(35) Thus in that fore-mentioned Year, the Angel Gabriel came, being sent of God the Father to Nazareth, to a poor (yet chaste and modest) Virgin, called Mary, (her Name signifies plainly in the Language of Nature, A Redemption out of the Valley of Misery; and though it is plain, that we are not born of the high Nature in our School of Wonders [or Miracles,] fixed, [stedfast, or perfect,] which the a Master of Art, in his Pontificalibus, will not believe,) and he greeted her through God, and brought the eternal Command of the Father out of his Will, and said to her; Hail, full of Grace, the Lord is with thee, thou blessed among Women: And when she looked upon him, she was terrified at his saying, and [considered] in her Thoughts what Manner of Salutation this was. And the Angel said to her, Fear not, Mary, thou hast found Grace with God; behold, thou shalt 6 conceive in the Womb [or Body,] and bear a Son, whose Name thou shalt call Jesus; he shall be great, and be called the Son of the most High, and God the LORD will give unto him the Throne of his Father David, and he shall be King over the House of u Years. dLuke 1,28-35, 38. Jacob eternally, and of his Kingdom there will be no End. Then said Mary to the Angel, How shall that come to pass, since I know not a Man? And the Angel answered her, and said; The Holy Ghost will come upon thee, and the Virtue [or Power] of the most High will overshadow thee, therefore also that Holy One, that shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God. Then said Mary; Behold! I am the Handmaid of the Lord, let it be done to me as thou hast said; and the Angel departed from her. Now when this Command [or Message] from God the Father came, then the Nature of the Spirit of the Soul in Mary was astonished, as the Text says; for fit was stirred by a precious Guest, who went into a wonderful Lodging [or Inn.]

(51) Observe it; the Angel said to Mary, Thou shalt conceive and bear a Son, and shalt call his Name Jesus; he shall be great, and be called a Son of the most High; and God the Lord shall give him the Throne of his Father David, and he shall be a King over the House of Jacob eternally, and of his Kingdom there shall be no End.

(22) Like the Gnostics, the Essenes were emanationists. One of their chief objects was the reinterpretation of the Mosaic Law according to certain secret spiritual keys preserved by them from the time of the founding of their order. It would thus follow that the Essenes were Qabbalists and, like several other contemporary sects flourishing in Syria, were awaiting the advent of the Messiah promised in the early Biblical writings. Joseph and Mary, the parents of Jesus, are believed to have been members of the Essene Order. Joseph was many years the senior of Mary. According to The Protevangelium, he was a widower with grown sons, and in the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew he refers to Mary as a little child less in age than his own grandchildren. In her infancy Mary was dedicated to the Lord, and the Apocryphal writings contain many accounts of miracles associated with her early childhood. When she was twelve years old, the priests held counsel as to the future of this child who had dedicated herself to the Lord, and the Jewish high priest, bearing the breastplate, entered into the Holy of Holies, where an angel appeared to him, saying, "Zacharias, go forth and summon the widowers of the people and let them take a rod apiece and she shall be the wife of him to whom the Lord shall show a sign." Going forth to meet the priests at the head of the widowers, Joseph collected the rods of all the other men and gave them into the keeping of the priests. Now Joseph's rod was but half as long as the others, and the priests on returning the rods to the widowers paid no attention to Joseph's but left it behind in the Holy of Holies. When all the other widowers had received back their wands, the priests awaited a sign from heaven, but none came. Joseph, because of his advanced age, did not: ask for the return of his rod, for to him it was inconceivable that he should be chosen. But an angel appeared to the high priest, ordering him to give back the short rod which lay unnoticed in the Holy of Holies. As the high priest handed the rod to Joseph, a white dove flew from the end of it and rested upon the head of the aged carpenter, and to him was given the child.

(9) How came our King JESUS CHRIST into this world? Poor, and in great trouble and misery, and had not where to lay his head.

(25) Stories like the foregoing represent the incrustations that have attached themselves to the body of Christianity during the centuries. The popular mind itself has been the self-appointed guardian and perpetuator of these legends, bitterly opposing every effort to divest the faith of these questionable accumulations. While popular tradition often contains certain basic elements of truth, these elements are usually distorted out of all proportion. Thus, while the generalities of the story may be fundamentally true, the details are hopelessly erroneous. Of truth as of beauty it may be said that it is most adorned when unadorned. Through the mist of fantastic accounts which obscure the true foundation of the Christian faith is faintly visible to the discerning few a great and noble doctrine communicated to the world by a great and noble soul. Joseph and Mary, two devout and holy-minded souls, consecrated to the service of God and dreaming of the coming of a Messiah to serve Israel, obeyed the injunctions of the high priest of the Essenes to prepare a body for the coming of a great soul. Thus of an immaculate conception Jesus was born. By immaculate is meant clean, rather than supernatural.

(84) And in the Gospel according to Matthew, the genealogy which begins with Abraham is continued down to Mary the mother of the Lord. "For," it is said, "from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from David to the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations; and from the carrying away into Babylon till Christ are likewise other fourteen generations," - three mystic intervals completed in six weeks.

(52) You must understand, Mary was to conceive in the Body, viz. in her own Body, not in a strange assumed [Body,] as the Unenlightened (who apprehend not the Kingdom of God) might interpret our Writings to mean. Besides, it is not the Ground neither, which the Ancients and those heretofore have set down (which yet went very high) as if Mary from Eternity had been hidden in Ternario Sancto [the holy Ternary or Trinity,] and that she entered at that Time only in Anna, as into a Case, [or House,] and was not of the Seed of Joachim, and Blood of Anna. They say, she was an eternal Virgin out of the Trinity, of whom Christ was born; because he came not out of the Flesh and Blood of any Man, and as himself witnesses, that he was not of this World, but was come from Heaven. He says, That he came forth from God, and must return again to God; and to Nicodemus he said, No one goes into Heaven, but the Son of Man which is come from Heaven, and who is in Heaven.

(8) "But Jehovah prospered the seed of the Essenians, in holiness and love, for many generations. Then came the chief of the angels, according to the commandment of GOD, to raise up an heir to the Voice of Jehovah. And, in four generations more, an heir was born, and named Joshua, and he was the child of Joseph and Mara, devout worshippers of Jehovah, who stood aloof from all other people save the Essenians. And this Joshua, in Nazareth, reestablished Jehovah, and restored many of the lost rites and ceremonies. In the thirty-sixth year of his age he was stoned to death in Jerusalem * * *"

(16) John was begotten by the World through a woman, Elizabeth; and Christ was begotten by the world through a virgin, Mary. What is (the meaning of) this mystery? John was begotten by means of a womb worn with age, but Christ passed through a virgin's womb. When she had conceived, she gave birth to the Savior. Furthermore, she was found to be a virgin again. Why, then do you (pl.) err and not seek after these mysteries, which were prefigured for our sake?

(29) And it came to pass when Rachel had borne Joseph, that Laban went to shear his sheep ; for they were distant from him a three days' journey.

(41) And out of this heart JESUS CHRIST, the Son of God, in the womb or body of the Virgin Mary, went into all the three births or genitures, and assumed them really, that he might, through and with his innermost birth or geniture, take the devil, death and hell captive in the outermost birth, and overcome the wrath of God, as a king and victorious prince; and, in the power of his geniture or birth in the flesh, press through all men.

(84) For the Word (which God promised in the Garden of Eden) sprung [and budded] in the Light of her Life, in the Center of God; and when the Angel Gabriel (from the Command of the Father) stirred that [Word of the Promise] with the Message, then it let itself into the chaste Virgin i in the Element; and not so wholly and altogether into the Soul of the Virgin, or into the earthly Body, that she was deified. No; for Christ himself says, None goes into Heaven but the Son of Man, who is come from Heaven, and who is in Heaven; all others must go through him into Heaven; khe is their Heaven, and the Father is his Heaven; he was in the Heaven, and also (in the Bosom of the Virgin) in this World: The World was made through him, how then could it comprehend him?