FOUR ELEMENTS

Fire

Earth

Water

 

Air

First posted Dec 2015

 Book of Urizen: full page images of the Four Elements. 

 

For the Sexes: Gates of Paradise, THE KEYS, (E 268) 

"2 Doubt Self Jealous Watry folly 

3 Struggling thro Earths Melancholy 

4 Naked in Air in Shame & Fear 

5 Blind in Fire with shield & spear"

 
 

Air - Urizen

Urizen's contribution was to 'divide the elements in finite bonds': to take the infinite archetypes and divide them into finite discrete entities which could be set against each other in warring factions.

Four Zoas, Night II, Page 30, (E 319)
"Then rose the Builders; First the Architect divine his plan
Unfolds, The wondrous scaffold reard all round the infinite
Quadrangular the building rose the heavens squared by a line.    
Trigon & cubes divide the elements in finite bonds
Multitudes without number work incessant: the hewn stone
Is placd in beds of mortar mingled with the ashes of Vala
Severe the labour, female slaves the mortar trod oppressed

Twelve halls after the names of his twelve sons composd          
The wondrous building & three Central Domes after the Names 
Of his three daughters were encompassd by the twelve bright halls
Every hall surrounded by bright Paradises of Delight
In which are towns & Cities Nations Seas Mountains & Rivers 
Each Dome opend toward four halls & the Three Domes Encompassd   
The Golden Hall of Urizen whose western side glowd bright 
With ever streaming fires beaming from his awful limbs

Water - Tharmas

Tharmas realized the the infinite elements which served the living would be left 'a formless unmeasurable Death' if he departed and they were left without the spirits which animated them.

Four Zoas, Night IV, Page 52, (E 334) 
"I will compell thee to rebuild by these my furious waves
Death choose or life thou strugglest in my waters, now choose life
And all the Elements shall serve thee to their soothing flutes
Their sweet inspiriting lyres thy labours shall administer
And they to thee only remit not faint not thou my son            
Now thou dost know what tis to strive against the God of waters

So saying Tharmas on his furious chariots of the Deep
Departed far into the Unknown & left a wondrous void
Round Los. afar his waters bore on all sides round. with noise
Of wheels & horses hoofs & Trumpets Horns & Clarions   

Terrified Los beheld the ruins of Urizen beneath
A horrible Chaos to his eyes. a formless unmeasurable Death"

Earth - Urthona

The 'shadowy semblance' of the detached elements seek existence in matter although they will suffer the pains of affliction common in the natural world.

Four Zoas, Night IX, Page 136, (E 404)
"Forsaken of their Elements they vanish & are no more
No more but a desire of Being a distracted ravening desire
Desiring like the hungry worm & like the gaping grave   
They plunge into the Elements the Elements cast them forth
Or else consume their shadowy semblance Yet they obstinate       
Tho pained to distraction Cry O let us Exist for
This dreadful Non Existence is worse than pains of Eternal Birth    
Eternal Death who can Endure. let us consume in fires
In waters stifling or in air corroding or in earth shut up
The Pangs of Eternal birth are better than the Pangs of Eternal Death 

Fire - Luvah 

Blind in Fire with shield & spear

 Milton, Plate 31 [34], (E 130)
"And all the Living Creatures of the Four Elements, wail'd
With bitter wailing: these in the aggregate are named Satan.
And Rahab: they know not of Regeneration, but only of Generation
The Fairies, Nymphs, Gnomes & Genii of the Four Elements         
Unforgiving & unalterable: these cannot be Regenerated
But must be Created, for they know only of Generation
These are the Gods of the Kingdoms of the Earth: in contrarious
And cruel opposition: Element against Element, opposed in War
Not Mental, as the Wars of Eternity, but a Corporeal Strife      
In Los's Halls continual labouring in the Furnaces of Golgonooza"

Blake states that the Four Zoas are the 'Four Eternal Senses of Man.' At the Eternal level Albion incorporates all of the created world; his senses are the Zoas. When Albion splits and falls the Eternal Senses become the Elements which are expressed as forces which are active in defining the natural world. The raw power of the elements breaks forth in the destruction of the Whirlwind, Flood, Earthquake and Fire. Milder but no less insidious formulations of the Elements are the Fairies, Nymphs, Gnomes & Genii, unconscious instruments which instigate strife and war among political entities, whether they be families, religions, political parties, or nations. The elements have become the masters of man rather than his servants.

Mankind would like to be free from subjugation to the results of the conflicts manifesting in nature and politics, but the powers that sustain them go unrecognized. If we knew that we have Eternal Senses capable of enjoying the infinite and eternal panoply of the universe, we would relinquish our grip on the partial to perceive the whole.

Jerusalem, Plate 32 [36], (E 178) 
"And the Four Zoa's clouded rage East & West & North & South      
They change their situations, in the Universal Man.
Albion groans, he sees the Elements divide before his face.
And England who is Brittannia divided into Jerusalem & Vala
And Urizen assumes the East, Luvah assumes the South
In his dark Spectre ravening from his open Sepulcher             

And the Four Zoa's who are the Four Eternal Senses of Man
Became Four Elements separating from the Limbs of Albion
These are their names in the Vegetative Generation
[West Weighing East & North dividing Generation South
     bounding]         
And Accident & Chance were found hidden in Length Bredth & Highth
And they divided into Four ravening deathlike Forms
Fairies & Genii & Nymphs & Gnomes of the Elements.
These are States Permanently Fixed by the Divine Power

The Atlantic Continent sunk round Albions cliffy shore
And the Sea poured in amain upon the Giants of Albion      
As Los bended the Senses of Reuben Reuben is Merlin
Exploring the Three States of Ulro; Creation; Redemption. & Judgment

And many of the Eternal Ones laughed after their manner"

. 

New Birth

First Published June 25, 2013

 Forgiveness
This was central to Blake's evolving theology. It came to him at 42 and delivered him from his need to flog Old Nobodaddy; he had experienced the 'healing balm'. Henceforth he loved and adored Jesus, the bearer of Forgiveness.

In this form Blake experienced the new birth, which Baptists tell us occurs when you "accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior". For Blake (and for me) it came with recognition of God's love, and particularly in his case a feeling of being accepted (for me, too actually). 

The First Vision of Light described his jubilation at being accepted and called "thou Ram hornd with gold":
     "Soft he smild
And I heard his voice Mild Saying This is My Fold O thou Ram hornd with gold Who awakest from sleep On the sides of the Deep On the Mountains around The roarings resound Of the lion & wolf The loud sea & deep gulf These are guards of My Fold O thou Ram hornd with gold And the voice faded mild.."

(Erdman 713)

For Blake (and for me) this led to an excess of power. It appears that Blake had a sense of guilt that came to a head during his three years at Felpham (by the sea). He had been invited there by a fashionable poet and man of affairs named Hayley.

That was wonderful, but Blake soon found that Hayley proposed to "assist" him to becoming successful by producing miniatures. Blake had struggled with the temptation to pursue worldly success instead of the "main chance", by which he meant artistic integrity (no doubt something all or most artists struggle with). Blake spoke of this in a letter to Cumberland dated 2 July 1800.

The pressure of Hayley on him to conform to worldly expectations was the last straw, and he returned to London a new man, no longer concerned about the approval of those who could reward him monetarily.

His best work came then with Milton and Jerusalem, but his new life is also expressed in the last part of The Four Zoas.

This experience of Blake's strikes me as a universal, applicable to many of us. The world calls, and God calls. Happy are those who hear and respond to the second call.

FLOOD & ARK

First posted Feb 2012

Quotes are from S. Foster Damon, A Blake Dictionary: The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake.

The Old Testament flood for which Noah built his ark is a pivotal development in history. Man is portrayed as ending one phase of his existence and beginning again with a clean slate. The ark made by Noah from God's instructions was the means through which humanity was preserved instead of being annihilated. An event which comes close to exterminating a population and altering a landscape made an imprint on the psyche. A complex of images developed around the story of the flood which kept the memory of it alive as a continually developing symbol.

Elements of the multifaceted symbol which developed around the 40 day rain and subsequent inundation include: the ark, the flood, the preservation of the species, the dove, the olive branch, the rainbow. As an event which incorporated negative aspects (such as punishment for sins, and destruction of the environment and its inhabitants), and positive aspects (such as saving of a remnant of the living things on the planet, and resulting in a promise that such an event of destruction would not recur), it offers itself for a symbol encompassing both destruction and reconstruction.

To focus on a single facet of the multifaceted image we look at the ark as Blake incorporated it. The ark is a safe feminine place of refuge as is Beulah.

Yale Center for British Art 

Jerusalem 

Plate 44

Yale Center for British Art 

Jerusalem 

Plate 24

 

Damon, Page 286
"It is the function of the female to provide a moony space of refuge and rest for the male."

Jerusalem, Plate 69, (E 223)
"& not like Beulah
Where every Female delights to give her maiden to her husband
The Female searches sea & land for gratification to the
Male Genius: who in return clothes her in gems & gold
And feeds her with the food of Eden. hence all her beauty beams
She Creates at her will a little moony night & silence
With Spaces of sweet gardens & a tent of elegant beauty:
Closed in by a sandy desart & a night of stars shining.
And a little tender moon & hovering angels on the wing.
And the Male gives a Time & Revolution to her Space
Till the time of love is passed in ever varying delights
For All Things Exist in the Human Imagination
And thence in Beulah they are stolen by secret amorous theft,"

Damon, Page 300
"As all forms of water signify matter, the flood was the overwhelming of mankind with Matter, which separated them from Eternity. This is the Sea of Time and Space in which we are all submerged. ...
The Ark, which preserved Noah and his family, symbolizes Love: consequently Blake depicted it as a crescent moon."

The achievement of the flood is the separation of intellect and love that each may be differentiated and defined. A tension must develop between the two so that the roles of each may be clarified. They are not meant to be enemies but friends who will be reunited when they have learned the lessons of misguided independence. Interdependence reunites them through the incarnation.

One of the forms Ololon assumes as Blake's Milton is concluding is that of an ark.
 
Damon, Page 308
"Then as a Moony Ark Ololon descended...into the Fires of Intellect" (42:7-9): love and intellect combined. The Starry Eight become Jesus; Ololon's clouds are his wedding garment; and Jesus becomes one with mankind (42:19). The mystical union has been achieved, and Blake falls fainting on his garden path."

Milton, Plate 42 [49], (E 143)
"So saying, the Virgin divided Six-fold & with a shriek
Dolorous that ran thro all Creation a Double Six-fold Wonder!
Away from Ololon she divided & fled into the depths
Of Miltons Shadow as a Dove upon the stormy Sea.

Then as a Moony Ark Ololon descended to Felphams Vale
In clouds of blood, in streams of gore, with dreadful thunderings
Into the Fires of Intellect that rejoic'd in Felphams Vale
Around the Starry Eight: with one accord the Starry Eight became
One Man Jesus the Saviour. wonderful! round his limbs
The Clouds of Ololon folded as a Garment dipped in blood
Written within & without in woven letters: & the Writing
Is the Divine Revelation in the Litteral expression:
A Garment of War, I heard it namd the Woof of Six Thousand Years"

In the development of the human psyche a major transition occurs when the mind attains an ability to focus on specific things rather than being immersed in an undifferentiated consciousness over which it has no control. When this happens the mind separates individual objects, events and experiences from one another. This may be described as being flooded with the world of materiality because what was experienced as a unity becomes many. A consciousness of the material, the world outside the mind, washes away the previous diffuse awareness.

Blake's ark is the safety net provided by Eternity in the time of the flood. The focused consciousness (the flood of the material) becomes the masculine side of the psyche and the unifying consciousness (of love, rest and repose) becomes the feminine side.

Four Zoas, PAGE 104 (SECOND PORTION), (E 377)
"Come Lord Jesus come quickly
So sang they in Eternity looking down into Beulah.
The war roard round Jerusalems Gates it took a hideous form
Seen in the aggregate a Vast Hermaphroditic form
Heavd like an Earthquake labring with convulsive groans
Intolerable at length an awful wonder burst
From the Hermaphroditic bosom Satan he was namd
Son of Perdition terrible his form dishumanizd monstrous
A male without a female counterpart a howling fiend
Fo[r]lorn of Eden & repugnant to the forms of life
Yet hiding the shadowy female Vala as in an ark & Curtains
Abhorrd accursed ever dying an Eternal death
Being multitudes of tyrant Men in union blasphemous
Against the divine image. Congregated Assemblies of wicked men." 

For more about masculine and feminine consciousness read Sukie Colgrave's Uniting Heaven and Earth: A Jungian and Taoist Exploration of the Masculine and Feminine in Human Consciousness.

BLAKE & DRUID

Wikipedia Commons

Illustrations to Poems of Thomas Gray

The Bard

Blake used the term Druid to mean more than conveyed by the common understanding. He did object to reported Druid practices of ritual human sacrifice, and forced submission to priestly rites and rituals. The association of religion with accusation, judgement and punishment was abhorrent to him. These objectionable characteristics made Druidism an appropriate symbol for the basic deficiencies of Natural Religion which eliminated spirit from the relationship of God and man. Blake wrote that the Druid priests turned the allegoric and mental significance which related 'heaven to earth' into corporeal command.

"Druidical age, which began to turn allegoric and mental signification into corporeal command," (E 542)
 
Discussions of William Blake edited by John E Grant includes an article by Peter F Fisher titled Blake and the Druids. This extract clarifies some of what Blake tried to convey by using the symbol Druid.

Page 39
"Blake made Druidism into a comprehensive symbol of the perversities of fallen existence which are respectably hidden in the 'Religion of Generation.' What made Druidism the cult of the world from which all 'worldly' religions come was its attempt to consolidate the original voice of the prophet into the fixed ritual and rule of the priest. The terms which had not been final, became final in the name of an organized cult, and the conditions of life and worship were rendered invariable in the interests of an organized clergy. This always produced, according to Blake, cruelty in the name of a benevolent concern for the victim's welfare, and he represented the human race in the person of Albion being sacrificed by his daughters in the temple of 'Natural Religion.' The 'Divine Vision' was lost, and the human form of man's possibilities was altered, so that his perceptions were dissipated into the' Indefinite Becoming' of natural process.  Druidism became the composite symbol of fallen man's preoccupation with a natural security at the expense of a greater human adventure.
...
Page 40
Druidism was connected with the initial stage of man's fall from innocence through the birth of a rational set of moral values based on a definitive system of nature.
...
Page 43
As he had said in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, 'Eternity if in love with the productions of time.' But inspiration from eternity must remain the true basis for their productions, and the temporal order of things should not be made - in the spirit of the builders of Babel and their utopian successors - the basis and end of its own productions. 'Eden' was the point where the productions of time and the life of eternity met. Blake claimed to be 'an inhabitant of that happy country,' and his professed aim was to unite the world of generation, through Eden, to its eternal source."

---

Jerusalem, Plate 27, (E 171)
 "All things Begin & End in Albions Ancient Druid Rocky Shore."

  Your Ancestors derived their origin from Abraham, Heber, Shem,
and Noah, who were Druids: as the Druid Temples (which are the
Patriarchal Pillars & Oak Groves) over the whole Earth witness to
this day.
  You have a tradition, that Man anciently containd in his mighty
limbs all things in Heaven & Earth: this you recieved from the
Druids.
  "But now the Starry Heavens are fled from the mighty limbs of
Albion"

  Albion was the Parent of the Druids; & in his Chaotic State of
Sleep Satan & Adam & the whole World was Created by the Elohim."

Descriptive Catalogue, (E542)
"The British Antiquities are now in the Artist's hands; all
his visionary contemplations, relating to his own country and its
ancient glory, when it was as it again shall be, the source of
learning and inspiration.  Arthur was a name for the
constellation Arcturus, or Bootes, the Keeper of the North Pole.
And all the fables of Arthur and his round table; of the warlike
naked Britons; of Merlin; of Arthur's conquest of the whole
world; of his death, or sleep, and promise to return again; of
the Druid monuments, or temples; of the pavement of
Watlingstreet; of London stone; of the caverns in Cornwall,
Wales, Derbyshire, and Scotland; of the Giants of Ireland and
Britain; of the elemental beings, called [P 41] by us by the
general name of Fairies; and of these three who escaped, namely,
Beauty, Strength, and Ugliness, Mr. B. has in his hands poems of
the highest antiquity.  Adam was a Druid, and Noah; also Abraham
was called to succeed the Druidical
age, which began to turn allegoric and mental signification into 
corporeal command,  whereby human sacrifice would have 
depopulated the earth.  All these things are written in Eden.  
The artist is an inhabitant of that happy country, and if 
every thing goes on as it has begun, the world of vegetation 
and generation may expect to be opened again to Heaven, 
through Eden, as it was in the beginning." 

Jerusalem, Plate 98, (E 258)
"Where is the Tree of Good & Evil that rooted beneath the cruel heel
Of Albions Spectre the Patriarch Druid! where are all his Human Sacrifices  
For Sin in War & in the Druid Temples of the Accuser of Sin: beneath
The Oak Groves of Albion that coverd the whole Earth beneath his Spectre
Where are the Kingdoms of the World & all their glory that grew on Desolation
The Fruit of Albions Poverty Tree when the Triple Headed Gog-Magog Giant
Of Albion Taxed the Nations into Desolation & then gave the Spectrous Oath

Such is the Cry from all the Earth from the Living Creatures of the Earth
And from the great City of Golgonooza in the Shadowy Generation 
And from the Thirty-two Nations of the Earth among the Living Creatures"

Jerusalem, Plate 66, (E 218)
"In awful pomp & gold, in all the precious unhewn stones of Eden
They build a stupendous Building on the Plain of Salisbury; with chains
Of rocks round London Stone: of Reasonings: of unhewn Demonstrations
In labyrinthine arches. (Mighty Urizen the Architect.) thro which
The Heavens might revolve & Eternity be bound in their chain.
Labour unparallelld! a wondrous rocky World of cruel destiny
Rocks piled on rocks reaching the stars: stretching from pole to pole.
The Building is Natural Religion & its Altars Natural Morality
A building of eternal death: whose proportions are eternal despair
Here Vala stood turning the iron Spindle of destruction          
From heaven to earth: howling! invisible! but not invisible"

GROVE

Blake's Illustrations to Dante

Homer and the Ancient Poets

 

First Posed Feb 2015 

Songs of Innocence, Songs 9 and 10, (E 9)
Little Black Boy

"....And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love
And these black bodies and this sunburnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.

For when our souls have learn'd the heat to bear,
The cloud will vanish, we shall hear His voice,
Saying, 'Come out from the grove, my love and care
And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice...',"

  

Jerusalem, Plate 38, (E 184)

 "If we are wrathful Albion will destroy Jerusalem with rooty Groves
If we are merciful, ourselves must suffer destruction on his Oaks:
Why should we enter into our Spectres. to behold our own corruptions
O God of Albion descend! deliver Jerusalem from the Oaken Groves!"
 
Jerusalem, Plate 6, (E 217)
"For a Spectre has no Emanation but what he imbibes from decieving
A Victim! Then he becomes her Priest & she his Tabernacle.
And his Oak Grove. till the Victim rend the woven Veil."
  (See also Matthew 27:51)

Jerusalem, Plate 25, (E 170)
"Why did you take Vengeance O ye Sons of the mighty Albion?

Planting these Oaken Groves: Erecting these Dragon Temples
Injury the Lord heals but Vengeance cannot be healed:            
As the Sons of Albion have done to Luvah: so they have in him
Done to the Divine Lord & Saviour, who suffers with those that suffer:
For not one sparrow can suffer, & the whole Universe not suffer also,
In all its Regions, & its Father & Saviour not pity and weep.
But Vengeance is the destroyer of Grace & Repentance in the bosom
Of the Injurer: in which the Divine Lamb is cruelly slain:
Descend O Lamb of God & take away the imputation of Sin
By the Creation of States & the deliverance of Individuals Evermore Amen"

Blake's Notebook, My Spectre, (E 476)
"Till I turn from Female love
And root up the Infernal Grove,
I shall never worthy be
To step into Eternity.
 
Let us agree to give up love,
And root up the Infernal Grove;
Then shall we return and see
The worlds of happy Eternity."

Notice that the 'love' in the last verse is the 'female love' of the earlier one. This 'love' in Blake's poetry is nothing like godly love; in fact it's just the opposite; it's love of fallen materiality- love of things, like Money, Golf, or Whiskey, or your Stomach; see (See Philippians 3:19)

So what did Blake mean with his groves. Damon said it's a "symbol of error"; I say it's a symbol of the 'fallen material world' where the Druid Priests built their Temples and Altars.

Blake used thousands of words to describe his primary myth: Creation, Fall, Redemption, Return, and many many pictures to portray it, and many, many capsules of two lines that state it. He wanted us to get it.

"Planting these Oaken Groves: 

Erecting these Dragon Temples" (Erdman 170)

"Patriarchal Pillars & Oak Groves over the whole Earth..." (Erdman 171)

"And build this Babylon & sacrifice in secret groves" (E 210)

Psychologically grove may mean our habitual ways of processing experience, the obstructions we place to acting according to the light we possess, the projections which disguise our inner landscapes, our failure to turn to intuitive abilities to seek understanding; any inner structures which prevent us entering the place prepared for us. Blake's grove includes all our prejudices, our hates and fears, our unwillingness or inability to love. 

Blake's calls upon us to leave the oaken groves, to rend the woven veil.

WORLD VIEW

 Jerusalem

Frontispiece

 Jerusalem

Title page

The book Jerusalem begins with two images. The first shows a man carrying a lamp for illumination as he enters a door into a dark space. If he is mentally and emotionally prepared he may discern the vision which Blake presents on the following plate. He will realize that he has entered the unexpected which is enticing and confusing. He has been invited to explore the bosom of Albion.

On plates 85-86 we learn more of what we are looking at on the Title Page.

Jerusalem, Plate 85, (E 244)

"O lovely mild Jerusalem! O Shiloh of Mount Ephraim!
I see thy Gates of precious stones: thy Walls of gold & silver
Thou art the soft reflected Image of the Sleeping Man
Who stretchd on Albions rocks reposes amidst his Twenty-eight
Cities: where Beulah lovely terminates, in the hills & valleys of Albion
Cities not yet embodied in Time and Space: plant ye
The Seeds O Sisters in the bosom of Time & Spaces womb
To spring up for Jerusalem: lovely Shadow of Sleeping Albion
Why wilt thou rend thyself apart & build an Earthly Kingdom    
To reign in pride & to opress & to mix the Cup of Delusion
O thou that dwellest with Babylon! Come forth O lovely-one
Plate 86
I see thy Form O lovely mild Jerusalem, Wingd with Six Wings
In the opacous Bosom of the Sleeper, lovely Three-fold
In Head & Heart & Reins, three Universes of love & beauty
Thy forehead bright: Holiness to the Lord, with Gates of pearl
Reflects Eternity beneath thy azure wings of feathery down     
Ribbd delicate & clothd with featherd gold & azure & purple
From thy white shoulders shadowing, purity in holiness!
Thence featherd with soft crimson of the ruby bright as fire
Spreading into the azure Wings which like a canopy
Bends over thy immortal Head in which Eternity dwells        
Albion beloved Land; I see thy mountains & thy hills
And valleys & thy pleasant Cities Holiness to the Lord
I see the Spectres of thy Dead O Emanation of Albion.

Thy Bosom white, translucent coverd with immortal gems
A sublime ornament not obscuring the outlines of beauty       
Terrible to behold for thy extreme beauty & perfection
Twelve-fold here all the Tribes of Israel I behold
Upon the Holy Land: I see the River of Life & Tree of Life
I see the New Jerusalem descending out of Heaven
Between thy Wings of gold & silver featherd immortal         
Clear as the rainbow, as the cloud of the Suns tabernacle

Thy Reins coverd with Wings translucent sometimes covering
And sometimes spread abroad reveal the flames of holiness
Which like a robe covers: & like a Veil of Seraphim
In flaming fire unceasing burns from Eternity to Eternity     
Twelvefold I there behold Israel in her Tents
A Pillar of a Cloud by day: a Pillar of fire by night
Guides them: there I behold Moab & Ammon & Amalek
There Bells of silver round thy knees living articulate
Comforting sounds of love & harmony & on thy feet           
Sandals of gold & pearl, & Egypt & Assyria before me
The Isles of Javan, Philistea, Tyre and Lebanon

Thus Los sings upon his Watch walking from Furnace to Furnace."

---

Reading Martin K Nurmi's essay in Discussions of William Blake, edited by John E Grant, we get an inkling of what it would mean to the individual and to the world if we were able to see as Blake saw.

"If everyone learned to see in this way, however, 'If the doors of perception were cleansed,' as Blake writes in The Marriage, and everything appeared to man 'as it is,  infinite', there would not only be a general transformation of men's view of this world. There would also, as a consequence of this new view, be a literal transformation of this world itself, an apocalypse. Viewing this world as 'One continual Vision of Fancy.' and knowing that life is truly a divine - and human - unity in Christ, men would reestablish society on a new foundation, forming laws of freedom and love instead of repression, abolishing every kind of tyranny that prevents man from realizing his potentialities, and celebrating the divinity that is in every man." (Page 95)

Jerusalem, Plate 96, (E 255)
"As the Sun & Moon lead forward the Visions of Heaven & Earth
England who is Brittannia entered Albions bosom rejoicing  
Then Jesus appeared standing by Albion as the Good Shepherd
By the lost Sheep that he hath found & Albion knew that it
Was the Lord the Universal Humanity, & Albion saw his Form     
A Man. & they conversed as Man with Man, in Ages of Eternity
And the Divine Appearance was the likeness & similitude of Los"

 

Heaven and Hell

First posted June 2013

  Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings? (Isaiah 33:14)

 
No one knows of the Beyond. Still men throughout history have seen visions of it. These visions have informed their faith and galvanized them to the words and deeds by which they have lived. Look now at Blake's visions of Heaven and Hell:

 For Isaiah (and Blake) 'everlasting burnings' had connotations opposite to those of conventional thinking.

Indeed throughout the Bible fire symbolizes God more often than the Devil: " our God is a consuming fire". Note also the burning bush seen by Moses and the forks of flame at Pentecost.  In Eden every bush burns and flaming tongues fill the air; Blake referred to them as burning arrows of thought.

       Blake's eternity, both here and hereafter, is characterized by two intense activities, War and Hunting. 

Wikimedia Commons

River of Life

Milton, Plate 35, (E135) 

"And War & Hunting: the Two Fountains of the River of Life 

Are become Fountains of bitter Death & of corroding Hell"

Both are intellectual in nature and aimed at growth into Truth. In this world they have been prostituted into "corporeal war" and the killing of the innocent. War and Hunting of course exhaust the Eternals, so periodic rest is provided in what might be called Lower Heaven; Blake called it Beulah:

 

Four Zoas, Night 1, (E 303)

"There is from Great Eternity a mild & pleasant rest Nam'd 

Beulah, a soft Moony Universe, feminine, lovely, 

Pure, mild & Gentle, given in Mercy to those who sleep, 

Eternally created by the Lamb of God around, 

On all sides, within & without the Universal Man."   

       We could also call Ulro "this world". In a sense "this world" is as close to the conventional hell as Blake got. In Blake as in the Bible, especially in Paul, "this world" has a technical meaning. It does not mean the present stage of life as opposed to a heavenly (or hellish) existence beyond physical death. Basically "this world" means a level of consciousness that sees only the material, which Blake called the corporeal. Ulro is the state in which "Reality was forgot, and the Vanities of Time and Space only Remembered and called Reality" (Vision of the Last Judment, (E 555); his comments on an astounding canvas; it concerns Revelation 20:11-15).

       Ulro, Blake's hell, denotes a form of blindness or sleep, from which one may awaken:

Jerusalem, Plate 4, (E 146)
 "Of the Sleep of Ulro! and of
the passage through Eternal Death! 
             and of the awaking to Eternal Life...."             

This is his theme, Blake tells us. Students of the New Testament know that sleep and waking are thoroughly biblical figures for the spiritual realities which concerned Blake here. He envisioned Eternal Death as the fallenness of "this world" through which we pass before "awaking to Eternal Life". Blake thus saw hell as man's fallen state before the coming of Jesus to awaken us and set us free.

    The biblical writers as they are generally understood had not adequately grasped the fullness of Jesus' power to rescue mankind totally from the darkness which Blake called Eternal Death. They wrote most of the New Testament in a time of persecution. In their effort to stiffen the spine of the believer in the face of that persecution they retreated into a degree of thralldom to the Old Testament God of Wrath, in the spirit of Jonathan Edwards' sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God".

       One can readily understand why the worldly ecclesiastics who followed Peter and Paul picked up on the angry God. All too often he became their primary weapon; the image of hell is the ultimate form of coercion. Blake made no such mistake, probably because of the ten years which he had spent confronting and subduing that "shadow from his wearied intellect", years of suffering, but it turned to glory.

       In those years he laid to rest the Punisher who has afflicted the minds of believers through the centuries, but he retained the creative possibility which represents the best of the Christian faith. The rationalists and deists had thrown out both and confined us to Ulro, which today threatens to engulf mankind. The reader must decide for himself whose hell is most real--the place of unending punishment or the sleep from which man may awaken.

JESUS & JERUSALEM

Yale Center for British Arts
Paul Mellon Collection
Jerusalem, Plate 62

First posted Oct. 2011
 

Frequently Blake used a shorthand to present his ideas. He quoted words or phrases from his sources to evoke larger bodies of ideas without stating them explicitly.

 

On Plate 62 of Jerusalem he points our attention to various Biblical passages to expand the context of the statements he is making about Jesus and about his own developing myth. To facilitate a more complete understanding of part of Plate 62, here are some Biblical passages which incorporated phrases from Blake's poem.

 

John 20:
11-12 - But Mary [Maglalen] stood just outside the tomb, and she was crying. And as she cried, she looked into the tomb and saw two angels in white who sat, one at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had lain.
20:13 - The angels spoke to her, "Why are you crying?" they asked. "Because they have taken away my Lord, and I don't know where they have put him!" she said.
20:14 - Then she turned and noticed Jesus standing there, without realising that it was Jesus.
20:15 - "Why are you crying?" said Jesus to her. "Who are you looking for?" She, supposing that he was the gardener, said, "Oh, sir, if you have carried him away, please tell me where you have put him and I will take him away."
20:16 - Jesus said to her, "Mary!" At this she turned right round and said to him, in Hebrew, "Master!"

Mark 1:
2 - just as the prophet Isaiah had written: "Look, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, and he will prepare your way.

Numbers 10:
12 - and the sons of Israel set out on their journeys from the wilderness of Sinai. Then the cloud settled down in the wilderness of Paran.

Nehemiah 9:
19 - You, in Your great compassion, Did not forsake them in the wilderness; The pillar of cloud did not leave them by day, To guide them on their way, Nor the pillar of fire by night, to light for them the way in which they were to go

Exodus 17:
5-6 - The Lord answered Moses, “Walk on ahead of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel.

Exodus 16:
4 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a day's portion every day, that I may test them, whether or not they will walk in My instruction.
 
John 11:
24 - "I know," said Martha, "that he [her brother Lazarus]
will rise again in the resurrection at the last day."
25-26 - "I myself am the resurrection and the life," Jesus
told her. "The man who believes in me will live even though he
dies, and anyone who is alive and believes in me will never die
at all. Can you believe that?"

John 14:28 - You have heard me say, 'I am going away and I am
coming back to you. ' If you really loved me, you would be glad
because I am going to my Father, for my Father is greater than I.
And I have told you of it now, before it happens, so that when
it does happen, your faith in me will not be shaken.

Revelation 14:20 - And the wine press was trodden outside the city, and blood came out from the wine press, up to the horses' bridles, for a distance of two hundred miles.

This may seem like a lot of Biblical references for one short passage but with some effort you can find even more.

Jerusalem, Plate 62, (E 213)
[Jerusalem speaking:]
"These are the Daughters of Vala, Mother of the Body of death
But I thy Magdalen behold thy Spiritual Risen Body
Shall Albion arise? I know he shall arise at the Last Day!
I know that in my flesh I shall see God: but Emanations
Are weak. they know not whence they are, nor whither tend.

Jesus replied. I am the Resurrection & the Life.
I Die & pass the limits of possibility, as it appears
To individual perception. Luvah must be Created
And Vala; for I cannot leave them in the gnawing Grave.
But will prepare a way for my banished-ones to return
Come now with me into the villages. walk thro all the cities.
Tho thou art taken to prison & judgment, starved in the streets
I will command the cloud to give thee food & the hard rock
To flow with milk & wine, tho thou seest me not a season
Even a long season & a hard journey & a howling wilderness!
Tho Valas cloud hide thee & Luvahs fires follow thee!
Only believe & trust in me, Lo. I am always with thee!

So spoke the Lamb of God while Luvahs Cloud reddening above
Burst forth in streams of blood upon the heavens & dark night
Involvd Jerusalem. & the Wheels of Albions Sons turnd hoarse
Over the Mountains & the fires blaz'd on Druid Altars
And the Sun set in Tyburns Brook where Victims howl & cry.

But Los beheld the Divine Vision among the flames of the Furnaces
Therefore he lived & breathed in hope."

As you may gather after viewing the plate, Blake is attempting to convey much more in this Plate than has been suggested in this post.