Hermes on the Mind
Presented on: Tuesday, April 15, 1986
Presented by: Roger Weir
Hermetic Tradition: From Egypt to America, From Osiris to Benjamin Franklin
Presentation 15 of 24
Hermes On His Mind
Presented by Roger Weir
Tuesday, April 15, 1986
Transcript:
The date is April 15th, 1986. This is part 15 in the Hermetic Tradition: Osiris to Franklin. Mr. Weir will announce his own title.
We will finally tonight get to Hermes on the mind. The life movement of the spirit is patterned. But unlike a mental organization is not a grid. it's not a pigeonhole embankment. But its motion comes in a sweeping duration and it's only after a while that one realizes that this is a great movement coming in towards the center. Not the great circumambulation movement, spirals in towards a centering. And it's rather like a snail shell or a chambered nautilus where it's very wide at the beginning. And as one moves in towards the center and curves around and changes it becomes narrower and narrower. And it's at some point where it becomes poignant that we experience the feeling of perhaps being trapped. And the intuition of uhoh, or the uneasiness as to anxiety comes. Because we at first do not understand that the spirit is achieving form. It's then at that point that discourses like the Hermetic discourses are needed to be given. Before that in wide movements before one is self-conscious of the emerging shape of spiritual being, it's enough just to have pleasantries and encouragement and sing-alongs and bhajans and so forth. And that's all very well and very nice. And they're legitimate. And they have their place. And for the great majority of mankind that will do. And they need to be continued because of that popular appeal. But there are always those who come to the crunch. For whom no adjustment, no songs, no flowers are going to do. And they must know. they must be told the truth.
And one of the first truth that needs to be conveyed and almost immediately. Almost like the dispatching of the antibiotic to stop the claustrophobic infection of ignorance from grabbing hold of the person and stopping them from going further into the center. And the message always is that this shape entirely is your presence and you are not trapped. That you are present throughout the entire structure of this spiraling. And so being in the center just means that you will also have that quality of presence along with all the others. That nothing has been lost. Nothing has been left behind. No, no Jeopardy's are coming. That all of it is of a single durational shape. But that the shape is incorporeal, it does not have a physical shape.
But before we can acclimate ourselves to the spirit, we need to use our imagination. We need an imago, an image of God. And we need that to be given to us. and all of us need that. There isn't any of us who don't need that at that particular transition, at that threshold. This is why there are Buddhists. And why there are Jesus's. And why there are Mohammed's. For this reason, for this. And it's unnecessary and all in order.
These Hermetic discourses are for the inner ear. Therefore, the having gone through that threshold, having been given an image of God and then having to hear the truth. Having the in effect to have that image speak to one. And speak to one in a responsive way. So that what is said is not by Fiat. Not by command. Not by declamation. Not by a decalogue. Thou shalt not, thou shalt not. But in a dialogue. In a poignant conversation where one can ask the questions one would really not only like to ask but need to ask. And to have the truth told to one.
So, these Hermetic dialogues are the truth. And they're the inner core of the truth. Therefore, the inner ear. Therefore, that portion of the spiritual enfolding that comes when one realizes that one is so far into the shape that the very quality of presence that one has begins to echo throughout one's entire life. So that all of the elements of one's life come current again. And eras that one is forgotten are suddenly freshened. People that one has that one would never see again reoccur. And events that one thought you had left behind come back again. And everything becomes current. And this is the age-old milestone sign that you're coming to the center of the city.
In The Discourse of Mind to Hermes, which is the eleventh of the fourteen books in the Hermetic, what is called The Corpus Hermeticum. That collected body of dialogues that were saved by the Byzantine savants. And were given to the Northern Italians in the 1440's. And translated into Latin in 1463 in Florence. Actually, just outside of Florence. Up on the hills by Fiesole, the Villa Careggi of Ficino, which was owned by the Medici family.
So, this eleventh book is entitled A Discourse of Mind to Hermes. And the twelfth book in the Hermetic tradition is a companion to it. And if we look at its title it's A Discourse of Hermes to Tat Concerning the Mind and Men. So that these two dialogues go together. One is the mind talking to Hermes and the other is Hermes talking to his son Tat. The first one is a discourse of mind. The second is a discourse of mind in men. So that the eleventh Hermetic dialogue is the grown-up basic structure, the mind itself. And the twelfth discourse is the smaller presentation of it the mind in men. So, we'll take the eleventh first and we'll see how we do. And hope we can get to the twelfth.
Hermes at last says I will not shrink from speaking as the thought has come to me. Many men have told me many things. Diverse things concerning the universe and God. And yet I have not learned the truth. I ask you therefore master to make this matter clearer to me. You and you alone I shall believe if you will show me the truth about it all.
And the mind addressing Hermes addresses him as a father. "Hearken then my son and I will tell you how things are as to God and the universe." So that the mind is a father to Hermes, as Hermes as a father to his son Tat.
Now in the Hermetic spiral, the innermost presence in that spiral is God. And this is why one should be apprised that the spiritual courage to go to the center will always be rewarded. There is nothing demonic at the center. There is only God. And God is there in all certainty. Therefore, the resonance of presence throughout the structure from the center will be divine. there is never any doubt as to this.
The Hermetic teaching on demons is that demons are not personified ever in any scale of the universe. That the demonic is but forces that ply like strings. And the overriding command of these strings are the 36 deck ends of the zodiac. But in no way are any of the demonic levels personages. So, there is no one there. there are no demons. There only forces. and it is through the clarity of the mind that we learn to structure those forces.
So that the forces collect together and make a mandala of power. Which we may then pass through unscathed. Because when all of the powers are balanced, they balance each other perfectly. When all the spokes of the wheel come together. All of the 36 deck ends come together. And all the twelve zodiacal signs are focused together in the perfect circle, the center is without any tension whatsoever. And when they pass through the core of the center effortlessly. There is no stress whatsoever.
So, mind is instructing Hermes. Because in the center of mind is God. And mind is in the center of Hermes. And Hermes is the in the center of the soul. And it is the soul then that is in the center of life. And this is where the Hermetic instruction comes out to us is in life. So, it must be presented to us in a living veracity. There must be someone who embodies this. What do they embody? They live the life, but they embody the other four levels of that quaternary. So that life is the beginning of this spiral itself. And as it comes in one finds the soul. Then one finds the instructor. Then one finds the mind. Then one finds God. And God is the quintessence of this movement.
The veracity of the movement demands but one precondition from us. And that is that we live the life truthfully. That if we live that life, we may encounter our soul. And it's in the instruction in that life that the soul is made apparent. And when the soul is made apparent, one realizes that that person who made that soul, our soul apparent to ourselves is the teacher, the Hermes Trismegistus. And having seen that teacher as in veracity, the Hermes Trismegistus, we understand that his mind is not a personal possession of him but is transcendentally the mind. And having come to understand that we penetrate into that mind and is there that we find the divine. This is the great chambered nautilus structure. the great snail shell as it were that comes spiraling to the center. So, in the beginning we must have the life, we must live that life.
In this dialogue we come very near the center. Because the teacher is now hearing from the mind. And the only thing beyond this dialogue is the experience of the divine, which has no words. The face of that language is the veracity of ultimate touch.
So, mind says to Hermes, "Look upon things through me." What can he see through him? The cosmos. "Contemplate the cosmos as it lies before your eyes." And as Hermes looks through mind and sees the cosmos, the cosmos is the outer expression of the divine. The cosmos is that pattern of forces perfectly balanced like a Great Wheel. And that the spinning of the wheel is of such a nature that seeing it all in balance, all of the spins are canceled out as it were, and it appears still. It appears as a motionless wheel. An ultimate motion. This is called the Dharma chakra. And in that experience then one's approach to the mind becomes translucent. That is to say the cognition of that mind. In that cognition we see that that mind is transparent, and we see through it. And what do we see through? To the cosmos.
So, mind then invites Hermes in this mystical moment to contemplate.
Given this spiritual perspective now contemplate this cosmos. This is the most ancient of all things mind says. Yet it is ever in its prime and ever new. Now you can see to the seven subject worlds marshaled in everlasting order. And filling up the measure of everlasting time as they run their diverse courses.
And we see now that the order is not just a static order in space but as a dynamic order in time also. That this unfolding of these seven realms, of this hebdomad, is an unfolding dynamically through time. So that its spatial structure is the upon motion.
This is why the balance of all motions negates the, the spatiality of it and makes it translucent or transparent. because it's opaque only as long as it's phenomenal. And to be phenomenal one needs to have what we call space. and when space no longer occurs all matter is transparent. The opaqueness no longer occurs. Why is this so physically? Because all of the atoms stop. And one looks past all the little electrons and all the little neutrons and protons and sees that almost all of it is space. And the space becomes clear.
All things that are filled with light in this mystical apperception. But mind cautioning Hermes says, notice that nowhere do you experience the fire. Only the light. Only this translucent light. For by the friendship of contraries and the blending of things unlike, the fire of heaven has been changed into light.
Because of all of the balancing of the forces. Because everything is brought together. One experiences the clarity. One experiences the light but does not see the fire. Which is God.
Instead what we experienced then in this light is the Sun. We experience the expression of it but not the reality of it. It is the Sun then that occurs to us.
The Sun, the beginner of all good. The ruler of all ordered movement. And governor of the seven worlds. and having seen the Sun we may then understand the moon. Look at the moon who outstrips all the other planets in her course. the instrument by which birth and growth are wha..are wrought.
It's the worker of change and matter. So, one sees the Sun. And having seen the Sun one can then see the moon. Notice that there's a progression. And having seen the Sun and the moon one can then see the Earth.
That is consciousness, self-consciousness. Does not understand that the earth exists. Until one coordinates the Sun and the moon and then the earth occurs as a reality. You can experience this incidentally in nature. When you see an event where the Sun and the moon are both up and both opposite. By positioning yourself so that out of the peripheral vision you are able just to see the Sun and the moon, the quality of Earth presence becomes extremely strong. And through a very even just a light Samadhi one can raise that to a tremendous level.
"Look at the earth firm seated at the center. The foundation of this goodly universe. The feeder and nurse of all terrestrial creatures. See how great the multitude of living beings." And then mind is telling Hermes that what moves on the earth are men. Mortal people. That all the other seven levels, like the Sun and the moon and the five planets, they move of themselves. But the earth does not move of itself. But what moves on the earth is man. So that the seven, the planets and the Sun and the moon the, the seven spheres that move are spiritual. They are immortal. Because only the immortal spiritual soul moves. But on the earth, the earth is not an immortal spiritual soul. But what moves on the earth is and that is man. This of course is a very peculiar understanding. A Hermetic understanding. And it is not the understanding in some other traditions of the world. For instance, the Taoist tradition. But it is in the Hermetic tradition the understanding.
Out of this will come, eventually, a prejudice against terrestrial things. That one must leave this earth. and in the in the Hermetic desire to be reunited with the divine the, the basic archetype is, is that one must leave the earth behind. One must go into the through the realms of the spheres. this is why for instance that the space program is so archetypal in our time. Because leaving the earth behind and going to the various planets is exactly living out the archetypal Hermetic journey of the soul. And this of course is extraordinary that this actually occurs in our time. We are living out archetypes on such a colossal level that we hardly realize what, what is happening. The religious significance of our lives is so enormous that it outstrips all conception.
So, what moves on earth are our human beings. what do they move? It's not their walking around that moves, it's the spirit within them that moves. So that the spirit within them must be harmonized with the movements of the other seven spheres. When this is done, when that order is established then the tyranny of the seven ceases to be a tyranny on man's soul. Because man's soul becomes harmonized with the movement of the seven spheres. And this means that an eighth sphere, that of man's soul, comes into juxtaposition with those seven. And when the eight is established then man's movement in his soul on earth is harmonized with the movement of the seven spheres and their resistances become transparent. And that's what he looks through. They're no longer obscuring forces, but they become balanced. Because, because of his great harmony.
And a spiritual person moves in harmony with, with those seven spheres creating an eighth sphere in harmony. And then one sees the ninth. And the ninth of course is the silence of the firmament. Wherein the shape of the throne of God is able to be seen in its via negative against that firmament. Excuse me for speaking mystically but it's the only way to speak. In this way.
Mind then says, "It is clear that there is someone who makes these things. And it is manifest that the maker is one. For the soul is one and life is one and matter is one." The soul, the life, the matter and the maker. Notice a quaternary here. And notice that in the horizon the polarity of life and soul come together. And matter and maker come together. So that in this quaternary you have this kind of a relationship.
Mind then seeks to impress upon Hermes the need to understand the cosmos in this way. And says,
And in speaking in this way dear Hermes I say that the cosmos is also changing through all time. In as much as day by day a part of its life passes away out of our sight. But that it never decomposed. And the things that befall the cosmos are and the cosmos assumes all forms. But it does not contain the forms as things placed in it, but the cosmos itself changes.
Remember how I begin tonight talking about that great movement. That great snail shell spiral structure that comes in. The movement of the cosmos is also in this way. That the movement of an individual soul is exactly like the movement of the cosmos as a whole. This is why man is a microcosm. He is a microcosm because the journey of his soul is exactly the journey of the cosmos. The whole history of the universe is revealed in the complete movement of a human soul.
This is why the, the great emphasis in the Western Hermetic tradition is upon seeing the form of the soul. But the Hermetic emphasis and the one that passed into Christianity was that the form of the soul is incorporeal. How is it incorporeal? It's in incorporeal in the sense that it is based on movement and not upon phenomenal structure. So that one must affinitize oneself to being intelligent and perceptive about spiritual movement. One must kinesthetically attune oneself to dynamicness rather than staticness. And when one attunes oneself to dynamic movement rather than static structure, then one begins to get the sense of the incorporeal shape of the soul. And then the cosmos makes sense. And as the cosmos makes sense, we see that at the center of it is the divine. And at the center of ourselves is the divine. And because these motions are at this stage of cognition seeing the divine there and the divine here, at that stage of cognition there's a recognition that there is a core between the two which is eternal. And that this axis of the soul core between the individual and the cosmos is the divine in motion.
And of course, the great Hermetic celestial sign of this axis spirituality. The spiritual axis was the constellation of the great bear, Uruses major. The seven stars in the Big Dipper. And in Hermetic
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Astronomy, astrology if you like, the Big Dipper was outside exactly above the circle of the signs of the zodiac. So that the cognition of the Big Dipper with its seven stars is an indication that it, it cups the hebdomad. What does it dip? It dips destiny out of its magnetized Heimarmene. and, and takes it up above. So that the recognition of that above-ness, that transcendental point in the firmament, the ninth heaven. The Big Dipper exists in the ninth sphere. It is an emblem of God's promise of freedom to man. That comes down to the individual soul. And in this way one experience is the core of being freed from the effects of astrological destiny. One is outside of that.
The cosmos itself disappears day by day from sight. From phenomenal sight. That is time past. it goes into the past. We don't see it anymore. It doesn't happen anymore. But it doesn't disintegrate. It doesn't go away. Hermetic time is very interesting this way. It's very Egyptian. Remember now Western man has an Egyptian soul. You have to get to your Egyptian soul. And when you do Hermes can come there and take you home.
It's just like remember at the beginning of the series in January that the Egyptian conception is that time is eternal. Nothing is ever lost. Every moment that has ever happened is, still is. It's just that our delusion is that we have passed beyond it and that it no longer exists. And this of course is the ultimate ignorance leading to anxiety and alienation. That the only thing that's real is this moment. well what's going to happen to me? Well what has happened to me? Whereas the salvation comes in realizing that one is not alienated from anything. Every moment of time that has ever been still exists. And is part of a structure of wholeness called the cosmos. Called the soul of the universe. It's like realizing that you can't fall off a mountain. You can't be alienated in this universe. It takes a really deluded mind to think that you are outside of the safety of the divine. You have to really tell yourself a lot of bad stories for a long time and then force yourself to believe it. And of course, because it's not true it never quite sticks.
Mind says to Hermes, giving him a simile now about the incorporeal shape. Says, "Shall we say that he is formless, our maker? Is he formless? Surely not that. Yet if he too assumes all forms he will be like the cosmos." And in fact, that's what the cosmos is God assuming all forms. "And if he has but one form, he will in that respect be inferior to the cosmos. What then are we to say of him? We must not let the discussion end in unsolved doubt. for in our thoughts of God no question is insoluble." And this of course is the basic, basic Hermetic curing wisdom. That everything can be known. There is nothing about the divine that is forbidden from man to be known. And all of it is knowable. This is called the, in the Mahayana is called the high dharma. It's what can be actually said. One doesn't have to take anything on somebody else's credit. You can know for, for yourself. So, no question of God is insoluble.
We will say then that God has one form and one alone. But it is a form that no eye can see for it is incorporeal. And marvel not that there is an incorporeal form. Such things there are for instance in pictures we see mountaintops standing out high, though the picture itself is quite smooth and flat. So how, if we see a picture of a mountain. Painting of a mountain. We can go up to the painting we can see that it's flat but when we look at it, we see the mountain in there and it's there is space and so forth. So that it requires the inner eye, which is imagination.
And of course, later on and the Hermetic tradition, much later on, this will be the occult eye. The Rosicrucian version of the third eye. Robert Fludd will bring in some illustrations of some of Fludd's Hermetic Rosicrucian Cosmo graphic designs. And to show the occult rays coming out from the third eye and seeing. How many rays are there? Seven. Why? Because there are seven levels. But the eye itself, the eye itself is not any of those rays. It is different.
Mind says to Hermes, "If you boldly grasp this conception you will get a truer notion of him who contains all things." So, at this point one has to be very bold. One has to have spiritual courage that this not only can this be known but you can know it. So, there's like a pilot light that has to come on here. It's spiritual courage. Mind is telling Hermes and later Hermes will tell Tat. And Tat will tell the world. And at this point we have to assent wholeheartedly to know this. It's like we have to suddenly energize ourselves and get up on our feet and go over and and have this. Grasp this. We have to do that in our spirit. Energize.
"There are terms that must be taken in a sense peculiar to the things spoken of. And of this what I am now saying is an instance, all things are in God. But things are not situated in God as in a place." A place is a body. And all bodies are subject to movement. But that which is incorporeal is motionless. And the things situated in it have no movement. For it is in a different sense that things are situated in what is incorporeal. Now this is extremely difficult. And this is why we have to be active and show spiritual courage at this moment to grasp it. Because what freed us in the first place was harmonizing our movement with the movement of the cosmos. So that we're all moving in tandem. And we experience freedom and liberation. We experience that we are no longer subject to the astrological deacons. We are no longer subject to the seven levels of destiny. That by harmonizing our eighth, our earthly eighth with the celestial seven we have produced a harmonized movement which raises from this destiny. But notice we are still in movement. But God is motionless.
So how do we and the cosmos, which are now in a synchronized in a, in a harmonious movement, how do we see the unmoving? And this is where there takes great spiritual presence and lack of arrogance and egotism on our part. If there's any arrogance whatsoever it cannot happen. We have to be able to see through all of the movements. They have to be transparent. And for movement to be transparent it takes a quality of, of mind which is very rare. It needs to be cultivated assiduously. There's no way to do have it without tremendous effort.
It's one thing to be able to make matter transparent and to be able to see through matter. But to make movement transparent so that one sees through movement to the motionless, this is something else. And in fact, it is a counter movement. Because one had to synchronize one's soul movement to get in touch with the seven levels. Now one has to reverse field and make one soul motionless. And one fears doing this. Why? Because one has just worked fifty thousand years to get freed by getting in harmony with the motions. So that one has to take the chance that by becoming motionless one is going to have the universe crush oneself. It's like stopping the world and having the ocean slosh over it because they're still moving. There's this intuition. There's this, this moment of apprehension that all is going to be lost.
So, the Hermetic instruction has to from the very beginning prepare the person for this spiritual crisis. Has to prepare them not only to free themselves in terms of the cosmos, but to let go of that very freedom at the very moment that you attain it. So that you have the courage to drop out of your harmonious movement with the cosmos and stand still. Stand motionless. And when you do the cosmos disappears and what is there is the divine. In its motionless veracity.
"But you have to boldly grasp this conception", says mind to Hermes. Because incorporeal it cannot be enclosed by anything. There's no shaped-ness to it. And if you're dependent on cognizing images and shapes. And why shouldn't you be dependent on it? Because it was the, the use of images and shapes that freed you in the first place. But now you have to reverse feel. You see wisdom is a is a double movement. It's a movement to harmonize movement then it's a movement to stop and be motionless. What does it say in the Gospel of Thomas? Jesus in teaching says, when they ask you have you seen God you tell them that you have and that he is a movement and a rest. It's in the Gospel of Thomas. God is a movement and a rest. Unedited words, the master.
Please turn your cassette now and we will commence playing again on the other side without a break in the continuity
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As for these machines. they need a rest.
You can see why there can be no promotion of these kinds of courses. This, this kind of straight talk and only come totally naturally and uncoerced among friends in the most legitimate kinds of settings. If there were any kind of choreography whatsoever.
In the old days I used to (blowing sound).
If there were any kind of choreography whatsoever, the mind when it is attentive not to things but to motions, would in its awareness. In itself conscious awareness think, ah if it was just because of the circumstance. It was because of the situation. it made sense there but as soon as I go out that there is back there and, and here's the, the real world. income taxes and all this other stuff. The real world. That's all very nice for them in those nice little settings that here's what I have to tend to. The mind has that kind of whobreeze. And so, it has to be forestalled by the setting of teaching on this level being absolutely legitimate. With no choreography. Or a minimum of choreography. Or a choreography which is so natural and homey that anyone can understand it and see that it is what it is. That's why this kind of teaching was never for the, the crowds. never will be.
Mind says then to Hermes having brought him this far. Says, "When you bid your soul in this purified condition to travel to any land you choose, sooner than you can bid it go it will be there." What does that mean? That means having experienced not only the harmony but having experienced the rest, the motionless. When you've experienced the divine in the motionless, one can go anywhere. Where can you not go? It's synchronistic.
Dante says in The Inferno at one level Virgil has to grab him because here's the lost souls barking like vicious dogs down in the darkness. He says what are they barking at? And Virgil says they're barking at each other. I wish I had the Italian because Dante does it so much better. you know. With **(inaudible Italian word) **.
So, the mind says to Hermes,
See what quickness you have? See what you can do? What power is yours? And when you yourself can do all this cannot God do it? You must understand them that it is in this way that God contains within himself the cosmos. And himself and all that is. It is as thoughts which God thinks that all things are contained in him.
And then mind holding out a teaching hand to Hermes, "If then you do not make yourself equal to God you cannot apprehend God." He's saying that at this particular juncture having acquired not only the harmony of motion but the ineffability of motionlessness. And having seen what one's soul is in its correlation to the divine. You have to accept that equality between God and oneself.
At this point, and at this point alone in the teaching, it is not profane. At any other point in the teaching if one were to accept that it would be profane. It would destroy the entire spiritual of shape. It would be egomania even if it were intimated by a supposition. But at this particular juncture where the soul core is opened one has to recognize that equality. And by this it's a mathematical equality of identity. If then at this particular juncture of maturity you do not make yourself equal to God, you cannot apprehend God. For like is known by like. And it's this affinity of like for a like. In Plotinus, the alone to the alone. It's this affinity that produces the voracity.
"Leap clear then at this moment of all that is corporeal." And to leap clear Kierkegaard writes in I believe it's Concluding Unscientific PostScript that there is a point in the Christian experience where one must experience a leap of faith. But it's only the mind that has prepared itself for purity, a kind of purity which is in sync with the heart, that it can make this leap. Because it requires a heart energy for the mind to make this leap of faith.
"Leap clear of all that is corporeal at this moment. And make yourself grow to a like expanse with that greatness which is beyond all measure." This is the oceanic mystic experience.
"Rise above all time and become eternal. Then you will apprehend God." Notice now that time is movement. One rises above space or spatiality, but one must, and one does that through motion. but one must rise above time which is motionless. So, you need both. And it's like a, it's like an infinity sign that rises about the ocean of space and then goes into itself. Into a vanishing and becomes eternal then.
Then you will apprehend God. Think that for you nothing is impossible. Deem that you are immortal. That you are able to grasp all things in your thought. To know every craft and every science. Find your home in the hearts of every living creature. Make yourself higher than all heights. Lower than all depths. Bring together in yourself all opposites of quality. Heat and cold. Dryness and fluidity. Think that you are everywhere at once. On land, on sea, in heaven. Think that you are not yet begotten. That you are in the womb. That you are young. That you are old. That you have died. That you are in the world beyond the grave. Grasp in your thought all this at once.
And that's that recognition, re-cognition, that the great movement of life has come into possession of soul. Come into possession of Hermes Trismegistus. Come into possession of mind. Come into experience of the divine. And that all of the shape is of one unit. A single unit. it is not divided. It has never been divided. It is eternal and eternal oneness.
Then you can apprehend God, says mind to Hermes. But if you shut up your soul in your body. and abase yourself and say, I know nothing. I can do nothing. I am afraid of Earth and sea. I cannot mount to heaven. I know not what I was now and what I shall be. Then what have you to do with God? Your thought can grasp nothing beautiful and good. You will cleave to the body and thus are evil.
So, there's a moment of fearfulness that must be overcome by spiritual courage. And that moment of fearfulness which reoccurs in small and increasingly poignant episodes. Becomes at that experience of the soul core, almost unbearable except for the fact that one can see the divine. This is why spiritual courage is taught all the way through.
Mind then concludes, "For it is the height of evil not to know God. But to be capable of knowing God intuition hope to know him is the road which leads straight to the good." And it is an easy road to travel. Why is it easy? Because it is real. Because there is the only real road. That there is the road to the divine is the only real road. What is the real road? It is through the personage which one is. The Royal Road is the person. The person. This is why the, the individuation process produces not individualism. Which would be sort of like a banner which an egotistical person, personage would weigh. But individuation yields the individual, that unique person. And it's the uniqueness of the person that occurs in our part of this tandem of the soul core to the divine. Because if we're there as a person God is there as a person. Eye to eye.
Mind says, "Everywhere then God will come to meet you." Everywhere he will appear to you. At places and times at which you look not for it. When you're and your waking hours are in your sleep. When you're journeying by water. When you're going over the land. In the nighttime or the daytime. You might be speaking. You might be silent. But there is nowhere that there is not God. it just takes a little a little reminder of presence, self-presence and there it is. The hallmark of the divine. And what is the hallmark of the divine? The personage. The personage. God is real.
"And do you say God is invisible? Speak not so. Who is more manifest than God?" Because it is everywhere. Everywhere. Everywhere. For this very purpose he has made all things. That through all things you may see him. And this is course, the, the scintillation of the spiritual vision. That there is nothing profane anywhere. Nothing that is profane. And this of course is, is not just the joie de vie but is the joie universal.
"Nothing is invisible not even an incorporeal thing. Mind is seen in its thinking. And God is that working. So far thrice greatest one I've shown you the truth think out all else in like manner for yourself. And you will not be misled."
So, this is the instruction of mind to Hermes. And I think next week we'll briefly take The Discourse of Hermes to Tat Concerning the Mind in Men but mainly next week what I want to get into is The Asclepius. we started with The Poimandres, I guess about two months ago. So, we need to get to The Asclepius, which is the, the other great hermetic of treatise.
And The Asclepius is about curing. And we have to understand the Hermetic tradition teaches curing of souls. Not adjusting to the problems but curing of souls. This is what is important. Healing is alright but healing just puts you back into shape to be injured again.
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curing takes you out of the situation that you could ever be diseased again. So, there's a lot of talk of healing but the talk you really should tune your ears to is that of curing.
So, we'll do that next week. Thank you.
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