Hermetic
Presented on: Tuesday, June 17, 1986
Presented by: Roger Weir
Hermetic Tradition: From Egypt to America, From Osiris to Benjamin Franklin
Presentation 24 of 24
Hermetic
Presented by Roger Weir
Tuesday, June 17, 1986
Transcript:
This too. One here on the outside. I have to put one of those in? that's really a medusa's nest. that's okay. one of its babies.
Someone in the room: **inaudible question**
No nothing bothers me anymore.
Someone in the room: **inaudible few words**
Christian Hermeticism. Christian Hermeticism.
I'm gonna try to do something that's not been done before. Just as I started the Hermetic tradition in Egypt, I want to carry it on so that we, we can see that that The Corpus Hermeticum extends directly into Christianity. into Christian theology. Into Christian mysticism. By doing this tonight you can see that we inherit an unbroken tradition from 5,000 years at least. But that in order to have that tradition we have to tune our experience strategically to this context. To this matrix. To this tradition.
I feel that the major problem of personality in our time is not so much the development of the individual characteristics. We have all kinds of help in that regard. For one thing we meet more people in our lifetimes than, than most other people ever did. In times past, within recent times, within 70 years you might have only met maybe 1,000 people in your whole life. 2,000 at the most. Through our exposure to television and film and mass culture we have the experience of tens of thousands of human beings in our lifetime. It's just one example of the way in which the individual aspect of our personalities is very well honed. But the strategic underlay is impoverished. And if we can tune ourselves to the fact that our basic tradition, whether we are Christian or not, makes no difference. I'm probably equally Daoist, Buddhist and Christian. And I have a tremendous background in Judaism. So, it doesn't really, it isn't a pet thing with me.
But the Christian tradition is in fact the living Hermetic tradition in its real interior core. and that real interior core coming out in our time tends to be more and more rediscovered as Gnosticism. Not the Gnosticism of the 3rd century A.D. but the Gnosticism of the late 20th century, early 21st century. Which is going to be different. Which is different.
In this strategic alignment with the tradition therefore I have to show tonight how there is a Christian Hermeticism. And I want to show particularly that one of the books of Dionysius the Areopagite, the book is called The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy. That this book written about 500 A.D. is a Hermetic treatise. And that it belongs in the Hermetic tradition.
We saw last week with Lamblichus on the mysteries when he began his book. Which was a answer to Porphyry, Plotinus' friend and disciple. and Lamblichus writing to Porphyry said,
Hermes the God who presides over language was formerly very properly considered as common to all priests. And the power who presides over the true science concerning the Gods. Is the one in the same in the whole of things. Hence our ancestors dedicated the inventions of their wisdom to this deity. Inscribing all their own writings with the name of Hermes.
And this was written around 300 A.D.
So that we begin to see that the Hermetic tradition thrives. But around 300 A.D. is changed just a little bit to amplify itself so that now the Hermetic doctrines are no longer anonymous so much. but they remain esoteric. So, there's always a tone there. And the, the documents are always personal.
Notice that the Hermetic tradition is always personal. The dialogue form of The Corpus Hermeticum is in fact massively, to the point that this is a personal wisdom delivered by someone to someone else. Either in private or with just one or at the most two witnesses. So that this is a private personal communication. A testament in the highest sense of the term. That the Hermetic tradition is always a, a testimonial. And in this way is very close to the sutra form in Buddhism. Which traditionally begins thus have I heard that what is being said to you I myself have heard. And got it from someone who knows. And, and I know that they knew. And you can trust me. And I am reporting to you personally and accurately.
So, the Hermetic tradition has these earmarks. It is usually a personal dialogue. Or if it's not a dialogue it's now in the form of a letter. Or a confidence to someone. It's either anonymous or it's limited in its range in appeal. That the Hermetic tradition is never public. That in fact the most public of all the figures in the Hermetic tradition was Plotinus, up until the Florentine Renaissance.
And we'll see for those of you that are going to go on with the Hermetic tradition which is going to move to Thursday nights at the PRS. And the Daoist tradition is going to come here on Tuesday nights. But you'll see that Ficino, Marsilio Ficino, around the 1450's, 1460's is the first person to bring the Hermetic philosophy back into the public. Well we say back into the public. It was limited to those individuals who would make the trek outside of Florence into the hills around Fiesole, going up to the Villa Careggi and spending a weekend or spending a week there with Ficino.
But Plotinus up until that time was the only figure who was public. And his teaching was never more than what I'm doing here. It was never more than to 15 or 20 people at the most. Ever. Because the nature of the Hermetic tradition makes it incumbent upon someone who accepts that responsibility to teach in that mode. For there to be ultimate truth which requires, requires of necessity a confidentiality. It has to be confidential. because of its disclosure mode of being total. No ossification whatsoever. And it is almost impossible for that confidentiality to come out of a teacher if there is not the companionability of friends. If there's any kind of a hint of a, of a public mode where there is an audience. Where there are students who are distant from an expert teacher. All of this has a interfering touch to the mode.
Now you say well there are people occasionally who come. That's right. But the occasional people if you've noticed you come do not stay. They come once or twice and that's it. Or they come spottily for a month or two and that's it. Because there's, there's nothing here to grasp or to identify as practical teaching. In the sense of it's going to do me some good in my job tomorrow. because all of this is strategic. All of it is structural. And it's structural and strategic specifically because it seeks to disclose the whole at once. The entirety of the wisdom teaching at once.
Dionysius the Areopagite is a pseudonym. In fact, in this scholarly edition he is referred to as Dionysius the pseudo Areopagite. The false. We don't know who he was.
The traditional Dionysius the Areopagite occurs in Luke, The Gospel of Luke. And Luke who was a friend and a companion to Paul recounts how one-time Paul was preaching in Athens. And not very well-received. And he was preaching on the side of the Greek forum, the Athenian forum. And there is a hill of Mars there, which is where the Areopagite comes from. Ares is Mars in Greek. The, the hill of Ares. The hill of Mars. And the only person who understood what Paul was teaching was someone who identified himself as Dionysius on the hill of Mars. And incidentally in Luke were given to understand that Dionysius had a female companion. That he was one of the one of the esoteric magas' who always traveled with a woman. That the two of them together presented a hyra...hyros gamos in its dynamic form. These are very rare masters, but they do occur in this way.
And so, this individual, who lived at the end of the 400's took as his name that esoteric figure who understood the original teaching of Paul to the Athenians. Way back when. and in the ecclesiastical hierarchy we find that this anonymous author, which is a sign of a Hermetic sage, is in fact writing. Dionysius the bishop to his fellow bishop Timothy.
Now at this time bishops were all equal. The Bishop of Rome had not yet really claimed to be the Pope over the church effectively. There were, there was a Bishop of Rome who identified himself as a pope. But bishops were generally eye to eye. So, this is a confidentiality from one bishop to another on very high level between two Bishops.
And he writes in here about the ecclesiastical hierarchy, it's tradition and scope. And right away the term hierarchy is indicative of the Hermetic tradition which has become energized by Plotinus. This hierarchy. And this will be a special hierarchy. This will be the ecclesiastical hierarchy. And Dionysius the Areopagite will also write a short little book on the mystical celestial hierarchy. And we'll, we'll see.
And now he's going to orient us to its tradition in scope. and this is how he begins, confidentially to his fellow bishop. About 1500 years ago.
We must show most, pious of sons, that our hierarchy is inspired by God. And that it implies a divine and defying science, activity and perfection. We shall show from our most sacred and supra mundane scriptures for the benefit of those who have been initiated by the consecration of sacred initiation in hierarchical mysteries and traditions.
So right away he says this is limited. This is an exclusive club. only those who have gone through sacred initiations in hierarchical mysteries and traditions. And he's speaking exactly a dead center on the line as a Hermetic tradition. He is akin now to all the ancient Egyptian priests, those who were the inheritors of the mysteries of Thoth straight on through all The Corpus Hermeticum masters through Plotinus up to his present day.
But these are not just regular writings. But they are what he calls supra, s-u-p-r-a. Supra mundane scriptures. not so much super as lifted away from. but supra as lifted above but still related. Supra mundane has that kind of a characteristic that it is above but it's above in a related way. Super mundane would be in a transcendental mode. Supramundane is in an imminent mode. It's high but it's high still in an eminent phrase. This is very careful language. Someone who writes like this is razor-sharp. Their consciousness doesn't make an error. It's just exactly where it needs to be. Like a well-honed of brush in the hands of an artist.
"However, take care not to reveal indiscreetly these most sacred things. Be prudent and respect the hidden things of God by using spiritual and obscure notions." Spiritual and obscure notions. That is to say, when you speak or when you write of this speak from a stance of consciousness positioned in wholeness. Do not speak with the mind trying to put out a train of thought. But speak from the consciousness being experientially in the wholeness. And this is speaking spiritually. And then obscurely by speaking around the point that one is making. So that by using language to circumambulate by imagery one creates a mystery by the precision that one has.
Let me make this more graphic. The speaking in the Hermetic tradition by 500 A.D. become, had to become extremely sophisticated. For one thing you could be killed for heresies. or you could be really in serious trouble for some of your ideas. So, the technique was instead of speaking directly to a point one spoke around the point. And made the point not by directness of speech but by the use of circles of imagery. And then one sense of presence filled those circles of imagery. And this was the technique that was used.
And later on, of course the sense of presence was given in an image or a symbol. so that one would have the converse of the sacred speaking. One would have just the symbol. And you would have to by your experience fill in the circles around it. The circles of meaning around it. So, you're given either one or the other. You're either given the visual image as a symbol and then you would have to use your experience to circumambulate and fill in the context of where it fit. Or you were given via volsa, the circumambulation, and you would have to fill in the symbolic presence, the center yourself. They go either way. And in this way, it was like instead of two teacher-student it would be too esoteric complements that when they met, they would fit exactly. Their symbol would illuminate your understanding. And your understanding would define their symbol into meaning. So that there was no mistaking. This is why it was very easy to tell phonies and charlatans, always has, in the spiritual mode. Psychic people cannot tell the difference. because they've they think that everything is just more or less a refined spiel anyway. And that it's in the refining of it that that gives one the, the power. But that's not at all. It's, it's the exactness. It's the specificity. This is why spirituality is, is like nature. If there's one ten thousandth of a difference in an angstrom of light, it's orange instead of red. It becomes, it's immediately something else. And it's this way in spiritual teaching. Either is exactly what it is or is not that at all.
So, in this specificity in Dionysius the Areopagite writing about 500 A.D., is saying now take care not to be indiscreet. How do we take care not to be indiscreet? By keeping our presence in the spirit and keeping our language symbolically dynamic.
Then he says, "Be prudent and respect the hidden things of God using spiritual and obscure notions. Keep these things undefiled, inaccessible to the uninitiated. Reverently communicating sacred things only to holy persons in a holy illumination." And Dionysius the Areopagite will introduce here the term which we'll ever after be the standard of mystical communion. Illumination. From this eventually a thousand years later the tradition of Illuminati. Illumine. That the light of understanding is this illumination.
And we'll see when we get to talking about the Muslim Neoplatonists, about the Ikhwan Alsaf...alsafa. The brotherhood of purity. Which is the original Rosicrucian model from the 8th century. They, they will talk about illumination and inner light. And it begins and it comes here into, into the tradition about this time.
Notice now that this is 400 years after Saint John in his gospel brings in the powerful spiritual understanding of eternal light. "In the beginning is the word and the word was light. And the light was the life of men." Now 400 years later the Hermetic tradition has understood this, has brought this in. And Dionysius the Areopagite now uses the term illumination.
"Only to holy persons in a holy illumination. Theology has taught us worshipers that Jesus himself is the transcendentally divine and supra essential mind." And Dionysius the Areopagite will always use this term supra now when he's talking about divinity. Supra. That it is above but related to. That the aboveness is here. Supra. Supra essential. The Supra essential mind.
"Jesus himself is the Supra essential mind. The source in essence of all hierarchy. All holiness. and all divine operation. The divinely sovereign power who illumines the blessed being superior to us in a manner at once more spiritual and clear." That is to say, our being in the spirit can be exact but as, as human beings we don't have very much spiritual power. It's like, it's like a low watt light bulb. It is a light bulb, but it only glows so much because it's only 5 watts. But with a charge coming into it from say the atmosphere, ala Nikola Tesla, that light can glow even more. It might go from 5 watts to 200 watts and be a real light. But notice that the structure of the bulb has to be able to take that energy. This is the whole point then of attuning oneself to the spiritual hierarchies. Because only by a tuning oneself and extending one's mind and one's sensibilities, to integrate into these celestial hierarchies can one take that power. Can one take that energizing. yes, you glow but you glow by virtue of the fact that you are grounded and rooted into a hierarchy which can amplify this for you. Were you not to have this and to come into this you would be blown out. Quite literally.
"As for us because of our love of the beautiful which attracts us to him and by which we are raised up to him. He folds together our multiple differences and perfects us into a unified divine life. And grants us the sacred power of the Divine priesthood." That someone who then attunes themselves to this divine hierarchy, like in the Hermetic tradition. Someone who comes into the I, I hate to use the term primal mind because it's been usurped in our language by someone else writing. But it is that. It is the, the primordial. The primordial mind.
By our approach to the sacred function of the priesthood we come nearer to the beings above us through imitating as much as we can the constancy and unchangeableness of their steadfastness in holy things. And by looking upon the constancy of the supremely divine and blessed Jesus, we shall become images of light and co-workers with God perfecting and making others perfect.
So that what happens to someone who is then integrated into the hierarchies through the Eclat...ecclesiastical hierarchy. Which then tunes us to the celestial hierarchies. When we glow brighter, we don't go brighter just to glow brighter, but we glow brighter in order to help others. That it's this selfless transmission of that amperage to helping others that allows us to glow. Were we to try and stop it, try to have it just by ourselves, that also want to short-circuit us. And the first thing that breaks is the sacred connection with the hierarchies. So that one goes errant. One goes astray one. Then is referred to as fallen. One is fallen in that in that state. Or we would rather, I think use the term, the connection has been broken. Short-circuited. That, that's a probably a better kind of a language to use anyway.
So, he writes in here about these hierarchies. And he says,
According to our August tradition every hierarchy gives full account of every sacred reality falling under it. And the most general summary of the rights that pertain to this or that particular hierarchy. Our hierarchy is called and is that function embracing all the sacred rites proper to it. And in accordance with which the divine Bishop, once he is consecrated, can participate in all the sacred rites which pertain to him. Because he takes his name from hierarchy.
What name does he take? Hierophant. Hierophant.
That is to say, someone who then is has learned to extend themselves out, amplify themselves, to this hierarchy they then are no longer just a teacher. But because they have this amplification, because the hierarchy works through them, they are part of it, they are more than a hierophant. A hierophant. And a Hierophant not only understands but is able to transmit that understanding to others. So that they understand almost mysteriously. They understand in spite of the in attentiveness of their minds, for instance. They feel that they understood even though they can't quite say what it is that they understood. That's the sign of a hierophant. When you start to notice people experiencing that. Or one experiences it one's self. Then then there's that hierophantic flow that's going on.
So, he takes his name from hierarchy. "And he who speaks of hierarchy speaks at the same time of the orderly arrangement of all sacred things taken together." That is to say, every pattern which becomes experiential in a hierophantic mode discloses immediately, effortlessly that all patterns are part of a pattern. The pattern. The all.
And this phenomenon and Dionysius the Areopagite will go to Plotinus to bring in a word for this, which is called emanation. Plotinus uses the term emanation. And it ever after comes into the usage in the language here. that emanation is coming out from the, from the divine. And what we experience in receiving that is illumination. And because the emanation is coming with the totality of the pattern in its meaningfulness, the illumination also then has this wholeness in its quality. I have to use a makeup a form of a of a word here totalistic. It has totalisticality to it. So that then it becomes not only a content, but it becomes the matrix in which all contents are related to each other in a unity.
And so, this unity then is what is the sacred arrangement. The orderly arrangement of all sacred things taken together. That is to say their orderly arrangement is not just because they're in a pecking order in a hierarchy. But one understands that that hierarchy is full round, is full circle. That the hierarchy I think prosaically the understanding was is that it works both ways. But we have to add to this that it works both ways instantly. So, there is no time delay whatsoever.
So that the emanation is the Divine, the illumination of the spiritual person and their contemplation by sending it back occur instantaneously all at once. And it is this instantaneousness of it that is the Hermetic seal. This is when experience is spiritual. It's Hermetically sealed like that. There is no there's no time differential whatsoever in it. And so is referred to as eternal. Because of that mode and because of that quality. And quite accurately so I might say. It's not a descriptive term so much as a phenomenological one.
Then he writes in here, "The very essence of our hierarchy is the divinely transmitted scriptures." Notice that the Hermetic tradition always then relates back to the scriptures. We get it in a watered-down sense of the Bible. But it isn't that so much. It's the sequence of the scriptures, of the sacred scriptures, that show that all of those scriptures are like a single emanation coming down through the hierarchies of the ages. That the whole tradition is one seamless tradition. So that the understanding that one has, the illumination that one has, penetrates and understands the anything in that tradition all the way back at your discretion. You focus your mind, your understanding, anywhere along that tradition. and all of it is understandable as one piece.
Sometimes this experience when, when one has it outside of the word in just of feeling tones. One would call this the experience of the morning star singing together. The choir of the hollies. but it happens in the Hermetic tradition with the scriptures. So that one can pick up anything in that tradition and it will be understandable anything whatsoever. You should know all things in the tradition to make you free then.
"We deem," writes Dionysius the Areopagite,
We deem most venerable these Oracle's, which are divinely inspired initiators, have given us in sacred writings and theological books. And further such as our leaders have revealed to us from these same holy men by a more immaterial initiation. That is very similar to the heavenly hierarchy since it is from mind to mind.
Now this goes back if you were here, if you can remember, the Hermetic treatises. When, when the individual was brought. When Tat was brought to a point of understanding Hermes. or Amun was brought to a point of understanding Hermes. So that it was mind to mind. So that language had honed of a closeness, a communion. between them. And when the communion got so close that the language was synonymous, the minds were also in contact fully. And then when this was mind to mind. This was called the divine ecstasy.
And in a quotation here from The Perfect Sermon from The Asclepius. This is a quotation which I'm taking from The Gospel of Hermes rather than from The Corpus Hermeticum that we used before. Here's the translation made by Duncan Greenlight. A very good one. Here's the experience of mind to mind. "Truly the doctrine of the Godhead to be understood by a divine effort of the mind is most like a rushing torrent that plunges down from a height with head long flow. So that it manages by swiftness of speed to outpace our attention. not only of the hearers but of those who speak also." That the ecstasy is not on the point of a naive student being filled with wonder. But that it is a communion between the teacher and the student. between the Hermetic master and the companion or companions. That that torrential rush, headlong, so that it manages by its swiftness. What kind of swiftness? Instantaneousness. You see the mind is extremely fast. The mind can move across the universe in and almost nanoseconds. But the spirit is instantaneous. And a differential between extremely fast and instantaneous is actually asymptotic. The quickness, the most quickness of the intuitive mind seems like slow motion ballet to the spirit. Whereas to the mundane of sensibilities it, it seems like nothing has elapsed at all.
We will see that Dionysius the Areopagite as a sophisticated Hermetic master of 500 A.D., shows us by the reorientation that this ecstasy. This mind to mind. This communion. Happens in the mass that it is exactly the Eucharist that brings this to happen.
And Dionysius the Areopagite will use two words together, almost like a tuning fork. Two words together to express this. So that the symbolic understanding can be understood in this twofold. the first word he will use is the word that we all translate and understand is communion. The deepest most profound sense communion. The second word he will use is a Greek word synaxis. Which doesn't appear in classical Greek. It doesn't even appear in New Testament Greek. But it is a Hermetic term that is made after 300 A.D. to specifically identify this mind-to-mind ecstatic communion with the divine. That the whole congregation who participate in the communion also participate in this synaxis. And that that actually does occur. So, we're working towards that. You can see how powerful this.
Dionysius the Areopagite in his four, three or four little books and ten letters positions the whole Hermetic tradition. Which had run unbroken from The Pyramid Texts of 3,000 B.C. right up to his own day. 3500 years of tradition by that time. He positions the entire tradition so that yet feeds into mystical Christianity. But the hitch in it is that one has to be spiritual to understand it. So that by energizing Christianity to this level he will bring Christianity into the Hermetic tradition. Or if you like bring the Hermetic tradition into Christianity. But it will also split off by sheer force of excellence most of the inferior minds who will not be able to follow this. And it's after Dionysius the Areopagite that you find all of the...it's after Dionysius that you find all of the church councils that argue doctrine. That nitpick theology.
And that then progressively over several hundred years dilute the understanding of Christianity to a paltry kind of a scholasticism. And it's this deadening of the understanding mind of Christianity through theological nitpicking that actually leads to the dark ages. It is not the triumph of Christianity that leads to the dark ages. It is the betrayal of the spiritual communion in Christianity to doctrinaire arguing and mental fictioning that creates this. It is the rediscovery of this wisdom that is the Renaissance. It is not the rediscovery of classical learning that is the Renaissance. It is the rediscovery that that classical learning had a Hermetic strand running through it that fed directly into Christianity. And that Christianity was a spiritual communion between all persons. And it was that that was the Renaissance.
The rediscovery of that we will see produces a very strange archetype. Because along with the excellence of the Renaissance for the Hermetic thread in Christianity, will also come this reawakening of the doctrinaire theological penumbra of the second-rate minds. Of the inferior psychics. And it is this that will uh...
END OF SIDE ONE
Is this too much? I'm sorry to have to speak so strongly. But this is it's, it's difficult to follow I know. But I hope you're getting a sense this is strategically important. This is why we are all having such a hard time.
Speaker in the room: **inaudible sentence**
No. put that out of your mind. We're talking about the Hermetic tradition. We're talking here, we're talking about Dionysius the Areopagite being a Hermetic teacher. And if this is Christian Hermeticism.
If you want to talk about something ancient in this tradition, we go back to the pyramid of Unas. We go back to Thoth's instructions to own us 3000 B.C. and that the soul has to be able to make its journey. We saw that the change came about in the time of about 0 B.C., where the soul does not make its journey after life but makes its journey in life. That instead of, of, of an after-life it's an in-life experience. So that this is then wisdom for the living. And I think that we were told that. I think the, the accurate reports are this that this is good news for the living. This is not for the dead. This is for the living.
And now this is the major emendation. There's been no improvement on this up until our own day. The major inundation in this is that the only way that this can be apprehended and appreciated is through a spiritual communion. Which must include a synaxis with it. And that for this to happen there has to be someone who is capable of bringing this the illumination into the presence. Otherwise it doesn't happen. Otherwise they're on the approximations.
So that he writes,
We deem most venerable these oracle's which are divinely inspired initiators have given us in sacred writings and theological books. And further such as our leaders have revealed to us from these same holy men by a more immaterial initiation that is very similar to the heavenly hierarchy since it is from mind to mind. It is corporeal because it comes through the medium of speech. And yet quite immaterial because it is unwritten. The divinely inspired bishops did not transmit these things in undisguised formulas for the common usage of sacred ceremony but in sacred symbols. Because not everyone is holy. Nor as scripture says does knowledge belong to all. The elect. necessarily therefore, after they themselves have been fulfilled with the sacred gift by the supra essential deity.
How they been fulfilled by the gift? They've become illuminated. How do they become illuminated? Because their contemplative mode matches up with the emanation from the divine. It is matching up that makes the, the illumination.
Picture the, the emanation coming down and the contemplation coming up. And where they crisscross, if you could do a cross-section of that, that would be the illumination. Well but you can do a cross-section anywhere along that. That's true. And there are nine cuts that one could make. and those nine cuts would show nine phases of a illumination, which are the hierarchies. And that's what Dionysius is teaching here.
Why is there nine? Because it is a Hermetic sacred structure. That if it's, if it's differentiated it differentiates itself into Trinities. into triads. And because the nature is for it to be into triads there must be three triads. Three times three is nine. That its differentiation is not according to the mundane psychic mind, which would be a bifurcation into dualities. Into pairs. But it's spiritual not psychic therefore its differentiation is into triads. And because it's in triads, there are always three triads. This is, this is the spiritual geometry as opposed to the mental or psychic geometry, which is always dualistic. Four is stable in terms of Earth but nine is stable in terms of celestial.
Necessarily therefore, after they themselves had been filled with a sacred gift by the supra essential deity, they were sent forth by his supremely divine goodness to proclaim this gift to posterity. Ardently desiring its elevation and deification with their own like Gods. The first leaders of our hierarchy transmitted to us the super celestial in sensible figures in accordance with the sacred ordinances. They transmitted the unified in variety and multiplicity. The divine in the human. The immaterial in the material. The supra essential on our own level. Making use of both written and oral instructions. They did this not merely on account of the unholy, for whom it is sacrilegious even to approach the symbols. But as I said because our hierarchy is something symbolic proportion to our nature that needs material things. For our more divine elevation from them to the spiritual.
This is very powerful. This is very powerful here.
The divine in the human. The immaterial in the material. The unified in variety. That as long as the unity is kept. As long as the sealed spiritual integrity is kept. Wherever it participates it illuminates. But if the integrity is, is not a sealed integrity. If it's just a made-up integrity. If it's just approximation. If it's just a surrogate. If it's a mental integration or just a physical integration. And not a spiritual unity it won't work.
It's like one of the most esoteric things in the Pythagorean communities a thousand years before this. One of Pythagoras is basic teachings is that a woman may participate in sacred ceremonies, in sacred mysteries. And if she has a husband, if they have had sexuality that day she may still participate in those sacred mysteries. But if she has had sexuality with someone that she is not married to, she may not participate. Because there's not a physical linking together. It's not a psychical linking together. But there's something there in the spiritual seal that that links it together. Dionysius the Areopagite is speaking here a very sophisticated level. He's saying that we have to be sealed into a community, into a communion, with the synaxis operating dynamically in it for us then to have these teachings. And, and then the teachings are here in the material. Then there in the humor. then there in the variety. Then the variety is not multiplicity but is unity. Then the human is sacred not profane.
Notice here that the that the, the differentiation is not between secular and sacred but profane and sacred. There's secular. There's sacred. And then there's profane. You see the triad in that. Not a question of someone moving from the secular sphere to the sacred sphere. The secular can accept the sacred quite easily. There's no problem. One has to watch out for profanation. And so, this is, this is the point that he's making here.
How do we seal ourselves? It's through initiation. What is that initiation? The initiation is having the experience of mind to mind. With whom? With God. Mind to mind. How is that done? It's done by a higher arc, a hierophant bringing the hierarchies to bear in the communion so that the experience is there. And the communion has veracity.
He writes here,
However, to the divine initiators and sacred things the reasons behind the symbols have been revealed. And they are not to be explained to those still being initiated. It is known that those who make laws concerning what is sacred and divinely handed down arrange the hierarchy and well fixed and distinct ranks of orders. And in proportional sacred distributions of what is proper for each according to its desserts. Therefore, I've confided this divine gift to you along with other hierarchical matters. Trusting and your sacred promises, for it as well to recall them, that you will not commit to everyone all the holy doctrines of the sublime Episcopal Order. But only to the Godlike teachers of sacred things of the same rank as yourself. Whom according to the hierarchical precept you will persuade to promise to treat pure things purely. To communicate the works of God only to Godly men. Things that perfect to those becoming perfect. And most holy things to the holy.
Then he gives us, and I'm not going to go into it this week, but I'll go into it next week. Then he gives us the first detailed Hermetic initiation in Christian terms of illumination. Showing the ancient Hierophantic Hermetic tradition, the initiation. Now in a Christian mode so that Christian Hermeticism actually comes into being in a ceremonial way. One can understand it. It's written down and we'll see next week because we'll go into it, the mystery of illumination. And the way in which a baptism and, and the Eucharist are used together complementarity to create the sacrament, the sacramentalness of it.
This material by 500 A.D. was extraordinarily work, well worked into the Christian tradition. And all during the 500's and all during the first half of the 7th century. Say from 500 to 650 A.D., Christian Hermeticism grew esoterically. Especially in Alexandria and especially in Jerusalem. These were the two places where it grew.
When Alexandria fell to the Arab conquests in 642. Omar came in with his troops and they took over the city of Alexandria in 642 A.D. The reverence for Hermes was still kept intact for Islam. And in fact, one finds two different indications of this, at least. One is in The Quran because there are two mentions of Hermes Trismegistus in The Quran. They do not call in Arabic him they do not call him Hermes, but they call him Idris. And in two surahs. This is the Yusuf Ali translation of The Quran. in surah 19, 56 and 57, whereas being mentioned who shall be listed in the book as being spiritual teachers for man. And Moses is there of course. And Aaron is there. And then also mentioned in the book the case of Idris. "He was a man of truth and sincerity, sincerity and a prophet and we raised him to a lofty station." Idris is Hermes Trismegistus.
And then again in Surah 21, 85 and 86. "And remember Ismael, Idris and Zulkafel, all men of constancy and patience. We admitted them to our mercy for they were the righteous ones." Zulkafel is the Arabic for Ezekiel. Ezekiel, Hermes and Israel. And so, in The Quran we have these two references to the sacredness of the person of Hermes Trismegistus.
Now again I don't have time this week, but I will go into it next week. The Muslim Neoplatonist. The Brethren of Purity. The Ikhwan Alsafa from Basra. Southern Iraq down in the Persian Gulf. About the 8th or 9th century A.D. The Muslim Neoplatonist will bring the Hermetic tradition into Islam. And a lot of Sufi thought then we'll have Hermetic undertones to it.
But the Hermetic undertones in Islam will have a strong influx of what is called Neoplatonism. Because what will be operating there will be the hierarchies and the emanations. And of course, what is all of one piece with the emanations and the hierarchies is the complement to that. which is the contemplation and the illumination. And because the illumination is the experience of instantaneity, that will become the intuitive esoteric experience in Sufi thought. Instantaneity. Spontaneousness. That the divine is eminent anywhere instantly if you will only look directly to have it so. But that you're looking must not be like in some kind of off the cuff Zen flash. But it must be from the purity of one's contemplative energy brought to bear. Because the hierarchical amplification of one's self is in order and intact and working. And that's why the divine is manifest there and then. Because he is. Not because one says so or hopes so. There are no fingers crossed. The hands are open. The Lord is there.
So, we see how powerful the Hermetic tradition becomes in the 500's and the 600s'. And what looked like at first like it was going to go completely underground we see that it goes into the most esoteric underground of all. It becomes the backbone of the major religious traditions. Christianity and Islam of the medieval period.
Well we'll see some more of this next week
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