(34) 4th. Fire (ether) He drew forth from the water. He engraved and established by it the Throne of Glory. He fashioned the Seraphim, the Ophanim, and the Holy Living Creatures (Cherubim?), as His ministering angels; and with (of) these three He formed His habitation, as it reads: "Who made His angels spirits, His ministers a flaming fire." (Psalms civ. 4.)

(117) He maketh the whole World of Fire, Air, Water, and Earth, and of the all-nourishing Ether.

(10) Second, from the Spirit he made Air and formed for speech twenty-two letters, three of which are mothers, A, M, SH, seven are double, B, G, D, K, P, R, T, and twelve are single, E, V, Z, CH, H, I, L, N, S, O, Tz, Q, but the spirit is first among these. Third, Primitive Water. He also formed and designed from his Spirit, and from the void and formless made earth, even as a rampart, or standing wall, and varied its surface even as the crossing of beams. Fourth, from the Water, He designed Fire, and from it formed for himself a throne of honor, with Auphanim, Seraphim, Holy Animals, and ministering Angels, and with these he formed his dwelling, as is written in the text "Who maketh his angels spirits and his ministers a flaming fire." (Psalm civ. 4.)

(53) The four Elements of this World, together with the Sun and Stars, could not qualify [or mix] with him; he drew no Air into him; but the Spirit of God (in the Virgin) was his Breathing, and [his] Kindling of the Fire in the Spirit.

(69) And as the three elements, fire, air and water, proceed from the sun and stars, and are one body in one another, and cause the living motion, and the spirit of all the creatures of this world.

(47) He sent forth the winds which he had created, the seven of them

(1) Iximiprus saith:—I testify that the beginning of all things is a Certain Nature, which is perpetual, coequalling all things, and that the visible natures, with their births and decay, are times wherein the ends to which that nature brings them are beheld and summoned.* Now, I instruct you that the stars are igneous, and are kept within bounds by the air. If the humidity and density of the air did not exist to separate the flames of the sun from living things, then the Sun would consume all creatures. But God has provided the separating air, lest that which He has created should be burnt up. Do you not observe that the Sun when it rises in the heaven overcomes the air by its heat, and that the warmth penetrates from the upper to the lower parts of the air? If, then, the air did not presently breathe forth those winds whereby creatures are generated, the i Sun by its heat would certainly destroy all that lives. But the Sun is kept in check by the air, which thus conquers because it unites the heat of the Sun to its own heat, and the humidity of water to its own humidity. Have you not remarked how tenuous water.

is drawn up into the air by the action of the heat of the Sun, which thus helps the water against itself? If the water did not nourish the air by such tenuous moisture, assuredly the Sun would overcome the air. The fire, therefore, extracts moisture from the water, by means of which the air conquers the fire itself. Thus, fire and water are enemies between which there is no consanguinity, for the fire is hot and dry, but the water is cold and moist.. The air, which is warm and moist, joins these together by its concording medium; between the humidity of water and the heat of fire the air is thus placed to establish peace. And lock ye all how there shall arise a spirit from the tenuous vapour of the air, because the heat being joined to the humour, there necessarily issues something tenuous, which will become a wind. For the heat of the Sun extracts something tenuous out of the air, which also becomes spirit and life to all creatures. All this, however, is disposed in such manner by the will of God, and a coruscation appears when the heat of the Sun touches and breaks up a cloud.

The Turba saith:—Well hast thou described the fire, even as thou knowest concerning it, and thou hast believed the word of thy brother.

(66) From the sun and stars proceed the four elements, fire, air, water and earth, as hereafter I shall demonstrate plainly, when I shall write of the creation. Now observe:

(102) Thou know st Him not. Now He appears as fire, Dread force; as water now; and now as gloom; And in the beasts is dimly shadowed forth, In wind, and cloud, in lightning, thunder, rain; And minister to Him the seas and rocks, Each fountain and the water's floods and streams.

(46) And the fourfold wind, and the sevenfold wind, and the whirlwind, and the wind which had no equal

(9) Moreover, what has proceeded from the four Elements may be perceived in the Fierceness of the Fire, how instantly the strong Air goes forth from the Fire; and the Stone or Wood is nothing else but a Sulphur from the Water and from the Earth; and if the Tincture be consumed by the Fierceness, then the [Wood or Stone] would come to Ashes, and at last to nothing; as indeed, at the End, this World with the four Elements will come to nothing, and there shall remain nothing else of them in the eternal Element, but the Figure and the Shadow in the Wonders of God. How then canst thou think that God has created the eternal Man out of the four Elements, or what has proceeded from them, which are but corruptible?

(1) That, then, from which the whole Cosmos is formed, consisteth of Four Elements—Fire, Water, Earth, and Air; Cosmos [itself is] one, [its] Soul [is] one, and God is one. Now lend to me the whole of thee, —all that thou can’st in mind, all that thou skill’st in penetration. For that the Reason of Divinity may not be known except by an intention of the senses like to it. ’Tis likest to the torrent’s flood, down-dashing headlong from above with all-devouring tide; so that it comes about, that by the swiftness of its speed it is too quick for our attention, not only for the hearers, but also for the very teachers.

(53) 4. The three Mothers, א מ ש, in the universe are: air, water, and fire. Heaven was created from the elementary fire (or ether) ש, the earth, comprising sea and land, from the elementary water, מ, and the atmospheric air from the elementary air, or spirit, א, which establishes the balance among them. Thus were all things produced.

(3) From him (when entering on creation) is born breath, mind, and all organs of sense, ether, air, light, water, and the earth, the support of all.

(45) He created the evil wind, and the tempest, and the hurricane

(61) And as we perceive that in this World there are Fire, Air, Water, and Earth, also the Sun and the Stars, and therein consist all the Things of this World, so you may conceive, by Way of Similitude, that the Father is the Fire of the whole [holy] Constellations, and also in the [holy] Element; and that the Son (viz. his Heart) is the Sun, which sets all the Constellations in a light pleasant Habitation; and that the Holy Ghost is the Air of the Life, without which neither Sun nor Constellation would subsist; and then that the concreted Spiritus majoris Mundi [or Spirit of the great World] is the chaste Virgin before God; which Spirit of the great World, in this World, gives to all Creatures, Mind, Sense, and Understanding, through the Influence of the Stars; and so also [does the chaste Virgin] in the Heaven.

(79) Out of the anguishing chamber in the body of this world, out of the seven spirits of God, are risen or sprung forth the stars, which kindle the body of this world; and out of or from the body the fruit or seed generateth itself, which is the water, fire, air and earth.

(32) As Fire, Air, Water, and Earth, lie in one Case, [or Chest,] and they four are but one Thing, and yet of four distinct Differences, and none of them can comprehend, nor retain the other, and something of one of the four being fixed in every Creature, that Creature cannot bind itself as to that, but is manifested therein, and according to that Spirit is comprehensible and perceptible, and yet is incomprehensible to the Spirits of the other Elements.

(74) In the deep the power of all stars, together with the heat and lustre of the sun, are all but one thing, a moving, boiling, hovering, like a spirit or matter; only it has not reason, for it is not the Holy Spirit. And thus also the fourth element must adhere or belong to a natural spirit, or it is not capable of reason. [75. " Thus God the Father goeth forth in his deep out of all his powers, and generateth the splendour, the Heart, or the Son of God in his centre."]

(33) 3rd. Primordial water He extracted from the air. He formed therein twenty-two letters and established them out of mud and loam, making them like a border, putting them up like a wall, and surrounding them as with a rampart. He poured snow upon them and it became earth, as it reads: "He said to the snow be thou earth." (Job. xxxvii. 6.)