And it is surely only reasonable to expect, that there should be something like consistency between this verse and the Cabala, which we know was founded, in some degree, perhaps entirely, upon it.
The conduct of Christian expositors, with respect to the words שמים smim and ראשית rasit, has been as unfair as possible. They have misrepresented the meaning of them in order to prevent the true astrological character of the book from being seen. But, that the first does mean disposers, the word heavens making nonsense, and the words relating to the stars, in the 16th verse, shewing that they cannot be meant, put it beyond a question. My reader may, therefore, form a pretty good judgment how much Parkhurst can be depended upon for the meaning of the second, from the striking fact that, though he has filled several columns with observations relating to the opinions of different expositors, he could not find room for the words, the opinion of the Synagogue is, that the word means wisdom, or the Jerusalem Targum says it means wisdom. But it was necessary to conceal from the English reader, as already stated, the countenance it gives to judicial astrology and the doctrine of emanations.
Indeed, I think the doctrine of Emanations in the Jewish system cannot be denied. This Mr. Maurice unequivocally admits: “The Father is the great fountain of the divinity; the Son and the Holy Spirit are Emanations from that fountain.” Again, “The Christian Trinity is a Trinity of subsistences, or persons joined by an indissoluble union.”[1] The reader will please to recollect that hypostasis means subsistence, which is a Greek word—ὑποςασις, from ὑπο sub, and ιςημι, sto, existo.
In the formation of an opinion respecting the real meaning of such texts as these, the prudent inquirer will consider the general character of the context; and, in order that he may be the better enabled to do this, I request him to suspend his judgment till he sees the observations which will be made in the remainder of this work.
Whatever trifling differences or incongruities may be discovered between them, the following conclusions are inevitable, viz. that the religion of Abraham and that of the Magi, were in reality the same; that they both contained the doctrine of the Trinity; and that the oriental historians who state this fact, state only what is true.
Dr. Shuckford gives other reasons to shew that the religions of Abraham and of the Persians were the same. He states, that Dr. Hyde was of his opinion, and thus concludes: “The first religion, therefore, of the Persians, was the worship of the true God, and they continued in it for some time after Abraham was expelled Chaldæa, having the same faith and worship as Abraham had, except only in those points concerning which he received instruction after his going into Haran and into Canaan.”[2]
8. I must now beg my reader to review what has been said respecting the celebrated name of God, Al, Ale, Aleim; and to observe that this was in all the Western Asiatic nations the name both of God and of the Sun. This is confirmed by Sir W. Drummond and Mr. Parkhurst, as the reader has seen, and by the names given by the Greeks to places which they conquered. Thus: בית אל Bit Al, House of the Sun, became Heliopolis. I beg my reader also to recollect that when the Aleim appeared it was generally in the form of fire, thus he appeared to Moses in the bush. Fire was, in a particular manner, held sacred by the Jews and Persians; a sacred fire was always burning in the temple of Jerusalem. From all this, and much more which the reader will find presently, he will see that though most undoubtedly the Sun was not the object of the adoration of Moses, it is very evident that it had been closely allied to it. In the time of Moses, not the sun, but the higher principle thought to reside in the sun, perhaps the Creator of the sun himself, had
