what could that Redeemer redeem us? Hence, there would be no more Christianity!!" Oh, Holy Father of Evil; Sainted Satan! We pray thee do not abandon such pious Christians as the Chevalier des Mousseaux and some Baptist clergymen!!


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 477 A PERSONAL DEVIL INVOLVES POLYTHEISM.

For our part, we would rather remember the wise words of J. C. Colquhoun,* who says that "those persons who, in modern times, adopt the doctrine of the Devil in its strictly literal and personal application, do not appear to be aware that they are in reality polytheists, heathens, idolaters."

Seeking supremacy in everything over the ancient creeds, the Christians claim the discovery of the Devil officially recognized by the Church. Jesus was the first to use the word "legion" when speaking of them; and it is on this ground that M. des Mousseaux thus defends his position in one of his demonological works. "Later," he says, "when the synagogue expired, depositing its inheritance in the hands of Christ, were born into the world and shone, the Fathers of the Church, who have been accused by certain persons of a rare and precious ignorance, of having borrowed their ideas as to the spirits of darkness from the theurgists."

Three deliberate, palpable, and easily-refuted errors -- not to use a harsher word -- occur in these few lines. In the first place, the synagogue, far from having expired, is flourishing at the present day in nearly every town of Europe, America, and Asia; and of all churches in Christian cities, it is the most firmly established, as well as the best behaved. Further -- while no one will deny that many Christian Fathers were born into the world (always, of course, excepting the twelve fictitious Bishops of Rome, who were never born at all), every person who will take the trouble to read the works of the Platonists of the old Academy, who were theurgists before Iamblichus, will recognize therein the origin of Christian Demonology as well as the Angelology, the allegorical meaning of which was completely distorted by the Fathers. Then it could hardly be admitted that the said Fathers ever shone, except, perhaps, in the refulgence of their extreme ignorance. The Reverend Dr. Shuckford, who passed the better part of his life trying to reconcile their contradictions and absurdities, was finally driven to abandon the whole thing in despair. The ignorance of the champions of Plato must indeed appear rare and precious by comparison with the fathomless profundity of Augustine, "the giant of learning and erudition," who scouted the sphericity of the earth, for, if true, it would prevent the antipodes from seeing the Lord Christ when he descended from heaven at the second advent; or, of Lactantius, who rejects with pious horror Pliny's identical theory, on the remarkable ground that it would make the trees at the other side of the earth grow and the men walk with their heads downward; or, again, of Cosmas-Indicopleustes, whose orthodox system of geography is embalmed in his "Christian topography"; or, finally, of Bede, who assured the world that the heaven "is tempered with glacial waters, lest it should be set on fire" -- a benign dispensation of Providence, most likely to prevent the radiance of their learning from setting the sky ablaze!

Be this as it may, these resplendent Fathers certainly did borrow their notions of the "spirits of darkness" from the Jewish kabalists and Pagan theurgists, with the difference, however, that they disfigured and outdid in absurdity all that the wildest fancy of the Hindu, Greek, and Roman rabble had ever created. There is not a dev in the Persian Pandaimonion half so preposterous, as a conception, as des Mousseaux's Incubus revamped from Augustine. Typhon, symbolized as an ass, appears a philosopher in comparison with the devil caught by the Normandy peasant in a key-hole; and it is certainly not Ahriman or the Hindu Vritra who would run away in rage and dismay, when addressed as St. Satan, by a native Luther.

The Devil is the patron genius of theological Christianity. So "holy and reverend is his name" in modern conception, that it may not, except occasionally from the pulpit, be uttered in ears polite. In like manner, anciently, it was not lawful to speak the sacred names or repeat the jargon of the Mysteries, except in the sacred cloister. We hardly know the names of the Samothracian gods, but cannot tell precisely the number of the Kabeiri. The Egyptians considered it blasphemous to utter the title of the gods of their secret rites. Even now, the Brahman only pronounces the syllable Om in silent thought, and the Rabbi, the Ineffable Name, . Hence, we who exercise no such veneration, have been led into the blunders of miscalling the names of HISIRIS and YAVA by the mispronunciations, Osiris and Jehovah. A similar glamour bids fair, it will be perceived, to gather round the designation of the dark personage of whom we are treating; and in the familiar handling, we shall be very likely to shock the peculiar sensibilities of many who will consider a free mentioning of the Devil's names as blasphemy -- the sin of sins, that "hath never forgiveness."**

Several years ago an acquaintance of the author wrote a newspaper article to demonstrate that the diabolos or Satan of the New Testament denoted the personification of an abstract idea, and not a personal being. He was answered by a clergyman, who concluded the reply with the deprecatory expression, "I fear that he has denied his Saviour." In his rejoinder he pleaded, "Oh, no! we only denied the Devil." But the clergyman failed to perceive the difference. In his conception of the matter, the denying of the personal objective existence of the Devil was itself "the sin against the Holy Ghost."

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

** Gospel according to Mark, iii. 29: "He that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost, hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation" ([[amartematos]], error).


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 479 "NO DEVIL, NO CHRIST!"

This necessary Evil, dignified by the epithet of "Father of Lies," was, according to the clergy, the founder of all the world-religions of ancient time, and of the heresies, or rather heterodoxies, of later periods, as well as the Deus ex Machina of modern Spiritualism. In the exceptions which we take to this notion, we protest that we do not attack true religion or sincere piety. We are only carrying on a controversy with human dogmas. Perhaps in doing this we resemble Don Quixote, because these things are only windmills. Nevertheless, let it be remembered that they have been the occasion and pretext for the slaughtering of more than fifty millions of human beings since the words were proclaimed: "LOVE YOUR ENEMIES."

It is a late day for us to expect the Christian clergy to undo and amend their work. They have too much at stake. If the Christian Church should abandon or even modify the dogma of an anthropomorphic devil, it would be like pulling the bottom card from under a castle of cards. The structure would fall. The clergymen to whom we have alluded perceived that upon the relinquishing of Satan as a personal devil, the dogma of Jesus Christ as the second deity in their trinity must go over in the same catastrophe. Incredible, or even horrifying, as it may seem, the Roman Church bases its doctrine of the godhood of Christ entirely upon the satanism of the fallen archangel. We have the testimony of Father Ventura, who proclaims the vital importance of this dogma to the Catholics.

The Reverend Father Ventura, the illustrious ex-general of the Theatins, certifies that the Chevalier des Mousseaux, by his treatise, Moeurs et Pratiques des Demons, has deserved well of mankind, and still more of the most Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. With this voucher, the noble Chevalier, it will be perceived, "speaks as one having authority." He asserts explicitly, that to the Devil and his angels we are absolutely indebted for our Saviour; and that but for them we would have no Redeemer, no Christianity.

Many zealous and earnest souls have revolted at the monstrous dogma of John Calvin, the popekin of Geneva, that sin is the necessary cause of the greatest good. It was bolstered up, nevertheless, by logic like that of des Mousseaux, and illustrated by the same dogmas. The execution of Jesus, the god-man, on the cross, was the most prodigious crime in the universe, yet it was necessary that mankind -- those predestinated to ever lasting life -- might be saved. D'Aubignee cites the quotation by Martin Luther from the canon, and makes him exclaim, in ecstatic rapture: "O beata culpa, qui talem meruisti redemptorem!" O blessed sin, which didst merit such a Redeemer. We now perceive that the dogma which had appeared so monstrous is, after all, the doctrine of Pope, Calvin, and Luther alike -- that the three are one.

Mahomet and his disciples, who held Jesus in great respect as a prophet, remarks Eliphas Levi, used to utter, when speaking of Christians, the following remarkable words: "Jesus of Nazareth was verily a true prophet of Allah and a grand man; but lo! his disciples all went insane one day, and made a god of him."

Max Muller kindly adds: "It was a mistake of the early Fathers to treat the heathen gods as demons or evil spirits, and we must take care not to commit the same error with regard to the Hindu gods."*

But we have Satan presented to us as the prop and mainstay of sacerdotism -- an Atlas, holding the Christian heaven and cosmos upon his shoulders. If he falls, then, in their conception, all is lost, and chaos must come again.

This dogma of the Devil and redemption seems to be based upon two passages in the New Testament: "For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the Devil." "And there was war in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the Dragon; and the Dragon fought, and his angels, and prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great Dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world." Let us, then, explore the ancient Theogonies, in order to ascertain what was meant by these remarkable expressions.

The first inquiry is whether the term Devil, as here used, actually represents the malignant Deity of the Christians, or an antagonistic, blind force -- the dark side of nature. By the latter we are not to understand the manifestation of any evil principle that is malum in se, but only the shadow of the Light, so to say. The theories of the kabalists treat of it as a force which is antagonistic, but at the same time essential to the vitality, evolving, and vigor of the good principle. Plants would perish in their first stage of existence, if they were kept exposed to a constant sunlight; the night alternating with the day is essential to their healthy growth and development. Goodness, likewise, would speedily cease to be such, were it not alternated by its opposite. In human nature, evil denotes the antagonism of matter to the spiritual, and each is accordingly purified thereby. In the cosmos, the equilibrium must be preserved; the operation of the two contraries produce harmony, like the centripetal and centrifugal forces, and are necessary to each other. If one is arrested, the action of the other will immediately become destructive.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 481 THE TEMPTING SERPENT OF EDEN.

This personification, denominated Satan, is to be contemplated from three different planes: the Old Testament, the Christian Fathers, and the ancient Gentile altitude. He is supposed to have been represented by the Serpent in the Garden of Eden; nevertheless, the epithet of Satan is nowhere in the Hebrew sacred writings applied to that or any other variety of ophidian. The Brazen Serpent of Moses was worshipped by the Israelites as a god; being the symbol of Esmun-Asklepius the Phoenician Iao. Indeed, the character of Satan himself is introduced in the 1st book of Chronicles in the act of instigating King David to number the Israelitish people, an act elsewhere declared specifically to have been moved by Jehovah himself.** The inference is unavoidable that the two, Satan and Jehovah, were regarded as identical.

Another mention of Satan is found in the prophecies of Zechariah. This book was written at a period subsequent to the Jewish colonization of Palestine, and hence, the Asideans may fairly be supposed to have brought the personification thither from the East. It is well-known that this body of sectaries were deeply imbued with the Mazdean notions; and that they represented Ahriman or Anra-manyas by the god-names of Syria. Set or Sat-an, the god of the Hittites and Hyk-sos, and Beel-Zebub the oracle-god, afterward the Grecian Apollo. The prophet began his labors in Judea in the second year of Darius Hystaspes, the restorer of the Mazdean worship. He thus describes the encounter with Satan: "He showed me Joshua the high-priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to be his adversary. And the Lord said unto Satan: 'The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan; even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?' "**

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* 2 Kings, xviii. 4. It is probable that the fiery serpents or Seraphim mentioned in the twenty-first chapter of the book of Numbers were the same as the Levites, or Ophite tribe. Compare Exodus xxxii. 26-29 with Numbers xxi. 5-9. The names Heva, , Hivi or Hivite, , and Levi , all signify a serpent; and it is a curious fact that the Hivites, or serpent-tribe of Palestine, like the Levites or Ophites of Israel, were ministers to the temples. The Gibeonites, whom Joshua assigned to the service of the sanctuary, were Hivites.

** 1 Chronicles, xxi. 1: "And Satan stood up against Israel and moved David to number Israel." 2d Samuel, xxiv. 1: "And again the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them to say: 'Go, number Israel and Judah.' "

*** Zechariah iii. 1, 2. A pun or play on words is noticeable; "adversary" is associated with "Satan," as if from , to oppose.


We apprehend that this passage which we have quoted is symbolical. There are two allusions in the New Testament that indicate that it was so regarded. The Catholic Epistle of Jude refers to it in this peculiar language: "Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the Devil, he disputed about the body of Moses, did not venture to utter to him a reviling judgment ([[Krisin epenegkein Blasphemias]]), but said, 'The Lord rebuke thee.' " The archangel Michael is thus mentioned as identical with the Lord, or angel of the Lord, of the preceding quotation, and thus is shown that the Hebrew Jehovah had a twofold character, the secret and that manifested as the angel of the Lord, or Michael the archangel. A comparison between these two passages renders it plain that "the body of Moses" over which they contended was Palestine, which as "the land of the Hittites" was the peculiar domain of Seth, their tutelar god. Michael, as the champion of the Jehovah-worship, contended with the Devil or Adversary, but left judgment to his superior.

Belial is not entitled to the distinction of either god or devil. The term , BELIAL, is defined in the Hebrew lexicons to mean a destroying, waste, uselessness; or the phrase AIS-BELIAL or Belial-man signifies a wasteful, useless man. If Belial must be personified to please our religious friends, we would be obliged to make him perfectly distinct from Satan, and to consider him as a sort of spiritual "Diakka." The demonographers, however, who enumerate nine distinct orders of daimonia, make him chief of the third class -- a set of hobgoblins, mischievous and good-for-nothing.

Asmodeus is no Jewish spirit at all, his origin being purely Persian. Breal, the author of Hercule et Cacus, shows that he is the Parsi Eshem-Dev, or Aeshma-dev, the evil spirit of concupiscence, whom Max Muller tells us "is mentioned several times in the Avesta as one of the Devs,**** originally gods, who became evil spirits."

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

** In the "Assyrian Tablets," Palestine is called "the land of the Hittites"; and the Egyptian Papyri, declaring the same thing, also make Seth, the "pillar-god," their tutelar deity.

*** Seth, Suteh, or Sat-an, was the god of the aboriginal nations of Syria. Plutarch makes him the same as Typhon. Hence he was god of Goshen and Palestine, the countries occupied by the Israelites.

**** "Vendidad," fargard x., 23: "I combat the daeva AEshma, the very evil." "The Yacnas," x. 18, speaks likewise of AEshma-Daeva, or Khasm: "All other sciences depend upon AEshma, the cunning." "Serv.," lvi. 12: "To smite the wicked Auramanyas (Ahriman, the evil power), to smite AEshma with the terrible weapon, to smite the Mazanian daevas, to smite all devas."

In the same fargard of the "Vendidad" the Brahman divinities are involved in the same denunciation with AEshma-daeva: "I combat India, I combat Sauru, I combat the Daeva Naonhaiti." The annotator explains them to be the Vedic gods, Indus, Gaurea, or Siva, and the two Aswins. There must be some mistake, however, for Siva, at the time the "Vedas" were completed, was an aboriginal or AEthiopian God, the Bala or Bel of Western Asia. He was not an Aryan or Vedic deity. Perhaps Surya was the divinity intended.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 483 SAMAEL AND TYPHON ARE SATAN.

Samael is Satan; but Bryan and a good many other authorities show it to be the name of the "Simoun" -- the wind of the desert,* and the Simoun is called Atabul-os or Diabolos.

Plutarch remarks that by Typhon was understood anything violent, unruly, and disorderly. The overflowing of the Nile was called by the Egyptians Typhon. Lower Egypt is very flat, and any mounds built along the river to prevent the frequent inundations, were called Typhonian or Taphos; hence, the origin of Typhon. Plutarch, who was a rigid, orthodox Greek, and never known to much compliment the Egyptians, testifies in his Isis and Osiris, to the fact that, far from worshipping the Devil (of which Christians accused them), they despised more than they dreaded Typhon. In his symbol of the opposing, obstinate power of nature, they believed him to be a poor, struggling, half-dead divinity. Thus, even at that remote age, we see the ancients already too enlightened to believe in a personal devil. As Typhon was represented in one of his symbols under the figure of an ass at the festival of the sun's sacrifices, the Egyptian priests exhorted the faithful worshippers not to carry gold ornaments upon their bodies for fear of giving food to the ass!

Three and a half centuries before Christ, Plato expressed his opinion of evil by saying that "there is in matter a blind, refractory force, which resists the will of the Great Artificer." This blind force, under Christian influx, was made to see and become responsible; it was transformed into Satan!

His identity with Typhon can scarcely be doubted upon reading the account in Job of his appearance with the sons of God, before the Lord. He accuses Job of a readiness to curse the Lord to his face upon sufficient provocation. So Typhon, in the Egyptian Book of the Dead, figures as the accuser. The resemblance extends even to the names, for one of Typhon's appellations was Seth, or Seph; as Satan, in Hebrew, means an adversary. In Arabic the word is Shatana -- to be adverse, to persecute, and Manetho says he had treacherously murdered Osiris and allied himself with the Shemites (the Israelites). This may possibly have originated the fable told by Plutarch, that, from the fight between Horus and Typhon, Typhon, overcome with fright at the mischief he had caused, "fled seven days on an ass, and escaping, begat the boys Ierosolumos and Ioudaios (Jerusalem and Judea)."

Referring to an invocation of Typhon-Seth, Professor Reuvens says that the Egyptians worshipped Typhon under the form of an ass; and according to him Seth "appears gradually among the Semites as the background of their religious consciousness." The name of the ass in Coptic, AO, is a phonetic of IAO, and hence the animal became a pun-symbol. Thus Satan is a later creation, sprung from the overheated fancy of the Fathers of the Church. By some reverse of fortune, to which the gods are subjected in common with mortals, Typhon-Seth tumbled down from the eminence of the deified son of Adam Kadmon, to the degrading position of a subaltern spirit, a mythical demon -- ass. Religious schisms are as little free from the frail pettiness and spiteful feelings of humanity as the partisan quarrels of laymen. We find a strong instance of the above in the case of the Zoroastrian reform, when Magianism separated from the old faith of the Brahmans. The bright Devas of the Veda became, under the religious reform of Zoroaster, daevas, or evil spirits, of the Avesta. Even Indra, the luminous god, was thrust far back into the dark shadow** in order to show off, in a brighter light, Ahura-mazda, the Wise and Supreme Deity.

The strange veneration in which the Ophites held the serpent which represented Christos may become less perplexing if the students would but remember that at all ages the serpent was the symbol of divine wisdom, which kills in order to resurrect, destroys but to rebuild the better. Moses is made a descendant of Levi, a serpent-tribe. Gautama-Buddha is of a serpent-lineage, through the Naga (serpent) race of kings who reigned in Magadha. Hermes, or the god Taaut (Thoth), in his snake-symbol is Tet; and, according to the Ophite legends, Jesus or Christos is born from a snake (divine wisdom, or Holy Ghost), i.e., he became a Son of God through his initiation into the "Serpent Science." Vishnu, identical with the Egyptian Kneph, rests on the heavenly seven-headed serpent.

The red or fiery dragon of the ancient time was the military ensign of the Assyrians. Cyrus adopted it from them when Persia became dominant. The Romans and Byzantines next assumed it; and so the "great red dragon," from being the symbol of Babylon and Nineveh, became that of Rome.

The temptation, or probation,* of Jesus is, however, the most dramatic occasion in which Satan appears. As if to prove the designation of Apollo, AEsculapius, and Bacchus, Diobolos, or son of Zeus, he is also styled Diabolos, or accuser. The scene of the probation was the wilderness. In the desert about the Jordan and Dead Sea were the abodes of the "sons of the prophets," and the Essenes. These ascetics used to subject their neophytes to probations, analogous to the tortures of the Mithraic rites; and the temptation of Jesus was evidently a scene of this character. Hence, in the Gospel according to Luke, it is stated that "the Diabolos, having completed the probation, left him for a specific time, [[achri kairou]], and Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee." But the [[diabolos]], or Devil, in this instance is evidently no malignant principle, but one exercising discipline. In this sense the terms Devil and Satan are repeatedly employed. Thus, when Paul was liable to undue elation by reason of the abundance of revelations or epoptic disclosures, there was given him "a thorn in the flesh, an angel of Satanas," to check him.

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

**** The term [[teirasmos]] signifies a trial, or probation.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 485 THE TEMPTATIONS OF JOB AND JESUS.

The story of Satan in the Book of Job is of a similar character. He is introduced among the "Sons of God," presenting themselves before the Lord, as in a Mystic initiation. Micaiah the prophet describes a similar scene, where he "saw the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the host of Heaven standing by Him," with whom He took counsel, which resulted in putting "a lying spirit into the mouth of the prophets of Ahab."* *** The Lord counsels with Satan, and gives him carte blanche to test the fidelity of Job. He is stripped of his wealth and family, and smitten with a loathsome disease. In his extremity, his wife doubts his integrity, and exhorts him to worship God, as he is about to die. His friends all beset him with accusations, and finally the Lord, the chief hierophant Himself, taxes him with the uttering of words in which there is no wisdom, and with contending with the Almighty. To this rebuke Job yielded, making this appeal: "I will demand of thee, and thou shalt declare unto me: wherefore do I abhor myself and mourn in dust and ashes?" Immediately he was vindicated. "The Lord said unto Eliphaz . . . ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath." His integrity had been asserted, and his prediction verified: "I know that my Champion liveth, and that he will stand up for me at a later time on the earth; and though after my skin my body itself be corroded away, yet even then without my flesh shall I see God." The prediction was accomplished: "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee. . . . And the Lord turned the captivity of Job."

In all these scenes there is manifested no such malignant diabolism as is supposed to characterize "the adversary of souls."

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

*** 2d Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, xii. In Numbers xxii, 22 the angel of the Lord is described as acting the part of a Satan to Balaam.

**** 1 Kings, xxii. 19-23.


It is an opinion of certain writers of merit and learning, that the Satan of the book of Job is a Jewish myth, containing the Mazdean doctrine of the Evil Principle. Dr. Haug remarks that "the Zoroastrian religion exhibits a close affinity, or rather identity with the Mosaic religion and Christianity, such as the personality and attributes of the Devil, and the resurrection of the dead." The war of the Apocalypse between Michael and the Dragon, can be traced with equal facility to one of the oldest myths of the Aryans. In the Avesta we read of war between Thraetaona and Azhi-Dahaka, the destroying serpent. Burnouf has endeavored to show that the Vedic myth of Ahi, or the serpent, fighting against the gods, has been gradually euhemerized into "the battle of a pious man against the power of evil," in the Mazdean religion. By these interpretations Satan would be made identical with Zohak or Azhi-Dahaka, who is a three-headed serpent, with one of the heads a human one.**

Beel-Zebub is generally distinguished from Satan. He seems, in the Apocryphal New Testament, to be regarded as the potentate of the underworld. The name is usually rendered "Baal of the Flies," which may be a designation of the Scarabaei or sacred beetles.*** More correctly it shall be read, as it is always given in the Greek text of the Gospels, Beelzebul, or lord of the household, as is indeed intimated in Matthew x. 25: "If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more shall they call them of his household." He was also styled the prince or archon of daemons.

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

** The "Avesta" describes the serpent Dahaka, as of the region of Bauri or Babylonia. In the Median history are two kings of the name Deiokes or Dahaka, and Astyages or Az-dahaka. There were children of Zohak seated on various Eastern thrones, after Feridun. It is apparent, therefore, that by Zohak is meant the Assyrian dynasty, whose symbol was the purpureum signum draconis -- the purple sign of the Dragon. From a very remote antiquity (Genesis xiv.) this dynasty ruled Asia, Armenia, Syria, Arabia, Babylonia, Media, Persia, Bactria, and Afghanistan. It was finally overthrown by Cyrus and Darius Hystaspes, after "1,000 years" rule. Yima and Thraetaona, or Jemshid and Feridun, are doubtless personifications. Zohak probably imposed the Assyrian or Magian worship of fire upon the Persians. Darius was the vicegerent of Ahura-Mazda.

*** The name in the Gospels is [[beelzeboul]], or Baal of the Dwelling. It is pretty certain that Apollo, the Delphian God, was not Hellenian originally, but Phoenician. He was the Paian or physician, as well as the god of oracles. It is no great stretch of imagination to identify him with Baal-Zebul, the god of Ekron, or Acheron, doubtless changed to Zebub, or flies, by the Jews in derision.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 487 THE GREAT RED DRAGON.

Typhon figures in the Book of the Dead, as the Accuser of souls when they appear for judgment, as Satan stood up to accuse Joshua, the high-priest, before the angel, and as the Devil came to Jesus to tempt or test him during his great fast in the wilderness. He was also the deity denominated Baal-Tsephon, or god of the crypt, in the book of Exodus, and Seth, or the pillar. During this period, the ancient or archaic worship was more or less under the ban of the government; in figurative language, Osiris had been treacherously slain and cut in fourteen (twice seven) pieces, and coffined by his brother Typhon, and Isis had gone to Byblos in quest of his body.

We must not forget in this relation that Saba or Sabazios, of Phrygia and Greece, was torn by the Titans into seven pieces, and that he was, like Heptaktis of the Chaldeans, the seven-rayed god. Siva, the Hindu, is represented crowned with seven serpents, and he is the god of war and destruction. The Hebrew Jehovah the Sabaoth is also called the Lord of hosts, Seba or Saba, Bacchus or Dionysus Sabazios; so that all these may easily be proved identical.

Finally the princes of the older regime, the gods who had, on the assault of the giants, taken the forms of animals and hidden in AEthiopia, returned and expelled the shepherds.

According to Josephus, the Hyk-sos were the ancestors of the Israelites. This is doubtless substantially true. The Hebrew Scriptures, which tell a somewhat different story, were written at a later period, and underwent several revisions, before they were promulgated with any degree of publicity. Typhon became odious in Egypt, and shepherds "an abomination." "In the course of the twentieth dynasty he was suddenly treated as an evil demon, insomuch that his effigies and name are obliterated on all the monuments and inscriptions that could be reached."** In all ages the gods have been liable to be euhemerized into men. There are tombs of Zeus, Apollo, Hercules, and Bacchus, which are often mentioned to show that originally they were only mortals. Shem, Ham, and Japhet, are traced in the divinities Shamas of Assyria, Kham of Egypt, and Iapetos the Titan. Seth was god of the Hyk-sos, Enoch, or Inachus, of the Argives; and Abraham, Isaac, and Judah have been compared with Brahma, Ikshwaka, and Yadu of the Hindu pantheon. Typhon tumbled down from godhead to devilship, both in his own character as brother of Osiris, and as the Seth, or Satan of Asia. Apollo, the god of day, became, in his older Phoenician garb, no more Baal Zebul, the Oracle-god, but prince of demons, and finally the lord of the underworld. The separation of Mazdeanism from Vedism, transformed the devas or gods into evil potencies. Indra, also, in the Vendidad is set forth as the subaltern of Ahriman,* created by him out of the materials of darkness, together with Siva (Surya) and the two Aswins. Even Jahi is the demon of Lust -- probably identical with Indra.

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* "Against Apion," i. 25. "The Egyptians took many occasions to hate and envy us: in the first place because our ancestors (the Hyk-sos, or shepherds) had had the dominion over their country, and when they were delivered from them and gone to their own country, they lived there in prosperity."

** Bunsen. The name Seth with the syllable an from the Chaldean ana or Heaven, makes the term Satan. The punners seem now to have pounced upon it, as was their wont, and so made it Satan from the verb Sitan, to oppose.


The several tribes and nations had their tutelar gods, and vilified those of inimical peoples. The transformation of Typhon, Satan and Beelzebub are of this character. Indeed, Tertullian speaks of Mithra, the god of the Mysteries, as a devil.

In the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse, Michael and his angels overcame the Dragon and his angels: "and the Great Dragon was cast out, that Archaic Ophis, called Diabolos and Satan, that deceiveth the whole world." It is added: "They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb." The Lamb, or Christ, had to descend himself to hell, the world of the dead, and remain there three days before he subjugated the enemy, according to the myth.

Michael was denominated by the kabalists and the Gnostics, "the Saviour," the angel of the Sun, and angel of Light. (, probably, from to manifest and God.) He was the first of the AEons, and was well-known to antiquarians as the "unknown angel" represented on the Gnostic amulets.

The writer of the Apocalypse, if not a kabalist, must have been a Gnostic. Michael was not a personage originally exhibited to him in his vision (epopteia) but the Saviour and Dragon-slayer. Archaeological explorations have indicated him as identical with Anubis, whose effigy was lately discovered upon an Egyptian monument, with a cuirass and holding a spear, like St. Michael and St. George. He is also represented as slaying a Dragon, that has the head and tail of a serpent.***

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* "Vendidad," fargard x. The name Vendidad is a contraction of Vidaeva-data, ordinances against the Daevas.

** Bundahest, "Ahriman created out of the materials of darkness Akuman and Ander, then Sauru and Nakit."

*** See Lenoir's "Du Dragon de Metz," in "Memoires de l'Academie Celtique," i., 11, 12.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 489 A NECESSARY AND LONG-DEFERRED EXPLANATION.

The student of Lepsius, Champollion, and other Egyptologists will quickly recognize Isis as the "woman with child," "clothed with the Sun and with the Moon under her feet," whom the "great fiery Dragon" persecuted, and to whom "were given two wings of the Great Eagle that she might fly into the wilderness." Typhon was red-skinned.*

The Two Brothers, the Good and Evil Principles, appear in the Myths of the Bible as well as those of the Gentiles, and Cain and Abel, Typhon and Osiris, Esau and Jacob, Apollo and Python, etc., Esau or Osu, is represented, when born, as "red all over like an hairy garment." He is the Typhon or Satan, opposing his brother.

From the remotest antiquity the serpent was held by every people in the greatest veneration, as the embodiment of Divine wisdom and the symbol of spirit, and we know from Sanchoniathon that it was Hermes or Thoth who was the first to regard the serpent as "the most spirit-like of all the reptiles"; and the Gnostic serpent with the seven vowels over the head is but the copy of Ananta, the seven-headed serpent on which rests the god Vishnu.

We have experienced no little surprise to find upon reading the latest European treatises upon serpent-worship, that the writers confess that the public is "still almost in the dark as to the origin of the superstition in question." Mr. C. Staniland Wake, M.A.I., from whom we now quote, says: "The student of mythology knows that certain ideas were associated by the peoples of antiquity with the serpent, and that it was the favorite symbol of particular deities; but why that animal rather than any other was chosen for the purpose is yet uncertain."**

Mr. James Fergusson, F.R.S., who has gathered together such an abundance of material upon this ancient cult, seems to have no more suspicion of the truth than the rest.***

Our explanation of the myth may be of little value to students of symbology, and yet we believe that the interpretation of the primitive serpent-worship as given by the initiates is the correct one. In Vol. i., p. 10, we quote from the serpent Mantra, in the Aytareya-Brahmana, a passage which speaks of the earth as the Sarpa Rajni, the Queen of the Serpents, and "the mother of all that moves." These expressions refer to the fact that before our globe had become egg-shaped or round it was a long trail of cosmic dust or fire-mist, moving and writhing like a serpent. This, say the explanations, was the Spirit of God moving on the chaos until its breath had incubated cosmic matter and made it assume the annular shape of a serpent with its tail in its mouth -- emblem of eternity in its spiritual and of our world in its physical sense. According to the notions of the oldest philosophers, as we have shown in the preceding chapter, the earth, serpent-like, casts off its skin and appears after every minor pralaya in a rejuvenated state, and after the great pralaya resurrects or evolves again from its subjective into objective existence. Like the serpent, it not only "puts off its old age," says Sanchoniathon, "but increases in size and strength." This is why not only Serapis, and later, Jesus, were represented by a great serpent, but even why, in our own century, big snakes are kept with sacred care in Moslem mosques; for instance, in that of Cairo. In Upper Egypt a famous saint is said to appear under the form of a large serpent; and in India in some children's cradles a pair of serpents, male and female, are reared with the infant, and snakes are often kept in houses, as they are thought to bring (a magnetic aura of) wisdom, health, and good luck. They are the progeny of Sarpa Rajni, the earth, and endowed with all her virtues.

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* Plutarch: "Isis and Osiris."

** "The Origin of Serpent Worship," by C. Staniland Wake, M.A.I. New York: J. W. Bouton, 1877.

*** "Tree and Serpent Worship," etc.


In the Hindu mythology Vasaki, the Great Dragon, pours forth upon Durga, from his mouth, a poisonous fluid which overspreads the ground, but her consort Siva caused the earth to open her mouth and swallow it.

Thus the mystic drama of the celestial virgin pursued by the dragon seeking to devour her child, was not only depicted in the constellations of heaven, as has been mentioned, but was represented in the secret worship of the temples. It was the mystery of the god Sol, and inscribed on a black image of Isis. The Divine Boy was chased by the cruel Typhon. In an Egyptian legend the Dragon is said to pursue Thuesis (Isis) while she is endeavoring to protect her son. Ovid describes Dione (the consort of the original Pelasgian Zeus, and mother of Venus) as flying from Typhon to the Euphrates, thus identifying the myth as belonging to all the countries where the Mysteries were celebrated. Virgil sings the victory:

"Hail, dear child of gods, great son of Jove!
Receive the honors great; the time is at hand;
The Serpent will die!"


It is pretty certain that whoever wrote the Pentateuch had this plan before him, as well as those who wrote the New Testament had become thoroughly well acquainted with Buddhistic ritualistic worship, legends and doctrines, through the Buddhist missionaries who were many in those days in Palestine and Greece.

But "no Devil, no Christ." This is the basic dogma of the Church. We must hunt the two together. There is a mysterious connection between the two, more close than perhaps is suspected, amounting to identity. If we collect together the mythical sons of God, all of whom were regarded as "first-begotten," they will be found dovetailing together and blending in this dual character. Adam Kadmon bifurcates from the spiritual conceptive wisdom into the creative one, which evolves matter. The Adam made from dust is both son of God and Satan; and the latter is also a son of God, according to Job.

Hercules was likewise "the First-Begotten." He is also Bel, Baal, and Bal, and therefore Siva, the Destroyer. Bacchus was styled by Euripides, "Bacchus, the Son of God." As a child, Bacchus, like the Jesus of the Apocryphal Gospels, was greatly dreaded. He is described as benevolent to mankind; nevertheless he was merciless in punishing whomever failed of respect to his worship. Pentheus, the son of Cadmus and Hermione, was, like the son of Rabbi Hannon, destroyed for his want of piety.

[[Footnote(s)]]--------------------------------------------------

* In the Secret Museum of Naples, there is a marble bas-relief representing the Fall of Man, in which God the Father plays the part of the Beguiling Serpent.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 493 JOB EXPLAINED BY THE "BOOK OF THE DEAD."

The allegory of Job, which has been already cited, if correctly understood, will give the key to this whole matter of the Devil, his nature and office; and will substantiate our declarations. Let no pious individual take exception to this designation of allegory. Myth was the favorite and universal method of teaching in archaic times. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, declared that the entire story of Moses and the Israelites was typical; and in his Epistle to the Galatians, asserted that the whole story of Abraham, his two wives, and their sons was an allegory.** Indeed, it is a theory amounting to certitude, that the historical books of the Old Testament were of the same character. We take no extraordinary liberty with the Book of Job when we give it the same designation which Paul gave the stories of Abraham and Moses.

But we ought, perhaps, to explain the ancient use of allegory and symbology. The truth in the former was left to be deduced; the symbol expressed some abstract quality of the Deity, which the laity could easily apprehend. Its higher sense terminated there; and it was employed by the multitude thenceforth as an image to be employed in idolatrous rites. But the allegory was reserved for the inner sanctuary, when only the elect were admitted. Hence the rejoinder of Jesus when his disciples interrogated him because he spoke to the multitude in parables. "To you," said he, "it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven, but to them it is not given. For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance; but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath." In the minor Mysteries a sow was washed to typify the purification of the neophyte; as her return to the mire indicated the superficial nature of the work that had been accomplished.

"The Mythus is the undisclosed thought of the soul. The characteristic trait of the myth is to convert reflection into history (a historical form). As in the epos, so in the myth, the historical element predominates. Facts (external events) often constitute the basis of the myth, and with these, religious ideas are interwoven."

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* First Epistle to the Corinthians, x. 11.: "All these things happened unto them for types."

** Epistle to the Galatians, iv. 24: "It is written that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bond-maid, the other by a freewoman . . . which things are an allegory."


The whole allegory of Job is an open book to him who understands the picture-language of Egypt as it is recorded in the Book of the Dead. In the Scene of Judgment, Osiris is represented sitting on his throne, holding in one hand the symbol of life, "the hook of attraction," and in the other the mystic Bacchic fan. Before him are the sons of God, the forty-two assessors of the dead. An altar is immediately before the throne, covered with gifts and surmounted with the sacred lotus-flower, upon which stand four spirits. By the entrance stands the soul about to be judged, whom Thmei, the genius of Truth, is welcoming to this conclusion of the probation. Thoth holding a reed, makes a record of the proceedings in the Book of Life. Horus and Anubis, standing by the scales, inspect the weight which determines whether the heart of the deceased balances the symbol of truth, or the latter preponderates. On pedestal sits a bitch -- the symbol of the Accuser.

The Great Hall of Truth or Judgment Seat of Osiris. Left to Right: Osiris in judgment chair. A leopard skin, his banner. Four genii over closed lotus flower, symbol of Mu. Great beast of Amenti. Thoth with Ibis head recording history of the deceased. Anubis with jackal's head and Horus with hawk's head weighing the heart in pair of scales against a feather. The deceased, hands aloft exposing his heart, being led into the Hall of Truth by a feather and being received by Maat, goddess of Truth. The bitch sits on top of the balance scale...the accuser...later called Satan by the Christian church.
From the Egyptian "Book of the Dead".

Initiation into the Mysteries, as every intelligent person knows, was dramatic representation of scenes in the underworld. Such was the allegory of Job.

Several critics have attributed the authorship of this book to Moses. But it is older than the Pentateuch. Jehovah is not mentioned in the poem itself; and if the name occurs in the prologue, the fact must be attributed to either an error of the translators, or the premeditation exacted by the later necessity to transform polytheism into a monotheistic religion. The plan adopted was the very simple one of attributing the many names of the Elohim (gods) to a single god. So in one of the oldest Hebrew texts of Job (in chapter xii. 9) there stands the name of Jehovah, whereas all other manuscripts have "Adonai." But in the original poem Jehovah is absent. In place of this name we find Al, Aleim, Ale, Shaddai, Adonai, etc. Therefore, we must conclude that either the prologue and epilogue were added at a later period, which is inadmissible for many reasons, or that it has been tampered with like the rest of the manuscripts. Then, we find in this archaic poem no mention whatever of the Sabbatical Institution; but a great many references to the sacred number seven, of which we will speak further, and a direct discussion upon Sabeanism, the worship of the heavenly bodies prevailing in those days in Arabia. Satan is called in it a "Son of God," one of the council which presents itself before God, and he leads him into tempting Job's fidelity. In this poem, clearer and plainer than anywhere else, do we find the meaning of the appellation, Satan. It is a term for the office or character of public accuser. Satan is the Typhon of the Egyptians, barking his accusations in Amenthi; an office quite as respectable as that of the public prosecutor, in our own age; and if, through the ignorance of the first Christians, he became later identical with the Devil, it is through no connivance of his own.

The Book of Job is a complete representation of ancient initiation, and the trials which generally precede this grandest of all ceremonies.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 495 PERVERSIONS OF THE TEXT AND INTERPOLATIONS.

The neophyte perceives himself deprived of everything he valued, and afflicted with foul disease. His wife appeals to him to adore God and die; there was no more hope for him. Three friends appear on the scene by mutual appointment: Eliphaz, the learned Temanite, full of the knowledge "which wise men have told from their fathers -- to whom alone the earth was given"; Bildad, the conservative, taking matters as they come, and judging Job to have done wickedly, because he was afflicted; and Zophar, intelligent and skillful with "generalities" but not interiorly wise. Job boldly responds: "If I have erred, it is a matter with myself. You magnify yourselves and plead against me in my reproach; but it is God who has overthrown me. Why do you persecute me and are not satisfied with my flesh thus wasted away? But I know that my Champion lives, and that at a coming day he will stand for me in the earth; and though, together with my skin, all this beneath it shall be destroyed, yet without my flesh I shall see God. . . . Ye shall say: 'Why do we molest him?' for the root of the matter is found in me!"

This passage, like all others in which the faintest allusions could be found to a "Champion," "Deliverer," or "Vindicator," was interpreted into a direct reference to the Messiah; but apart from the fact that in the Septuagint this verse is translated:

"For I know that He is eternal
Who is about to deliver me on earth,
To restore this skin of mine which endures these things," etc.

In King James's version, as it stands translated, it has no resemblance whatever to the original. The crafty translators have rendered it, "I know that my Redeemer liveth," etc. And yet Septuagint, Vulgate, and Hebrew original, have all to be considered as an inspired Word of God. Job refers to his own immortal spirit which is eternal, and which, when death comes, will deliver him from his putrid earthly body and clothe him with a new spiritual envelope. In the Mysteries of Eleusinia, in the Egyptian Book of the Dead, and all other works treating on matters of initiation, this "eternal being" has a name. With the Neo-platonists it was the Nous, the Augoeides; with the Buddhists it is Aggra; and with the Persians, Ferwer. All of these are called the "Deliverers," the "Champions," the "Metatrons," etc. In the Mithraic sculptures of Persia, the ferwer is represented by a winged figure hovering in the air above its "object" or body. It is the luminous Self -- the Atman of the Hindus, our immortal spirit, who alone can redeem our soul; and will, if we follow him instead of being dragged down by our body. Therefore, in the Chaldean texts, the above reads, "My deliverer, my restorer," i.e., the Spirit who will restore the decayed body of man, and transform it into a clothing of ether. And it is this Nous, Augoeides, Ferwer, Aggra, Spirit of himself, that the triumphant Job shall see without his flesh -- i.e., when he has escaped from his bodily prison, and that the translators call "God."

Kali, the Goddess in her destructive
aspect of Chamunda holds the 'noose'/'Nous'

"Isaiah 52:1-2

1."Awake, awake, put on your strength,
O Zion; put on your beautiful garments
O Jerusalem, the holy city; for there
shall no more come into you the
uncircumcised and the unclean.  

2:Shake yourself from the dust, arise,
o captive Jerusalem, loose the bonds
from your neck, o captive daughter of
Zion.

Not only is there not the slightest allusion in the poem of Job to Christ, but it is now well proved that all those versions by different translators, which agree with that of King James, were written on the authority of Jerome, who has taken strange liberties in his Vulgate. He was the first to cram into the text this verse of his own fabrication:

"I know that my Redeemer lives,
And at the last day I shall arise from the earth,
And again shall be surrounded with my skin,
And in my flesh I shall see my God."

All of which might have been a good reason for himself to believe in it since he knew it, but for others who did not, and who moreover found in the text a quite different idea, it only proves that Jerome had decided, by one more interpolation, to enforce the dogma of a resurrection "at the last day," and in the identical skin and bones which we had used on earth. This is an agreeable prospect of "restoration" indeed. Why not the linen also, in which the body happens to die?

And how could the author of the Book of Job know anything of the New Testament, when evidently he was utterly ignorant even of the Old one? There is a total absence of allusion to any of the patriarchs; and so evidently is it the work of an Initiate, that one of the three daughters of Job is even called by a decidedly "Pagan" mythological name. The name of Kerenhappuch is rendered in various ways by the many translators. The Vulgate has "horn of antimony"; and the LXX has the "horn of Amalthea," the nurse of Jupiter, and one of the constellations, emblem of the "horn of plenty." The presence in the Septuagint of this heroine of Pagan fable, shows the ignorance of the transcribers of its meaning as well as the esoteric origin of the Book of Job.

Instead of offering consolations, the three friends of the suffering Job seek to make him believe that his misfortune must have come in punishment of some extraordinary transgressions on his part. Hurling back upon them all their imputations, Job swears that while his breath is in him he will maintain his cause. He takes in view the period of his prosperity "when the secret of God was upon his tabernacles," and he was a judge "who sat chief, and dwelt as a king in the army, or one that comforteth the mourners," and compares with it the present time -- when vagrant Bedouins held him in derision, men "viler than the earth," when he was prostrated by misfortune and foul disease. Then he asserts his sympathy for the unfortunate, his chastity, his integrity, his probity, his strict justice, his charities, his moderation, his freedom from the prevalent sun-worship, his tenderness to enemies, his hospitality to strangers, his openness of heart, his boldness for the right, though he encountered the multitude and the contempt of families; and invokes the Almighty to answer him, and his adversary to write down of what he had been guilty.


[[Vol. 2, Page]] 497 JOB A SYMBOLICAL POEM UPON INITIATION.

To this there was not, and could not be, any answer. The three had sought to crush Job by pleadings and general arguments, and he had demanded consideration for his specific acts. Then appeared the fourth; Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the kindred of Ram.

Elihu is the hierophant; he begins with a rebuke, and the sophisms of Job's false friends are swept away like the loose sand before the west wind.

"And Elihu, the son of Barachel, spoke and said: 'Great men are not always wise . . . there is a spirit in man; the spirit within me constraineth me. . . . God speaketh once, yea twice, yet man perceiveth it not. In a dream; in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon man, in slumberings upon the bed; then he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction. O Job, hearken unto me; hold thy peace, and I shall teach thee WISDOM.' "

And Job, who to the dogmatic fallacies of his three friends in the bitterness of his heart had exclaimed: "No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you. . . . Miserable comforters are ye all. . . . Surely I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God. But ye are forgers of lies, ye are physicians of no value!" The sore-eaten, visited Job, who in the face of the official clergy -- offering for all hope the necessarianism of damnation, had in his despair nearly wavered in his patient faith, answered: "What ye know, the same do I know also; I am not inferior unto you. . . . Man cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down: he fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not. . . . Man dieth, and wasteth away, yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he? . . . If a man die shall he live again? . . . When a few years are come then I shall go the way whence I shall not return. . . . O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbor!"

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* The expression "of the kindred of Ram" denotes that he was an Aramaean or Syrian from Mesopotamia. Buz was a son of Nahor. "Elihu son of Barachel" is susceptible of two translations. Eli-Hu -- God is, or Hoa is God; and Barach-Al -- the worshipper of God, or Bar-Rachel, the son of Rachel, or son of the ewe.

Excerpted from Isis Unveiled
Oriental and Christian Satanism Unlike
Vol II - page 500

It will be perceived from these extended illustrations that the Satan of the Old Testament, the Diabolos or Devil of the Gospels and Apostolic Epistles, were but the antagonistic principle in matter, necessarily incidedent to it, and not wicked in the moral sense of the term. The Jews, coming from the Persian country, brought with them the doctrine of two principles. They could not bring the Avesta, for it was not written. But they - we mean the Asideans (Chasidim) and Pharsi - invested Ormazd with the secret name of   and Ahriman with the name of the gods of the land, Satan of the Hittites and diabolos, or rather Diabolos, of the Greeks. The early Church, at least the Pauline part of it, the Gnostics and their successors, further refined their ideas; and the Catholic Church adopted and adapted them, meanwhile putting their promulgators to the sword.

Excerpted from The Veil of Isis
Serpent Worship of Israel
by Helena Blavatsky - Vol I. Page 554

Modern research has demonstrated on unimpeachable evidence that the whole genealogical table of the tenth chapter of Genesis refers to imaginary heroes, and that the closing verses of the ninth are little better than a bit of Chaldean allegory of Xisuthros and the mysthical flood, compiled and arranged to fit the Noachian frame. But suppose the descendants of these Canaanites, "the accursed," were to resent for once the unmerited outrage? It would be an easy matter for them to reverse the table and answer to this fling, based on a fable, but a fact proved by archaeologists and symbologists - namely, that Seth, Adam's third son, and the forefather of all Israel, the ancestor of Noah, and the progenitor of the "chosen people," is but Hermes, the god of wisdom, called also Thoth, Tat, Seth, Set and Sat-an; and that he was, furthermore, when viewed under his bad aspect, Typhon, the Egyptian Satan, who was also Set. For the Jewish people, whose well-educated men like Philo, or Josephus the historian, regard their Mosaic books as an allegory, such a discovery amounts to but little. But for Christians who, like des Mousseaux, very unwisely accept the Bible narratives as literal history, the case stands very differently.

BIBLICAL QUOTES

JOB

God and Satan make a Deal
Satan accuses Job of being good only because he is prosperous,
so God allows Job to lose everything to prove that Satan is wrong

The Central problem of the Book of Job, i.e. the sufferings of the Lord's people, is explained at least in part by the divinely beneficent purposes which are served.

1. Job's experiences opened his eyes more fully to the ineffable holiness of God, leading him thereby to self-knowledge and self-judgment.

2. The sufferings of Job are shown to be corrective rather than penal, being used of God to test and refine his character.

3. The outcome demonstrates that by God's grace His people trust and serve Him because of what He is,not as a mere return for temporal benefits.

4. Such experiences, as interpreted here by divine inspiration, reveal the ultimate triumph of a wise and loving God in His unseen contest with Satan over the souls of men.

Finally, when all has been said that can be said in relief of the intellectual problem involved, it must be confessed that beyond the revealed purposes of God there still remains much of a mystery. And for this there is no answer except the attitude of worship in which we humbly acknowledge that a sovereign God cannot be required by men to give all the reasons for what He chooses to do.

The challenge begins:

Chapter 1 - Verse 6

6 Now on a certain day when the sons of God came to stand before the Lord, Satan also was present among them.

7 And the Lord said to him: Whence   thou ? And he answered and said: I have gone round about the earth, and walked through it.

8 And the Lord said to him: Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a simple and upright man, and fearing God, and avoiding evil?

9 And Satan answering, said: Doth Job fear God in vain ?

10 Hast not thou made a fence for him, and his house, and all his substance round about, blessed the works of his hands, and his possession hath increased on the earth ?

11 But stretch forth thy hand a little, and touch all that he hath, and see if he blesseth thee not to thy face.

12 Then the Lord said to Satan: Behold, all that he hath is in thy hand: only put not forth thy hand upon his person. And Satan went forth from the presence of the Lord.

13 Now upon a certain day when his sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in the house of their eldest brother,

14 There came a messenger to Job, and said: The oxen were ploughing, and the asses feeding beside them,

15 And the Sabeans rushed in, and took all away, and slew the servants with the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell thee.

16 And while he was yet speaking, another came, and said: The fire of God fell from heaven, and striking the sheep and the servants, hath consumed them, and I alone have escaped to tell thee.

17 And while he also was yet speaking, there came another, and said: The Chaldeans made three troops, and have fallen upon the camels, and taken them, moreover they have slain the servants with the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell thee.

18 He was yet speaking, and behold another came in, and said: Thy sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in the house of their elder brother:

19 A violent wind came on a sudden from the side of the desert, and shook the four corners of the house, and it fell upon thy children and they are dead, and I alone have escaped to fell thee.

20 Then Job rose up, and rent his garments, and having shaven his head fell down upon the ground and worshipped,

21 And said: Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away: as it hath pleased the Lord so is it done: blessed be the name of the Lord.

22 In all these things Job sinned not by his lips, nor spoke he any foolish thing against God.

Chapter 2

1 And it came to pass, when on a certain day the sons of God came, and stood before the Lord, and Satan came among them, and stood in his sight,

2 That the Lord said to Satan: Whence comest thou ? And he answered and said: I have gone round about the earth, and walked through it.

3 And the Lord said to Satan: Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a man simple, and upright, and fearing Cod, and avoiding evil, and still keeping his innocence ? But thou hast moved me against him, that I should afflict him without cause.

4 And Satan answered, and said: Skin for skin, and all that a man hath he will give for his life:

5 gut put forth thy hand, and touch his bone and his flesh, and then thou shalt gee that he will bless thee to thy face.

6 And the Lord said to Satan: Behold he is in thy hand, but yet save his life.

7 So Satan went forth from the presence Of the Lord, and struck Job with a very grievous ulcer, from the sole of the foot even to the top of his head:

8 And he took a potsherd and scraped the corrupt matter, sitting on a dunghill.

9 And his wife said to him: Dost thou still continue in thy simplicity? bless God and die.

10 And he said to her: Thou hast; spoken like one of the foolish women: if we have received good things at the hand of God, why should we not receive evil? In all these things Job did not sin with his lips.

11 Now when Job's three friends heard all the evil that had befallen him, they came every one from his own place, Alphas the Themanite, and Baldad the Suhite, and Sophar the Naamathite. For they had made an appointment to come together and visit him, a nd comfort him.

12 And when they had lifted up their eyes afar off, they knew him not, and crying out they wept, and rending their garments they sprinkled dust upon their heads towards heaven.

13 And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no man spoke to him a word: for they saw that his grief was very great.

Chapter 4

1 Then Eliphaz the Themanite answered, and said:

2 If we begin to speak to thee, perhaps thou wilt take it ill, but who can withhold the words he hath conceived?

3 Behold thou hast taught many, and thou hast strengthened the weary hands:

4 Thy words have confirmed them that were staggering, and thou hast strengthened the trembling knees:

5 But now the scourge is come upon thee, and thou faintest: it hath touched thee, and thou art troubled.

6 Where is thy fear, thy fortitude, thy patience, and the perfection of thy ways?

7 Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished being innocent? or when were the just destroyed?

8 On the contrary I have seen those who work iniquity, and sow sorrows, and reap them,

9 Perishing by the blast of God, and consumed by the spirit of his wrath.

10 The roaring of the lion, and the voice of the lioness, and the teeth of the whelps of lions are broken:

11 The tiger hath perished for want of prey, and the young lions are scattered abroad.

12 Now there was a word spoken to me in private, and my ears by stealth as it were received the veins of its whisper.

13 In the horror of a vision by night, when deep sleep is wont to hold men,

14 Fear seized upon me, and trembling, and all my bones were affrighted:

15 And when a spirit passed before me, the hair of my flesh stood up.

16 There stood one whose countenance I knew not, an image before my eyes, and I heard the voice as it were of a gentle wind:

17 Shall man be justified in comparison of God, or shall a man be more pure than his maker?

18 Behold they that serve him are not steadfast, and in his angels he found wickedness:

19 How much more shall they that dwell in houses of clay, who have an earthly foundation, be consumed as with the moth?

20 From morning till evening they shall be cut down: and because no one understandeth, they shall perish for ever.

21 And they that shall be left, shall be taken away from them: they shall die, and not in wisdom.

Chapter 10

1 My soul is weary of my life, I will let go my speech against myself, I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.

2 I will say to God: Do not condemn me: tell me why thou judgest me so.

3 Doth it seem good to thee that thou shouldst calumniate me, and oppress me, the work of thy own hands, and help the counsel of the wicked?

4 Hast thou eyes of flesh: or, shalt thou see as man seeth?

5 Are thy days as the days of man, and are thy years as the times of men:

6 That thou shouldst inquire after my iniquity, and search after my sin?

7 And shouldst know that I have done no wicked thing, whereas there is no man that can deliver out of thy hand.

8 Thy hands have made me, and fashioned me wholly round about, and dost thou thus cast me down headlong on a sudden?

9 Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast made me as the clay, and thou wilt bring me into dust again.

10 Hast thou not milked me as milk, and curdled me like cheese?

11 Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh: thou hast put me together with bones and sinews:

12 Thou hast granted me life and mercy, and thy visitation hath preserved my spirit.

13 Although thou conceal these things in thy heart, yet I know that thou rememberest all things.

14 If I have sinned and thou hast spared me for an hour: why dost thou not suffer me to be clean from my iniquity?

15 And if I be wicked, woe unto me: and if just, I shall not lift up my head, being filled with affliction and misery.

16 And for pride thou wilt take me as a lioness, and returning thou tormentest me wonderfully.

17 Thou renewest thy witnesses against me, and multipliest thy wrath upon me, and pains war against me.

18 Why didst thou bring me forth out of the womb: O that I had been consumed that eye might not see me!

19 I should have been as if I had not been, carried from the womb to the grave.

20 Shall not the fewness of my days be ended shortly? suffer me, therefore, that I may lament my sorrow a little:

21 Before I go, and return no more, to a land that is dark and covered with the mist of death:

22 A land of misery and darkness, where the shadow of death, and no order, but everlasting horror dwelleth.

Chapter 16

12 God hath shut me up with the unjust man, and hath delivered me into the hands of the wicked.

13 I that was formerly so wealthy, am all on a sudden broken to pieces: he hath taken me by my neck, he hath broken me, and hath set me up to be his mark.

14 He hath compassed me round about with his lances, he hath wounded my loins, he hath not spared, and hath poured out my bowels on the earth.

15 He hath torn me with wound upon wound, he hath rushed in upon me like a giant.

16 I have sowed sackcloth upon my skin, and have covered my flesh with ashes.

17 My face is swollen with weeping, and my eyelids are dim.

18 These things have I suffered without the iniquity of my hand, when I offered pure prayers to God.

19 O earth, cover not thou my blood, neither let my cry find a hiding place in thee.

20 For behold my witness is in heaven, and he that knoweth my conscience is on high.

21 My friends are full of words: my eye poureth out tears to God.

22 And O that a man might so be judged with God, as the son of man is judged with his companion!

23 For behold short years pass away and I am walking in a path by which l shall not return.

Chapter 17

12 God hath shut me up with the unjust man, and hath delivered me into the hands of the wicked.

13 I that was formerly so wealthy, am all on a sudden broken to pieces: he hath taken me by my neck, he hath broken me, and hath set me up to be his mark.

14 He hath compassed me round about with his lances, he hath wounded my loins, he hath not spared, and hath poured out my bowels on the earth.

15 He hath torn me with wound upon wound, he hath rushed in upon me like a giant.

16 I have sowed sackcloth upon my skin, and have covered my flesh with ashes.

17 My face is swollen with weeping, and my eyelids are dim.

18 These things have I suffered without the iniquity of my hand, when I offered pure prayers to God.

19 O earth, cover not thou my blood, neither let my cry find a hiding place in thee.

20 For behold my witness is in heaven, and he that knoweth my conscience is on high.

21 My friends are full of words: my eye poureth out tears to God.

22 And O that a man might so be judged with God, as the son of man is judged with his companion!

23 For behold short years pass away and I am walking in a path by which l shall not return.

Chapter 18

7 Behold I cry suffering violence, and no one will hear: I shall cry aloud, and there is none to judge.

8 He hath hedged in my path round about, and I cannot pass, and in my way he hath set darkness.

9 He hath stripped me of my glory, and hath taken the crown from my head.

10 He hath destroyed me on every side, and I am lost, and he hath taken away my hope, as from a tree that is plucked up.

11 His wrath is kindled against me, and he hath counted me as his enemy.

12 His troops have come together, and have made themselves a way by me, and have besieged my tabernacle round about.

13 He hath put my brethren far from me, and my acquaintance like strangers have departed from me.

14 My kinsmen have forsaken me, and they that knew me, have forgotten me.

15 They that dwelt in my house, and my maidservants have counted me a stranger, and I have been like an alien in their eyes.

16 I called my servant, and he gave me no answer, I entreated him with my own mouth.

17 My wife hath abhorred my breath, and I entreated the children of my womb.

18 Even fools despise me; and when I gone from them, they spoke against me.

19 They that were sometime my counsellors, have abhorred me: and he whom I love most is turned against me.

20 The flesh being consumed. My bone hath cleaved to my skin, and nothing but lips are left about my teeth.

21 Have pity on me, have pity on me, at least you my friends, because the hand of the Lord hath touched me.

22 Why do you persecute me as God, and glut yourselves with my flesh?

23 Who will grant me that my words may be written? Who will grant me that they may be marked down in a book?

24 With an iron pen and in a plate of lead, or else be graven with an instrument in flint stone.

25 For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and in the last day I shall rise out of the earth.

26 And I shall be clothed again with my skin, and in my flesh I will see my God.

27 Whom I myself shall see, and my eyes shall behold, and not another: this my hope is laid up in my bosom.

28 Why then do you say now: Let us persecute him, and let us find occasion of word against him?

29 Flee then from the face of the sword, for the sword is the revenger of iniquities: and know ye that there is judgment.

Chapter 34

Elihu speaks: He believes this:

He asks a good question:

12 For in very deed God will not condemn without cause, neither will the Almighty pervert judgment.

13 What other hath he appointed over the earth? or whom hath he set over the world which he made?

Chapter 38

The Lord Tells Job how Great He, Himself Is

1 Then the Lord answered Job out of a whirlwind, and said :

2 Who is this that wrappeth up sentences in unskillful words?

3 Gird up thy loins like a man : I will ask thee, and answer thou me.

4 Where wast thou when I laid up the foundations of the earth ? tell me if thou hast understanding.

5 Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it?

6 Upon what are its bases grounded? or who laid the corner stone thereof,

7 When the morning stars praised me together, and all the sons of God made a joyful melody?

8 Who shut up the sea with doors, when it broke forth as issuing out of the womb :

9 when I made a cloud the garment thereof, and wrapped it in a mist as in swaddling bands?

10 I set my bounds around it, and made it bars and doors :

11 And I said : Hitherto thou shalt come, and shalt go no further, and here thou shalt break thy swelling waves.

12 Didst thou since thy birth command the morning, and shew the dawning of the day its place?

13 And didst thou hold the extremities of the earth shaking them, and hast thou shaken the ungodly out of it?

14 The seal shall be restored as clay, and shall stand as a garment :

15 From the wicked their light shall be taken away, and the high arm shall be broken.

16 Hast thou entered into the depths of the sea, and walked in the lowest parts of the deep?

17 Have the gates of death been opened to thee, and hast thou seen the darksome doors?

18 Hast thou considered the breadth of the earth? tell me, if thou knowest all things?

19 Where is the way where light dwelleth, and where is the place of darkness :

20 That thou mayst bring every thing to its own bounds, and understand the paths of the house thereof.

21 Didst thou know then that thou shouldst be born ? and didst thou know the number of thy days?

22 Hast thou entered into the storehouses of the snow, or has thou beheld the treasures of the hail :

23 Which I have prepared for the time of the enemy, against the day of battle and war?

24 By what way is the light spread, and heat divided upon the earth?

25 Who gave a course to violent showers, or a way for noisy thunder :

26 That it should rain on the earth without man in the wilderness, where no mortal dwelleth :

27 That it should fill the desert and desolate land, and should bring forth green grass?

28 Who is the father of rain ? or who begot the drops of dew?

29 Out of whose womb came the ice; and the frost from heaven who hath gendered it?

30 The waters are hardened like a stone, and the surface of the deep is congealed.

31 Shalt thou be able to join together the shining stars the Pleiades, or canst thou stop the turning about of Arcturus?

32 Canst thou bring forth the day star in its time, and make the evening star to rise upon the children of the earth?

33 Dost thou know the order of heaven, and canst thou set down the reason thereof on the earth?

34 Canst thou lift up thy voice to the clouds, that an abundance of waters may cover thee?

35 Canst thou send lightnings, and will they go, and will they return and say to thee : Here we are?

36 Who hath put wisdom in the heart of man? or who gave the cock understanding?

37 Who can declare the order of the heavens, or who can make the harmony of heaven to sleep?

38 When was the dust poured on the earth, and the clods fastened together?

39 Wilt thou take the prey for the lioness, and satisfy the appetite of her whelps,

40 When they couch in the dens and lie in wait in holes?

41 Who provideth food for the raven, when her young ones cry to God, wandering about, because they have no meat?

Chapter 39

1 Knowest thou the time when the wild goats bring forth among the rocks, or hast thou observed the hinds when they fawn?

2 Hast thou numbered the months of their conceiving, or knowest thou the time when they bring forth?

3 They bow themselves to bring forth young, and they cast them, and send forth roarings.

4 Their young are weaned and go to feed : they go forth, and return not to them.

5 Who hath sent out the wild ass free, and who hath loosed his bonds?

6 To whom I have given a house in the wilderness, and his dwellings in the barren land.

7 He scorneth the multitude of the city, he heareth not the cry of the driver.

8 He looketh round about the mountains of his pasture, and seeketh for every green thing.

9 Shall the rhinoceros be willing to serve thee, or will he stay at thy crib?

10 Canst thou bind the rhinoceros with thy thong to plough, or will he break the clods of the valleys after thee?

11 Wilt thou have confidence in his great strength, and leave thy labours to him?

12 Wilt thou trust him that he will render thee the seed, and gather it into thy barnfloor?

13 The wing of the ostrich is like the wings of the heron, and of the hawk.

14 When she leaveth her eggs on the earth, thou perhaps wilt warm them in the dust.

15 She forgetteth that the foot may tread upon them, or that the beasts of the field may break them.

16 She is hardened against her young ones, as though they were not hers, she hath laboured in vain, no fear constraining her.

17 For God hath deprived her of wisdom, neither hath he given her understanding.

18 When time shall be, she setteth up her wings on high : she scorneth the horse and his rider.

19 Wilt thou give strength to the horse, or clothe his neck with neighing?

20 Wilt thou lift him up like the locusts? the glory of his nostrils is terror.

21 He breaketh up the earth with his hoof, he pranceth boldly, he goeth forward to meet armed men.

22 He despiseth fear, he turneth not his back to the sword,

23 Above him shall the quiver rattle, the spear and shield shall glitter.

24 Chasing and raging he swalloweth the ground, neither doth he make account when the noise of the trumpet soundeth.

25 When he heareth the trumpet he saith : Ha, ha : he smelleth the battle afar off, the encouraging of the captains, and the shouting of the army.

26 Doth the hawk wax feathered by thy wisdom, spreading her wings to the south?

27 Will the eagle mount up at thy command, and make her nest in high places?

28 She abideth among the rocks, and dwelleth among cragged flints, and stony hills, where there is no access.

29 From thence she looketh for the prey, and her eyes behold afar off.

30 Her young ones shall suck up blood : and wheresoever the carcass shall be, she is immediately there.

Some Bible separate Chapters here and start Chapter 40
This makes the verses in Chapter 40 number differently from Bible to Bible

31 And the Lord went on, and said to Job :

32 Shall he that contendeth with God be so easily silenced? surely he that reproveth God, ought to answer him.

33 Then Job answered the Lord, and said :

34 One thing I have spoken, which I wish I had not said : and another, to which I will add no more.

Chapter 40

God tells of His Greatness

He tells what happens to men who are proud and arrogant

1 And the Lord answering Job out of the whirlwind, said :

2 Gird up thy loins like a man : I will ask thee, and do thou tell me.

3 Wilt thou make void my judgment : and condemn me, that thou mayst be justified?

4 And hast thou an arm like God, and canst thou thunder with a voice like him?

5 Clothe thyself with beauty, and set thyself up on high and be glorious, and put on goodly garments.

6 Scatter the proud in thy indignation, and behold every arrogant man, and humble him.

7 Look on all that are proud, and confound them, and crush the wicked in their place.

8 Hide them in the dust together, and plunge their faces into the pit.

9 Then I will confess that thy right hand is able to save thee.

10 Behold behemoth whom I made with thee, he eateth grass like an ox.

11 His strength is in his loins, and his force in the navel of his belly.

12 He setteth up his tail like a cedar, the sinews of his testicles are wrapped together.

13 His bones are like pipes of brass, his gristle like plates of iron.

14 He is the beginning of the ways of God, who made him, he will apply his sword.

15 To him the mountains bring forth grass : there all the beasts of the field shall play.

16 He sleepeth under the shadow, in the covert of the reed, and in moist places.

17 The shades cover his shadow, the willows of the brook shall compass him about.

18 Behold, he will drink up a river, and not wonder : and he trusteth that the Jordan may run into his mouth.

19 In his eyes as with a hook he shall take him, and bore through his nostrils with stakes.

Chapter 41

1 Canst thou draw out the leviathan with a hook, or canst thou tie his tongue with a cord?

2 Canst thou put a ring in his nose, or bore through his jaw with a buckle?

3 Will he make many supplications to thee, or speak soft words to thee?

4 Will he make a covenant with thee, and wilt thou take him to be a servant for ever?

5 Shalt thou play with him as with a bird, or tie him up for thy handmaids?

6 Shall friends cut him in pieces, shall merchants divide him?

7 Wilt thou fill nets with his skin, and the cabins of fishes with his head?

8 Lay thy hand upon him : remember the battle, and speak no more.

9 Behold his hope shall fail him, and in the sight of all he shall be cast down.

10 None is so fierce that dare stir him up; who then is able to stand before me?

11 Who hath prevented me, that I should repay him? Whatsoever is under the whole heaven is mine.

12 I will not conceal his parts, nor his power, nor his comely proportions.

13 Who can discover the face of his garment? or who can come to him with his double bridle?

14 Who can open the doors of his face? his teeth are terrible round about.

15 His scales are his pride, shut up together as with a close seal.

16 One is so near to another, that no air can come between them.

17 They are joined one to another, they stick together that they cannot be sundered.

18 By his neesings a light doth shine and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.

19 Out of his mouth go burning lamps, and sparks of fire leap out.

20 Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot or caldron.

21 His breath kindleth coals, and a flame goeth out of his mouth.

22 In his neck remaineth strength, and sorrow is turned into joy before him.

23 The flakes of his flesh are joined together; they are firm in themselves; they cannot be moved.

24 His heart is as firm as a stone; yea, as hard as a piece of the nether millstone.

25 When he raiseth up himself, the mighty are afraid; by reason of breakings they purify themselves.

26 The sword of him that layeth at him cannot hold; the spear, the dart, nor the habergeon.

27 He esteemeth iron as straw, and brass as rotten wood.

28 The arrow cannot make him flee, slingstones are turned with him into stubble.

29 Darts are counted as stubble; he laugheth at the shaking of a spear.

30 Sharp stones are under him; he spreadeth sharp pointed things upon the mire.

31 He maketh the deep to boil like a pot; he maketh the see like a pot of ointment.

32 He maketh a path to shine after him; one would think the deep to be hoary.

33 Upon earth there is not his like, who is made without fear.

34 He beholdeth all high things; he is a king over all the children of pride.

Chapter 42

1 Then Job replied to the Lord,

2 "I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted.

3 You asked, "Who is this that obscures my counsel without knowledge? Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.

4 "You said, 'Listen now, and I will speak; I will question you and you shall answer me.

5 My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you.

6 Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes."

7 After the Lord had said these things to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, "I am angry with you and your two friends because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.

8 So now take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and sacrifice a burnt offering for yourselves. My servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer and not deal with you according to your folly. You have not spoken to me what is right, as my servant Job has,

9 So Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Maamathie did what the Lord told them; and the Lord accepted Job's prayer.

10 After Job had prayed for his friends, the Lord made him prosperous again and gave him twice as much as he had before

11 All his brothers and sisters and everyone who had known him before came and ate with him in his house. They comforted him and consoled him over all the trouble the Lord had brought upon him, and each one gave him a piece of silver and a gold ring.

12 The Lord blessed the latter part of Job's life more than the first. He had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen and a thousand donkeys.

13 And he also had seven sons and three daughters.

14 The first daughter he named Jemimah, the second Keziah and the third Keren-Happuch.

15 Nowhere in all the land were there found women as beautiful as Job's daughters and their father granted them an inheritance along with their brothers.

16 After this, Job lived a hundred and forty years, he saw his children and their children to the fourth generation.

17 And so he died, old and full of years.

*****************

ZECHARIAH

Chapter 3

A Vision

1  Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right side to accuse him.

2 The Lord said to Satan, "The Lord rebuke you, Satan! The Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you!  Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?"

3 Now Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel.

4 The angel said to those who were standing before him, "Take off his filthy clothes." Then he said to Joshua, "See, I have taken away your sin, and I will put rich garments on you."

5 Then I said, "Put a clean turban on his head." So they put a clean turban on his head and clothes him, while the angel of the Lord stood by.

6 The angel of the Lord gave this charge to Joshua.

7 This is what the Lord Almighty says, "If you will walk in my ways and keep my requirements, then you will govern my house and have charge of my courts, and I will give you a place among these standing here.

8 "Listen, O high priest Joshua and your associates seated before you, who are men symbolic of things to come: I am going to bring my servant, the Branch.

9 See, the stone I have set in front of Joshua! There are seven eyes on that one stone, and I will engrave an inscription on it, says the Lord Almighty, and I will remove the sin of this land in a single day.

10 "In that day each of you will invite his neighbor to sit under his vine and fig tree, declares the Lord Almighty.

*****************

Isaiah 45:7 -

I form the light,
and create darkness;
I make peace, and create evil;
I the Lord do all these things.

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