I
The Hebrew word Cabala means tradition. Jewish cabalists
believed that Moses received its teachings from God. Unlike the law
of Moses, Cabala was to be given only to a select circle of adepts.
Joshua and the seventy elders of Israel were said to be the original
group. In truth Cabala can only be traced to about the ninth century
A.D. and the writing of the mystical treatise Sepher Yezirah
or Book of Formation.
Yezirah was incorrectly attributed to Akiva
ben Joseph (fl. 130). Saadiah Gaon (d. 942), a leading Talmudic scholar,
wrote a commentary on Yezirah as did the famous Neo-platonist
Soloman ibn Gabirol, the Avencebrol of the Fons Vitae. The
attention given to Yezirah by these prominent scholars helped
to establish it and its mystical views as important aspects of Judaism.
Yezirah contains ideas which became basic to Cabala. Besides
being a standard text for Jewish mystics, Yezirah influenced
Christian cabalists. It was translated and published in Latin in 1552
by William Postel, a Christian. Two more Latin and several Hebrew
editions appeared between 1562 and 1642.
Yezirah is a description of the formation of
the universe. Numbers, letters and words, all aspects of the Hebrew
Alphabet, were the instruments of the formation. This alphabetic view
of creation became an integral part of later cabalistic works like
the Sepher Bahir and the Zohar. Yezirah was a
source for the cabalistic belief in ten Divine emanations or Sephiroth.
Each emanation in Yezirah was equated with a letter of the
alphabet and represented a step in the act of formation. Later cabalists
described theSephiroth as attributes of the supreme Deity giving them
names like wisdom and love.
The first Sephirah was the Spirit, Ruach,
of the living God, Elohim.3 The source of this emanation
was later called the En Soph or boundless. The Ruach Elohim
was the origin of three lesser emanations, Air, Water and Fire,
which were thought to correspond with the letters Aleph, Mem and
Shin. Six final Sephiroth arose in turn to complete the
heavenly realm. They were Light, Depth, East, West, North and South.
The ten Sephiroth existed in a celestial world and were eternal
like their boundless beginning. Yezirah explains, "their end
is in their beginning and likewise their beginning is in their end
...."4
In its most developed form, Jewish cabalism taught
that three other worlds, identical except in their nearness to the
En Soph, arose from the Sephirothic world: the Briatic
world, the habitation of the angel Metatron, the archetypal
man; the Yetziratic world, the home of the angelic host; and
the Assiatic world, the realm of the spheres, of matter and
the residence of the prince of darkness.
Cabala declared that man, an inhabitant
of the lowest world, was the microcosmic image of the archetypal man.
The Zohar states, "The Heavenly Adam who emanated from the
highest primordial obscurity (the En Soph) created the Earthly
Adam."5 Cabala's strong adherence to the macrocosmal-microcosmal
analogy is further developed in the Zohar. It compares the
letters of God's name, the Tetragrammaton (Yod Hay Waw Hay) to the
major parts of the body; the Yod represents the head, the Hay the
arms and shoulders, the Waw the breast, and the final Hay, the back
and legs (fig. 1).6 This macrocosm-microcosm analogy and
the idea of a dark world of matter, it will be seen, were especially
appealing to Fludd.
Cabala validated the alphabetic view of creation by
equating the alphabet with physical reality. The seven double letters
of the Hebrew alphabet were shown to correspond to the seven days
of the week, the seven planets, the seven heavens and the seven gateways
of the body. The twelve simple Hebrew letters were found to be the
source of the twelve zodiacal signs, the twelve months and the twelve
members of man.
Cabala was scientific in that the correspondence between
the visible world and the letters used in its formation was believed
to be not just symbolic but actual. Cabalists were convinced that
the study of numbers, letters and words yielded the underlying realities
of the heavens and of the earth. This attitude was adopted by Christian
and Hermetic cabalists.
The resemblance between the macrocosm-microcosm
analogy of Cabala and ideas started by Plato in the Timaeus
and the Phaedrus gives an indication of why Cabala was acceptable
to Hermetic philosophers. Hermeticists as adherents of Neo-platonism
would naturally seek out and adopt compatible ideas. The Hermetic
belief in the Neo-platonic macrocosm-microcosm doctrine found an ally
in Cabala.
Robert Fludd 1574-1637
There are also similarities between cabalistic concepts
and the Pimander of the Hermetic corpus. The Pimander
relates that the divine Nous created the world by an emanation or
Demiurge brought forth by his word.
"But the divine Nous . . . existing as Life and Light
brought forth by a word another Nous, the Demiurge, who as god over
the fire and the breath fashioned seven Governors who encompass with
their circles the sensible world . . ."7
The series of seven governors originating from a word
is much like the Sephirothic doctrine of Cabala. The idea of
a decending order of creation from the celestial to the sensible world
is also paralleled in Cabala. In the Pimander, as in Cabala,
the divine emanation is said to be reflected in man. The macrocosmmicrocosm
relationship is thus established.
The connection between the divine Nous, light and
the creation found in the Pimander is of importance, for the
role of light is also stressed in Cabala. The Zohar supposes
a view of creation similar to that of Hermes when it says, "The most
mysterious struck its void, and caused this point (the first emanation)
to shine."8 Cabala further teaches that man's soul is the
image of the macrocosm because it is composed of light. The phrase
"in our image" refers to light, declares the Zohar.9
In this writer's opinion, it is in the similarity
between the doctrines of Cabala, Neo-platonism and the Hermetic corpus
that the reason for the rapid acceptance and wide diffusion of Cabala
in the Renaissance and early modern period is to be found. Cabala
was a tool with tremendous appeal for men like Dee and Fludd. Because
Cabala claimed to originate with Moses, an assertion also made for
Neo-platonism and hermeticism, and relied on the Holy Scriptures for
its doctrines, it had the added recommendations of age and divinity.
Up to this point Cabala has been examined from the
standpoint of its cosmogony and cosmology. Of equal importance are
the methods by which cabalistic truths were wrested from Holy Writ.
The tradition which Cabala claimed to represent was one of teaching
holy men the techniques necessary for understanding the true and recondite
meaning of the scriptures. Both Jewish and Christian cabalists saw
the true message of the scriptures as:
"Like a beautiful woman, concealed in the interior
of her palace, who when her friend and beloved passes by, opens for
a moment a secret window and is seen by him alone, and then withdraws
herself immediately and disappears for a long time, so the doctrine
only shows herself to the chosen . . ."10
Three techniques were applied to discover the hidden
woman: Notaricon, Tsiruf and Gematria. Notaricon is the art of decomposing
words found in the scriptures and using their letters as abbreviations
for other words or ideas. The notariconic method would interpret the
letters of the phrase B'reshith, in the beginning, to mean
"in the beginning God saw that Israel would accept the Law."
Tsiruf is the division and/or transposition of the
parts or letters of a word into all possible permutations so as to
form other words. By applying Tsiruf, B'reshith is found to
yield B're, he created, Shith, six. The phrase he created
six was used by cabalists to support the doctrine of the Sephiroth.
Gematria is the technique of employing letters as
numbers. A gematriatic example is Genesis 38:2 where the words "Lo
three men stood by him", are found to have the numerical value of
701. The sum of the names Michael, Gabriel and Raphael is also 701.
The conclusion is that they must have been the three men.
Cabalistic methods of exegesis are not limited to
Jewish theology. They can, in fact, be used to prove almost anything
from the scriptures. Christian scholars quickly recognized this fact
and adapted Cabala to Christian theology. Hermeticists did not remain
ignorant of Cabala's malleability. They used it to prove their mystical-religious
theories of nature.
Before turning to Hermetic Cabala as developed by
Dee and Fludd, it would be helpful to look at the Christian Cabala
of Johannes Reuchlin, an early popularizer of Cabala who greatly influenced
Fludd. Reuchlin is important because he recognized the harmony between
Cabala and Neoplatonism, explained Notaricon, Tsiruf and Gematria,
and transmitted the cabalistic cosmology in his widely circulated
works.
In his first cabalistic treatise De
Verbo Mirofico (Basel, 1494), Reuchlin identified the Tetragrammaton
as the true source of the Pythagorean tetrad. By comparing the tetrad
with God's name, Reuchlin demonstrated Greek philosophy's dependence
on Cabala. The first letter of the Tetragrammaton, Yod, has the appearance
of a point so Reuchlin saw it, in the Pythagorean sense, as the beginning
and the end of all things. The second letter, Hay, numerically equal
to five, was the sum of the trinity's union with nature, the duad.
The numerical value of the third letter, Waw, is six. The number six
was the symbol of perfection to the Pythagoreans. The last letter,
also a Hay, symbolized the human soul which was between heaven and
earth as the number five was in the decade. Reuchlin's belief that
Cabala was the source of Greek philosophy opened fruitful paths for
its application to the explanation of philosophical and theological
doctrines.
John Dee 1527-1608
In addition to philosophical Cabala Reuchlin practiced
a Christian oriented cabalistic spiritual exegesis, an example of
which was deriving the names Father, Spirit and Son from the letters
of the Hebrew verb he created.11 Reuchlin is valuable in
understanding both Dee and Fludd. Dee saw mathematical possibilities
in Cabala as did Reuchlin. Fludd appears to have been directly influenced
by the cabalistic cosmology imparted by Reuchlin's works. His writings
often cite Reuchlin's De Arte Cabalistica (Hagenau, 1516).
Reuchlin also provides a standard of Christian Cabala against which
the goals and usages of Hermetic Cabala can be measured.
II
In his "Mathematical Preface" to Euclid's Elements,
John Dee cites Boethius that God created all from number. He reasons
that if all was derived from number, we can by means of mathematics:
". . . behold in the Glasse of creation the Form of
Forms, the exemplar Number of all things numerable both visible and
invisible."12
Dee's view that nature originated from and can
be discovered through mathematics is representative of Renaissance
Neoplatonism. His views are especially like those of Nicholas of Cusa
whom he quotes in the "Mathematical Preface." Cusa in Of Learned
Ignorance propounded the view that mathematics is a means by which
God can be understood.13 Both Dee and Cusa agreed that
mathematics is a useful tool because it allows a comparison of the
finite with the infinite.
Dee saw mathematics as an intermediary between the
natural and the supernatural. Mathematical things were not as perfect
as the ideal world but were also not as gross as the natural world.14
At its highest level, Dee believed, mathematics leads to a knowledge
of the formal or celestial world of Platonism. It was Platonism's
concentration on the ideal rather than on the practical that accounted
for its lack of popularity, said Dee.15
Dee translated Euclid's Elements as a preparation
to lead people from practical mathematics back to the true science
of Plato, a science which discovered the nature of the universe.16
It was in an attempt to explain the celestial realm and its order
through mathematics that Dee made use of Cabala in the Monas.
He treated Cabala as an adjunct to mathematics. To him true Cabala
was mathematical rather than linguistic. In the Monas, he interpreted
his monad by means of Notaricon, Tsiruf and Gematria.
Dee believed the hieroglyphic monad to be a geometrical
symbol in which the organization and reality of the entire universe
was represented and from which the whole of creation could be derived.
The role of the monad is analogous to that of the Hebrew alphabet
in traditional Cabala. The monad, said Dee, "imbued [the astronomical
symbols] with immortal life" and allowed their meaning to be expressed
"most eloquently in any tongue and to any nation."17 The
monad could express all because the external bodies of the celestial
sphere were reduced to "their mystical proportions" in it.
Dee did not consider the monad to be his original
discovery. It was, rather, a symbol based on the alchemical sign for
mercury sent to him by IEOVA, the Tetragrammaton, to rebuild and restore
astronomy. The monad was to be viewed as a new dispensation or restoration
of a preexistent art of writing which had become extinct. These points
are made clear in the Monas' "Preface to the King."
"Mercury may rightly be styled by us the rebuilder
and restorer of all astronomy [and] an astronomical messenger [who
was sent to us] by our lEOVA so that we might either establish this
sacred art of writing as the first founders of a new discipline, or
by his counsel renew one that was entirely extinct . . ."18
It seems that Dee equated the monad or its component
parts with the origin of alphabets. The monad was, therefore, the
ultimate source of alphabetical Cabala. He pointed out that the letters
of the Latins, Greeks and Hebrews, like the monad, were derived from
points, straight lines and the circumference of circles.19
Divine power was viewed by Dee as the source of the Hebrew alphabet
and the symbolism represented by its vowel signs and letters.20
A corollary to the view that alphabets originated
in geometrical symbols was the idea that alphabetical Cabala is inferior
to mathematical Cabala. Cabala is most productive when applied to
deriving knowledge from mathematical symbols. Dee stated that the
investigation of the monad, like the investigation of the Hebrew letters,
through Notaricon, Tsiruf and Gematria, is a holy art.21
Dee's purpose was not only to understand the mysteries
of visible and invisible things by interpreting the monad with Cabala
but also to demonstrate to the Jews, in a missionary sense, that God
is benevolent to all, i.e. he has endowed Christians with great wisdom.
". . . then (compelled by truth, if he may understand)
he [the Jewish cabalist] will call this art holy. too; and he will
own that, without regard to person, the same most benevolent God is
not only of the Jews but of all peoples, nations and languages."22
It was, then, not without some religious zeal that
Dee discussed Cabala with the Jews. The Monas' Christian tone
is especially obvious in the preface where Dee, like Reuchlin, states
that Cabala is not opposed to the Trinity.23 He viewed
non-Jewish Cabala much like Reuchlin and believed it to be the true
Cabala, a point he hoped to make to the Jews. Dee was even more precise
than Reuchlin in his definition of true Cabala. He selected mathematical
Cabala as the highest means of knowing truth. Still Dee considered
the alphabetic form to be important.
"... no mortal may excuse himself for being ignorant
of this our holy language, [the cabalistic interpretation of the monad]
. . . (which) I have called the real cabala, or of that . . . other
and vulgar one, which rests on well known letters that can be written
by man . . . "24
Real or mathematical Cabala "explains the most obtruse
arts" and was used in the Monas as a key to the universe. The
Monas applies Cabala first as a geometrical form of Notaricon.
Dee describes each part of the monad as a symbol for a cosmic reality
(fig. 2). This corresponds to alphabetic Notaricon wherein each letter
represents a word or concept.
Theorem One states that all things happen by means
of a straight line and a circle. The monad embodies this basic reality
for it is made up of lines and circles. Theorem Three says that as
a circle is derived from a point and a line, Theorem Two, the circle
and point of the monad represent the geocentric universe. Because
the sun is the highest perfection of the universe, the circle and
the point also represent it.
The use of Notaricon is extended to explain the monad's
joining of a half circle to the solar circle. The half circle represents
the moon. The meaning is that on an evening and a day, the duration
of the creative period in Genesis, the light of philosophers was made.
Two final examples of notaraiconic interpretation are the rectilinear
cross and the sign of Aries. The cross represents the mystery of the
four elements from which the world was made by the action of fire,
symbolized by Aries.
The technique of Tsiruf was used by Dee to derive
the signs of the planets from the component parts of the monad. As
in alphabetical Cabala, Dee permuted the parts of the monad to form
new and meaningful symbols. Theorem Twelve states that the signs of
the planets are derived from the symbols of the moon, the sun and
Aries. The accompanying diagram shows that Saturn can be derived from
the rectilinear cross with one half the symbol of Aries attached to
the lower right quadrant. The construction of Jupiter is said to be
opposite to that of Saturn (fig. 3).
Theorem Thirteen deals with Venus and Mercury in a
similar vein. Venus is made by attaching the solar circle to the cross
and Mercury is the same as Venus with the lunar half circle added
(fig. 4). The majesty of the sun and its relationship to the moon
and the zodiacal signs are demonstrated in Theorems Fourteen and Fifteen
.
The word Tsiruf appears in Theorem Twenty-three as
a precise term to describe the permutations of the numbers which Dee
associated with the monad.25 It is clear, however, that
the derivation of the planetary symbols from permutations of the monad
is a correct general application of Tsiruf.
John Dee used Gematria or numerical interpretation
to a considerable extent in the Monas. Numbers are derived from the
monad in Theorems Sixteen to Twenty. Theorems Twenty-three and the
concluding Theorem Twenty-four, however, are the sections where the
gematriatic method is most clear and intelligible. The discussion
centers on the rectilinear cross of the monad and its relationship
to the Pythagorean quaternary.
Using Tsiruf Dee determines that the numbers one,
two, three and four have twenty-four possible permutations. By means
of a gematriatic interpretation, Dee links, in Theorem twenty-four,
the twenty-four permutations to the hours of the day; the six wings
of the four Gospel beasts found in the Apocalypse of John; and the
twenty-four elders mentioned in the same Apocalypse. This section
is particularly worthy of reproduction as an example of Dee's application
of the cabalistic method.
"Thus we shall now at last, in this our twenty-fourth
speculation, consummate and terminate the permutations of the quaternary,
to the honour and glory of Him who (as John . . . witnesses in the
fourth and last part of the fourth chapter of the Apocalypse) sits
on the throne and around Whom four animals (each having six wings)
speak day and night; ... Whom also twenty-four elders, . . . falling
prostrate from twenty-four seats . . ., adore . . ."26
The Monas' mystical explanation of the universe
gains intelligibility when approached from the standpoint of Cabala.
John Dee, as did the writers of Yezirah and the Zohar,
explained the universe in symbols which had reality to him. The monad
cabalistically interpreted served its function well of embodying all
the symbols related to the universe. The lack of Sephiroth
and angelology in Dee's system indicates how "rational" and "mathematical"
he sought to make it. He used the cabalistic method but not the cabalistic
cosmology.
The primary goal of the Monas seems to have
been the symbolic quantification of the universe. The religious aspects
of the system should not be overlooked for God was recognized as the
source of truth and the origin of all things, the Form of Forms.
Dee's role in developing a mathematical form of Cabala
which could be applied to nature seems to have been recognized by
contemporaries for his monad appears in Libavius' Commentariorum
Alchymiae (Frankfurt, no date) and in Steeb's Coleum Sephiroticum
Mainz, 1679). Reuchlin's theological Cabala which proved the superiority
of Christianity is in marked contrast to Dee's geometrical Cabala
which discovered celestial relationships. Just how mathematical Dee's
cabalistic system is can be best appreciated when it is compared to
Fludd's alchemical universe.
III
The Monas' description of the universe did
not stress the macrocosmal-microcosmal relationship or the material
world. Dee's greatest interest seems to have lain in knowing the celestial
or formal world. Robert Fludd's emphasis in the Mosaicall Philosophy
was quite different. As a physician and alchemist, Fludd was occupied
with matter and man. He concerned himself with the celestial realm
as it related to its material image. In the Mosaicall Philosophy
he sought to elucidate and apply knowledge gained from the Bible of
celestial influences to the material world and to the microcosm. It
is through alchemy and cabala that the Mosaicall Philosophy
attempts to explore the connection between the heavenly and the earthly
worlds.
Fludd did not believe that alchemy was the only science
that could describe the universe. Three mystical sciences; Cabala,
natural magic and alchemy, were capable of illuminating the creation.
The universe which these sciences were meant to explore consisted
of three worlds: the Intelligible, the Celestial and the Elementary.
The Mosaicall Philosophy emphasizes the roles of alchemy and
Cabala in describing these worlds.27 The book develops
the relationship between the three mystical sciences, the three worlds
of the macrocosm and the three corresponding parts of man cabalistically.
"[Cabala, Natural Magic and Alchemy] . . . are the
three mystical sciences, which are by wise men appropriated into the
knowledge of the three worlds; I mean, the Intelligible, the Celestial,
and Elementary, represented, according unto the Cabalists by these
three Letters of the name of Adam. Also the three parts of man, termed
the little world, to wit, alteration and corruption, as also the elementary
part."28
Of importance in this passage are the cabalistic equation
of the letters of the Hebrew word for man with the tripartate macrocosm
and the emphasis placed on the alteration and corruption of the elementary
world. The Mosaicall Philosophy and its use of Cabala may be
viewed as an elucidation of these themes.
Fludd begins his description of the universe with
a cosmogony based on Genesis which resembles doctrines found in the
Pimander, in Cabala and in Paracelsus. The universe was created
by the "Eternal spirit of wisdom" or the Ruach Elohim, a term
found in Yezirah, who "doth operate by his Angelicall Organs of a
Contrary fortitude, in the Catholic Element of the lower waters."29
The contrary actions referred to are those of condensation and rarefaction.
It should be noted that Paracelsus gives a similar view of creation
by separation and coagulation in his Three Books of Philosophy
Written to the Athenians.
The angelical organs of the Ruach were the
sun, governed by the 'potent angell' Michael, and its subservient
forces the four winds, each also governed by an angel. The sun by
"celestial Alchimy, or spagerick vertue of the divine illumination"
divided the waters into upper and lower parts.30 The upper
waters, the home of good angels, "were obedient unto bright Divinity,
and were converted into a fiery nature" whereas, the lower waters,
Satan's habitat, "being fecall, gross, impure, and therefore more
rebellious unto light" were converted into an elementary nature subject
to change.31
Fludd demonstrated the sun's role in the rarefaction
of creation by pointing to the action of a weather glass. In sunlight
the water in the glass expands, but in darkness, the cold north influence
of the elementary world, the water contracts. Between the upper waters
and the lower waters existed the third part of the universe, the firmament.
The firmament was the mediator between the dwelling place of the Ruach
Elohim and the fecal world.
Above the firmament, all stood in the changeless similitude
of God while in the world below the action of contraries led to change.
As an example of the existence of opposite actions in the elementary
world, Fludd cited the heart's systole and diastole, contraction by
the cold nature of matter and dilatation by the act of formal light.32
The trilevel universe which Fludd described is primarily
in interpretation of God's division the the waters in Genesis. God's
use of an intermediary Ruach Elohim suggests both the Pimander
and Cabala. The Pimander's influence on Fludd is seen in his
unpubished work A Philosophical Key (1618).
The Key's discussion of the creation turns
on a Demogorgon which worked by means of two intermediaries, chaos
and eternity. The elementary world was described as the Litigum,
abortion, of chaos. It was the realm of evil and was fecal in nature.
The Key like the Pimander also stressed the role of
light in the creative process. The Mosaicall Philosophy continued
the Key's fecal analogy and view of light but substituted the
Ruach Elohim and angelology of Cabala for the Demogorgon and
its agents.
A most significant aspect of Fludd's
cosmogony is its similarity to the alchemical process of distillation.
The Divine emanation is viewed as an alchemist who used beams of light
to separate the primordial waters into their constituent parts. The
finest material rose, leaving behind the fecal debris of the elementary
world. In distillation Fludd believed that he had observed the process
of creation described by Moses in Genesis. The weather glass was an
experiment which supplied convincing proof of the role of light in
rarefaction. This explanation of creation based on experiment was
the true mosaical philosophy.
A Table of
Planetary Influences which shows how each hour of the day is ruled
by a certain planet differing for each day of the week.
A diagram used by Robert Fludd when treating diseases.
It is difficult to determine how much of Fludd's general
scheme was taken from Cabala. Creation by light's emanation, the macrocosm-microcosm
doctrine and angelology are all found in Neo-platonism and the Hermetic
corpus as well as in Cabala. Fludd's extreme reliance on alchemical
processes indicates that he probably used Cabala as a support for
ideas developed from non-cabalistic sources. Cabala's similarity to
his beliefs gave him a covenient proof for his views. In the matter
of particulars, Cabala, perhaps, added more to his thought. This is
especially true of the macrocosm-microcosm analogy. Fludd displays
good cabalistic form when he states that the "aevaill or angelical
effect, is the image of the eternal Idea, and the temporal
world, is the similitude of the aeviall."33
It is true that in any macrocosmal-microcosmal system
the two worlds are identical, but the interspersion of a series of
three worlds is reminiscent of the cabalistic cosmos. The universe
developed in the Mosaicall Philosophy is more like the three
sub-Sephirothic worlds of Cabala than the seven level cosmos of the
Pimander. The Mosaicall Philosophy's use of light corresponds
to Cabala. Fludd's statement that each "world was made by the sending
forth of God's bright Emanation"34 is paralleled in the
Zohar. The three worlds of the Mosaicall Philosophy
like the Zohar's differed only in that each had a "lesse proportion
of light than other."35
Fludd's terminology and angelology in the Mosaicall
Philosophy seem to be drawn from Cabala. As the cabalistic Sephiroth
correspond to the divine attributes so does each angel in Fludd's
cosmos perform a necessary function to God's nature and his creation.
The attribute Elohim, for example, sends down the power of
cold effects to Saturn while the attribute Jehovah Sabaoth
pours forth the beams of concupiscibility.36
Even in this, his most cabalistic of moods, Fludd
leans heavily on ocular demonstration. The means by which angels influence
the world, he compares to the sympathetic action of a lodestone.37
Angels do not work directly but rather through intermediaries in the
firmament. Angelical beams proceed to the stars. Each animal or vegetable
has a particular star "that poureth out upon him his proper influence.38
The topic of celestial influences on the elementary world as demonstrated
by lodestones is the subject of the last portion of the Mosaicall
Philosophy.
The doctrines of Cabala and alchemy are thoroughly
mixed in the Mosaicall Philosophy. Fludd, perhaps, did not
distinguish the two because their cosmological teachings were so similar.
Both systems were, after all, sciences which should yield the same
results in studying the universe. The scriptural interpretations of
Cabala lent divine authority to Fludd's alchemical views. His free
combination and equation of Cabala with alchemy resulted in a system
which was a homogenous mixture of the two approaches.
The Mosaicall Philosophy's discussion of the
doctrine of anima mundi or world soul illustrates this homogeneity.
The pagan concept of anima mundi, said Fludd, was the same
as the Catholic soul of Christianity and the angel "mitattron" of
Jewish Cabala.39 Anima mundi, Catholic soul and
Metatron were simply three terms for the same truth. Seen in
this syncretistic light the cabalistic elements in Fludd's philosophy
make a good deal of sense.
In reading the Mosaicall Philosophy, a question
arises, how much first hand knowledge of Hebrew and Cabala did Fludd
possess. This question grows out of serious errors made by him in
his cabalistic interpretations of Hebrew phrases. One near comical
error which he committed was in referring to Zohar as a rabbi.40
Another obvious misuse is found in part two of the Mosaicall Philosophy
where Fludd tries to prove his three level cosmos by Notaricon. He
asserts that the phrase "the heavens",mem yod mem shin hay
means the heavens or the firmament, are between fire, the upper waters
and the lower waters. According to Fludd, the spelling reads mem
yod mem shin aleph=a shamaum. The Aleph and Shin,
signify esch, fire and mayim, mem yod mem, represents
water.41
Fludd is correct, esch is fire and mayim
water. Cabalistically they could mean that the heavens are between
fire and water. Unfortunately the interpretation is based on a mispelling,
"The heavens" is spelled with a Hay, and not an Aleph.
Such an error invalidates his conclusion and casts doubt on his knowledge
of Hebrew.
This writer has been able to find no usage in Jewish
Cabala where "the heavens" is interpreted using an Aleph instead of
a Hay.42 If a check of the cabalistic sources cited in
the Mosaicall Philosophy indicates anything about Fludd's knowledge
of Cabala, it was derived in large part from Johannes Reuchlin's De
Arte Cabbalistica.43 Reuchlin, in fact, is the only
cabalist mentioned in the book.
In light of Fludd's linguistic defects, it is strange
that he, like Dee and Reuchlin, claimed his Cabala to be the true
one. After discussing how the world was created by twenty-two spiritual",
letters, he calls the Jews to repentance by saying that Hebrew is
"much spoken by the learned Rabbis of our age, but little known or
understood by them."44 A similar indictment could be brought
against Fludd. One should note that a critique of Dee's knowledge
of Hebrew is more difficult to find than one of Fludd. Nowhere in
the Monas does he betray his cabalistic sources. He actually
used Hebrew but once and only then in an unintelligible phrase.45
In defense of Fludd, it would appear that his purpose
in the Mosaicall Philosophy was not to show a mastery of Hebrew
or of Cabala but rather to integrate a system dating from Moses into
his alchemical view of the universe based on the Bible. If Moses received
both Genesis and Cabala from God, should not Cabala be used to understand
Genesis. Fludd's major tool for discovering the mosaicall philosophy
was alchemy and not Cabala, however. The Mosaicall Philosophy's
views were conditioned primarily by the physical theories of alchemy
and its ocular proofs. To these proofs were fit compatible doctrines
of Cabala. In its own way the Mosaicall Philosophy was as successful
a mystical scientific work as Dee's Monas Hieroglyphica. Its
physical explanation of the universe took into account all the factors
which Fludd considered necessary for scientific validation: Holy Writ,
alchemical knowledge, and the cabalistic tradition.
The systems which Dee and Fludd developed indicate
two uses to which Cabala could be put by Hermetic scientists. The
intensely mathematical approach of Dee found in Cabala a tool to explore
cosmical relationahips. Fludd on the other hand saw the cabalistic
cosmology as a proof for his alchemical view of nature. Within Cabala's
doctrines and methodology were the seeds for both interpretations.
It was natural for Dee and Fludd to use a system of
the supposed antiquity and divinity of Cabala. Cabala's teachings,
especially those concerning the creation and the macrocosm-microcosm,
were welcome because of their harmony with the Neo-platonic and Hermetic
doctrines upon which mystical science was based. The cabalistic approach
was deemed scientific by both Dee and Fludd. They believed it, like
mathematics and alchemy, revealed the underlying processes and realities
of nature.
The difference between Hermetic and
Christian cabalists lies in the Hermetic attempts to integrate Cabala
into an explanation of nature. Reuchlin and his genre sought to prove
and illuminate Christian theology with Cabala, not to found a scientific
world system. Both Dee and Fludd stepped into the theological arena
in declaring that theirs was the true Cabala and that the Jews would
do well to heed their teachings, but this proselytizing of the Jews
was a secondary consideration. Understanding two applications of Cabala
to Hermetic science only begins to shed light on the broader issue
of Cabala's role in Hermetic thought. For the historian of science,
a knowledge of Hermetic Cabala can increase his understanding of the
goals, the doctrines and the methods of Hermetic scientists.
FOOTNOTES
*Some of the material
on John Dee is contained in Michael T. Walton "John Dee's Monas Hieroglyphica:
Geometrical Cabala" Ambix, vol. 23, pt. 2, July 1976, pp. 116-123.
1. For a more general presentation of Cabala in the Renaissance see
F. Secret, Les Kabbalistes Cretions de la Renaissance, (Paris,
1964). A general discussion of Jewish Cabala is found in G. G. Scholem,
Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, (Jerusalem, 1941).
2. That Fludd was steeped in the mathematical tradition is seen in his
Utrinsque Cosmi (Oppenheim, 1617). In that book on page 164,
he describes a tri-level cosmos based on Pythagorean and Platonic views.
Much of the book is based on a mathematical description of the world.
In his use of Cabala, however, Fludd did not select out its mathematical
aspects. He adopted, rather, Cabala's way of describing the physical
order of the universe. The distinction between Dee as a mathematician
and Fludd as a alchemist is, then, somewhat limited to their Cabala.
3. Cabalistic terms like Ruach Elohim were much used by Hermeticists.
Henricus Khunrath in his Magnesia Catholica Philosophorum (Mageleburg,
1599) refers to the Ruach Chochmah-El, Spirit of the wise God.
4. Sepher Yezirah, trans. by Knut Stenring (London: Wm. Rider
and Son Ltd., 1923), p. 22.
5. Zohar ii, 70 b, trans. by Christian D. Ginsburg in The Kabbalah,
(London: 1896).
6. Zohar ii, 42 a, Ibid.
7. Hermes Trismegistus, The Poimandres, trans. by Hans Jonas
in The Gnostic Religion (Boston: Beacon Press, 1963), pp. 149-50.
8. Zohar i, 15 a, trans. by Harry Sperling and Maurice Simon
(London: Soncino Press, 10949).
9. Zohar i, 22 b, trans. by Ginsburg, op cit.
10. Zohar ii, 99 Ibid.
11. For more on Reuchlin's Cabala see Christian D. Ginsberg, The
Kabbalah (London, 1896), pp. 206-13.
12. Euclid's Elements, introduction by John Dee (London: Leyborn,
1661), p. 3.
13. Nicholas of Cusa, Of Learned Ignorance, trans. by Fr. Germain
Heron (Yale Press, 1954), chapter 11.
14. Elements, p. 2.
15. Ibid., P. 1.
16. Ibid., p. 1.
17. John Dee, Monas Hieroglyphica, trans. by C. H. Josten, Ambix,
XII, p. 121.
"Ibid., p. 122.
"Ibid., p. 127.
20. Ibid., p. 127.
21. Ibid., p. 133.
22. Ibid., p.133.
23. Ibid., p. 127.
24. 1b id., p. 135.
25. Ibid., p. 209.
26. Ibid., p. 217.
27. J . B. Craven in Doctor Robert Fludd points out that in section
one of De practernaturi utriusque mundi historia in sectiones tres
divisa (Frankfurt, 1621) Fludd discusses Cabala. The ideas Fludd
set forth there are very much like Zoharic doctrines. He compared
the Tetragrammaton to the parts of the body and used the Zoharic
names for the Sephiroth. The Yeziratic doctrine of a creation
from earth (Aleph), fire (Shin) and water (Mem) was also developed.
Cabala is mentioned in other works by Fludd but only the system of the
Mosaicall Philosophy will be discussed here.
28. Robert Fludd, Mosaicall Philosophy (London: Humphrey Moseley,
1659), p. 155.
29. Ibid., p. 59.
30. Ibid., p. 193.
31. Ibid., p. 192.
32. Ibid., pp. 193-94.
33. Ibid., p. 197.
34. Ibid., p. 198.
35. Ibid., p. 172.
36. Ibid., pp. 193 and 196.
37. Ibid., p. 196.
38. Ibid., p. 196.
39. Ibid., p. 145.
40. Ibid., p. 155.
41. Ibid., p. 155.
42. An identical cabalistic interpretation of the phrase "the heavens"
is found on page 4 of Georg von Welling's Opus Mago-Cabbalisticum
et Theosophicum (Homburg vor der Hohe, 1735). Welling may have
drawn it from Fludd or some other cabalistic work unknown to this author.
The fact remains that the interpretation is a misuse of Hebrew.
43. Two of Fludd's many references to Reuchlin are in Ibid.,
pp. 61 and 137.
44. Ibid., p. 161.
45. Monas Hieroglyphica in op. cit. p. 127.
Essentia 1980
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