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WILLIAM BLAKE AND JACOB BOEHME. AN INTRIGUING APPROACH TO CHRISTIANITY

Georgia Dimitrakopoulou

First published: 2022https://doi.org/10.35603/sws.iscah.2022/s10.20View metrics

Abstract

In this paper, William Blake’s religious system, the relationship between Natural Religion (Deism) and Art will be discussed. Blake rejected Natural Religion because Deism, which he considered Atheism and the tree of mystery, that is the dichotomy of good and evil, is false religion. ‘Natural religion’s impossible absurdity’ urged him to allege The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. Catholicism and Orthodoxy, which proclaim that nature is God’s creation, follow Urizen’s cruel practices. Deism, Druidism is responsible for human slavery, war, and spiritual backwardness. Blake’s Protestant Jesus, that is imagination incarnated is spirituality and productivity. This does not mean that Catholicism and Orthodoxy are consisted by false religious beliefs. The basic idea of the differentiation between religions is not the division of the spirit in good and evil but the ground on which this division is based. Although “Man must and will have some Religion,” religion is a ‘web’ and a ‘direful wheel.’ Jesus is not a religion, in the sense that religion is a system of justice which is based on single standards that regulate human ethics and conduct. Understanding Jesus is a process of self - knowing. Man should not strive to express himself through religion but through his creative imagination and the humanitarian values of annihilation of the selfhood, universal brotherhood, and mutual forgiveness of sins. In a false religious system these values are ignored and forgotten. In order to form these ideas Blake received various influences from Boehme’s assertions, for example about the single root of the God of the holy world, and the God of the dark world. Also, God is the Fire and Jesus is the Light; Boehme saw the incarnation of Jesus not as a sacrificial offering to redeem humans from sins but as an offering of love to all humanity. In addition, Blake’s ideas about Virgin Mary are significant to compare and contrast to Boehme’s. The latter’s Marian views helped Blake to construct his own view on divine birth and Jesus’s human side.

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Publication details

Title
WILLIAM BLAKE AND JACOB BOEHME. AN INTRIGUING APPROACH TO CHRISTIANITY
Authors
Georgia Dimitrakopoulou
Proceedings
Proceedings of 9th SWS International Scientific Conference on Arts And Humanities - ISCAH 2022, VOL 9
Publisher
SGEM WORLD SCIENCE (SWS) Scholarly Society
Year
2022
Pages
195-206
SWS Citekey
Dimitrakopoulou202225195206
ISSN
2682-9940
ISBN
978-3-903438-05-7
Language
en
Publication type
Proceedings Paper
Keywords
Natural ReligionNatureVernunft and VerstandImagination and UrizenBoehme’s Ungrundselfhood and self - annihilation
References46

  1. S. Foster Damon. A Blake Dictionary. The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. UP of New England, Hanover and London 1988. 39.

  2. Ibid.

  3. Ibid. 40.

  4. The influence of Jacob Boehme on the work of Blake, by Bryan Aubrey. September 11, 2016 by Golgonooza https://thehumandivine.org/2016/09/11/the-influence-of-jacob-boehme-on-thework-of-blake-by-bryan-aubrey/ [accessed May 2022].

  5. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 146.

  6. The influence of Jacob Boehme on the work of Blake, by Bryan Aubrey. September 11, 2016 by Golgonooza https://thehumandivine.org/2016/09/11/the-influence-of-jacobboehme-on-the-work-of-blake-by-bryan-aubrey/ [accessed May 2022].

  7. Ibid.

  8. Ibid.

  9. Ibid. ‘the Fierceness [or wrath] is the Root of all Things, and moreover, the Originality of the Life; therein only consists the Might and the Power, and from thence only proceed the Wonders.’ Jacob Boehme. The Three Principles of the Divine Essence.

  10. S. Foster Damon. A Blake Dictionary. The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. UP of New England, Hanover and London 1988. 40.

  11. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 34.

  12. Ibid. 42.

  13. Ibid. 43.

  14. Deists taught that man is righteous by nature, (self-righteousness), preached vengeance for sins of others, caused war, and did not practice forgiveness. http://ramhornd.blogspot.com/2020/11/satan-deism.html [accessed 18/5/2022].

  15. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 60.

  16. Ibid. 38.

  17. Ibid. 199.

  18. Ibid. 310.

  19. Ibid. 108.

  20. Ibid. 128.

  21. S. Foster Damon. A Blake Dictionary. The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. UP of New England, Hanover and London 1988. 40.

  22. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 124.

  23. The Treatise of the Incarnation. https://thehumandivine.org/2016/09/11/theinfluence-of-jacob-boehme-on-the-work-of-blake-by-bryan-aubrey/ [accessed April 2022].

  24. Six Theosophic Points. https://thehumandivine.org/2016/09/11/the-influence-ofjacob-boehme-on-the-work-of-blake-by-bryan-aubrey/ [accessed April 2022].

  25. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 132.

  26. Ibid. 36.

  27. Blake’s Urizen (Reason) erases Imagination.

  28. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 665.

  29. Ibid. 141.

  30. Ibid. 201. ‘… if he has not the Religion of Jesus, he will have the Religion of Satan, & will erect the Synagogue of Satan. calling the Prince of this World, God; and destroying all who do not worship Satan under the Name of God. Will any one say: Where are those who worship Satan under the Name of God! Where are they? Listen! Every Religion that Preaches Vengeance for Sins is the Religion of the Enemy & Avenger; and not the Forgiver of Sin, and their God is Satan, Named by the Divine Name Your Religion O Deists: Deism, is the Worship of the God of this World by the means of what you call Natural Religion and Natural Philosophy, and of Natural Morality or Self-Righteousness, the Selfish Virtues of the Natural Heart. This was the Religion of the Pharisees who murderd Jesus. Deism is the same & ends in the same.’

  31. Ibid. 663.

  32. Ibid. 664.

  33. S. Foster Damon. A Blake Dictionary. The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. UP of New England, Hanover and London 1988. 102.

  34. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 665.

  35. Ibid. 150.

  36. Ibid. 875.

  37. Ibid. 300.

  38. Treasures from the writings of Jacob Boehme. http://www.passtheword.org/JacobBoehme/jbimage2.htm [accessed May 2022].

  39. Ibid.

  40. Aubrey, Bryan. Watchmen of Eternity, Blake’s Debt to Jacob Boehme. UP of America, Lanham - New York - London, 1986. 10.

  41. S. Foster Damon. A Blake Dictionary. The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. UP of New England, Hanover and London 1988. 436-437.

  42. David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 688.

  43. S. Foster Damon. A Blake Dictionary. The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. UP of New England, Hanover and London 1988. 264.

  44. Jacob Boehme - Alchemical drawings. https://zaklynsky.wordpress.com/2012/11/28/98/amp/ [accessed May 2022].

  45. ‘…the fundamental purpose of Mary’s existence was to conceive the Holy Child; therefore (and in this sense only) when she was impregnated, she was obeying the Holy Ghost within her. In Blake’s watercolor of the Assumption, Mary rises from the tomb, not towards the conventional Trinity, but towards the Babe.’ S. Foster Damon. A Blake Dictionary. The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. UP of New England, Hanover and London 1988. 264.

  46. https://thehumandivine.org/2016/09/11/the-influence-of-jacob-boehme-on-thework-of-blake-by-bryan-aubrey/ [accessed April 2022].

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