(104) 10. When the Patriarch Abraham had comprehended the great truths, meditated upon them, and understood them perfectly, the Lord of the Universe (the Tetragrammaton) appeared to him, called him His friend, kissed him upon the head, and made with him a covenant. First, the covenant was between the ten fingers of his hands, which is the covenant of the tongue (spiritual); second, the covenant was between the ten toes of his feet, which is the covenant of circumcision (material); and God said of him, "Before Abraham bound the spirit of the twenty-two letters (the Thora) upon his tongue and God disclosed to him their secrets. God permitted the letters to be immersed in water, He burned them in the fire and imprinted them upon the winds. He distributed them among the seven planets and gave them to the twelve zodiacal signs.

(3) Now, as for the things which came forth from the of the Hebrews, things which are written by the hylics who speak in the fashion of the Greeks, the powers of those who think about all of them, so to speak, the "right ones," the powers which move them all to think of words and a representation, they them, and they grasped so as to attain the truth and used the confused powers which act in them. Afterwards they attained to the order of the unmixed ones, the one which is established, the unity which exists as a representation of the representation of the Father. It is not invisible in its nature, but a wisdom envelops it, so that it might preserve the form of the truly invisible one. Therefore, many angels have not been able to see it. Also, other men of the Hebrew race, of whom we already spoke, namely the righteous ones and the prophets, did not think of anything and did not say anything from imagination or through a likeness or from esoteric thinking, but each one by the power which was at work in him, and while listening to the things which he saw and heard, spoke of them in [...]. They have a unified harmony with one another after the manner of those who worked in them, since they preserve the connection and the mutual harmony primarily by the confession of the one more exalted than they. And there is one who is greater than they, who was appointed since they have need of him, and whom the spiritual Logos begot along with them as one who needs the exalted one, in hope and expectation in accord with the thought which is the seed of salvation. And he is an illuminating word, which consists of the thought and his offspring and his emanations. Since the righteous ones and the prophets, whom we have previously mentioned, preserve the confession and the testimony concerning the one who is great, made by their fathers who were looking for the hope and the hearing, in them is sown the seed of prayer and the searching, which is sown in many who have searched for strengthening. It appears and draws them to love the exalted one, to proclaim these things as pertaining to a unity. And it was a unity which worked in them when they spoke. Their vision and their words do not differ because of the multitude of those who have given them the vision and the word. Therefore, those who have listened to what they have said concerning this do not reject any of it, but have accepted the scriptures in an altered way. By interpreting them, they established many heresies which exist to the present among the Jews. Some say that God is one, who made a proclamation in the ancient scriptures. Others say that he is many. Some say that God is simple and was a single mind in nature. Others say that his activity is linked with the establishment of good and evil. Still others say that he is the creator of that which has come into being. Still others say that it was by the angels that he created.

(15) And I shall establish My covenant between Me and thee, and thy seed after thee, throughout their generations, for an eternal covenant, so that I may be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee.

(4) Whether, then, it be the law which is connate and natural, or that given afterwards, which is meant, it is certainly of God; and both the law of nature and that of instruction are one. Thus also Plato, in The Statesman, says that the lawgiver is one; and in The Laws, that he who shall understand music is one; teaching by these words that the Word is one, and God is one. And Moses manifestly calls the Lord a covenant: "Behold I am my Covenant with thee," having previously told him not to seek the covenant in writing. For it is a covenant which God, the Author of all, makes. For God is called from qesis (placing), and order or arrangement. And in the Preaching of Peter you will find the Lord called Law and Word. But at this point, let our first Miscellany of gnostic notes, according to the true philosophy, come to a close.

(33) "When Moses distinguished the tabernacle into three parts, and allowed two of them to the priests, as a place accessible and common, he denoted the land and the sea, these being of general access to all; but he set apart the third division for God, because heaven is inaccessible to men. And when he ordered twelve loaves to be set on a table, he denoted the year, as distinguished into so many months. By branching out the candlestick into seventy parts, he secretly intimated the Decani, or seventy divisions of the planets; and as to the seven lamps upon the candlesticks, they referred to the course of the planets, of which that is the number. The veils too, which were composed of four things, they declared the four elements; for the plain linen was proper to signify the earth, because the flax grows out of the earth; the purple signified the sea, because that color is dyed by the blood of a sea shell-fish; the blue is fit to signify the air; and the scarlet will naturally be an indication of fire.

(7) And the ark which held them will then be the knowledge of divine and human things and wisdom. And perhaps the two tables themselves may be the prophecy of the two covenants. They were accordingly mystically renewed, as ignorance along with sin abounded. The commandments are written, then, doubly, as appears, for twofold spirits, the ruling and the subject.

(5) When, then, the comprehensive melody of the holy Hymns has harmonized the habits of our souls to the things which are presently to be ministered, and, by the unison of the Divine Odes, as one and concordant chorus of holy men, has established an accord with things Divine, and themselves, and one another, the things, more strained and obscure in the intellectual language of the mystic Psalms, are expanded by the most holy lections of the inspired writings, through more full and distinct images and narratives. He, who devoutly contemplates these, will perceive the uniform and one conspiration, as being moved by One, the supremely Divine Spirit. Hence, naturally, in the history of the world, after the more ancient tradition, the new Covenant is proclaimed; the inspired and Hierarchical order teaching this, as I think, that the one affirmed the Divine works of Jesus, as to come; but the other accomplished; and as that described the truth in figures, this shewed it present. For the accomplishment, within this, of the predictions of that, established the truth, and the work of God is a consummation of the Word of God.

(15) (And I shall give to thee and to thy seed after thee) the land where thou hast been a sojourner, the land of Canaan, that thou mayst possess it for ever, and I shall be their God." II. And the Lord said unto Abraham : " And as for thee, do thou keep My Covenant, thou and thy seed after thee ; and circum- cise ye every male among you, and circumcise your foresKins, and it will be a token of an eternal covenant between Me and you.

(17) The two tables signify respectively the superior and the inferior worlds--the paternal and the maternal formative principles. In their undivided state they represent the Cosmic Androgyne. The breaking of the tables signifies obscurely the separation of the superior and the inferior spheres and also the division of the sexes. In the religious processionals of the Greeks and Egyptians an ark or ship was carried which contained stone tablets, cones, and vessels of various shapes emblematic of the procreative processes. The Ark of the Israelites--which was patterned after the sacred chests of the Isiac Mysteries--contained three holy objects, each having an important phallic interpretation: the pot of manna, the rod that budded, and the Tablets of the Law--the first, second, and third Principles of the Creative Triad. The manna, the blossoming staff, and the stone tables are also appropriate images respectively of the Qabbalah, the Mishna, and the written law--the spirit, soul, and body of Judaism. When placed in King Solomon's Everlasting House, the Ark of the Covenant contained only the Tablets of the Law. Does this indicate that even at that early date the secret tradition had been lost and the letter of the revelation alone remained?

(24) For to thee and to thy seed shall I give all this land, and I shall estab- lish My oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father, and I shall multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven, and shall give unto thy seed all this land. II. And in thy seed will all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thy father obeyed My voice, and kept My charge and My commandments, and' My laws, and My ordinances, and My covenant ; and now obey My voice and dwell in this land." 2080-

(10) The Tetragrammaton, or four-lettered Name of God, is here arranged as a tetractys within the inverted human heart. Beneath, the name Jehovah is shown transformed into Jehoshua by the interpolation of the radiant Hebrew letter סה, Shin. The drawing as a whole represents the throne of God and His hierarchies within the heart of man. In the first book of his Libri Apologetici, Jakob Böhme thus describes the meaning of the symbol: "For we men have one book in common which points to God. Each has it within himself, which is the priceless Name of God. Its letters are the flames of His love, which He out of His heart in the priceless Name of Jesus has revealed in us. Read these letters in your hearts and spirits and you have books enough. All the writings of the children of God direct you unto that one book, for therein lie all the treasures of wisdom. * * * This book is Christ in you."

(18) 3. The ten numbers (Sephiroth) out of Nothing are analogous to the ten fingers and the ten toes: five over against five. In the center between them is the covenant with the Only One God. In the spiritual world it is the covenant of the voice (the Word), and in the corporeal world the circumcision of the flesh (the rite of Abraham).

(74) The Tetragrammaton, or the four-lettered Name of God, written thus יהוה, is pronounce Jehovah. The first letter is י, Yod, the Germ, the Life, the Flame, the Cause, the One, and the most fundamental of the Jewish phallic emblems. Its numerical value is 10, and it is to be considered as the 1 containing the 10. In the Qabbalah it is declared that the a Yod is in reality three Yods, of which the first is the beginning, the second is the center, and the third is the end. Its throne is the Sephira Chochmah (according to Ibn Gebirol, Kether), from which it goes forth to impregnate Binah, which is the first ה, He. The result of this union is Tiphereth, which is the ו Vau, whose power is 6 and which symbolizes the six members of the Lesser Adam. The final ה, He, is Malchuth, the Inferior Mother, partaking in part of the potencies of the Divine Mother, the first He. By placing the four letters of the Tetragrammaton in a vertical column, a figure closely resembling the human body is produced, with Yod for the head, the first He for the arms and shoulders, Vau for the trunk of the body, and the final He for the hips and legs. If the Hebrew letters be exchanged for their English equivalents, the form is not materially changed or the analogy altered. It is also extremely significant that by inserting the letter ש, Shin, in the middle of the name Jehovah, the word Jehoshua, or Jesus, is formed thus:

(15) And I will make My covenant between Me and thee, and I will multiply thee exceedingly." l 5.' And Abram fell on his face, and God talked with him, and said :

(24) The fingers and toes also have special significance. The toes represent the Ten Commandments of the physical law and the fingers the Ten Commandments of the spiritual law. The four fingers of each hand represent the four elements and the three phalanges of each finger represent the divisions of the element, so that in each hand there are twelve parts to the fingers, which are analogous to the signs of the zodiac, whereas the two phalanges and base of each thumb signify the threefold Deity. The first phalange corresponds to the creative aspect, the second to the preservative aspect, and the base to the generative and destructive aspect. When the hands are brought together, the result is the twenty-four Elders and the six Days of Creation.

(7) And, as we arrive at some knowledge of God's essence and attributes from the contemplation of the soul's essence and attributes, so we come to understand God's method of working and government and delegation of power to angelic forces, etc., by observing how each of us governs his own little kingdom. To take a simple instance: suppose a man wishes to write the name of God. First of all the wish is conceived in his heart, it is then conveyed to the brain by the vital spirits, the form of the word "God" takes shape in the thought-chambers of the brain, thence it travels by the nerve-channels, and sets in motion the fingers, which in their turn set in motion the pen, and thus the name "God" is traced on paper exactly as it had been conceived in the writer's brain. Similarly, when God wills a thing it appears in the spiritual plane, which in the Koran is called "The Throne"; from the throne it passes, by a spiritual current, to a lower plane called "The Chair"; then the shape of it appears on the Tablet of Destiny"; whence, by the mediation of the forces called "angels," it assumes actuality, and appears in the earth in the form of plants, trees, and animals, representing the will and thought of God, as the written letters represent the wish conceived in the heart and the shape present in the brain of the writer.

(21) Moses Maimonides, the great Jewish Philosopher of the twelfth century, in describing the Tables of the Law written by the finger of God, divides all productions into two general orders: products of Nature and products of art. God works through Nature and man through art, he asserts in his Guide for the Perplexed. Thus the Word of the Lord is the hand, or active principle, by which the will of the Creator is traced upon the face of His creation. The Tannaim, or initiates of the Jewish Mystery School, alone possessed a complete understanding of the significance of the Ten Commandments. These laws are esoterically related to the ten degrees of contemplation constituting the Path of Ecstasy, which winds upward through he four worlds and ends in the effulgence of AIN SOPH.

(48) 5. How was it all accomplished? He combined, weighed, and changed: the א (A) with all the other letters in succession, and all the others again with א (A), and all again with ב (B); and so with the whole series of letters. Hence it follows that there are two hundred and thirty-one formations, or gates, through which the powers of the letters go forth; every creature and every language proceeded from One Name and the combinations of its letters.

(36) And he divided all his possessions between the two on that flay, and he gave the larger portion to him that was the first-born, and the tower and all that was about it. and all that Abraham possessed at the Well of the Oath.

(32) And he saw in a vision of the night, and behold an angel descended from heaven with seven tablets in his hands, and he gave them to Jacob, and he read them and knew all that was written therein which would befall him and his sons through- a For - cf. Gen. xxxv. -