The Sermon on the Mount

Paul Sédir, pseudonym of Yvon Le Loup (1871-1926), published numerous works on Christian Mysticism and Hermeticism. He first collaborated with several esoteric movements of his time; then, following his meeting with the remarkable Christian teacher and healer Master Philippe of Lyon, he devoted himself to serving Christ. In this service he gave numerous lectures, many of which were collected and published as books. Of Sédir's meeting with Master Philippe, the prolific author Dr. Gerard Encausse (Papus), wrote: "There was in Sédir's life a solemn, decisive event that made him grasp the emptiness of secret sciences and societies and placed him forever upon the sole way of the gospel."

The Sermon on the Mount is the second of five volumes by Sédir dedicated the gospels. Selections from each gospel are given, together with the author's panoramic commentaries. Far from being outdated, the gospels are shown to be eternally "current" guides to the inner mysteries of Christianity We are led to the inexhaustible riches of spiritual poverty. Freed from acquired habits, we learn to rely on ourselves-on the ardor of our search and the rigor of our moral discipline-to deepen and enlarge our understanding of the gospel. We grasp revealing analogies throughout God' dominions, and that in this quest our Master must be pious love-for, whereas the realm of thought is limited to the universe, Jesus Christ takes us beyond the universe. Our sole care must be to apply all our intelligence to knowing ourselves and all our will to mastering our egoism. As Sédir writes: "May those who read my books keep all their emotion, all their enthusiasm, for Him who is their only Master since the creation of their souls, and who will remain their Friend unto eternity."

"Sédir believed, not without reason, to have found in Master Philippe an authentic witness to spiritual reality, to Hermeticism understood in the same sense as we understand it in these Letters: as the tradition of authentic spiritual experience across the ages, which has the aspects named mysticism, gnosis, and magic."-Valentin Tomberg, Meditations on the Tarot: A Journey into Christian Hermeticism

"After the death of the Austrian thinker and seer Rudolf Steiner in 1925, when the revered Bulgarian spiritual teacher Peter Deunov was asked whether great spirits who had already died ever came to his lectures, he replied that only Rudolf Steiner and Paul Sédir attended them."-Harrie Salman, Rudolf Steiner & Peter Deunov