(116) This, as is mentioned above, is that fair, bright and holy heaven, which is thus in the total Deity, and which has neither beginning nor end, whither no creature with its sense can reach.

(156) Now observe what is the fountain of the gracious, amiable, blessed and friendly love of God; observe it exactly, for it is the very pith, marrow or kernel.

(60) Thus now the Heaven in this Forming or Framing, and the Framing and Generating out of it in infinitum, or endlessly, is the Paradise of God, as the highly worthy Moses writes: The Spirit of God moved upon the Water, in the Framing [Forming or Fashioning] of the World. This is, and continues so in its Eternity, that the Spirit of God (in the Birth of the Son of God) moves upon the Water; for he is the Virtue, or Power, and the Out-Flowing of the Father, out of the kindled Light- Water, out of the Water and Light of God.

(110) For this now is the true heaven of nature, which is out of or from God, wherein the holy angels dwell, and out of which they were created in the beginning.

(48) And in that place I saw the fountain of righteousness Which was inexhaustible: And around it were many fountains of wisdom; And all the thirsty drank of them, And were filled with wisdom, And their dwellings were with the righteous and holy and elect.

(33) In that same power grows up and is generated fruit according to every quality and species or kind, viz. heavenly trees and plants, which without ceasing bear fruit, blossom fairly, and grow in divine power, so joyfully that I can neither speak it nor write it down;

(4) For he can neither see nor comprehend nor apprehend the light and holy generation or production, which stands in the water of the heaven, but he can see the generation or production only which stands in the astringent, bitter, sour and hot quality, from whence existed the outermost birth or geniture, which is his royal fort or castle.

(29) This therefore is the only ground and meaning, that the holy Father, who is ALL, would have in these angelical gates his most joyful and most richly loving qualities, out of which is generated the most joyful and most richly loving light, word, heart, or fountain of powers; and therefore has he created his holy angels in this place for his joy, honour and glory. [30. "In the abyssal or bottomless eternity indeed, it is [the same] in one place as in another; but where there are no creatures nothing can be known, except by the spirit in its wonders."]

(72) This I write as a word which is generated in its heaven, where the holy Deity always generateth itself, and where the moving spirit riseth up in the flash of life; even there this word and this knowledge is generated, and risen up in the lovefire through the zealous spirit of God.

Paradise is the perfection in the thought of the father, and the plants are the words of his reflection. Each one of his words is the work of his will alone, in the revelation of his word. Since they were in the depth of his mind, the word, who was the first to come forth, caused them to appear, along with an intellect that speaks the unique word by means of a silent grace. It was called thought, since they were in it before becoming manifest. It happened, then, that the word was the first to come forth at the moment pleasing to the will of him who desired it; and it is in the will that the father is at rest and with which he is pleased. Nothing happens without him, nor does anything occur without the will of the father. But his will is incomprehensible. His will is his footstep, but no one can know it, nor is it possible for them to concentrate on it in order to possess it. But that which he wishes takes place at the moment he wishes it—even if the view does not please people before god: it is the father’s will. For the father knows the beginning of them all as well as their end. For when their end arrives, he will greet them. The end, you see, is the recognition of him who is hidden, that is, the father, from whom the beginning came forth and to whom will return all who have come from him. For they were made manifest for the glory and the joy of his name.

(4) "God seeth all things, and in Him, blest spirit, Thy sight is," said I, "so that never will Of his can possibly from thee be hidden; Thy voice, then, that for ever makes the heavens Glad, with the singing of those holy fires Which of their six wings make themselves a cowl, Wherefore does it not satisfy my longings? Indeed, I would not wait thy questioning If I in thee were as thou art in me." "The greatest of the valleys where the water Expands itself," forthwith its words began, "That sea excepted which the earth engarlands, Between discordant shores against the sun Extends so far, that it meridian makes Where it was wont before to make the horizon. I was a dweller on that valley's shore 'Twixt Ebro and Magra that with journey short Doth from the Tuscan part the Genoese. With the same sunset and same sunrise nearly Sit Buggia and the city whence I was, That with its blood once made the harbour hot. Folco that people called me unto whom My name was known; and now with me this heaven Imprints itself, as I did once with it;

(34) You are the eternal realm of eternal realms, the all-perfect one, who is established.

(2) When we passed beyond that place, we sent our minds up further. We saw with our eyes and heard with our ears hymns, angelic praises and angelic rejoicing. Heavenly majesties were singing hymns, and we rejoiced too.

(8) Unto what is the kingdom of God like? and whereunto shall I resemble it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and cast into his garden; and it grew, and waxed a great tree; and the fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it.

(35) Now when the heavenly music of the angel riseth up, then in the heavenly pomp, in the divine Salitter, there rise up all manner of vegetations, springings or sprouts, also all manner of figures, shapes or ideas, and all manner of colours; for the Deity presenteth, sheweth or discovereth itself in endless and unsearchable varieties of kinds, colours, ideas, forms and joys.

(3) I will go down to the Apsu to live with my lord, Ea, and upon you he will rain down abundance, a profusion of fowl, myriad(!) fishes. He will bring to you a harvest of wealth, in the morning he will let loaves of bread shower down, and in the evening a rain of wheat!"' Just as dawn began to glow the land assembled around me- the carpenter carried his hatchet, the reed worker carried his (flattening) stone,... the men... The child carried the pitch, the weak brought whatever else was needed. On the fifth day I laid out her exterior. It was a field in area, its walls were each 10 times 12 cubits in height, the sides of its top were of equal length, 10 times It cubits each. I laid out its (interior) structure and drew a picture of it (?).

(136) Now I speak here not only of the heaven above the earth, but this stirring and birth or geniture was also in the earth, and everywhere.

(1) WHEN man beholdeth the deep above the earth he seeth nothing but stars, and clouds of water, and then he thinketh, Sure there must be another place, where the Deity presenteth or sheweth forth itself, together with the heavenly and angelical government: man will needs have the deep, together with its regimen or dominion, severed from the Deity; for there he seeth nothing but stars; and the regimen or dominion between, is fire, air, and water.

(40) Further, if thou wilt consider the heavenly divine pomp, state and glory, and conceive how it is, and what manner of sprouting, branching, delight and joy there is in it.

(6) And that verily shall be the best of all words to Him which the All-(wise one) will declare to me in very deed, that word which is the Mãthra of Welfare and of Immortality (for it proclaims His beneficent power). And to the Great Creator (shall there be) a Realm such as that (whose strength I asked for victory ), and which (at the last) shall flourish in its holiness to His (glory )!