T H SECOND BOOK. O F TRUE RESIGNATION. SHEWING How Man must daily die to his own Will in Self; how he must bring his Defire into GOD, and what he fhould afk and defire of GOD. Likewise How he muft fpring up out of the dying finful Man, with a new Mind and Wi through the Spirit of Chrift. ALSO, What the Old and New Man are, and what each of them is in Life, Will, and Practice. Written in the German Language, (Anno. 1622) By JACOB BEHME N. Matthew Matthew xvi. 24. Mark viii. 34. Luke ix. 23. John xii. 26. Chrift faith, He that will follow me, let him deny himself, and take up his Crofs and follow me. Matth. xix. 27. Mark x. 28. Luke xviii. 28: Peter faith to Chrift, Behold, We have forfaken All, and followed thee.. O F TRUE RESIGNATION. 1. CHA P. I. WE E have a clear Example in Lucifer, and alfo what Self doth, when it getteth the Light of Nature to be its own, and may walk with the Underftanding in its own Dominion. We fee also in Men learned in Arts and Sciences, that when they get the Light of this outward World or Nature into the Poffeffion of their Reafon, nothing cometh of it but Pride of themfelves. And yet all the World fo vehemently defireth and feeketh after this Light as the beft Treafure; and indeed it is the best Treasure this World affords, if it be rightly ufed. 2. But while Self, viz. Reafon, is captivated and fast bound in a close and strong Prison, that is to say, in the Anger of GOD, and in Earthlinefs; it is very dangerous for a Man to make Ufe of the Light of Knowledge in Self, as if it were in the Poffeffion of Self. G 3. For 3. For the Wrath of the Eternal and Temporary Nature will foon take Pleasure in it, and then Self and a Man's own Reason, will rife up in Pride, and depart from the true refigned Humility towards GOD, and will no longer eat of the Fruit of Paradife, but of the Property of Self, viz. of that Dominion of Life, wherein Good and Evil are mix'd, as Lucifer and Adam did. Who both entered with the Defire of Self back again into the Original, out of which the Creatures were brought forth, and into the Condition of the Creatures; Lucifer into the Centre and Wrathful Nature, into the Matrix or Womb which bringeth forth Fire; and Adam into the Earthly Nature, into the Matrix of the outward World, viz. into the Luft after Good and Evil. 4. This happened to them both, because they had the Light of Understanding fhining in Self, in which they could behold themfelves, whereby the Spirit of Self went into the Imagination, (viz. into a Defire to get the Centre,) that they might exalt themfelves in Might, Power and Knowledge. Now when Lucifer fought after the Mother of Fire in his Centre, and thought to reign therewith over the Love of God, and all the Angels; and when Adam alfo defired to try in the Effence what the Mother or Root was from whence Evil and Good did fpring, and purpoftly brought his Defire thereinto thereinto in order to become Knowing and full of Understanding thereby: Both Lucifer and Adam were captivated in their evil or falfe Defire in the Mother, and broke off themselves from Refignation which proceeds from GOD, and fo were caught by the Spirit of the Will, by the Defire in the Mother. Which Defire immediately got the Dominion in Nature; and fo Lucifer fuck faft in the wrathful Source of Fire, and that Fire became manifeft in the Spirit of his Will, whereby the Creature in its Defire became an Enemy to the Love and Meekness of GOD. 5. Adam in like Manner, was immediately caught by the earthly Mother, which is Evil and Good, created out of the Love and Anger of GOD and compacted into one Subflance. Whereupon the earthly Property inftantly got the Dominion in Adam, and from thence Heat and Cold, Enuy and Anger, and all-Malice and Contrariety to God became manifeft, and bore Rule in him. 6. But if they had not brought the Light of Knowledge into Self, then the Glafs of the Knowledge of the Centre and of the Original of the Creature, viz. of the Power which it had in itself, had not been manifefted, from whence the Imagination and Luft did arife. |