Through the Flaming Sword

This painting by the poet William Blake is the image I use as the banner image for this blog. The “flaming sword” comes from the story of “the Fall” in Genesis three, which I’ll quote below; I’ll also quote from Blake and from George Fox.

The image

But Blake’s painting is hardly directly representational, as we’ll see from the Genesis passage. 

• There are flames but no sword or gate into Paradise. 
• The cherub is oddly presented and is human, or at least humanoid, in form, whereas cherubim are variously described in the Bible and other ancient mythologies, but always in some composite and mostly animal form. The cherubim that sit atop the ark of the covenant at least have wings.
• The human, presumably Adam, is supine, laid out almost as though he is dead. He has fallen.

Genesis 3:22–24:

And Yahweh God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever:

Therefore Yahweh God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.

So he drove out the man, and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubim, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.

Comment

So the cherubim’s charge is to keep humans from reentering Paradise, eating from the tree of life, and becoming immortal. Yahweh and his angelic court (the “us” in the quote) are worried that humans will become like them. And we are already halfway there, having learned good and evil.

Blake’s blanket of flames and the outstretched arms of the cherub block the laid out Adam from rising.

Blake’s text

This image accompanies a page in Blake’s “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell”, one of his prophetic books, which is mostly text as captions for a series of paintings with a poem prologue. The poet presents himself as having descending into Hell and come back with prophecy that will reconcile heaven and hell. Here’s the text on that page. Note that Blake has given us here a significant phrase.

The ancient tradition that the world will be consumed in fire at the end of six thousand years is true, as I have heard from Hell.

For the cherub with his flaming sword is hereby commanded to leave his guard at tree of life; and when he does, the whole creation will be consumed and appear infinite and holy, whereas it now appears finite & corrupt.

This will come to pass by an improvement of sensual enjoyment.

But first the notion that man has a body distinct from his soul is to be expunged; this I shall do by printing in the infernal method, by corrosives, which in Hell are salutary and medicinal, melting apparent surfaces away, and displaying the infinite which was hid.

If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite.

For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.

George Fox

This image, these texts, together build an astonishing set of figures, both visual and theological, a kind of theological koan, a reality that seeks to transcend our either/or. But I used the image as a banner for my blog because of George Fox’s account of one of his visions. Here’s that passage from his journal:

Now I was come up in spirit through the flaming sword into the paradise of God. All things were new, and all the creation gave another smell unto me than before, beyond what words can utter. I knew nothing but pureness, and innocency, and righteousness, being renewed up into the image of God by Christ Jesus, so that I say I was come up to the state of Adam which he was in before he fell. The creation was opened to me, and it was showed me how all things had their names given them according to their nature and virtue. And I was at a stand in my mind whether I should practice physic [medicine] for the good of mankind, seeing the nature and virtues of the creatures were so opened to me by the Lord. But I was immediately taken up in spirit, to see into another or more steadfast state than Adam’s in innocency, even into a state in Christ Jesus, that should never fall. And the Lord showed me that such as were faithful to him in the power and light of Christ, should come into that state in which Adam was before he fell, in which the admirable works of the creation, and the virtues thereof, may be known, through the openings of that divine Word of wisdom and power by which they were made. [John 1:3] Great things did the Lord lead me into, and wonderful depths were opened unto me, beyond what can by words be declared; but as people come into subjection to the spirit of God, and grow up in the image and power of the Almighty, they may receive the Word of wisdom, that opens all things, and come to know the hidden unity in the Eternal Being.  [Journal, Nickalls edition, page 27–28]

Fox claims to have made it past the guardian cherubim and the flaming sword back into Paradise. He says he came “up in spirit through the flaming sword.” He ascended through the flames into Paradise, just as the supine Adam in Blake’s painting would have to do. And the first thing that happens to him is Blake’s “improvement of sensual enjoyment”: Fox’s sense of smell became transcendentally acute.

And he was “renewed up into the image of God”. He was restored to the condition of Adam before the Fall, including the wisdom with which Adam named all the animals from mystical insight into their true nature—the doors of his perception were cleansed. [Check out Bob Dylan’s wonderful song Man Gave Names To All The Animals.] And Fox ate of the tree of life, though he does not describe it this way—through Christ he attained eternal life.

Tagged: bible, Christianity, faith, god, Jesus, Through the Flaming Sword