1. THE ONE AND THE MANY GODS
1. The Paradox of Monotheism
During the 1920s of this [the last]
century, the French translation of a double trilogy by Dimitri Merejkowsi, an
eminent Russian novelist and philosopher, was published in
It is to be deplored that this word, like
many others, is carelessly used in our times.
For example, one speaks of “monotheist” civilisation to describe a
patronistic (patronale)
civilisation. The term is employed as
absurdly as the word “manichaeism” by people who have absolutely no idea of its
meaning. Needless to say it is not from
this misguided use of the term as a metaphor that we should expect any
elucidation on “monotheism” and what I call its paradox. This paradox is essentially philosophical and
theological in nature. When we speak of
“monotheist religions” we generally have in mind the three great Abrahamic
religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
To draw out the paradox that I have in
mind here, first it would be wise for us to associate ourselves with certain
aspects of Judeo-Biblical thought -
eldest sister to us all. It will be necessary to specify the importance that
esoteric teaching accords the use of the word “Gods” in plural in frequently
used expressions such as “the sons of God” in verse 10/17 of Deuteronomy: “The Lord your God is God of Gods, the Lord
of Lords.” 2 It will be necessary to dwell upon the
angelology of the Essenians and the entire collection of the Books of Enoch
regarding the Angel YHWH, the Cherubim on the Throne, Angel Metatron, Angel of
the Face, the Sephirot; early and
later Kabbalah, etc. Our fellow Jewish
Kabbalists are the best placed to confront the complexity of this angelology
and cosmology. We will recall how Fabre
d’Olivet translated the name Elohim found at the beginning of Genesis: “He – the Gods, the Being of
beings”. But it will also be necessary
to evoke the expansive Gnostic systems from early Gnosis to the Christian
Kabbalists, not to mention opinions held by some Greek Fathers of the Church
for whom trinitary Christianity was equidistant from monotheism and
polytheism. Unfortunately, we have
neither the time nor the space for this.
I will therefore confine myself to Islamic theosophy and gnosis that I
have previously dealt with here at Eranos.
We will surely examine these disciplines to consider the consequences on
closely related areas of study and thus a comparison will at least have been
initiated.
And so when I speak of “the paradox of
monotheism” above all I have in mind the situation as it was experienced and
overcome by Muslim gnostics and theosophers, more specifically by the School of
the great visionary theosopher Mohyidin Ibn Arabi (d. 1240). I will summarise this paradox very briefly,
such that we may be able to discern its three phases according not only to Ibn
Arabi himself but his successors as well.
Here I will rely especially upon Sayyed Haydar Amoli (d. post 785/1385) at once critic and
fervent disciple of Ibn Arabi. We have
on many occasions in this very forum analysed his quite considerable oeuvre. 3
The three instances of the paradox are:
1)
In its exoteric form, namely the profession of faith that declares La Ilaha illah, monotheism perishes in
its triumphant moment, unknowingly obliterating itself by becoming volens nolens metaphysical
idolatry.
2)
Monotheism attains salvation and obtains its truth only by attaining its
esoteric form whose symbol of faith is expressed thus: Laysa fi’l-wojud siwa Allah - “in being, there is only God”.
For the naïve soul, this too seems to obliterate monotheism. Exoteric monotheism thus arises at the
esoteric and gnostic level of theomonism. However, just as the exoteric level is
constantly subject to the menace of metaphysical idolatry, so too the esoteric
level is threatened by the danger that arises from a mistaken interpretation of
the word being.
3)
This danger is conjured by the institution of an integral ontology presenting
itself, as we shall see, as integration at two levels; now this double
integration establishes eo ipso
metaphysical pluralism.
The risk incurred during the second
instance was often denounced with foresight notably by two of our Shiite
theosophers. As for the situation to
which integral ontology leads, it is perfect harmony of the One and Many Gods -
a situation also encountered by the great Neoplatonist Proclus in his
commentary on the Parmenides. A paradox that is apparently difficult to
perceive by the naïve soul unfamiliar with philosophical speculation who thus
confuses the various levels of meaning.
As evidence one may cite the campaign launched recently in
What exactly is the danger that arises during
the instance we have just designated as the second instance of the paradox of
monotheism? It is the danger embedded in
the very pronouncement of theomonism: “in being
there is only God” which is the expression itself of transcendental unity of being rendered in Arabic as wahdat al-wojud. The disaster occurs when feeble-minded folk,
unexperienced in philosophy, confuse this unity of being (wojud, esse, είναι,
das Sein) with the so-called unity of
the existent being (mawjud, ens, όν, das Seiende). Orientalists as well have fallen into the trap and
spoken of “existential monism”, that is to say a monism that would be at the
level of existent or existent being [étant],
the very level of the multiple, the level at which theomonism itself
established the pluralism of beings (the existents). It is here therefore that one does not see
the contradicto in adjecto. This is the danger that is vigorously
denounced by Sayyed Ahmad Alavi Isphahani (17th century)4 one of the great
philosopher-theologians from the
The confusion leads to professing unity of
the existent being, expressing itself in the pseudo- esoterism(s) by
affirmations of an illusory identity, whose monotonous repetition
understandably exasperates Hosayn Tonkaboni5
another great figure from the
“I
was concerned with the need to write something on the unity of being which goes
hand in hand with the multiplicity of epiphanies (tajalliyât) and the ramifications of their descent without the
concrete existences becoming illusory things with neither substance nor
permanence as implied by comments that are reportedly made by certain
Sufis. For understood as the Sufis
intend, the matter is no more than sophism.
It would follow then that heaven and earth, paradise and hell, judgement
and resurrection, that all this would be illusory. The futility of these conclusions will be
apparent to all.” 6
Theomonism therefore does not profess
that the Divine Being is the only existent but the One-being, and precisely
this unitude of being establishes and
renders possible the multitude of epiphanies that are existent beings; the act
of existing [exister] alone and on
its own existentiates the multiple beings, for beyond being there is only
nothingness. In other words, the
One-being is the source of the multitude of theophanies. The immanent danger, present already in the
first instance of the paradox of monotheism, is to make of God not a pure Act
of being, the One-being, but an Ens,
an existent being (mawjud),
infinitely above all the other existents.
Since it is already constituted as existent being, the distance that one
attempts to establish between Ens
supremum and the entia creata
only aggravates its condition of Ens
supremum as that of an existent being.
For as soon as one has invested it with all the conceivable positive
attributes to their pre-eminent degree, it is no longer possible for the spirit
to rise further. The ascension of the
spirit is stilled in the absence of the hereafter, an Ens, an existent being. And
that is metaphysical idolatry7, which
contradicts the status of existent being since it is impossible for an existent
to be Ens supremum.
Indeed,
the Ens, the existent being in
essence refers beyond itself, to the act of being that transcends it and
constitutes it as an existent being.
Muslim theosophers conceive the movement of being (esse) to existent being (ens),
as putting being into the imperative (KN, Esto). It is by the imperative Esto that the existent being is invested with the act of
being. What is the Source and Principle
cannot therefore be Ens, an existent
being. And this is what mystic
theosophers, notably such as the Ismailis and those of the
With them we shall discern the threat all
the more clearly; the paradox by which monotheism of the naïve soul perishes in
its triumph, were we to briefly evoke, as I pointed out a moment ago, the
situation that reigns from beginning to end in the commentary that Proclus
wrote on Plato’s Parmenides. The Parmenides for Proclus is the Theogony that his very own “Platonic
Theology” was to elaborate upon further.
Plato’s Parmenides is in some
ways the Bible, the Sacred Scripture of the eminently Neoplatonic, negative,
apophatic theology. Negative theology, via
negationis (tanzih in Arabic)
rejects the cause beyond all causes, the absolute One beyond all the Ones;
being beyond all existent beings etc.
Negative theology is presumed precisely by the investment of being in
all existent beings of the One in the
Many etc. All the while appearing to
destroy affirmative theology of the dogmatic consciousness, it is negative
theology that in effect safeguards the truth it bears; and this is the second
instance of the “paradox of monotheism”. The term is well known to both Greek
and Arab Neoplatonists. In both cases
it is resolved by simultaneity, the at once present [comprésent] One-God and the many divine Figures. Comparison of the process in these two cases
has yet to be attempted.
Let us say that in the system envisioned
by Proclus, there are the One and Many Gods.
The One-God is the henad of henads. The word One does not name what it is but is the symbol of the absolutely
Ineffable. The one is not One. It does not possess the attribute One. It is essentially unificent [unifique],
unifying, constitutive of all the Ones, of all the beings that can only be
existents by being each time an
existent, i.e. unified [made one], constituted in unities precisely by the
unifying One. This sense of unifying of the One is what Proclus
meant by the word henad [principal of
unity]. When this word is used in the
plural form, it does not denote productions of the One but manifestations of
the One, 8 “henophanies”. Those in
addition to Unity, are the divine Names and these Names govern the diversity of
beings. It is from beings that are their
partners that it is possible to know the divine substances, that is to say the
Gods that are themselves inconceivable. 9
We have already compared the theory of the divine Names and celestial
hierarchies in Proclus and in Pseudo Dionysius the Areopagite.
There is much to be learned from an
in-depth comparison of the theory of divine Names and theophanies that are the
divine Lords -- I mean to say the parallelism between Ibn Arabi -- the
ineffability of God who is the Lord of Lords and the multiple theophanies that
constitute the hierarchy of the divine Names -- and Proclus: the hierarchy
originating in the henad of henads manifested by these henads themeselves, and
permeating all levels of the hierarchies of being: there are the transcendant
Gods; the intelligible Gods (at the level of being); the
intellective-intelligible-Gods (at the level of life); the intellective Gods
(at the level of intellect); the hypercosmic Gods (leaders and assimilators);
the intracosmic Gods (celestial and sub-lunar); there are the superior beings:
archangels, angels, heroes, daimons. 10 However, these multiple hierarchies
presuppose the One-Unique that transcends the Ones, because it unifies them;
the being that transcends existents because it essentiates them;
life that transcends the living because it vivifies them. In Proclus, harmony results from the
encounter in
One may say that from generation to
generation, the mystics and theosophers in Islam have contemplated and
reflected on tawhid ad infinitum. This term generally denotes the profession of
monotheist faith, which consists in affirming that there is no God except God;
what Haydar Amoli, disciple of Ibn Arabi, designates as theological tawhid.
Theologians reflect on the
concept of God. Theological tawhid poses and presupposes God as
already being an existent being, Ens supremum. Now, the word tawhid is causative; it means to make one; to enable the becoming
of one, to unify. It goes without saying
that for abstract monotheism -- which consists of expressing oneself on the concept of God -- the unity of
God cannot be envisaged as resulting ontologically from tawhid by man. This is the
attestation of Unity, not the act of the Unificent (Unifique) making itself One in each One. This “unificence” comes into play with and by
ontological tawhid: in being (the
Act-to be) there is only God (laysa fi’l
wojud siwa Allah). Which does not amount to saying that the only existent
being (mawjud) is God. This confusion, already denounced here, is
such a fatal error that Haydar Amoli does not hesitate to declare emphatically:
Tawhid is to affirm being (wojud, the Act-to be) and to deny the
existent being.11 It is not denying that
the existent is existent, but to deny that it is being and to deny that being
is existent. It is to deny that tawhid professes the Unity of an
existent, for it professes the unity of being, of the Act of being.
One therefore needs to consider the
relationship between being and existent being. We shall advance two hypotheses: does the One
absolutely One transcend being itself?
Or is it concomitant with Being, of the “Act-to be” that transcends existent beings? The first interpretation is Plato’s
interpretation as held by Proclus. We
encounter it again among theosophers of Ismailism, in the
In order to make themselves understood,
our authors turn to comparisons; for example ink and letters, the theme of the
cosmic Ink and the primordial Inkwell.12
Ink is single, letters multiple. It would be ridiculous to claim -- on the
pretext that there is only one inkwell -- that letters do not exist. There would be nothing to read! This is the horrible confusion between wojud and mawjud; the inability to conceive simultaneously the One and the many. The transcendent One is therefore the
unificent [unifique], the unitive,
what constitutes the existent as existent since unless at each instance the
existent were to be an existent (a plant, a colour, a mountain, a forest, a species, a group) there
would be chaos; there would be no being-s.
To be an existent being is to be constituted one; to be made one by the unificent One. Then the ontological multiple acts that unify
the existents are always a unique “Act-to be” of the One and must be
represented by 1 x 1 x 1 x 1, etc. In
other words, the Unitude of the unificent One is not a mathematical unity; it
is an ontological unity. That is what laysa fi’l-wojud siwa Allah seeks to
express. On the other hand, the many
existent beings actualised by the unificent One are represented by 1+1+1+1,
etc. We may thus represent the simultaneous presence of the One and the
Many in two ways. This occurred to me
while studying the great mystic Ruzbehan Baqli of
Henceforth we understand the import of
pithy declarations such as those made by Haydar Amoli: He who contemplates the
Divine (al-Haqq) at the same time as
the Creatural (al-Khalq), i.e. the One
at the same time as the Many, and vice versa, without either one veiling the
other, well yes, then he is a unitarian, an authenthic theomonist in the real
sense of the word (mowahhid haqiqi). On the other hand, whosoever contemplates the
Divine without contemplating the creatural, the One without the Many, though he
[perhaps] attests no more than the unity of Essence is not one who integrates
the totality, one who actually accomplishes this integration.
Which is why the Sages of God, the
theosophers, are categorised according to their kind or mode of vision:
1)
There is the person who possesses intellect (dhu’l-aql, the man of ‘ilm
al-yaqin); he is the one who conceives the creatural as being what is
manifest, apparent, exoteric and the Divine as being what is concealed, hidden,
esoteric. For such a person, the Divine
is a mirror reflecting the creature but he does not see the mirror; he only
sees the form that is manifested therein.
2)
There is the person who possesses vision (dhu’l’ayn,
the man of ‘ayn al-yaqin). And conversely, unlike the first, he sees the
Divine as what is manifest, visible; and the creatural as what is concealed,
hidden, not apparent. Well then, for
this person the creatural is the mirror reflecting the divinity, but he as well
does not see the mirror; he only sees the form that is manifested therein.
3)
Then there is the person who at once possesses intellect and vision (the man of
haqq al-yaqin). He is the hakim
mota’allih, the mystic theosopher, the “hieratic” in the Neoplatonic sense
of the word. This person simultaneously
sees the divine in the creature, the One in the many; and the creatural in the
divine, the multiplicity of theophanies in the Unitude that “theophanises” itself. He identifies the unitive Act of Being (1 x 1
x 1, etc.) in all the beings actualised in as many monads or unities. The henadic unity that monadises all the
monads and constitutes all the beings in multiple unities does not blind him to
the multiplicity of epiphanic forms (mazahir)
in which this Unitude of the primordial One is epiphanised. Here the mirrors reflect each other. 13
Although this person (a disciple of
Suhravardi and Ibn Arabi) has read neither Plato’s Parmenides nor its interpretation by Proclus, he finds himself at the
very stage that Proclus’ initiatory teaching -- revealing the secret in the
theogony of the Parmenides -- wishes
to lead the initiate (myste). This observation will prove to be important
for the dénouement of the paradox of monotheism.
We now have to consider how this
integration is accomplished, more specifically, how the idea of an ontology --
that we may describe as an integral ontology and that corresponds to the very
process of Creation as theophany -- unfurls.
We shall then be able to appreciate how Haydar Amoli’s diagrams
illustrate this relationship between the One and Many entirely in conformity
with the relationship between the unificent One and the unified One [i.e. made
one]; of the pure Act-to be (wojud, esse) and of the being - existent being
(étant, mawjud, ens) as we have
just described: a relationship between the unitude of the unificent henad and
the monadic unities that it monadises by actualising them. The vision will culminate in a figure
(resembling a stained-glass window of a cathedral) in which Haydar Amoli
integrates the entire history of religions.
2. Integral ontology and the theophanies
The advent of integral ontology has three
moments, until we learn, as Ibn Arabi says, that “it is a world that is hidden
and that never appears, whereas the Divine Being is the Manifested and is never
hidden”; in short, the moment when Adam explains why he accepted the burden
that the sky, the mountains and all creatures had refused: “I was not aware,” he says “that there was any
Other than God.”[14] This
could very well be the expression of integral ontology.
There
is:
1)
the point of view (maqam, station)
that is called differentiation or discrimination (iftiraq, farq); that of the naïve conscience [simple soul]
distancing things outside itself and contemplating their concept. This is the exoteric “station” of theological
monotheism (tawhid oluhii),
proclaiming divine unity as that of the Ens
supremum, the Existent Being that dominates all the others, without an
intimation of the question that being (the act of being) asks of the other
existent beings. To use a familiar
image, let us say that this is the point of view of one who cannot see the
forest for the trees, or the inkwell for ink.
2)
the point of view that is called integration (jam’). The dispersed or
widely separated units are gathered and totalled in a unique whole. The latent danger here is the confusion
between unity of being [wahdat al-wujud]
and unity of the existent being [wahdat
al-mawjud]. At this level in fact
there are no more trees: there is only the forest; there are no more letters,
there is only ink and nothing to read.
All that is other than the unique existent, all that constitutes “the
many” is said to be to be “inexistant”, illusory.
Next:
3)
One must reach the level called the integration of integration or sum of the
sum (jam’ al-jam’), i.e. move from
the undifferentiated Whole to the differentiated Whole once more. After the integration of diversity into
unity, there must follow the integration of unity in diversity vanquished
again. This is the second differentiation (farq
thani) that succeeds the first integration.
Such is the integral vision possessed by the integral Sage: a complete
and whole vision of the One-God and the many divine forms. The trees enter the picture again. We see the forest and the trees, the inkwell
and letters [of the alphabet]. The integrated “unitotality” is then itself
integrated into the diversity of its component parts. Mathematicians speak of functions. In this case we have mazhariya, the theophanic function that expresses the relationship
between the One-Being and its theophanies.
It is therefore the transition from monolithic unity -- that excludes
the “many” and in so doing excludes any notion of a theophanic unity -- to the
henadic unity, which is the explanation of the “many” whose epiphanic functions
it establishes. To turn once more to the
Parmenides as commented by Proclus,
we would say that the first two instances just described correspond respectively
to those [instances] in the physicians from the Ionian School and
metaphysicians from the Elean School, namely Parmenides and Zeno. Their encounter took place in
By this we have an intimation of what the
fundamental categories of esoteric tawhid
mean, that is to say tawhid in its
ontological aspect: tawhid of Essence
(dhat), of the Names and Attributes (asma’ and sifat, tawhid of the
operations (af’al) or of
theophanies. Haydar Amoli’s imaginal representation of these three
categories of tawhid in diagrams uses
the image of trees.[16]
Now,
as for the question pertaining to how the unitive act of tawhid is accomplished in these three forms: this may be grasped by
referring to the cosmogony professed by the
1)
The first theophany (tajalli awwal)
is the theophany of Essence with regard to itself, of the divine absolute Self
to itself (al-dhat li-dhat-hi). [17] It is the level of the Presence or as Ramon
Lull translated it, henadic “Dignity” (hazrat
ahadiya), the level at which the act of Being in its pure state consists of
neither definition, description nor qualification any more than the henadic
unity needs, in addition to itself, a Unity that makes one-being or determines
it as a unity, since quite the opposite it
is the unificent of all unities (the unified);
that which monadises all the monads (1 x 1 x 1. . .). One might say that all the metaphysical
entities (haqa’iq) are in the henadic
One just as the tree is [already present] in its seed, whereas the henadic One
is the mystery of mysteries (ghayb
al-ghoyub).
2)
The second theophany[18]
is of divine Names and Attributes. Let
us point out that the process here is conceived as an intensification of light,
an ever-intensifying intra-divine illumination.
The second theophany is the initial determination (ta’ayyon awwal, in German: die
Urbestimmtheit.
Here
the pure henadic essence becomes contemplative, its own witness, that is to say
of its eternal cognoscibles. These are all the Names by which it can be
named and flowing from this the divine Attributes denoted by the Names; for
example, the Knowing and Knowledge, the Desiring and Desire, the Viewing and
Vision, etc. (At a corresponding level,
one may evoke the procession of the divine Names in the Hebrew 3 Enoch or of the Gods in the Greek
Neoplatonists). The metaphysical and
concrete / physical realities to which these Names and Attributes correspond
are termed “eternal hexeities” (a yan
thabita) - archetypes of all the individualised concrete existences (the
“socrates-ness” [socrates-like quality] of Socrates). These eternal hexeities respond to the
nostalgia of the Divine Names aspiring to be revealed, to be invested with
concrete existences that underpin them. There is complicity between the divine
Names and these hexeities, without whose actualisation the divine Names (as
denoted by the plural Gods in the expression Ilah al-aliha, God of Gods) invested respectively in beings, would
remain forever unknown and unrevealed.
Here we are at the crux of the matter, namely of the theogony that
irradiates into a third instance.
3)
The third theophany is at once contemplative and operative, i.e. onto - genetic
(tajalli wojudi shohudi). It is the manifestation of the being as Light
- Theophany in its many forms of divine Names; forms that are the concrete
supports for the revelation of these divine Names because they are respectively
its operations (in the
In short, the first theophany is at the
level of the mystery of the henadic Unity (ahadiya)
that only apophatic theology can discern and that can be represented by 1 x 1 x
1 . . . The second theophany is at the level of constituted monadic Unity (wahidiya), a unity able to be “pluralised” (1 + 1 + 1 . . .), that which
has affirmative or cataphatic theology in mind when it articulates or deduces
the divine Names and Attributes. The
third theophany is at the level of Operations
(af’al) being the very
theophanies themselves. It is the level
we designate as robubiya, of the
lordly condition because that is where the plurality of divine Lords (Arbab) is born; precisely that which
establishes the integral ontology, the metaphysical pluralism, thus the level
of integration of the integration, second differentiation succeeding pure and
simple integration that abolished the many, the multiple. It is therefore the denouement of the theogony
upon which the relationship between the unificent One-God and many Gods or
theophanies depend. We have just said as
much: this relationship is defined as the lordly condition - robubiya. Which is to say?
To say it is to attain what we technically
designate as sirr al-robubiya, the
secret of this lordly condition; the secret establishes and renders it possible
and without which it would disappear.
The divine Names possess meaning and reality only by and for beings for
whom they are forms, theophanies by which divinity reveals itself to his
loyal-faithful. [20] Al-Lah,
for example, is the Name that signifies the divine Essence clothed in all its
attributes. Al-Rabb, the “Lord” is the particularised Divine one of these Names
personified in one of its Attributes.
These divine Names are the “lords”, the “Gods”, [21]
whence the supreme Name such as “Lord of Lords” (God of Gods in the Deuteronomy and Suhrawardi; “the best of
the Creators” in the Qur’an.
Haydar Amoli[22]
explains it thus: “The Divinity (oluhiya)
and lordliness (robubiya) only become
real by God and by one whose God is this God, by the Lord and by one whose Lord
is this Lord.” Furthermore[23]: “The absolute active Agent (al-fa’il al-motlaq) requires an absolute
receptacle (patiens) such as the
relationship that exists between the Divine Being and the Universe. Similarly, the limited active Agent requires
a determined and limited receptacle, such as the relationship between the
multiple divine Names and the eternal hexeities [pure possibles that do not
demand concrete existence]. This is so
because each divine Name, each divine Attribute postulates its own epiphanic
form; what we designate as the relationship between rabb, the lord and marbub,
he whose lord he is. These signs attest
to the plurality of Creators and the multiplicity of Lords (Arbab).”
The complicity we spoke of earlier --
between the divine Name and the eternal hexeity in which this Name aspires to
reveal itself -- leads to the investment of this Name in a form of
manifestation (mazhar) that is
specific to itself. There follow the
acts of a cosmogony or theogony based not on the idea of an Incarnation, but on
the idea of a theophanic union (a union exemplified by image and mirror), a
theophanic union of the lahut and nasut, of the divine Name and the sense-perceptible
form that is the mirror in which this name would appear. For integrality of the divine Name is an
ensemble of Name and its mirror, the
form of manifestation, not one without the other nor one confused with the other (as is the case in
a hypostatic union). It is these two
together that constitute the totality and reality of the divine Name. [24] Integral ontology is based on the epiphanic
function that holds the “secret of the lordly condition”.
Rabb
is actually a proper name that postulates and implies the relationship with one
whose lord he is; his marbub (marbub “carries” the Name; his name is
theophore [god-bearing]). Sahl Tostari, a great mystic defined the secret in
question as follows: “The divine lordly
condition has a secret and that secret is you.
If this you/I were to be
removed, the lordly condition of the divine lord would also be abolished.” [25] Elsewhere we have already pointed out the
idea of a chivalric pact underlying the mystical relationship of Rabb and marbub, of the lord and his vassal, his “theophore”. Each depends on the other. In the West, this very notion is what
inspired a most beautiful distich composed by Angelus Silesius: “God does not
live without me; I know that without me God cannot exist even for a blink of an
eye.” This is the “secret of the divine
lordly condition”. It is this secret
that one must not forget when we pronounce -- as we did at the beginning -- the
words “death” and “renaissance of the Gods”.
Thus, abstract monotheism opposing a
divine Being (Ens supremum) with a
creatural Being vanishes. The latter is
integrated into the very advent of the lordliness of its lord. It [the creatural Being] is itself its own
secret. They are partners in the same theogonic epic. In truth, this secret originates in the
initial determination with which the totality of divine Names postulating the
multitude of theophanies appear; thus the multiplicity of the relationship
between Rabb and marbub linked to one another by the same secret which is definitively
the epiphanic function of [the] marbub. This epiphanic function extends to an
esoteric catotriptic level (i.e. of the science of mirrors). We now understand that it can only be
safeguarded by integral ontology, going beyond every antinomian concept of the
One and the Many, of monotheism and polytheism by the sum of the sum or
integration of the integration (jam’
al-jam’) integrating the unified Whole to the diversified Whole. The danger of metaphysical idolatry, of
confusion between unity of being and unity of the existent being, is henceforth
averted. In his exentsive commentary on
the Gems of Wisdom by Ibn Arabi,
Sayyed Haydar Amoli -- whose ingenius, I would say even inspired diagrams that
we have already analysed here at Eranos some years ago -- will illustrate some
aspects of this integration of the integration, as determined by the authentic
relationship between the unificent One and these multiple theophanies; the
unificent One by no means a mathematical unity adding itself to the concrete
unities that it unifies, i.e. actualises in unities. Which is why in these diagrams in the form of
circles, it will always be at the centre.
3. Diagrams of the unificent One
and the many theophanies
We have previously highlighted Haydar Amoli’s
penchant for diagrams (there are 28 of them, each one taking a whole page in
his Text of Texts) [26]
and the significance of this “diagrammatic art” as such, mostly ignored until
now. Haydar Amoli expressly establishes
a relationship [between his art] and metaphysics of the Imagination. We may say the same for the cosmological
diagrams so dear to Ismaili theosophers.
It is an attempt to conjure (at the level of the active Imagination) a
structure that corresponds with a pure intellective diagram. Which is why Haydar Amoli speaks of
“intellective” or “metaphysical” images projected into pure imaginal space. [27] According to him, the construction [of this
imaginal space] is indispensable as soon as we wish to better appreciate the
relationship of unitive tawhid with
regard to multiple theophanies. Here we
readily perceive the case of an “anamorphosis” [distorted projection] sui generis that we wish played a role
in his research. Haydar Amoli’s effort
-- with a view to depicting in space the relationships and intensification of
modalities of being -- resembles that attempted by Nicolas d’Oresme (14th
century).[28] The
success of Haydar Amoli’s diagrammatic art lies in the fact that we sometimes
get the impression we are reading a ground plan of some temple in the round in
which the inscribed circles are indicating the placement of columns. There are also gardens (categories of tawhid forming tangled branches of
trees). [29] Finally, we discover therein an ideal
topography that meditation is called upon to roam in the manner of a mandala.
Haydar Amoli explains this very well
himself: [30] “The reason,” he says “for all these diagrams
in the form of circles is that it is extremely difficult to make tawhid understood and rather arduous to
explain Being. Many philosophers have
gone astray while seeking to understand tawhid
(the unitive act) and being; and subsequently they have misled many others that
followed them.” It is incumbent upon the
gnostic “to integrate and
differentiate”. Separated from each
other, both operations lead to catastrophe.
It is up to you therefore to combine them for he who does so is an
authentic unificent (a theomonist, mowahhid
haqiqi, practises tawhid in the
true sense) and this is what we call the integration of integration (jam’ al-jam’). To differentiate (tarifa, to separate) is to contemplate created beings without
contemplating the divine Being at the same time. To integrate (and no more) is to contemplate
the Divine Being (the Unique/ the One) without simultaneously contemplating
created beings (the Many). . . . To such a person, the vision of the Divine
Being in its epiphanic forms (vision of the One God in the many Gods) -- forms
in which in one sense he shows himself, although in another sense these forms
are other than him -- remains veiled. It
is therefore key to have a simultaneous vision of the Divine Being with that of the created beings, and the
simultaneous vision of created beings with
that of the Divine Being. In short, it
is important to see the multiple in the very unity of this multiplicity (and to
see the unity in the very multiplicity of this unity), an integral vision that
is “the integration of integration”; this is realised by the differentiation
that succeeds the first integration.
1)
Diagram of Mirrors (no. 18). [31]
In the centre the One-God. The many flames in the surrounding mirrors
are as many theophanies of this One-God: one in itself many in its theophanies
without the truth of the Unity abolishing that of multiplicity or vice versa
(cf. in Proclus the One and Many Gods).
“The vision of unity in plurality,” declares Haydar Amoli “and of
plurality in unity is only truly understood by the image of a single mirror in
which (sic: fi-ha) there is a single
candle placed in the centre. All around
there are many mirrors, such that in each mirror a candle is seen depending on
the placement of the [single] mirror.” Now, such is the reciprocal relationship
of being (wojud) and determined
existent (mawjud) (or the unificent
One and the unities that it monadises).
Most people are perplexed before being, before its essential unity and
its multiplicity as for its Names and forms of manifestation (mazahir, its hypostases). The mystic theosophers solve the matter by
the vision of the Unicity in the multiplicity itself and of the multiplicity in
the unicity itself. “In fact whosoever
contemplates the single mirror placed in the centre and the many mirrors all
around, contemplates in each of these mirrors the same candle, in such a manner
however, that the single candle is each time another candle. The person contemplating will not be dazzled
by the fact that the candle in the middle is one all the while being many in
its epiphanies (the mirrors).”
To summarise, one who differentiates (and
no more) sees the mirrors but does not see the solitary candle in the
center. This is the case with most
people. The person who integrates (and
no more) simply shatters all the mirrors.
He only sees the solitary candle in the centre. Such is the case with exoteric monotheism. Integration of integration is to see all the mirrors differentiated at the
same time as one sees the candle in the centre.
That is esoteric monotheism, theomonism.
2) Diagrams
of the divine Names. A) Diagrams of the Names of grace/bounty and Names
of austerity (diagram no. 17). This
differentiation between the divine Names is a fundamental dichotomy that is
also present in the Sephirot of
Jewish Kabbalah. Unfortunately we shall
have to confine ourselves to very brief comments here.[32]
When the Absolute agent wishes to confer being to one of the receptacles of its
Names designated as eternal hexeities (a’yan
thabita) this implies that he has forever known the quiddity, the essential
reality, the inherents and the accidents in which its existence will consist . . . (n.b. these hexeities, these
essences are uncreated; they are eternally as they are and have been in the
divine knowledge.) Then the absolute
Agent confers it existence as a function of the knowledge he has of it and due
to justice doing right by each deserving one (. . . ). Zayd cannot voice an
objection: why did you create me in such and such a manner? This objection
would be overruled by itself because what is manifested of Zayd is what has
always belonged to his essence and requires to be manifested in such and such a
fashion (. . . ). Similarly, when a
writer confers being to a certain letter among the letters [of the alphabet],
either orally or in writing, this letter cannot object to the writer: why do
you make me exist in such and such a fashion?
The writer would say to him: it is your eternal individuality, your
quiddity that demands this. I have no
choice but to confer being to what you are (not to what your are not).” In short, the act of existing is conferred in
response to a silent request (lisan
al-hal) formulated by the very state of the hexeity in which such and such
a divine Name is invested. [33] Now there are Names of bounty (asma’ jamaliya) and Names of austerity (asma’ jalaliya). The entire secret of predestination (sirr al-qadar) is thus the very secret
of the theophany of divine Names. In
diagram 17, the vertical diameter separates the blessed from the outcasts. Each semicircle has twelve divine Names
inscribed: on the one hand, twelve Names of grace or gentleness that are the
“lords of proximity and rejunction”. On
the other hand, twelve Names of austerity that are the “lords of distancing and
rejection”. On one side Adam, the
prophets and men of God down to blessed animals and plants. On the other, Iblis-Satan, the Pharaohs,
Nimrods, down to the cursed animals and harmful plants. [34] We get the impression that we are standing
before a dualist Zoroastrian diagram. In
fact it is a depiction of the twofold category of divine Names. It appears that
what is being postulated here is a metaphysics of immutable essences and that a
revolution of the essences (inqilab
al-haqa’iq) is inconceivable.
However, it is this revolution indeed that Molla Sadra Shirazi (d. 1640)
will attempt by giving priority to the act of existing whose intensifications
and diminutions determine and vary the essences themselves.
B) Diagram of the Names of essence, attributes
and operations (diagram no. 19).[35] The divine Names are the divine Essence
itself and the divine Attributes are its act of being . . . Which is why the
mystic theosopher does not contemplate any divine Name without at the same time
contemplating what this Name names, which is to say this Essence which it names
relative to an Attribute, whereas this Attribute is itself relative to a
theophany, a determined divine operation.
Theosophy excludes all that philosophy designates as nominalism. It is a question of the relationship between
being as inactive (wojud) and the
existent as a passive name (mawjud),
since the latter is the receptacle, the patiens,
of the unificent being that constitutes it as an existent. We are guided here by the relationship
between the single and multiple candles in the diagram of mirrors (see above,
diagram no. 18). Whence we have here at
the centre of the diagram in the form of a circle, the henadic Essence (dhat ahadiya). The periphery is formed by three large
concentric circles: a) The innermost is the circle of the Names of essence (al-Lah, al-Rabb, etc.), 36 names in total.
b) The middle circle is the circle of Attributes (sifat) where 24 small circles bearing 24 Names of attributes are
inscribed. c) As for the outermost
circle, it is that of Names of activity or operation (af’al) upon which are inscribed 33 small circles bearing 33
names. The diagram that follows is its
complement:
C) Diagram
of divine Names relating to numbers and letters (diagram no. 20).[36] This diagram invites one to contemplate the
divine Being in numbers and letters, the numeric value of these serving as the
basis of the science of letters (‘ilm
al-horuf) which is a kind of philosophical algebra. “The “co-presence” [i.e simultaneous presence
(ma’iya)] of the Divine Being with
the world is nothing less than the co-presence of the One with the Numbers or
the co-presence of alif with the
letters, or of the manifestation of ink with the form of these letters.” In the centre of this diagram there is tawhid, the unicity of the One in
relation to the forms of numbers and letters participating in the One. Then, as in the previous diagram, three large
concentric circles: a) Inscribed in its radiuses, the innermost circle bears
the names of a two-fold series of cosmogonic entities (28 + 28 = 56). b) and c)
A double outer circle is inscribed with 28 small circles corresponding to
28 cosmogonic entities. Each small
circle is divided by a line traced in the middle. In the lower section, there
are the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet.
In the upper section, the value of each letter is indicated. The method of theosophic prayer thus sets the
philosophical algebra to work. Here too,
contemplation of this diagram leads to the diagram of mirrors.
3) Diagrams
of Religions (nos. 21 & 22)
The
purpose of these diagrams is to “enable us to see” by means of an imaginative
structure, the edifice of the history of religions as a whole; in other words,
to operate integration of the integration.
We regret one matter. The
material at Haydar Amoli’s disposal is drawn entirely from the encyclopedia of
the history of religions (Kitab al-Milal)
by Shahrastani (d. 1153), granted a very honest and sincere historian to whom
we owe knowledge of many sources, yet without being elaborated upon to the
extent the presumed scale envisioned by Haydar Amoli. Before proceeding, let us recall that in these
diagrams, the unity in the centre is not a unity that would be added to the
others. As in the previous diagrams, it
is unificent [unifique]; generator of
all the surrounding determined unities as individual unities. The centre is not a mathematical unity in
addition to the others. It is
co-presence of the One with all the unities.
This situation will enable a homologation of the structure presented by
schools of thought and sects within Islam with the structure presented by all
religions other than Islam.
This was a rather audacious undertaking; a
theomonist, an esoterist alone could have conceived it. Haydar Amoli was perfectly aware of
this. Referring to these two diagrams
(21 & 22) in the form of circles or rosettes that correlate branches of
Islam and those constituting the entirety of religions i.e. the res religiosa of mankind, he writes: “My
purpose is to facilitate their perception in the imaginative faculty . . . No
one before me has ever had the idea of presenting such diagrams especially in
terms of their layout (a structure enabling comparison).” In each diagram there are 72 “squares”. “Contained within this number,” continues
Haydar Amoli, “are esoteric secrets of subtle realities, secret impressions.” [37]
The point of departure is thus the
material that Shahrastani provides in his encyclopedia of the history of
religions to which everyone has referred over the centuries because it
testifies to matters that have since perished.
Amoli begins by recalling the pages in which Shahrastani mentions the
different ways to classify religions.[38] Some classify them in terms of the seven
climates of traditional geography; others according to regions of the world
(North, South, East, West); others still based on empires (Persians, Arabs,
Byzantines, Indians); finally in terms of opinions and doctrines. From this rich diversity, we shall here
retain only the remark about the arithmosophic significance of the number of
branches vis à vis the four communities that constitute the People of the Book
(Ahl al-Kitab).[39] We are told that the Mazdeans are comprised
of 70 branches; the Jews 71; the Christians 72; and Muslims 73. No doubt a number rich with arithmosophic
meaning. Unfortunately, reasons for the
mathematical progression from 70 to 73 are not given. Still we are aware of the importance of the
numbers 70 and
This arithmosophy does no more than
prompt the recollection of a famous hadith
in which the prophet of Islam clearly states: [40]
“My community will be divided into 73 branches; only one will attain salvation,
the others will be condemned.” Two
questions arise immediately: in the first place why 73? Haydar Amoli goes to great lengths to point
out that all the modes of arithmosophic deduction, whether borrowed from
anthropology, cosmology, astronomy or hierohistory lead to the number 72 and
not 73. Unfortunately, we cannot here
dwell upon his reasoning in detail.[41] In the second place, which branch or sect is
the only one to be saved (najiya)? The answer emerges from the very
juxtaposition of these two questions [i.e. why 73 and which sect].
For the stroke of genius is to have made
of the only sect that saves and which is saved, a sect that would
mathematically be the 73rd, but is said to be the 73rd because it does not
belong to the mathematical whole of 72.
In the centre, the number 73 is ontologically the unificent of these 72
and that is an entirely different thing than being a mathematical unity added
therein. One need only study both diagrams carefully. Each of them has 72 squares. If the sect that saves were simply and
mathematically a 73rd sect, then like the others it would occupy a box - 73rd
in this instance. Well, such is not the case: it is in the centre; rather it
forms the centre. Let us once more refer
to the paradigm that is the mirror of mirrors.
The sect that saves and is saved is to the 72 others as Esse is to ens, in the same relationship as the unificent One with regard to
the unities that it monadises in as many unities (its unitivity represented by
1 x 1 x 1 . . . ). The 73rd that saves
is not 72 + 1 but the centre of the 72.
The reason for the 72 is only intelligible in relation to this centre,
just as the many are intelligible only when led back to the One-Being. The plurality of religions is in fact the
very secret of the plurality of theophanies.
Just as the diagram of the single candle is multiplied in the many
candles of the many mirrors, so is this implying and guaranteeing the
multiplicity of theophanies entirely faithful to the theomonism expressed by
Ibn Arabi. It is the ontological tawhid, the unitivity of the One that is
the guarantor of theomonism, [42]
in the sense of expressions such as “Lord of Lords” or “God of Gods”.
Such is well and truly Haydar Amoli’s
profession of faith: “The Saved (naji),”
he says, “is the witness of the integrality of being (esse) as of a unique “Act-to be” . . . He for whom the linked 72
are a veil, the True (Haqq) will
remain veiled. The saved is the
unificent (mowahhid), the perfect
gnostic to whom nothing is veiled. Those
that are delivered [saved] from veils are designated as the family of tawhid (ahl al-tawhid), members of the home of the Prophet (ahl al-bayt).” [43] In strictly Shiite terms, the latter are the
holy Imams; in the gnostic interpretation of the designation, they are all
those who along with the Imams constitute the
Indeed, there has been many an objection
regarding the identification in name of this pseudo-seventy-third branch.[44] However, for Haydar Amoli as well as for
Shiite theosophy in general there is no doubt.
The saved group is the pleroma of the prophets and immaculate Imams (the
seven major prophets - manifestations of Verus
Propheta - each extended esoterically by twelve Imams). [45] And with them, all the loyal-faithful
gathered in the same temple, the same home of the family (ahl al-bayt). “For among the
immaculate Imams of the home of the Prophet, there is the following tradition:
the image of my home (of my family, of my temple, mithl bayti) is comparable to Noah’s Ark. Whosoever boards is
saved. Whosoever remains behind shall
drown.” [46]
Noah’s
Let us compare the situations as laid
out. In its centre, Diagram 21[47]
has the Ahl al-tawhid and Ahl al-bayt. We have just examined what this means. Around them the 72 sects or schools within
Islam; as soon as they ceased to be a veil, they are led to the centre (to the
co-presence of the centre). As for
diagram 22[48]
regarding those who are termed “men of desire” [49]
i.e. those of religions other than Islam, we find the Yeshuanites[50],
Qaraites, Samaritans, the Melkites, Jacobeans, Nestorians, Zoroastrians,
Manichaeans, Mazdeans, Daysanians
(disciples of Bardesanes, the gnostic), the Brahmans, the ancient Arabs,
all the Greek Sages from Thales upto Plotinus, Porphyr and Proclus. [51]
Of course, all this material is borrowed
from Shahrastani and so Haydar Amoli is not immune to inadvertent observations.
The most serious one is the following: in the centre of Diagram 22 we find --
as if equivalent to the Ahl al-Bayt
shown in Diagram 21-- “men of God of utmost integrity to whom the call of the
prophets has never reached”. Well then,
where does this leave the Jewish and Christian communities? This does not
reconcile well with Haydar Amoli’s Shiite prophetology: Judaism and
Christianity are the fourth and fifth events in the cycle of prophethood Sealed
by Muhammad.
Having expressed this reservation, I would
say that the marked interest of Haydar Amoli’s project lies elsewhere.
1)
It lies in the correspondence established in diagrams 21 and 22 between the
Muhammadian totality centred on the family or temple of the immaculate Imams (Ahl al-bayt) and the totality of
religions centred on men whose original intrinsic nature was preserved (fitr salima). Fitra
salima is human nature, the Imago Dei
“as released from the hands”of the Creator without ever being destroyed. This merits a comparison between the
conception of the destiny of the Imago
Dei according to the different theological schools of Christianity, that in
any case advances the idea of natural religion and rights that the flood of
historicism and dialectical sociology have long since swept away in the
West. This idea is nonetheless required
for a homologation to be possible between those to whom the call of prophets
has reached (those of the cycle of the Verus
Propheta) and those who — without having received this call — testify to an
appeal to the instrinsic nature of man, in the sense that man is already
prophet of God at the center of Creation.
2)
The interest also lies in the layout of the 72 [sects] around the centre
(simple reminder: the rotunda of the
I believe that to this point we have
surveyed, though ever so briefly, the question that arises regarding the
relationship between the One and Many Gods, the simultaneous truth of the One
and the Many, that of the Multiple being conditioned by the Single. It is
remarkable that tawhid, the
profession of unitarian faith, should have placed the speculative high
theosophy of Islam on the path of problems confronted by Plato in his Parmenides and that to solve these
unprecedented dialectical difficulties, we have at once to extend a helping
hand to Haydar Amoli (the most profound [Twelver] Shiite commentator of Ibn
Arabi, and to Proclus the most profound commentator of Plato. I fear that until now we have hardly been
aware of this.
Henceforth, the path is clear to restore
the meaning of divine hierarchies whose mediating function is perhaps the most
foreign of conceptions to the official science of our time.
II. THE DIVINE HIERARCHIES
1. Theogonic dramaturgy
I
have learned of an expression coined by Joseph de Maistre thanks to Science de l’homme et tradition, the
admirable book by our friend Gilbert Durand.
The expression that most naturally finds its place here in our
presentation is “reasoned polytheism” arranging their rank and inamissible function to all the
metaphysical hierarchies of intercessors and mediators between the worlds.[54] The idea is of interest to us all the more so
since it accommodates Dii gentium as
well as Angelus rector “still dear to
Kepler’s astrology”; it encompasses what we have now to discover by
re-descending so to speak down the other slope of the paradox of monotheism.
Upto this point, we have drawn out the
idea that the ontological and esoteric truth of the latter [monotheism]
essentially rendered theomonism the guarantor for the pluralism of beings,
existents, a pluralism that is essentially formed as an ontology of divine
hierarchies. Ismaili theosophers define tawhid as “the spiritual knowledge of
celestial and terrestrial hierarches and the recognition that each of these
ranks is unique in its respective position.” [55]
Now, the existence of these hierarchies brings us face to face with a theogonic
dramaturgy whose acts are constituted by the eternal birth of their hypostases
in the form of a “Battle in Heaven” that determines the unification of the
plurality of their ranks necessary with the One-being. We find signs of this battle in a Proclus
just as in Ismaili theosophy and among disciples of Sohravardi, the Ishraqiyun, “Orientals’ in the
metaphysical sense of the word. The
procession of these hierarchies culminates in the advent of a Figure who is the
Holy Spirit-Angel, Angel of humanity. Thus
it requires a phenomenology of this Holy Spirit, the ultimate product of a
pluralism that was only envisaged, it seems, by a few errant knights of
philosophy and that definitely spares us -- in one fell swoop-- from all the
excesses of an absolute Spirit sinking into totalitarianism. Finally, we shall see that this idea
establishes the relationship of a [human] community of Elected ones with the
celestial entity that Suhravardi designates with the name of the first
archangel from Zoroastrianism i.e. the royal Order of Bahman-Light.
The idea that divine hierarchies, this
“reasoned polytheism” at its origin presupposes a “battle in heaven” is already
found, as we have just noted, in Proclus, the master
Neoplatonician/Neoplationian. He had
admirably grasped the sense of dramatic scenography in Plato’s Parmenides which is the major dialogue
regarding the Ideas (in the Platonic sense of this word) and which consequently
is a theogony + since according to the Parmenides
itself, “the Ideas are Gods”. [56] In his major commentary on this dialogue –
reputedly one of Plato’s most difficult – Proclus reads symbolic meaning into
Zeno of Elea’s arrival in
Indeed
Zeno arrives in
This is the very theme of our current
study: the profound meaning of the link we have come across elsewhere between
the two-fold integration that esoteric tawhid
accomplishes and the integration which at once renders the witness of the
unificent One, the One and the Many, a unified balanced being, in whom the
myriad forces of light are deployed.
We find this idea of a theogonic battle
elsewhere. We will have occasion here to
compare it with the battle against the Giants that both the 1st Book of Enoch as well as Manichaean
cosmogony inform us about. I fleetingly
refer to it here since it introduces us to the very heart of some cosmogonies
of Islamic gnosis, above all Ismaili and Ishraqi
gnosis. Each in its own way, these
cosmogonies demonstrate how as a result of the “battle in heaven” are formed
divine hierarchies from which in turn pleromatic unity results. As the process nears its end, we are brought
together with this Angel of humanity whom I moments ago described as the
interceding and mediating Figure that radically changes the horizon of abstract
monolithical monotheism; based on which our theological and philosophical
sytems have developed for centuries.
Yet, we find the idea of hiearchical pluralism -- from which its Figure
emerges as the beacon -- clearly expressed in some currents of thought in our
times.
Having dwelt extensively upon the doctrines
of Ismailism and the Ishraqiyun
elsewhere, I shall confine myself to a brief discussion. [59] What dominates the conception of the world as
professed by the Ismailis is the fundamental theme of an apophatic theology (tanzih, via negationis). As in every
form of gnosis, the Principle (Mobdi’)
that is the source of being, is itself beyond being; it is hyperousion. It is
absolutely ineffable and indescribable; one can confer it neither Name nor
Attribute (cf. En-Sof of the Jewish
Kabbalists). The Principle is the
One-unificent. This “unificence”
consists of putting the being of a unique-Being eternally into the imperative. This is the primordial Origin (Mobda’awwal, Protokristos), First Archangel of the primordial Verb (Kalima) from which the Pleroma of
cherubimic Intellects proceed. As no
Name can be conferred to the Principle, the supreme name Al-Lah falls upon the first among the Cherubims (Karubiyun, Kerubim) as fiat [command].
But Ismaili theosophers have given the Name an etymology that takes into
account the
This third Intelligence is designated as
the celestial Anthropos, the spiritual (ruhani)
or metaphysical Adam. From the very
beginning, he is the
Without
mediator, he seeks to accomplish and directly attain tawhid of the Principle that is inaccessible to him. In short, his obsession with the One, leads
him to cast himself as an absolute that excludes pluralism - the very secret of
the hierarchy of being. I believe that
Ismaili gnosis here had, as far reaching as possible, a vision of the
originsand consequences of what we call “the paradox of monotheism” at its
exoteric level. Unfortunately, the
esoterism of Ismaili gnosis has barely enabled it, until now, to influence
currents of philosophical thought.
Here then our Angel of Humanity is brought
to a standstill in a giddy stupor, an unconsciousness that immobilises him and
excludes him from the hierarchical procession of being. The metaphysical time
of this stupor is measured by the procession of being that continues to take
place without him, i.e. of the Seven cherubim Intellects or primordial Verbs. It is these Seven Intellects that eventually
have compassion for the third, take pity upon it and awaken it. However from
the third rank that he originally occupied, the spiritual Adam, the Angel of
humanity now finds himself relegated to the tenth and last rank of the Pleroma.
This is the “delayed eternity” in which the phases of cosmogony originate; the
rhythm of the seven phases of the cycle of prophethood does not constitute its
official History of Mankind but its secret and Divine History, its
hierohistory. Unfortunately, I am not
able to narrate further details here.
Let us simply recall that awakened by the
conscience of its being by its “brothers” in the Pleroma, the Angel- Adam
wishes to rectify his error by summoning the multitude of human entities to the
celestial state that forms his own Pleroma, so that each may perform their own tawhid.
Apart from a small number in his favour, he is met with fierce
resistance. A formidable battle then
ensues; a battle comparable to that described by Manichean cosmogony. A proto-Ismaili treatise in Persian describes
it as the seven battles of Salman the Pure against ‘Azaziel. [60] Let us say that our celestial Adam is not
unlike an archangel Michael defeating the devil (earlier hidden within himself)
by hurling him into the abyss. He then
begins to form the physical world as an instrument for the salvation of his
condemned own. This is clearly
reminiscent of Manichaean cosmogony.
This cosmos will follow a cyclical rhythm
successively of epiphany (kashf) --
during which the Antagonist and his band of devils remain hidden and harmless
-- and clandestinity (satr) during
which the forces of light remain hidden in the face of demoniac forces
unleashed. To the hierarchy of the ten
primordial cherubimic Verbs corresponds the hierarchy of the esoteric sodality,
itself in correspondence with the hierarchy of the heavens in astronomy. To the seven Verbs that proceed while the
stupor of the Angel Adam lasts, correspond the seven periods of a cycle of
prophethood. From cycle to cycle, the
Archangel of Humanity leads all his own (partners in the same struggle) to
reconquer their celestial status in the paradise lost. From cycle to cycle, the entire Ismaili
chivalry rises one degree in the structure of the “Imam’s
Here then in broad strokes is the Shia
Ismaili conception of the drama of humanity, the meaning of its secret history
originating from a fault committed by its Angel, the one by whom mankind
communicates with the Pleroma of archangelical entities. The drama is set off by a monotheism
understood in the exoteric sense, in which the Anthropos considers himself the
Absolute. Gnostic Redemption occurs by
the gradual restoration of the multiple ranks that constitute the ontological
hierarchy of the “
It is this figure of the Archangel of
Humanity as the tenth of the archangelical Pleroma that we encounter in
Avicenna’s cosmology and -- with an even more dramatic context -- in Suhravardi
(1191) whose work was deliberately the restoration in Islamic Iran of the
philosophy of Light as professed by the Sages of ancient Zoroastrian Persia. [61] Although we do not find the notion of a
“battle in Heaven” as in Ismailism, the process of the emanation of beings
leads to the same result: the condition of man in darkness, the salutary
function of the Angel of humanity. As for the procession of the Many from the
One-being, our Suhravardi’s work describes a two-fold aspect of this that I
shall review briefly. On the one hand,
there is the procession of the Many as he described in his major work, the Book of Oriental Theosophy (Hikmat al-Ishraq) where he proves to be
under Avicennian influence. Here too
apophatic theology gives way to affirmations that have the splendour of the
Light of Glory, the Mazdean Xvarnah.
There is ab origine the Light
of Lights, that in his Book of Hours
he honours with the name it bears in ancient Iranian religion: Ohramazd (in the
Avesta: Ahura Mazda, the Lord [of] Wisdom).
“The unique/one God to whom absolute Unity belongs in all forms . . .
Light of Lights.” Therefore at once
unique and God of Gods (as Deuteronomy
10/17 has already reminded us). From
this Light of Lights proceeds the primordial
Let us briefly state that Suhravardian
angelology is comprised of three major Orders:
1)
There are the dominating triumphal Lights (Anwar
qahira), cherubic transcendent Intellects that have no direct relationship
with the world manifested to sensible perception; these are the archangels that
constitute the “world of Mothers”,[63]
the longitudinal or vertical series (silsila
tuliya).
2) There is the “latitudinal series” (silsila ardiya) of Archangel-theurgies,
angels or lords of multiple species, the latter being respectively their image,
icon or “theurgy”. These are the Arbab al-anwa’ (singular rabb al-nu’ ; feminine rabbat al-nu). At this level of
archetypes, Suhravardi interprets the Platonic Ideas in terms of Zoroastrian
angelogy. But we have heard Proclus
proclaim that “the Ideas are Gods.”
Now, the Angel of humanity is at the head of these lords or Angels of
the species. [64]
3)
Finally, there are the Angel-Souls by which the Angels, the lords of species
govern the latter. Hence their name,
“Regent/Custodian Lights” (Anwar
modabbira; there are Souls that are movers of the Heavens and there are
human souls); they are also designated by the term Espahbad [Greek: Hegemonikon] borrowed from ancient
Iranian chivalry.
On
the other hand, there is the scheme from the angelology of the Avicennian
tradition that Suhravardi employs in his other books. This scheme is not at all in contradiction
with the previous one but by limiting himself to three spiritual “dimensions”
in each intellect, he is able to better determine the rank and function of the
Holy Spirit-Angel, Angel of humanity, Tenth Intellect of the Pleroma, just as
in Ismaili theosophy. These three
constitutive dimensions of the archangelical being at each grade of the pleroma
consist of three theogonical acts or genesis of the Dii-Angeli, the psychogony or genesis of Souls and cosmogony or
genesis of the worlds. 1)
The
First emanated Intelligence that Suhravardi sets in Zoroastrian angelology
contemplates its Principle. 2) It contemplates its own essence that by itself would not have
the power to confer itself being and contains its part of non-being. 3) It
contemplates its own act of being, of
existing, which as a necessity for its Principle, is absolved of all
contingency.
As there is no hiatus between thought and
being, these three acts of contemplation eo
ipso produce being. 1) The first contemplative act of the First Intellect
is its dimension of pure light. By this
act it eternally breeds a Second Intellect.
2) The contemplation of its own essence which is not powerful enough to
confer itself being on its own, is its dimension of darkness/shadow. From it is produced the first (or ninth)
Heaven or the Sphere of Spheres, admittedly from yet more subtle matter but
including the origin of darkness/shadow.
3) Thus by contemplating its own act of being necessitated by its
connection to the procession that proceeds from its Principle, it produces a
Soul, the first of the Animae caelestes,
the Soul that is the driving force behind the first (or ninth) Heaven. And so it continues from Intellect to
Intellect, the three acts of contemplation recurring in each of them and
generating a new triad. Each Heaven in
some ways marks the distance that separates every archangelic Intellect from
the
Let us take good note of the
following. By recurring from Intellect
to Intellect, each time the three acts of contemplation form a world that the
corresponding astronomical heaven with its own circular movement typifies. Certain historians ridicule this universe
arranged in hierarchies of concentric Spheres for they fail to see that this
system of the world is the projection of the transcendent Imago mundi. [66] Here
once again Proclus will be our guide. He is well aware of the assimilation of
thought moving as a Sphere, revolving aroung itself; consequently he knows that
the thought of the Being is a spherical movement. He knows that this spherical figure is of the
world even before its generation and it is better contemplated in the
intellective Gods (the Intellects in the Avicenno-Surhavardian context). He knows moreover that theologians are aware
of the “incorporeal cyclophor ”since the theology professed by the Hellenes (Orpheus) said of the first
God, of the hidden God anterior to Phanes (the revealed, the zahir), “that it accomplishes a movement
of translation following a vast circle without ever tiring. And the Chaldean Oracles proclaim that “all
Sources and Principles . . . always remain in an unending circular movement. [67]
Thus we find the context of the
Avicennian and Suhravardian system of the world, and at the same time we are
alerted to the fact that the essential are not the Spheres of astronomy . . .
but the internal movement of thought prior to the genesis of the worlds; in
short the movement of invisible Heavens, known to spiritual astronomy that
outlive the vicissitudes of physical astronomy in which it was expressed.
It is precisely by following what is
expressed here that we understand the drama that is played out with the
emergence of archangelical hierarchies, a drama that is described as less
tumultous than in Ismaili cosmology, but that similarly interprets the same
situation. The dimension of shadow born with
one of the acts of contemplation of the First Intellect will continue to grow
in relation to the descent of the hierarchical degrees. Once the procession of
the Intellects reaches the Tenth, it is as if the flow of light had sapped its
energy. The Tenth has no more energy to generate a new unique and individual
Intellect. Its contemplation explodes,
so to speak, in the multitude of human souls that proceed from it and of whom
it is the NOUS patrikos, the
archangelical Intellect that is their “father”, whereas the subtle matter of
higher Heavens denegerates into dark matter of the sub-lunar world. However, the ordeal of movement through this
Matter will also prove to be the redemption of these souls.
This situation, as is evident, leads us
back to that described by Ismaili cosmology.
Here too, the Tenth Angel is the Angel of humanity (In broad outline, it
corresponds to the rank of the tenth [angel] in the Sephirot). As such it is
Gabriel, the Angel-Holy Spirit, at once Angel of knowledge and Angel of
revelation. It shares the destiny of humanity that is its divine œuvre, its
“theurgy”. In response to the
visionary’s question, he states: “A long time ago, he who imprisoned you . . .
hurled me as well into the Well of Obscurity.”
[68]
And this is how the crimson
At the beginning of the vision of the
initiatic recital that Surhavardi names “the Rustling of Gabriel’s Wings” the
visionary is put in the presence of a brotherhood of ten Sages “amiable and of
elegant physical stature, whose respective positions form an ascending
hierarchical order”. He notes however,
that notwithstanding their beauty, magnificence and grace, they observe
absolute silence. He questions the young
Sage who is the closest to him - none other than Gabriel, Tenth in the
hierarchy. The latter answers: “Given
your situation, you and those of your kind cannot have a relation with them. I
am their interpetor [mediator], but they can converse neither with you nor your
kind. [69] This is a warning of incalculable
significance. He informs the visionary
and us alongside him that all the worlds above the Angel of humanity -- or in
the symbolic terms of another recital -- all the Sinaïs arranged in tiers above
the mystical Sinaï that is his oratory, all these worlds are as yet unrevealed
and inaccessible to us. Their doors will
be cracked ajar for us only by the mediation of this cherubimic Intelligence or
Angel of humanity. He is for us the
spiritual interpretor (herméneute) of
these universes, without whom they shall remain forever closed.
Thus we reach the heart of our research,
at the flourishing point of a pluralism of “hierarchicised” universes
forevermore challenging every philosophy (atheist or exoterically monotheist)
that would [dare] claim to be privy to secrets of divine understanding or of
universal absolute Reason. We therefore need to better discern the traits of
this archangelic Figure - the mediator for humanity guiding mankind to the
conclusion of a drama whose origins lie well before its history on earth
because the latter is no more than a consequence of the drama played out “in
Heaven”.
When the Ishraqiyun speak of the Angel or Lord of a species (rabb al-nu’) they mean to suggest the
Angel as hypostasis, a spiritual entity from whose thought (a contemplative
act) proceed the material species in the manner of a theurgy.[70] All the natural proportions and relationships
that we observe in the corporeal species are the shadow, image or icon (sanam) of spiritual relationships and
modalities of light that are constitutive of the angelic hypostasis and its
noetic activity. Every philosophy of
Nature must present itself as a phenomenology of the angelic
consciousness. The notions of the
mirror, the epiphanic form (mazhar)
and functions (mazhariya) are
fundamental in this case. Just as by
one of its acts of contemplation the angelic Intellect is the mirror of the
Intellect that precedes it and which in fact gave it origin by an act of
contemplation, so too the world proceding from a contemplative act by the Angel
is its mirror, its apparitional form. At
levels above the hierarchy, it is a matter of universes represented
emblematically by the heavens of astronomy.
At the level of our mundane world, it is the human race as the thought
of its Angel, “explosing” in a multitude of souls that procede from it, an
active thought which thus makes of it “father” of the human race.
In the Book
of the Temples of Light, Suhravardi writes: [71] « In the hierarchy of archangelical
triumphal Lights (Anwar qahira),
there is a relationship with us that is analogous to the relationship between
father and child. It is our
«Father », the lord of the theurgy that is the human species, at once the
Donor that emanates from our souls and the one that confers them their
perfection. It is the Holy Spirit (Ruh al-Qods) which among philosophers is
designated as the Intellect Agent (al-Aql al-fa’al). » As the Holy Spirit, this Angel of Humanity is
identified with Angel Gabriel in theological terms. It is at once the Angel of Knowledge and the
Angel of Revelation that henceforth renders the vocation of a philospher
inseparable from that of a prophet, as their respective knowledge is derived
from the same source.[72] This is the distinguishing mark given by our
theosophers of « the religion of the Book » to their gnoseology. It has far-reaching consequences. Many other names are given to this same
archangelical Figure. Among others in
pure Persian, Javidan Kharad, which
is the literal equivalent of the Latin Sophia
aeterna. As Angel of the human
species (Rabb al-nu al-insani), it
also takes on an altogether typical appellation. Suhravardi refers to it as Angel of the species
of Christ (Rabb nu al-Masih) [73]
by which he means the Christus aeternus,
manifest in all the prophets from Adam to Jesus of Nazareth continuing to
Muhammad, Seal of the prophets. Here we
find a trace of the prophetology of Verus
Propheta as professed by Judeo-Christianity in
And this is what determines the johannisme present in Suhravardi’s
theosophy. In the last section of the Book of the Temples of Light, he cites
with precision all the verses from the Gospel of John announcing the advent of
the Paraclete: “I go to my Father and your Father so that he may send the
Paraclete (al-Faraqlit) who will
reveal the spiritual meaning to you (John
14/16, 15/26, 20/17).” He adds: “the
Paraclete that my Father sends in my name will teach you all things (John 14/26).” [75] However, we know from a previous chapter from
the same Book of the Temples, that
this “father” is the Holy Spirit Angel Gabriel from whom our souls
emanate. The commentators stress
this point. In the Book of Hours by Suhravardi we also find
verses such: “Honour your Father, the magnificent prince of the Malakut, the Holy Spirit, the archangel
Serosh.”[76] Serosh is the name of an archangel from the
Avesta that Suhravardi identifies with Gabriel. The text continues: Our Father the Holy
Spirit speaks to us thus: “You who are
born from me you do not answer . . . O soul!
You the occidental, you are of noble lineage. You are daughter of the Holy Spirit. How will you return to your father . . . and
so on; [77] the
entire passage or “Verses of Rememoration” are just as allusive.
Thus we find ourselves in a situation that
eminently describes the shattering of monolothic monotheism. It is by the Holy Spirit-Angel that the human
race can gain access to loftier universes, find a clear path leading to the God
of Gods (Ilah al-aliha). This Holy Spirit is the Christus aeternus, the one for whom the successive prophets served
as Christophor. He is the Dator formarum in both the cosmogonical
and gnoseological sense i.e. the entire process of knowledge makes human
consciousness the mirror into which the Angel projects the forms whose
structure and relationships constitute its very own being – its being that is
itself the mirror or epiphany of higher angelical consciences of the
Pleroma. At the actual level of our
being, our spiritual conjuntion with this Angel of humanity as Holy Spirit and
as Intellect Agent is for both prophet and philosopher the necessary prelude
but in no way does it indicate the final step.
This Holy Spirit-Angel, the Intellect Agent is itself in an ascending
procession towards the glorious majesty of the God of Gods. Its journey leads it to the Light of Lights,
but this Light of Lights is it itself marching in a procession towards the God
of Gods. Elated, it rushes on in an
uninterrupted eternal journey carried along without rest regardless of the many
degrees by which it is succesful in elevating itself, for God designates
himself as the highest above the highest of degrees (HQ 40:15). [78]
What however does this procession entail? Acts of knowledge whose increasing scope abolishes the darkening of Gabriel’s left wing. Just as in Ismaili theosophy these actions are those by which the Angel, with the help of his owns, regains the status of paradise lost. “With the help of his own”, we just noted. Since these active thoughts, these acts of increasing and ascending knowledge, are exactly the forms that the Holy Spirit-Angel illuminates upon our souls and by which, while wresting them from ignorance and unconsciousness, he wrests them from darkness. The history of the gnostics of this world is in some ways the autobiography of the Angel of Humanity. It is a phenomenology of angelic consciousness, of the Holy Spirit - Angel that rises progressively towards the horizon of an absolute consciousness whose day can only break beyond worlds whose names remain unknown to man.
In this dramatic gesture, the way is
paved for an infinitely ascending procession post mortem – what seems to me to be a fundamental contrast with we
are accustomed to reading in the West as phenomenology of the Spirit. Hegel’s phenomenology is in direct lineage of
monotheism that, according to the Ismaili vision of things, led to tragedy in
the Pleroma. Just as it is in direct
lineage of the homoousious in
official Christology of the Councils; although it elevates the meaning to an
unforeseen point of view on the exoteric theological consciousness. As we have said however, all it takes is for
Karl Marx to turn Hegelian philosophy on its head in order for what happens to
have really happened.
The contrast stemming from the eruption of what we have termed the paradox of monotheism seems to me evident in the contrast between the phenomenology of the angelic consciousness, that of the Holy Spirit–Angel, and a phenomenology that seeks to be of the absolute Spirit. If in Hegelien terms we were to say that religion is the knowledge that God gradually acquires about Himself, the revelation of the Spirit through History, the formation of God as he becomes conscious of Himself as absolute Spirit, then the finite Spirit, the human spirit, is the vehicle by which God attains this absolute. Now, in terms of the phenomenology of the angelic consciousness of a Holy Spirit that is the Angel of Humanity, the meaning of man and his fate as the partner of his Angel in the quest to regain paradise lost is entirely different. In this world, the God of Gods, the absolute Spirit remains forever beyond the knowledge that religion can have of it. The formation of the supreme divine consciousness does not occur [in the discipline] of History. The contact of divine archangelic Forces with what we call History volatises the latter and is accomplished between Heaven and Earth. This is the very meaning of theophanies. We are not dealing with History when we speak of theophanies. I must admit that I have been obsessed with this opposition for some years now. I have been confronted by it at many crucial turning points in my research. This as you can see has just happened to me again. I wish the Heavens would grant me the time to write a book on the phenomenology of such an opposition. Perhaps the human hand is not capable of writing such a book.
For the moment and to bring our inquiry
towards its conclusion, I would simply like to evoke two testimonies from
favoured lands whose secret remains unsuspected and supports what we have just
attempted to draw out from our “oriental” philosophers.
The first testimony is found in the
cosmology of a heroically destined community that designates itself as the
Church of Jesus Christ of the Saints of the Final Days or simply as the
Mormons. Their doctrine includes a
theogony, the concept of a primordial God, who as the God of Gods is not at all
the creator but the generator of other Gods.
All have the stature of man, since man was created in the image of
God. The essential function of these
Gods is to produce souls for bodies that have been created in this and other
worlds. Each world has its own God. In
the case of our planet, the God is Adam as described in the Book of Genesis and
who has gradually reached his present predominant status. He is the God with whom we have to deal. All the Gods are in a gradual process of
development. Saints gain entry into this
series of Gods via death. At first they
are much lower in rank but they progress until each one even surpasses the
Adam-God in splendour and might. This is
the meaning of the pithy statement: “What you are, God has been. What God is, you shall be.” In body, an eminently subtle body, our God is
in space. In Holy Spirit, he is
omnipresent. [79]
It is striking that here we find an entire
structure not unlike Ismaili and Ishraqi
monadologic hierarchism. There is an
inaccesible God of Gods, removed from the most central and vital position of
all the universes. It is incumbent upon
each of the Gods to function as the previously described Dator formarum. There is an
Angel or lord of the human species, the only God to whom we have immediate
access, and who is the mediator opening up other worlds to us. This Adam-Angel is identified by the Mormons
with Adam of the Book of Genesis. Among Ismaili theosophers, Adam featured in Genesis is the epiphanic form of the
metaphysical, spiritual Adam, the celestial Anthropos, the Third Angel become
Tenth due to his error. Finally, there
is the idea of an infinite post mortem ascension that corresponds to what
Ismaili theosophy describes as operating from world to world in an attempt to
reconquer paradise led by the Angel of humanity, this Tenth Angel of the
cherubimic pleroma, the guide of the Ishraqi
pilgrim rising from Orient to Orient, whose names (i.e. the pleroma) still
remain unknown to us. This it seems to
me concurs with Mormon adamology. For
Ismaili gnosis, the reconquest of paradise lost is the exaltation of the Imam’s
“
As for the second testimony, it is found
in the work of Samuel Butler (1835 - 1902), a British writer, philospher and
novelist whose profound originality has attracted no less original friendships. Unable to acquire his very rare book on the
known and unknown God, I here refer to a page from his New Travels in Erewhon (Erewhon is an anagram for nowhere, which in turn corresponds to Na-Koja-abad [80]
- a term forged by Suhravardi; however, Erewhon is not yet exactly what
Suhravardi designates as the eighth climate, “no-where land” i.e. that has no
[geographical] location in this world).
We cite a passage from this book in which the hero’s son describes his
first voyage to Erewhon.
“My father had given them [the Erewhonians] some vague notions about
astronomy and had affirmed to them that all the fixed stars are suns like ours,
with planets that revolve around them, and that are probably inhabited by
intelligent beings as different as they may be from us. Based on these facts they constructed a
theory according to which the Sun was the lord and master of our planetary
system and thus should have to be considered as a person, just as they
considered as persons, the God of the air, of time and space, the Godesses of
hope and justice, and all the other deities listed in my father’s book. They held on to their ancient belief in the
real existence of these Gods, but henceforth they considered them as
subordinate to the Sun. The only point
when they come near to having the same conception as ours of God, is when they
say that it [the Sun] is the lord and master of all the suns in the universe;
the suns being in relation to it as the planets and their inhabitants are to
our Sun. They say that they do not take
any more interest in our sun and its particular system than any other sun. All the suns with their tributary planets are
considered its offspring equal among them, and It delegates to each sun the
duty to administer and protect their particular system. From this they conclude that if we can
address prayers to the God of air and other divinities, and even to the Sun, we
should not address them to God. We may
discretely thank him for watching over the suns, but should go no further than
that.” [81]
In the guise of its British and Socratic humour, this text conceals a very important point; and it is not insignificant that it is made by a liberal Anglican thinker of the last century [i.e. 19th]. Briefly stated, this is the affirmation of a cosmic pluralism, the exploding of every conception of a monolithic spiritual universe, and flowing from this are all the theological consequences of such an explosion. The multiplying of worlds, each with its own sun, lets Samuel Butler (so-called anti-Platonist unknowingly gripped) foresee the profound thought of late Neoplatonism, namely that of Syrianus, Proclus’ master. This is the idea of an astronomy that is able to define the Sun and infer the necessary attributes of all the suns. “If we are able to ‘define’ the Sun and Moon, says Syrianus, each of the properties that such a definition will have attributed to each of these beings, will apply to all the suns (and moons), even if there were to be ten thousand suns, for in their Idea, they will all be identical to each other.” [82] Again here, the Platonic harmony of the One and the Many Gods.
Among Samuel Butler’s Erewhonians, the
Sun God of our world, the only God to whom our prayer may actually be
addressed, holds the rank of the Angel of humanity in Ismaili and Ishraqi theosophy; of Angel or Adam-God
among Mormon theosophers. One will note
that the Angel of the Sun holds a distinguished rank in both Suhravardi’s
cosmology and hymnology[83]
where one may at times even perceive a resonance with the Mithraic faith. As for the multitude of other Gods of each
respective universe, this idea corresponds with that desribed by Mormon
theogony and the archangelical hierarchies in Suhravardi. In short, each of these encounters ushers us
into the presence of a known and limited God (known because limited and vice
versa): Holy Spirit-Angel, Angel-Adam, Sun of our world and of an unknown and
unknowable God, God of Gods, for whom all the universes and galaxies are the sensorium. Well, is a phenomenology of the Spirit (i.e.
the absolute Spirit of this God of Gods), possible hic et nunc for Man? Or
rather, isn’t every phenomenology at the human level in essence that of the
Holy Spirit who is the Angel of humanity?
The name Samuel Butler has many striking
resonances. Indeed he is one of the
patron saints of this group that we mainly, if not only, know through the
admirable book by Raymond Ruyer titled The
Gnosis of Princeton.[84] Admittedly, the work contains its share of
literary fiction, and we are slightly in the position of our ancestors at the
beginning of the 17th century, in the presence of manifestos penned
by the Rosicrucian order. One is
not sure whether the “gnostics of
By the gnostics of
I have just pointed out Samuel Butler’s
conception of the structrure of worlds, which is in harmony with the pluralism
that is the very theme of our inquiry.
Here I can only suggest some complementary hints in the hope that they
may be examined in depth in the near future.
Above all, these hints have a bearing upon the concept itself of new
gnosis and upon what stems from it regarding a fundamental gnostic concept,
namely of hypostases or Aions (Eions) to which archangelic entities of Ismaili
and Ishraqi gnosis correspond. Finally, to conclude, we shall examine its
effect upon the community of gnostics in this world? We find striking analogies. The new American gnosis - a discreet even
secret movement going back according to R. Ruyer the last ten years. It emerged in
Above all, a preliminary effort is
required to understand the meaning of words such as “myth” and “to
demythify”. If we are told that new
gnosis is not a mythology, that the new gnostics who at once welcome and
vigourosly minimise myth, [87] we
must note that neither the Eons of Gnosis nor the Dii-Angeli advanced by Proclus, nor even the Angels of lords of
species are myths, at least according to current usage of the word connotating
imaginary or unreal. They are hypostases
of forms that are self-aware. As for us,
we never speak of mythology but of hierology, hiero-history [sacred knowledge
and history], of events in the imaginal world.
This clarified once and for all, we perceive the key preoccupations of
new gnosis with a musical flourish [symphoniquement]. There is the notion of multiple universes
arranged on multiple levels in which modern gnostics are inclined to see the
equivalent of insurmountable abysses as once spoken of by ancient gnosis. It will be necessary to banish every tendency
that believes these upper levels to be illusory. Well then, how to conceive communication
between the unity or cosmic consciousness (i.e. God of Gods) and this multitude
of tiered levels? Would this be in some
simply thematic manner, by impulses or missions [assignments]? Or rather by participation of all the domaniale consciousnesses? [88]
This latter term is typical. New gnosis speaks of great domanial unities,
of great “totalising” domains if not, holons
(from the Greek holos, the whole, the
universe) employing a term forged by Arthur Koestler. [89] But does it suffice to use this term to
demythicise, so to speak, the Eons of early gnosis and would this
demythification be conceivable or desired?
I believe quite the contrary in the need to refer to the sources of
traditional gnosis (only just recently discovered) in order for new gnosis to
attain its goals. Surely, God is not observable. However, is it possible to reconcile the
notion of the participable with that of the unknowable, in the ordinary sense
of the word? This may be the direction
for new gnosis to explore; we might consider that for this new gnosis the
psychological, biological and linguistic experience (and we would add, every
other experience of participation) is truly a kind of natural revelation of religious value. And this would then be eo ipso the participation in Great Beings, great domains or the
supreme Domain that is “over-orderly” to us. [90]
The finality of the scheme would here seem
to us to be in perfect harmony with those of the divine hierarchies put forward
to us by the pluralism of Ismaili and Ishraqi
theosophy; and also with the theosophy suggested to us by the Mormons or by
Samuel Butler. We will thus only pose
two complementary questions: 1) What would the alchemists (we will resist
saying soufflers) have done if they
had access to the material in laboratories of our time? Here I have in mind for example a John Dee or
Michael Maier, in short to those works revealed to us by Fran Yates as
constituting the Rosicrucian reform. 2)
Did the Neo-Gnostics pursue something analogous to what they would have
done? If not, where would the difference
lie?
Whether there is similarity or difference,
seen simply or not, I believe that both would depend on our definition of the
Figures of Light who constitute the pleroma of superhumans - these great domaniale unities that designate the
Eons of Gnosis and the archangelical Intellects, the triumphant Lights of Ishraqi theosophy, the latter being
mediator and Angel of humanity.
Now, the consequences of the idea we might
form of these superhuman Entities depend on the sense that the gnostic
community has of itself. And here too,
we would perceive so striking an analogy that it would make us wish even more
fervently for a confrontation that would surmount any illusion of myth and the
so-called demythification. In the
awareness that the Neo-gnostic community has of it itself we find the idea that
enlightens the spiritual horizon of Suhravardi, our restorer of the theosophy
of Light as professed by the Sages of ancient Persia, namely the royal Order of
Bahman-Light.
3. The Royal
The gnostics from
These few lines in which the Neo-gnostics
invoke the relationship between master and companion or master and disciple are
in harmony with the practice of companionship in the profound philosophy of
high spirituality in Islamic gnosis. It
is the form par excellence for the
relationship between man and God. This is precisely what is meant in Arabic by fotovvat or in Persian javan-mardi namely, spiritual chivalry. [93] Such a community cannot be this humanity
whose knowledge it has of it self would identify itself with the absolute
Spirit. Absolute knowledge in the
Hegelian sense would fill a void whose maintenance is a vital necessity for the
Spirit. A human community founded on the
link conceived by the Neo-gnostics and the fotovvat
will never form a totalitarian imperium,
whether of Church or State. It is thus
even more necessary that the link that unites this community and the purely
spiritual hierarchy that constitutes it rise beyond the limits of this
world. This hierarchy must encompass the
entire pluralist whole of universes to such an extent that doubts will once
again be expressed regarding these Great cosmic Beings already indicated as the
equivalent of the Eons in ancient gnosis.
If we consider them as myths suitable to demythicise, we can be sure
that the constitutive link of the gnostic corporation will very quickly
disappear. Both Ismaili and Ishraqi theosophy as well as ancient and
Neoplatonic gnosis have very complex divine hierarchies that are related to
those of the gnostics. Fotovvat or spiritual chivalry can only
be the extension on earth of celestial chivalry, and it is all the more telling
that our Suhravardi conceives the structure of these celestial hierarchies as
exemplifying the typical relationship of master and companion or master and
disciple. To conclude, let us attempt to
provide a prelude to the encounter between Ishraqi
and modern gnosis.
Suhravardi, we have seen, has given the
first hierarchical Intellect its Zoroastrian name Bahman. He simply affixes to it the epithet
Light. For his Book of Hours he composed a liturgy for Ahura Mazda, God of Gods,
Light of Lights, the Sacrosant that is beyond all description. There follow the
liturgies of the God(s)-archangels, first of Bahman-Light as First
Intelligence, principle Light of God, supreme Creation of God, the primordial
Image, the Most-Holy, the Most-Proximate, king of Angels, prince of triumphant
Lights, the master of the house of Malakut
in the sacrosant world: Bahman-Light. [94] In verses about the beings of light, the God
of Gods himself proclaims: “None is more venerable for me than
Bahman-Light. He is the first I
originated. Then I instated supreme Archangels in being.” As if in response, this verse follows:
“Celebrate in extensive liturgies the race of Bahman-Light and kings of the
family of Bahman-Light populating the inviolable depths of Jabarut.” [95]
These kings of Bahman’s race, this Royal
Order of Bahman-Light, are all God(s)-Archangels of the Pleroma that the Book of Hours honours. In the final position (in descending order),
there is the Holy Spirit-Angel, Gabriel, Angel of the human race, who is the
link between their celestial chivalry and those who -- issued from him in this
world -- respond to his Call to constitute the earthly extension of this Royal
Order. [96] Gabriel the Holy Spirit, the celestial
Anthropos, is the mediating Intellect that intelligises the human being and
human universe issued from him [Gabriel], just as he himself is the thought of
the God-archangel that precedes him, and so on until the God of Gods. It is this entire pleroma of Light, the
entire royal race of Bahman-Light that is the Theophany reproducing itself from
world to world. And it is by mediation
that to human souls of light comes the Call to rejoin their brothers in kind, a
Call that ends human solitude and anguish. [97]
The entire structure of mystical cosmology
is ordered according to the ranks of this Royal Order of Bahman-Light. The end of the Recital of the Occidental
Exile ushers us into the mystical Sinaï that is the abode or oratory of the
Angel, our Holy Spirit. Above this Sinaï,
arise in unscalable spiritual heights other Sinaïs (this plural form seems to
insinuate the plural Elohim!). These superposed tiers of Sinaïs are the
respective abodes of the archangelical princes from the race of
Bahman-Light. Man in his current state
may aspire to climb there only by mental ascension and this too only if led by
the Angel of humanity. Elsewhere, these
Sinaïs are designated as castles making up the fortified castle (shahrestan, Burg) of the spiritual world. [98]
We note mainly that the archangelical
filiation, the relationship of each Nous
patrikos with the subsequent, of each
Intellect with one that proceeds from it, is represented as a relationship
between master and companion or master and disciple. In his visionary Recital that Suhravardi
names The Rustling of Gabriel’s Wings,
the hierarchy of the Order of Bahman-Light appears as an initiatic
order/brotherhood of Sages. The highest
in rank is the Shaykh, the educator and master of the second Sage who follows
immediately in status. And so on from
Sage to Sage, until the descending Order reaches the rank of Gabriel the Holy
Spirit, whose master is the ninth Sage; the one who engraved his name in the
student register, invested him with the robe and conferred initiation. The entire description of their Orders draws
its symbols from the ways and customs of the Sufis and the fotovvat: there is the Pir (shaykh
in Arabic); the khangagh, or lodge of
the Sufis; the jarida, the
[enrollment] register; and the khirqa
or robe. The arrangement of the ranks in
the archangelical Pleroma is thus an archetype that is replicated in the
initiatic order - its extension in this world.
The Ismaili order/brotherhood is also organised according to the
celestial archetype of the Pleroma of Intelligences. [99] Here from century to century is a community
that does not take the form of a Church or political State. As R. Ruyer specifies, this is the secret
ambition of the Neo-gnostics of
This idea has such repurcussions that with
Surhavardi, the entire cosmology is expressed in symbols from astronomy
formulated in terms of companionship.
The constellations of the zodiac, the planets in the sky are all
characterised as workshops whose activities are supervised by a master (ostâd).
[100] The ten archangel-Gods are represented as ten
brothers constituting an esoteric sodality whose first nine are the nine
brothers of our Angel-Holy-Spirit.[101] Know that all ten of them form an order whose
companion is never abandoned in distress nor anyone familiar to them ever left
alone.[102] Their world is designated as Bayt al-Maqdis, the
In the epistle of the lofty towers, as we
have already pointed out, this Holy Spirit is designated by the strictly
Persian term Javidan Kharad, the
literal equivalent of the Latin Sophia
aeterna just as piri javan, an
eternally youthful spiritual master.
Here too, Mosannifak the commentator draws our attention to an essential
aspect of Ishraqi spirituality. The Angel is designated as their shaykh, their morshed, he explains, because the Ishraqi do not rely upon a human master, upon any guru. Their only
master and guide is he who designates himself as the crimson Archangel, partner
in their struggle and fate, their secret master, their guide or inner Imam.[104] By this defining feature, the Royal Order of
Bahman-Light is not subject to human genealogy, just as hierohistory does not
at all belong to the framework of exoteric History.
It is by this precisely -- by no means an
accident -- that the idea of the Royal Order of Bahman Light is akin to the
Order that in other contexts is designated as the Order of Elie, the prophet. [105] Elie is the one whose advent is promised in
the Bible at the end of the book of the Prophet Malachie (4/5). He is the
master of all those who do not have a human master. His inspiration alone suffices to
authenticate a teaching deemed innovative.
This is the role he plays in Jewish gnosis; so too in Islamic gnosis
where it may even extend to conferring the robe of initiation.
Indeed, we learn from R. Ruyer that the
movement approached ever nearer to the point of winning over Anglican priests
of the
All the more striking, we reiterate,
that this new gnosis – considering the objective world of science as the “left
side of a right side” would seek to rediscover beyond this right side what one
might call the the right side of the right side which in turn would seem to
correspond -- subject to further in-depth analysis -- to what the gnostics in
Islam, among the Shaykhis for example, designate as batin al-batin, the esoteric of the esoteric, the inner of the
inner and which would perhaps be only one aspect of this integration of
integration that we spoke of in our introduction.
If conscience
is the right side (inner, esoteric, batin)
of this left side (zahir, apparent)
that is the visible and perceivable body, as R. Ruyer says, there must
necessarily be a right side of a right side, because nature “naturising”
[making nature] remains as mysterious as nature “natured” [made nature]. The vision is perhaps still a stain in the
eye. It is of profound importance that
popular wisdom attributes clairvoyance/clear vision to the blind. [108] One needs a form of vision beyond vision to
perceive the presence of the Royal Order of Bahman Light or the Order of Elie
the prophet, just as one requires a vision beyond vision to understand the
paradox of monotheism.
This pre-eminence of visionary
clairvoyance may even render us clairvoyant regarding a prophetic symbol that
André Neher in his book entitled The
Exile of Speech urges us to understand in an entirely different manner:
before the two statues on the southern façade of the Strasburg Cathedral, he
writes, more than a Christian has been struck by the fascinating beauty of the Synagoga of this surprisingly young
woman: a band over her eyes prevents her from seeing, and she has most
certainly heard nothing and hears nothing, as she pursues a dream whose silence
speaks volumes more than the eloquent expression of the Ecclesiastics. The band over
the young woman’s eyes alerts us that her vision is beyond vision. So emphatic is the certitude of this
visionary clairvoyance that it made its presence felt to a German poet, a
Christian and theologian of our times. André Neher reports his testimony. The
poet Albrecht Goes believed that in a metaphysical dimension the Synagoga was not only more beautiful but also more truthful than the exoteric Ecclesia. Which prompts him to declare: Sie ist’s, die sieht:“She is the one
that sees.” [109]
Pentecost
Monday.
7th
June 1976.
1 James Hillman, Re-Visioning Psychology,
2 Cf. Ps.82/1: “He judges among Gods” Ps. 82/6: “I said: You are Gods; you are
all sons of the Almighty.” John: 10/34: “Is it not written in your
Law: I said: You are Gods.” Ps. 136/3: “Praise the Lord of Lords.”
Apocal: 17/14: “For he is the
Lord of Lords.” Job 1/6: “For the
sons of God shall some day come . . .”, etc.
3 Cf. Henry Corbin, « la Science de la Balance et les correspondances entre les mondes en gnose islamique, d’après l’œuvre de Haydar Amoli, VIIIe/XIV siècle » in Temple et Contemplation Paris, Flammarion, 1981.
4 Regarding this eminent personality and his work, see S.J.Ashtiyani and H. Corbin, Anthologie des philosophes iranien depuis le XVIIe siècle jusqu’à nos jours, tome II (Bibliothèque iranienne, 19), Tehran-Paris, 1975, p. 7 to 31 of the French section [reprinted in la Philosophie iranienne islamique aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles, Paris, Buchet-Chastel, 1981]. On the issue at hand, see pp. 22-23. See also our articles: l’Evangile de Barnabé et la prophetologie islamique, in Cahiers de l’Université Saint-Jean de Jérusalem, Paris, ed. Berg International, 1977, cahier no. 3: La loi prophétique et le Sacré. “Theologoumena Iranica”, in the journal Studia Iranica (1976, II), as well as our course summary in l’Annuaire de l’Ecole pratique des Hautes Études: Section des Sciences religieuses, 1976 - 1977, p. 273-277.
5 Regarding Hosayn Tonkaboni, refer to Anthologie II (see our preceding note),
p. 77 to 90 of the French section.
6 Ibid., p. 88.
8 Consult the references in Jean Trouillard, l’Un et l’âme selon Proclus, Paris, Belles-Lettres, 1972, p. 95 ff., 108.
9 Cf. Proclus, Eléments de théologie, translation, introduction and notes by Jean Trouillard, Paris, Aubier, 1965, par. 162, p. 157.
10 See Proclus, Théologie platonicienne, Livre I, text established and translated
by H.D. Saffrey and L. G. Westerink,
11 Cf.
Sayyed Haydar Amoli, le Texte des Textes
(Nass al-Nosus), Commentaire des Fosus al-hikam d’Ibn’ Arabi. Les Prolégomènes, published with a two-fold introduction a five-fold index by Henry
Corbin and Osman Yahya, tome I: Texte and introduction (Bibliothèque iranienne,
22). Tehran-Paris, 1975, par. 769, p.
350.
12 For what these technical terms
designate, see the diagrams of Semnani’s cosmology that we have presented in
our book, En Islam iranien: aspects
spirituels et philosophiques, Paris, Gallimard, 1971-1972 (reed., 1978),
tome III, p. 330 and 339.
13 For the preceding, see mainly le Texte des Textes (note 11 above),
par. 789-790, p. 360. As for the formula
1 x 1 x 1, etc. see En Islam iranien
. . . (note 12 above), tome IV, index s.v. Un.
[14] See En Islam Iranien . . ., tome I, p. 104-5.
[15] Cf. Le Texte des Textes, par. 794 ff., p. 362 ss.
[16] See Le Texte des Textes, par. 803 ff., 808-813, with diagrams 14, 15 and 16 that unfortunately we have not been able to reproduce here. On many occasions, as their inventor, Haydar Amoli explains his approach to the diagrams that illustrate his metaphysical concept of the Imagination. For example, regarding diagrams 14-16, he states: “We have rendered them in the form and structure of trees with roots, trunk, branches, leaves, fruit, flowers . . . we have outlined them according to the structure (tartib) of genres, species, individuals and categories (asnaf) to help better perceive and understand elements therein. For, when one interprets things borne of intimate experience by intellective realities, their meaning approximates the Intelligences. And when one interprets things by objects of sense-perception, their meaning approximates sense-perception. In short, [we have sought to] help the seeker in his quest, to bring him closer to the path that leads to realisation. If one truly understands this, he will notice that the Qur’an as a whole follows this structure, most notably verse 24:35: ‘God is the Light of the Heavens and the Earth. The image of his Light is like a niche in which there is a lamp, the lamp in a glass’, etc.” Ibid., par. 809.
[17] Cf. Le Texte des Textes, par. 951, p. 442.
[18] Ibid., par. 952, p. 443.
[19] Ibid.,
par. 953-954 and Soufisme d’Ibn Arabi,
2nd ed., p. 95 ff.
[20] Cf. Soufisme d’Ibn Arabi, p. 93 ff.
[21] Ibid., p. 98 ff.
[22] Le Texte des Textes, par. 966, p. 451.
[23] Ibid., par. 969, p. 452.
[24] Cf. Soufisme d’Ibn Arabi, index s.v. Nom divin.
[25] Ibid., index s.v. sirr al-robubiya and Le Texte des Textes, par. 969-970.
[26] Cf. our study on “la Science de la Balance” cited above in note 3.
[27] Cf. Le Texte des Textes, 32 ff. of the French section.
[28] See our article, “Comment concevoir la philosophie comparée?” in Philosophie iranienne et philosophie comparée, Paris, Buchet-Chastel, 1977, p. 21-51, mainly p. 39 ff.
[29] As noted above, this is the case
with diagrams 14 to 16.
[30] Le Texte des Textes, p. 32 ff.
[31] Refer to Diagram 18 reproduced
here, Cf. Le Texte des Textes, par. 838.
The numbering of these diagrams corresponds to our edition of Haydar
Amoli’s Le Texte des Textes (see note
11 above).
[32] Le Texte des Textes, par. 835, p. 382.
[33] Ibid.,
par. 836.
[34] The details of the nomenclature in
Diagram 17 (not reproduced here): In the semicircle formed by the theophanies
of the Names of bounty (jamal) we
find: 1) Adam, father of humanity. 2) Prophets and Men of God. 3) The Awliya and the Imams. 4) The truly learned among the men of God. 5)
All the Believers. 6) The gnostics of
God. 7) The poles and Abdal. 8)
Angels of Mercy. 9) Men of good nature. 10) Beneficial animals. 11) Beneficial
plants. 12) Beneficial minerals. In the
semicircle formed by the Names of austerity (jalal) we find: 1) Iblis, father of the jinn. 2) Pharaohs and
Nimrods. 3) The unfaithful and moshrikun.
4) Charlatan learned ones. 5) Negators. 6) The masses and the vulgar. 7)
Magicians. 8) Angels of Punishment. 9) Men of evil nature. 7) Harmful animals.
8) Harmful plants. 9) Harmful minerals.
These theophanies of the names of austerity pose a very serious problem. The Creator cannot confer essence an
existence other than what this essence requires. He has pre-eternal knowledge of it, but no
alteration of the divine cognoscibles
is possible. The creative act of the
Agent (conferring existence) does not create the essences and their
capabilities as they are from all eternity (Cf.
par. 836-837). And so the theophanies
of the Names of austerity take on a devilish form. On this point, comparative research may find
resonances with the Kabbala of Isaac Louria, specifically the theme of the
“shattering of the vase”. In both cases
there is a kind of katharsis (a
process of purification for the divine Being).
We cannot dwell upon this here.
[35] Le
Texte des Textes, par. 841 and 845, p. 385 ff. Diagram 19 is not reproduced here; it can be
found in our edition of Haydar Amoli’s text.
[36] Ibid.,
par. 841 and 846. Diagram 20 not
reproduced here; see our edition of the text.
[37] Ibid.,
par. 866 and 867. For the meaning and
usage of the word « impressions »
compare with Surhavardi’s Épître des
haute-tours (in our collection, l’Archange
empourpré [The Crimson Archangel]; see note 61 above. Awaken among our traditional philosophers
the awareness of not having a precursor for a somewhat essential aspect. Haydar Amoli affirms it here (par. 866); as
for Surhavardi, he affirms it in his chapter The Word of Sufism. These
masters hardly ever “transmit” anything without giving rise to something
new.
[38] Ibid., par. 853, p. 391.
[39] Ibid., par. 854.
[40] Ibid.,
par. 869 to 874.
[41] Ibid.,
par. 855.
[42] Ibid.,
par. 875.
[43] Ibid.,
par. 873 and 874.
[44] Ibid.,
par. 856 to 859.
[45] Ibid.,
par. 861.
[46] Ibid.,
par. 860 and 861.
[47] Ibid.,
par. 864.
[48] Ibid.,
par. 865. Diagrams 21 and 22 are
reproduced here.
[49] Ahl
al-ahwa’: In this context, we cannot translate the term simply as
“man who is slave to his passions” which would then include the Greek
Sages and the Christians. Especially since the term hawa (pl. ahwa’) is
employed ambiguously. It may be used to
denote carnal desire but also ardent desire experienced by mystics. Which is
why we have translated it as “men of desire” (reminiscent of L.- C de
Saint Martin).
[50] From Yishu = ‘Isa = Jesus. Whom does this mean? Shahrastani describes the ‘Isawiya as disciples of Abu Isa ibn
Ya’qub Isphahani, the Judeo-Christian messianic prophet during the Abbasid
caliphate of al-Mansur (754 - 775). Kitab al-Milal, lithogr.
[51] The Greek Sages are listed in the
following order (par. 865): Thales, Anaxagoras, Anaximenes, Empedocles,
Pythagoras, Plato the divine, Socrates the ascetic, Plutarch, Xenophanes, Zeno
the Great, Democrites, Heraclios the wise, Epicurus, Hippocrates, Ptolemy,
Euclide, Chrysippe, Aristotle, Themistios, Theophrastes, Alexander the king,
Diogenes, Porphyr, Plotinus (as-shaykh
al-yunani, the Greek shaykh), Proclus, Alexander of Aprhodisias.
[52] See the chapter, “le Temple et les Templiers du Graal” in our study, “L’Imago Temple face aux normes profanes”, in Temple et Contemplation, Paris, Flammarion, 1981.
[53] Le Texte des Textes, par. 868.
[54] Gilbert Durand, Science de l’homme et tradition, le “nouvel esprit anthropologique”, Paris, Tête de feuilles Sirac, 1975, p. 157.
[55] See our Trilogie ismaélienne (Bibliothèque iranienne, vol. 9) Tehran-Paris, 1961, 2nd treatise, p. 148 of the French section.
[56]
Proclus the philosopher, Commentaire sur
le Parménide . . . translated . . . by A. - Ed. Chaignet, tome I,
[57]
Ibid., p. 127. See also our outline on “Les Cités
emblématiques”, in the Preface to Henri Stierlin, Ispahan, image du paradis,
[58] Proclus, op. cit., I, p. 133.
[59] For what follows, see our Trilogie ismaélienne (note 55 above),
the second treatise ; as well as our study, “Epiphanie divine et naissance
spirituel dans la gnose ismaélienne”, in Eranos
23-1954,
[60] See Ummu’l-Kitab (= Le Madre del Libro), introduzione, traduzione e note di Pio Filippani-Ronconi, Napoli, 1966, p. 65 ff.
[61] For what follows, see our Avicenne et le Récit visionnaire, Paris, Berg international, 1979; H. Corbin, En Islam iranien: aspects spirituels et philosophiques, in 4 volumes (see note 12 above), tome II: Sohravardi et les Platoniciens de Perse. Sohravardi, Shaykh al-Ishraq, l’Archange empourpré, recueil de quinze traités et récits mystiques, translated from the Persian and Arabic and introduced by H. Corbin (Documents spirituels 14), Paris, Fayard, 1976.
[62] See En Islam iranien . . ., tome II, p.121 ff.
[63] Ommahat. Not to be confused with usage of the word to
mean « the Elements ».
[64] En
Islam iranien . . ., tome II, p. 125.
[65] Refer to the treatise,
« Vade-mecum des fidèles d’amour » in our collection l’Archange empourpré (see note 61
above).
[66] We are rather surprised that in his
monumental work, les Somnabules,
otherwise doing justice so lucidly to Kepler’s fate and work, Arthur Koestler
should have devoted the first hundred pages to a caricature of Ptolemy’s
system. We are all the more taken aback
by this derision and condemnation in that it targets a system that the author
reproaches for delaying (by a thousand years) the birth of a science that he
himself, at the end of his book, denounces as a catastrophe without precedent
for humanity.
[67] Proclus, Commentaire sur le Parménide (note 56 above), tome II, p. 390-391.
[68] Cf. l’Archange empourpré (note 61 above), p. 203.
[69] Ibid., p. 229-230.
[70] Cf. En Islam iranien . . ., tome II, p. 117 ; tome IV, general index and l’Archange empourpré, index. s.v. Rabb al-nu, Angels of species etc.
[71] L’Archange
empourpré, p. 52.
[72] See ibid., index s.v. Ange-Esprit-Saint, [theory of visionary
knowledge], and En Islam iranien. .
., tome IV, index s.v. Intelligence agente, Gabriel, etc.
[73] L’Archange
empourpré, p. 65 and 87, note 115.
[74] See our study, “L’Evangile de
Barnabé . . .” cited above in note 4.
[75] L’Archange
empourpré, p. 65 and p. 87, note 115.
[76] Ibid.,
p. 494.
[77] Ibid.,
p. 496.
[78] See our edition and translation of
Molla Sadra Shirazi, le Livre des
pénétrations métaphysiques (Kitab
al-Masha’ir) (Bibliothèque iranienne, vol. 10), Tehran-Paris, 1964, p. 241
of the French section.
[79] Cf. J. J. Herzog, Realencylopadie fur protestantische Theologie und Kirche, 3. Aufl., vol. XIII, article, Mormonismus, p. 477.
[80] On Na-Koja-Abad, see En Islam iranien . . . tome IV, index s.v.
[81]
Samuel Butler, Nouveaux Voyages en
Erewhon, accomplis vingt ans après la découverte du pays, par le premier
explorateur et par son fils, translated from the English by Valery Larbaud,
Paris, NRF, 1934, p. 76. The page cited above is all the more
meaningful for Samuel Butler’s “pluralist
theism” that one may read in God the
Known and God the Unknown, London, 1909 (a work that is no longer
available; we owe a debt of gratitude to M. Michael Innes of London for
providing us with a photocopy). Cf. also Raymond Ruyer, la Gnose de Princeton,
[82] Syrianus, In metaphysica commenteria, ed. Kroll, p. 28, cited by Pierre Duhem, le Système du monde de Platon à Copernic, tome II, Paris 1914, p. 102.
[83] Refer to the hymn by Surhavardi
addressed to the Zoroastrian archangel Shahrivar as archangel of the sun, for
whom Hurakhsh is the “theurgy”, En Islam
iranien . . ., tome II, p. 131 ff.
Compare with l’Archange empourpré,
p. 493, 496, 505, 507, related notes and index s.v. Hurakhsh, Sharivar.
[84] Cf.
R. Ruyer, op. cit., p. 250.
[85] I deliberately use the word biologues and not biologists as
currently misused in French no doubt under the influence (contamination) of
English. On the other hand we refer to géologue, archéologue, psychologue,
sociologue. Psychologisme
and sociologisme have a different
connotation than psychologie and sociologie. Well then, what of the biologisme of the biologiste?
[86] R. Ruyer, la Gnose de Princeton, p. 33-34.
Cf. as well: “materialism
consists of believing that “all is object”, “all external”, “all thing” [. . .
]. It considers the wrong side of beings
to be the right side. This right side
confers beings an independent reality.
“The vast matter of the stars and clouds are in a pulverised state, a
kind of snow of consciousness, snow composed of billions of ice crystals and
rendered visible whereas the ice (consciousness) is transparent,” ibid., p. 35.
[87] Ibid.,
p. 75 ff.
[88] Ibid.,
p. 55-58.
[89] Ibid.,
p. 63 ff. Cf. Arthur Koestler, les Racines du hasard (=The Roots of Coincidence) translated
from the English by G. Pradier, Calmann-Levy, 1972 (better yet, rather than
coincidence it is a matter of “synchronicity” as Pauli and Jung meant), p.
144 : “These un-whole entities,
these holons (from the Greek holos) . . . as I have named them, are
not unlike enitities in Janus: at once having independent properties, a whole;
and properties that are dependent, a part.”
But how to maintain: “The holons or Great cosmic Beings are
themselves mortals . . . “? Our feeling is that every type of Neo-Gnosis
in the West should rediscover the ontology of mundus imaginalis in order not to succumb to the very thing they
wish to avoid.
[90] R. Ruyer, op.cit., p. 129-130. “The gnostics
turn Hobbes’ formula on its head. The
latter stated: ‘When someone says that God spoke to him in a dream, it is as
though he said that he dreamt that God spoke to him.’ Yes, the gnostics reply. But the statement has two aspects . . . It is
his Daimon, God that spoke to him in
a dream [. . .]. Gnosis seeks to insert participation and the particible in
religious philosophy by the front door and not the back door of pschology that
is suspect . . .” ibid., p. 130. Once again it becomes necessary to rediscover
the reality of the subtle body, corpus
spirituale, without necessarily going back to theories emanating from
[91] Ibid.,
p. 9. One must also take into
consideration the spiritual
[92] Ibid., p. 241.
[93] Cf. M. Sarraf and H. Corbin, Traités des compagnons-chevaliers, recueil de sept « Fotovvat-Nameh » (Bibliothèque-iranienne, vol.20), Tehran-Paris.
[94] See L’Archange empourpré, p. 487- 488 and p. 505 notes 43 to 45. The
description “King of Angels” here corresponds to the designation of the
archangel Logos in Philon as Arkhe ton
Angelon.
[95] L’Archange
empourpré, p. 494.
[96] Ibid.,
p.509 and notes 77 - 78.
[97] Ibid.,
p. 475.
[98] Ibid.,
p. 287 note 43. Regarding the Sinaïs
standing one above the other, see ibid.,
the conclusion of Récit de l’Exil occidental, p. 279 and p. 334, note 39.
[99] See ibid., p. 229 to 231, the passage that corresponds to Bruissement des Ailes de Gabriel [The
Rustling of Gabriel’s Wings] and the commentary, p. 245 - 246.
[100] Ibid.,
p. 209-210.
[101] Ibid., p .(Book of Hours), p. 345, verses 6, 29, 30 and p. 354.
[102] Ibid., p. 355, verse 30.
[103] Ibid.,p.
482, 486, 511, note 98.
[104]
Ibid., p.359 note 19 and p.
369.
[105] Regarding the “Great Order of
Elie” see our study, l’Evangile de
Barnabé (chapter V) cited above in note 4.
[106] R. Ruyer, la Gnose de Princeton, p. 27-28.
[107]
Arthur Koestler, la Treizième Tribu,
Paris, Calmann-Levy, 1976. It is probably going too far to
attribute the origin of all the
Jewish communities from
[108] Cf. R. Ruyer, op. cit., pages 283-385. R. Ruyer (p. 285) believes that “for lack of a scientific step, [leading
then to] “a converted scientist”, the Sages or ancient gnostics could only
refer to the hereafter of consciousness in a vague and confused manner.” I firmly believe that this observation is
equally valid for “New Gnosis”. The step
hinted here should not be missed.
[109] André Neher, l’Exil de la Parole,
