Jakob böhme quotes

Cease but from thine own Activity, steadfastly fixing thine eye upon one point, and with a strong purpose relying upon the promised grace of God in Christ, to bring thee out of thy darkness into His marvellous light.

into its own Lubet, the same receives, in passing through the Degrees, the Abominate; for each Form of Nature out of the Mystery receives of its Property in its Hunger, and therein it is not annoyed or molested, for it is of their Property.”

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Jakob Böhme, Dialogues on the Supersensual Life

“If thou forsakest the World, then thou comest unto that out of which the World is made, and if thou losest thy life, then thy life is in that for whose sake thou forsakest it.

— Jakob Bohme

The soul shall mightily rule in all hidden secrets: but it must not let in the devil. He complied for several years but eventually resumed his theological writings.

Major Works

• Aurora (1612) – his first book, dealing with divine wisdom and the origin of evil.

• The Three Principles of the Divine Essence (1619) – outlining his cosmology of God, nature, and humanity.

• The Way to Christ (1623) – a devotional work emphasizing personal spiritual renewal.

• The Signature of All Things (1621) – explaining how divine realities are mirrored in nature.

• Forty Questions Concerning the Soul – one of his most influential works on anthropology and spirituality.

Key Ideas

• Duality of Good and Evil: Böhme taught that creation is a struggle between light and darkness, love and wrath, freedom and necessity.

• Mystical Knowledge: He believed true wisdom comes not from book learning but from divine illumination.

• God’s Self-Revelation: God, for Böhme, was an unfathomable unity who reveals Himself through contrast and tension.

• Nature as Symbol: All natural phenomena reflected spiritual truths and could be read as divine “signatures.”

Later Life and Death

Despite ongoing opposition from the church authorities, Böhme continued to write, producing a vast body of mystical theology.

according to nature. — Jakob Bohme

It is the greatest folly that is in Babel for people to strive about religion, so that they contend vehemently about opinions of their own forging, viz. — Jakob Bohme

In 'Yes' and 'No' all things consist. As it was before the Times of this World in his eternal Harmony [or Voice] , so also it continues in the creaturely Voice in him in his Eternity; and this is the Beginning and the End of all Things.”

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Jakob Böhme, The Signature of All Things — Chapter XIV(1650s)

“All Things are generated out of the grand Mystery, and proceed out of one Degree into another: Now whatever goes forwards in its Degree, the same receives no Abominate, let it be either in Vegetables or Animals; but whatever enters in itself into its Self-hood, viz.

Neither could any one know what Love is, if there were no Hatred; or what friendship is, if there were no foe to contend with. For only in itself it worketh and is revealed, being one and undivided in all.

It filleth all, it is [Pg 98] within all, it is without all, it encompasseth all; without division, without place; working by a Divine Manifestation, and flowing forth universally, but not going in the least out of itself. — Jakob Bohme

When the Soul that is sprung from God's Word and Will is entered into its own desire to will of itself, it will run in mere uncertainty till it return to its Original again.

So shall thy light break forth as the morning; and after the redness thereof is passed, the Sun Himself, which thou waitest for, shall arise unto thee, and under His most healing wings thou shalt greatly rejoice; ascending and descending in His bright and salutiferous beams. — Jakob Bohme

A shepherd, in whom the spirit of God works, is more highly esteemed before God than the wisest and most potent in self-wit, without the divine dominion.

Though poorly educated in the academic sense, his writings reveal a profound originality and daring imagination. in the Spirit. The liver is the mother of the blood. — Jakob Bohme

Everything we see in nature is manifested truth; only we are not able to recognize it unless truth is manifest within ourselves.

— Jakob Bohme

The will leadeth us to God, or to the devil; it availeth not whether thou hast the name of a Christian; salvation doth not consist therein. — Jakob Bohme

Just as a drop of water in the ocean cannot avail much; but if a great river runneth into it, that maketh a great commotion.

Love is greater than the Greatest. — Jakob Bohme