If Waite sought the "secret doctrine" of Christianity it leads to the Chaldean Oracles, which perhaps provided inspiration for the allegorical imagery of Mutus Liber. While I have yet to read a serious study comparing Christianity to Zoroastrianism, I see a distinct similarity. In a theological study, one might argue that the much earlier religion, which deifies a Father god, represents the very roots of Judaism and consequently Christianity. This was the national religion of the greatest empire of the pre-Hellenistic world, until the battle of Marathon (490 BC). As perhaps the single most important battle in Greek history, it had Earth shaping consequences. In the battle Greek soldiers actually make the 26 mile run in full gear to surprisingly head off the Persian Navy and invent… you guessed it, the Marathon race.
Zoroastrianism incorporates astrology to a large degree and is thought to be the religion of the “Magi” of Biblical fame. Abraham was leaving the heart of the ancient Persian Empire when he met a Father God but I'm not sure when they met. Putting Biblical dates to the historic record is a problem but we do know in Persia, sometime before 600 BCE, a reformer was born. While we know little or nothing about the Persians in this period, we know the name of this redeemer, who first introduces the roots of Monotheism. Called Zarathustra (Zoroaster in Greek), his new religion and new triadic god captivate the spiritual and social imagination of the Persians. While in rough outlines, Zoroastrianism is a dualistic religion, it set aside widespread Polytheistic worship in a vast empire that ruled Mesopotamia for centuries. Porphyry states Pythagoras spent several years learning from the “Chaldeans” in Persia after his tutoring in Egypt.
By calling them "operators" Waite employs some unusual grammar, which also occurs in the Oracles. Hecate is "operatrix" in the Stanley version. In an English translation by Thomas Stanley in 1661 CE, Hecate, a triple sided Greek Goddess, represents a feminine aspect of Divinity. According to the translation, Hecate serves as a main operator because she is Dispenser of spiritual fire that “fills the Life producing bosome of Hecate.” In the Oracles, the triadic goddess signifies creative mental power; however, Greek archeological finds portray her as guardian of the gate that offers illumination or guidance with her fiery torches. In modern Wicca, Hecate acts as a protector of witches that Robert Graves links to three lunar phases in his 1948 CE book, The White Goddess. The Moon actually displays four distinct phases.
Two kinds of alchemy perhaps relates to physical and spiritual branches of the ancient art. To Waite, making gold in the spiritual sense, as in "making gold" in ones heart likely represents his personal preference. As I mention earlier, the High Magic of Mathers and Crowley was not to his liking.
Frankly, the images are too small for me to comment on in detail. Since Waite makes a point on mentioning male female imagery, I’ll start with the female, who appears to be a dispenser of fire or "Hecate" in the Stanley translation and, by the way, the date of the first English version of the Oracles is prior to the date of these images.
Birds appear in these images and in the Oracles there are some curious fragments dealing with birds.
An astrological aspect of the Oracles works well with Bull/Ram Aries and Taurus in the sky in the images of Mutus Liber. Looks like those operators are working during the Spring Equinox. Also, the Oracles say “And from the downward elements Nature brought forth lives reason-less; for He did not extend the Reason (Logos) [to them]. The Air brought forth things winged; the Water things that swim, and Earth-and-Water one from another parted, as Mind willed. And from her bosom Earth produced what lives she had, four-footed things and reptiles, beasts wild and tame.”
Here’s another direct quote from the Staley version (notice what sign he mentions as he writes of alchemy)
“The Oracles assert that the impressions of characters and other divine visions appear in the Ether. The Chaldæan philosophy recognized the ethers of the Elements as the subtil media through which the operation of the grosser elements is effected—by the grosser elements I mean what we know as Earth, Air, Water and Fire—the principles of dryness and moisture, of heat and cold. These subtil ethers are really the elements of the ancients, and seem at an early period to have been connected with the Chaldæan astrology, as the signs of the Zodiac were connected with them. The twelve signs of the Zodiac are permutations of the ethers of the elements—four elements with three variations each; and according to the preponderance of one or another elemental condition in the constitution of the individual, so were his natural inclinations deduced therefrom, Thus when in the astrological jargon it was said that a man had Aries rising, he was said to be of a fiery nature, his natural tendencies being active, energetic and fiery, for in the constitution of such a one the fiery ether predominates. And these ethers were stimulated, or endowed with a certain kind of vibration, by their Presidents, the Planets; these latter being thus suspended in orderly disposed zones.”
In another image, it seems only a slumbering male appears... from the "One comes the Two or as the Oracles put it “Paternal Monad… is enlarged, which generates two. For the Duad sits by him, and glitters with Intellectual Sections. And to govern all Things, and to Order every thing not Ordered, For in the whole World shineth the Triad, over which the Monad Rules. This Order is the beginning of all Section. For the Mind of the Father said, that All things be cut into three, Whose Will assented, and then All things were divided. For the Mind of the Eternal Father said into three, governing all things by the Mind. And there appeared in it [the Triad] Virtue and wisdome, And Multiscient Verity. This Way floweth the shape of the Triad, being pre-existent. Not the first [Essence] but where they are measured. For thou must conceive that all things serve these three Principles.“
Patrick