64 § The Roots of Plants
A c c ORdiNG to the Kabbalistic tradition, among those who made their way into Pardes, [1] there are some who 'ravaged the garden'; and more precisely, it is said that these ravages consisted of 'severing the roots of the plants'. In order to understand what this means, it is necessary to refer before all else to the symbolism of the inverted tree, about which we have already spoken on other occasions. [2] The roots are above, that is, in the Principle itself; to cut these roots, therefore, is to consider the 'plants' or the beings they symbolise as in some way having an existence and a reality independent of the Principle. In the case in question, these beings are chiefly the angels, for this naturally relates to degrees of existence of a supra-human order; and it is
easy to understand what the consequences of all this can be, in particular for what is wont to be called the 'practical Kabbala'. Indeed, the invocation of angels who are conceived in this way, not as 'celestial intermediaries', which they are from the perspective of traditional orthodoxy, but as veritable independent powers, strictly amounts to 'association' (shirk in Arabic) in the sense given this word by the Islamic tradition; for such powers then inevitably appear as associated with the divine Power itself instead of simply being derived from it. These consequences occur likewise, and with all the more reason, in the lower applications relating to the domain of magic, the domain moreover where those who commit such an error necessarily find themselves imprisoned sooner or later; for through this very error there could no longer be for them any question of theurgy, all effective communication with the Principle becoming impossible once 'the roots are cut'. We will add that these same consequences extend even to the most degenerate forms of magic, such as 'ceremonial magic'; but in this last case, though the error is always essentially the same, the real dangers are at least attenuated by the insignificance of the results that can be obtained. [3] Finally, it should be mentioned that this immediately provides the explanation for at least one of the ways in which the origin of such deviations is sometimes attributed to 'fallen angels'. The angels are indeed truly fallen once they are conceived in this way, as it is by their participation in the Principle that they really have all that constitutes their being, so much so that when this participation is misunderstood, nothing remains but an aspect that is purely negative, like a kind of inverted shadow in relation to that being in itself. [4]
According to the orthodox conception, an angel, as 'celestial intermediary', is fundamentally nothing other than the expression of a divine attribute in the order of supraformal manifestation; for it is only at this level that there can be established, through such an expression, a real communication between the human state and the Principle itself, of which the intermediary in question thus represents an aspect more particularly accessible to the beings who are in the human state. It is this, moreover, that is clearly shown by the very names of the angels which in fact are always the designations of such and such divine attributes. In fact, it is here especially that the name corresponds fully to the nature of the being and is truly one with its very essence. As long as this meaning is not lost sight of, therefore, the 'roots'
cannot be cut. It could be said, consequently, that the error of believing that the divine name belongs rightly to the angel as such, that is, as a separated being, becomes possible only when the understanding of the sacred language becomes clouded; and if account be taken of all that this really implies, it will be understood that this remark admits of a much more profound meaning than may appear at first sight. [5] These considerations also give all its value to the Kabbalistic interpretation of Malaki, 'My angel' or 'My envoy', [6] as 'the angel in whom is My name', that is, in whom God himself is, at least under one of His 'attributive' aspects. [7] This interpretation applies in the first instance and pre-eminently to Metatron, the 'angel of the Face', [8] or to Mikaël (of which Malaki is the anagram) in that in his 'solar' function he is in a certain way identified with Metatron. But it is applicable also to every angel, because every angel is truly and in the most rigorous sense of the word, the 'bearer' of the divine name with regard to manifestation; and even, as seen from the side of the Truth (al-Haqq), it is really not other than this very name. The only difference here is that which results from a certain hierarchy that can be established between the divine attributes, according to whether they proceed more or less directly from the Essence, so that their manifestation can be considered as situated at different levels, and this is in fact the basis of the angelic hierarchies. These attributes or these aspects, furthermore, must necessarily be conceived as being of indefinite multitude once they are envisaged 'distinctively'; and it is to this that the very multitude of the angels corresponds. [9]
It could be asked why we have been considering here only the angels, whereas in truth every being, whatever it may be and to whatever order of existence it belongs, also depends entirely upon the Principle in all that it is; and this dependence, which is also a participation, could be said to be the very measure of its reality. Moreover, every being has in its centre, at least virtually, a divine principle without which its existence would not even be an illusion, but indeed a nothingness pure and simple. This corresponds exactly to the Kabbalistic teaching according to which the 'channels' by which the influences emanating from the Principle are communicated to
manifested beings do not stop at a certain level but extend step by step to all degrees of universal Existence, even to the lowest, [10] so much so that, to take up once again our initial symbolism, there could not be anywhere any being which might be compared to a 'plant without roots'. It is obvious, however, that there are degrees to take into account in the participation in question, and that these degrees correspond precisely to the degrees of Existence. This is why the higher these degrees are, that is, the nearer they are to the Principle, the greater their reality (although there is certainly no common measure between any state of manifestation, be it the highest of all, and the principial state itself). The first difference that calls for mention here, as elsewhere, is the difference between the case of beings situated in the domain of supraformal or supraindividual manifestation to which the angelic states correspond, and that of beings situated in the domain of formal or individual manifestation; and this has yet to be given as precise an explanation as it needs.
It is only in the supraformal order that a being can be said to express or manifest an attribute of the Principle as truly and as integrally as possible. It is the distinction of these attributes which causes in this case the distinction of beings, and their distinction can be characterised as a 'distinction without separation' (bhedābheda in Hindu terminology), for it goes without saying that ultimately all these attributes are really 'one'; and this is the least limitation conceivable in a state which, being manifested, is also conditioned by this very fact. On the other hand, as the nature of each such being is concentrated entirely as it were on the expression of a single attribute, it is thereby evident that this being possesses in itself a unity of an entirely different order and one far more real than the very relative unity, both fragmentary and 'composite', that belongs to individual beings as such; and fundamentally, it is by reason of the reduction of the angelic nature to a definitive attribute, without any composition other than the blending of act and potency which is necessarily inherent in all manifestation, [12] that St Thomas Aquinas was able to consider the differences between the angels as comparable to differences between species and not to individual differences. [13] If one now wishes to find in the order of formal manifestation a correspondence or a reflection of what we have just said, it is not the individual beings taken each in its particularity that must be considered (and this results clearly enough from the last remark), but the 'worlds' or states of existence themselves, each of them in its entirety, 'globally' as it were, being linked more especially to a certain divine attribute of which it will be, if we may use
such an expression, the particular production; [14] and this takes us back directly to the conception of the angels as 'rectors of the spheres', along with the considerations we have already pointed out in this connection in our chapter on the 'chain of the worlds'.