(19) Wherefore Solomon also says, that before heaven, and earth, and all existences, Wisdom had arisen in the Almighty; the participation of which -that which is by power, I mean, not that by essence - teaches a man to know by apprehension things divine and human. Having reached this point, we must mention these things by the way; since the discourse has turned on the seventh and the eighth. For the eighth may possibly turn out to be properly the seventh, and the seventh manifestly the sixth, and the latter properly the Sabbath, and the seventh a day of work. For the creation of the world was concluded in six days.

(17) Mark what John says: In the Beginning of the Creation, and before the Times of the World, was the Word, and the Word was God, and in the Word was the Light, and it shone in the Darkness, and the Darkness could not comprehend the Light. Wherein may be clearly understood, that the eternal Light is God; and that it has its eternal Original in the eternal Virtue or Power; and that it is the eternal Word which shone in the Darkness. Seeing then that Word created all Things in all Places, therefore it was in all Places, for without it was nothing made.

(63) For because Man was to be eternal, therefore he must also come to be out of the Eternal; for nothing is created out of the Fountain of the Heart of God. For that is the End of Nature, and has no such Essences; no comprehensible [or palpable] Thing enters therein; otherwise it would be a Filling and Darkness, and that cannot be: Also from Eternity, there has been nothing else but only the Source [or working Property] where the Deity continually rises up, as is mentioned before.

(52) But seeing the whole deep, in the third birth or geniture, was very dark in regard of the corrupted Salitter of the earth and stones, thereore the Deity could not endure it so to be, but created and compacted together the earth and stones, as in one lump, or as on a heap. Concerning which, Moses writeth thus: Am Anfang schuff Gott Himmel unb Erden. In the beginning created GOD heaven and earth.

(37) Thus is the Birth (and also the first Original) of all the Creatures; and it standeth yet in such a Birth in the Essence; and after such a Manner it is, out of the eternal Thoughts (viz. the Wisdom of God) by the Fiat, brought out of the Matrix; but being come forth out of the Darkness, out of the Out-Birth, out of the Center, (which yet was generated in the Time, in the Will,) therefore it is not eternal, but corruptible [or transitory,] like a Thought; and though it be indeed material, yet every again, as it was before the Beginning.

(73) Before the times of the creation he sat in the Salitter of the earth, when the Salitter was yet thin or transparent, and stood in a heavenly, holy birth or geniture, and he was in the whole kingdom of this world, therein was neither earth nor stones, but a heavenly seed, which was generated out of the seven qualifying or fountain spirits of nature; for in the kingdom of this world sprang up heavenly fruits, forms and ideas, which were a pleasant, delightful food of angels.

(6) The Creator of the World spoke to David from behind the veil of mystery. 'All that exists, whether good or bad, visible or invisible, moving or unmoving, is only a substitute if it is not myself, for whom you will find neither replacement nor equal. Since nothing can take the place of me, do not separate yourself from me. I am necessary to you, you are dependent on me. Therefore do not desire that which offers itself if it be not L'

(13) Wherefore also Moses says, " Show Thyself to me," - intimating most clearly that God is not capable of being taught by man, or expressed in speech, but to be known only by His own power. For inquiry was obscure and dim; but the grace of knowledge is from Him by the Son. Most clearly Solomon shall testify to us, speaking thus: "The prudence of man is not in me: but God giveth me wisdom, and I know holy things." Now Moses, describing allegorically the divine prudence, called it the tree of life planted in Paradise; which Paradise may be the world in which all things proceeding from creation grow. In it also the Word blossomed and bore fruit, being "made flesh," and gave life to those "who had tasted of His graciousness;" since it was not without the wood of the tree that He came to our knowledge. For our life was hung on it, in order that we might believe. And Solomon again says: "She is a tree of immortality to those who take hold of her." "Behold, I set before thy face life and death, to love the Lord thy God, and to walk in His ways, and hear His voice, and trust in life. But if ye transgress the statutes and the judgments which I have given you, ye shall be destroyed with destruction. For this is life, and the length of thy days, to love the Lord thy God."

(2) For when God through the Word had created heaven and earth, and had separated the light from the darkness, and had given a place to each of them, then each began at once its birth or geniture and qualifying or working.

(65) According to the mysteries of the Sephiroth, the order of the Creation, or the Divine Lightning Flash which zigzags through the four worlds according to the order of the divine emanations, is thus described: From AIN SOPH, the Nothing and All, the Eternal and Unconditioned Potency, issues Macroprosophus, the Long Face, of whom it is written, "Within His skull exist daily thirteen thousand myriads of worlds which draw their existence from Him and by Him are upheld." (See The Greater Holy Assembly.) Macroprosophus, the directionalized will of AIN SOPH, corresponding to Kether, the Crown of the Sephiroth, gives birth out of Himself to the nine lesser spheres of which He is the sum and the overbrooding cause. The 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet, by the various combinations of which the laws of the universe are established, constitute the scepter of Macroprosophus which He wields from His flaming throne in the Atziluthic World.

(49) 6. He created a reality out of Nothing. He called the nonentity into existence and hewed colossal pillars from intangible air. This has been shown by the example of combining the letter א (A) with all the other letters, and all the other letters with א. By speaking He created every creature and every word by the power of One Name. As an illustration, consider the twenty-two elementary substances from the primitive substance of א. The production of every creature from the twenty-two letters is proof that they are in reality the twenty-two parts of one living body.

(4) In the process of creation the diffused life of AIN SOPH retires from the circumference to the center of the circle and establishes a point, which is the first manifesting One--the primitive limitation of the all-pervading O. When the Divine Essence thus retires from the circular boundary to the center, It leaves behind the Abyss, or, as the Qabbalists term it, the Great Privation. Thus, in AIN SOPH is established a twofold condition where previously had existed but one. The first condition is the central point--the primitive objectified radiance of the eternal, subjectified life. About this radiance is darkness caused by the deprivation of the life which is drawn to the center to create the first point, or universal germ. The universal AIN SOPH, therefore, no longer shines through space, but rather upon space from an established first point. Isaac Myer describes this process as follows: "The Ain Soph at first was filling All and then made an absolute concentration into Itself which produced the Abyss, Deep, or Space, the Aveer Qadmon or Primitive Air, the Azoth; but this is not considered in the Qabbalah as a perfect void or vacuum, a perfectly empty Space, but is thought of as the Waters or Crystalline Chaotic Sea, in which was a certain degree of Light inferior to that by which all the created [worlds and hierarchies] were made." (See The Qabbalah.)

(2) Indeed Moses writes; That God made Man of the Dust of the Earth. And that is the Opinion of very many: And I should also not have known how that was to be understood, and I should not have learned it out of Moses, nor out of the Glosses which are made upon it; and the Vail would have continued still before my Eyes, yet in great Trouble. But when I found the Pearl, then I looked Moses in the Face, and found that Moses had written very right, and that I had not rightly understood it. The high and deep Wisdom of God.

(25) "Before the visible universe was formed its mold was cast. This mold was called the Archetype, and this Archetype was in the Supreme Mind long before the process of creation began. Beholding the Archetypes, the Supreme Mind became enamored with Its own thought; so, taking the Word as a mighty hammer, It gouged out caverns in primordial space and cast the form of the spheres in the Archetypal mold, at the same time sowing in the newly fashioned bodies the seeds of living things. The darkness below, receiving the hammer of the Word, was fashioned into an orderly universe. The elements separated into strata and each brought forth living creatures. The Supreme Being--the Mind--male and female, brought forth the Word; and the Word, suspended between Light and darkness, was delivered of another Mind called the Workman, the Master-Builder, or the Maker of Things.

(6) The Text in Moses says; he was created in the Paradise; that is, in the Gate of the Deep between the Deity and the Abyss of the Kingdom of Hell. His Body was out of the [one pure] Element, and his Spirit was breathed into him out of the eternal Mind of God the Father, from the chaste Virgin of the divine Wisdom and Love.

(21) First, he is God, and is in the Father of Eternity, generated out of the Father of Eternity from Eternity, without Beginning and End, out of the Depth of the Omnipotence, out of the broken Gates of the Sharpness [or Depths] of God in the Joy, [or Habitation,] where the Father attracts the pleasant Joy in his eternal Will, whereby the Will is impregnated, with the attracted Virtue of the Light, out of which [Impregnation] the Father conceives the other [or second] Will to generate the Virtue; and that Conception [or comprehension] is his Word, which the Father speaks (out of the Will, before the Will) out of himself; and this Speaking remains in the Mouth of the Father, as fa comprehended Word, with the second Will; and the proceeding forth out of the spoken Word (which goes forth out of the Will through the Word) is the Spirit; and that which is spoken forth % before the Will, is the eternal Wisdom of God, the Virgin of the Chastity.

(32) But what do you think there was before the Times of the World, out of which the Earth and Stones proceeded, as also the Stars and Elements? That out of which these proceeded was the Root. But what is the Root of these Things? Look, what do you find in these Things? Nothing else but Fire, Bitterness, and Harshness, [or astringent Sourness,] and these three are but one Thing, and hence all Things are generated. Now this was but a Spirit before the Times of the World, and yet you cannot find God in these three Forms. The pure Deity is a Light which is incomprehensible, and unperceivable, also almighty and all-powerful, where is it then that Men may find God?

(4) Now this cannot be expressed or described, nor brought to the Understanding by the Tongue of Man; for God has no Beginning. But I will set it down so as if he had a Beginning, that it might be understood what is in the first Principle, whereby the difference between the first and second Principle may be understood, and what God or Spirit is. Indeed there is no difference in God, only when it is enquired from whence Evil and Good proceed, it is to be known, what is the first and original fountain of Anger, and also of Love, since they both proceed from one and the same Original, out of one Mother, and are one Thing. Thus we must speak after a creaturely Manner, as if it took a Beginning, that it might be brought to be understood.

(8) But as I was in great astonishment, He saith to me again: Thou didst behold in Mind the Archetypal Form whose being is before beginning without end. Thus spake to me Man-Shepherd. And I say: Whence then have Nature's elements their being? To this He answer gives: From Will of God. [Nature] received the Word (Logos), and gazing upon the Cosmos Beautiful did copy it, making herself into a cosmos, by means of her own elements and by the births of souls.

(8) And before anything came into being, it was the Father alone who existed, before the worlds that are in the heavens appeared, or the world that is on the earth, or principality, or authority, or the powers. [...] appear [...] and [...] And nothing came into being without his wish.