Hermetica

This article is about the texts attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. For the Argentine heavy metal band, see Hermética.

The Hermetica are the philosophical texts attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus (a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth). These texts may vary widely in content and purpose, but are usually subdivided into two main categories:

• The so-called 'technical' Hermetica: this category contains treatises dealing with astrology, medicine and pharmacology, alchemy, and magic, the oldest of which were written in Greek and may go back as far as to the second or third century BCE. Many of the texts belonging to this category were later translated into Arabic and Latin, often being extensively revised and expanded throughout the centuries. Some of them were also originally written in Arabic, though in many cases their status as an original work or translation remains unclear. These Arabic and Latin Hermetic texts were widely copied throughout the Middle Ages (the most famous example being the Emerald Tablet).
• The so-called 'philosophical' Hermetica: this category contains religio-philosophical treatises which were mostly written in the second and third centuries CE, though the very earliest of them may go back to the first century CE. They are chiefly focused on the relationship between human beings, the cosmos, and God (thus combining philosophical anthropology, cosmology, and theology), and on moral exhortations calling for a way of life (the so-called 'way of Hermes') leading to spiritual rebirth, and eventually to apotheosis in the form of a heavenly ascent. The treatises in this category were probably all originally written in Greek, even though some of them only survive in Coptic, Armenian, or Latin translations. During the Middle Ages, most of them were only accessible to Byzantine scholars (an important exception being the Asclepius, which mainly survives in an early Latin translation), until a compilation of Greek Hermetic treatises known as the Corpus Hermeticum was translated into Latin by the Renaissance scholars Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499) and Lodovico Lazzarelli (1447–1500).

Though strongly influenced by Greek and Hellenistic philosophy (especially Platonism and Stoicism), and to a lesser extent also by Jewish ideas, many of the early Greek Hermetic treatises do contain distinctly Egyptian elements, most notably in their affinity with the traditional Egyptian wisdom literature. This used to be the subject of much doubt, but it is now generally admitted that the Hermetica as such did in fact originate in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt, even if most of the later Hermetic writings (which continued to be composed at least until the twelfth century CE) clearly did not. It may perhaps even be the case that the great bulk of the early Greek Hermetica were written by Hellenizing members of the Egyptian priestly class, whose intellectual activity was centred in the environment of the Egyptian temples.

The technical Hermetica

Greek

Greek astrological Hermetica

The oldest known texts associated with Hermes Trismegistus are a number of astrological works which may go back as far as to the second or third century BCE:

• The Salmeschoiniaka (the "Wandering of the Influences"), perhaps composed in Alexandria in the second or third century BCE, deals with the configurations of the stars.
• The Nechepsos-Petosiris texts are a number of anonymous works dating to the second century BCE which were falsely attributed to the Egyptian king Necho II (610–595 BCE, referred to in the texts as Nechepsos) and his legendary priest Petese (referred to in the texts as Petosiris). These texts, only fragments of which survive, ascribe the astrological knowledge they convey to the authority of Hermes.
• The Art of Eudoxus is a treatise on astronomy which was preserved in a second-century BCE papyrus and which mentions Hermes as an authority.
• The Liber Hermetis ("The Book of Hermes") is an important work on astrology laying out the names of the decans (a distinctly Egyptian system which divided the zodiac into 36 parts). It survives only in an early (fourth- or fifth-century CE) Latin translation, but contains elements that may be traced to the second or third century BCE.

Other early Greek Hermetic works on astrology include:

• The Brontologion: a treatise on the various effects of thunder in different months.
• The Peri seismōn ("On earthquakes"): a treatise on the relation between earthquakes and astrological signs.
• The Book of Asclepius Called Myriogenesis: a treatise on astrological medicine.
• The Holy Book of Hermes to Asclepius: a treatise on astrological botany describing the relationships between various plants and the decans.
• The Fifteen Stars, Stones, Plants and Images: a treatise on astrological mineralogy and botany dealing with the effect of the stars on the pharmaceutical powers of minerals and plants.

Greek alchemical Hermetica

Starting in the first century BCE, a number of Greek works on alchemy were attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. These are now all lost, except for a number of fragments (one of the larger of which is called Isis the Prophetess to her Son Horus) preserved in later alchemical works dating to the second and third centuries CE. Especially important is the use made of them by the Egyptian alchemist Zosimus of Panopolis (fl. c. 300 CE), who also seems to have been familiar with the religio-philosophical Hermetica. Hermes' name would become more firmly associated with alchemy in the medieval Arabic sources (see below), of which it is not yet clear to what extent they drew on the earlier Greek literature.

Greek magical Hermetica

• The Cyranides is a work on healing magic which treats of the magical powers and healing properties of minerals, plants and animals, for which it regularly cites Hermes as a source. It was independently translated both into Arabic and Latin.
• The Greek Magical Papyri are a modern collection of papyri dating from various periods between the second century BCE and the fifth century CE. They mainly contain practical instructions for spells and incantations, some of which cite Hermes as a source.

Arabic

Many Arabic works attributed to Hermes Trismegistus still exist today, although the great majority of them have not yet been published and studied by modern scholars. For this reason too, it is often not clear to what extent they drew on earlier Greek sources. The following is a very incomplete list of known works:

Arabic astrological Hermetica

Some of the earliest attested Arabic Hermetic texts deal with astrology:

• The Qaḍīb al-dhahab ("The Rod of Gold"), or the Kitāb Hirmis fī taḥwīl sinī l-mawālīd ("The Book of Hermes on the Revolutions of the Years of the Nativities") is an Arabic astrological work translated from Middle Persian by ʿUmar ibn al-Farrukhān al-Ṭabarī (d. 816 CE), who was the court astrologer of the Abbasid caliph al-Mansur (r. 754-775).
• The Carmen astrologicum is an astrological work originally written by the first century CE astrologer Dorotheus of Sidon. It is lost in Greek, but survives in an Arabic translation, which was in turn based upon a Middle Persian intermediary. It was also translated by ʿUmar ibn al-Farrukhān al-Ṭabarī. The extant Arabic text refers to two Hermeses, and cites a book of Hermes on the positions of the planets.
• The Kitāb Asrār an-nujūm ("The Book of the Secrets of the Stars", later translated into Latin as the Liber de stellis beibeniis) is a treatise describing the influences of the brightest fixed stars on personal characteristics. The Arabic work was translated from a Middle Persian version which can be shown to date from before c. 500 CE, and which shared a source with the Byzantine astrologer Rhetorius (fl. c. 600 CE).
• The Kitāb ʿArḍ Miftāḥ al-Nujūm ("The Book of the Exposition of the Key to the Stars") is an Arabic astrological treatise attributed to Hermes which claims to have been translated in 743 CE, but which in reality was probably translated in the circles of Abu Ma'shar (787–886 CE).

Arabic alchemical Hermetica

• The Sirr al-khalīqa wa-ṣanʿat al-ṭabīʿa ("The Secret of Creation and the Art of Nature"), also known as the Kitāb al-ʿilal ("The Book of Causes") is an encyclopedic work on natural philosophy falsely attributed to Apollonius of Tyana (c. 15–100, Arabic: Balīnūs or Balīnās). It was compiled in Arabic in the late eighth or early ninth century, but was most likely based on (much) older Greek and/or Syriac sources. It contains the earliest known version of the sulfur-mercury theory of metals (according to which all metals are composed of various proportions of sulfur and mercury), which lay at the foundation of all theories of metallic composition until the eighteenth century. In the frame story of the Sirr al-khalīqa, Balīnūs tells his readers that he discovered the text in a vault below a statue of Hermes in Tyana, and that, inside the vault, an old corpse on a golden throne held the Emerald Tablet. It was translated into Latin by Hugo of Santalla in the twelfth century.
• The Emerald Tablet: a compact and cryptic text first attested in the Sirr al-khalīqa wa-ṣanʿat al-ṭabīʿa (late eighth or early ninth century). There are several other, slightly different Arabic versions (among them one quoted by Jabir ibn Hayyan, and one found in the longer version of the pseudo-Aristotelian Sirr al-asrār or "Secret of Secrets"), but these all date from a later period. It was translated several times into Latin in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and was widely regarded by medieval and early modern alchemists as the foundation of their art.
• The Risālat al-Sirr ("The Epistle of the Secret") is an Arabic alchemical treatise probably composed in tenth century Fatimid Egypt.
• The Risālat al-Falakiyya al-kubrā ("The Great Treatise of the Spheres") is an Arabic alchemical treatise composed in the tenth or eleventh century. Perhaps inspired by the Emerald Tablet, it describes the author's (Hermes') attainment of secret knowledge through his ascension of the seven heavenly spheres.
• The Kitāb dhakhīrat al-Iskandar ("The Treasure of Alexander"): a work dealing with alchemy, talismans, and specific properties, which cites Hermes as its ultimate source.
• The Liber Hermetis de alchemia ("The Book of Hermes on Alchemy"), also known as the Liber dabessi or the Liber rebis is a collection of commentaries on the Emerald Tablet. Translated from the Arabic, it is only extant in Latin. It is this Latin translation of the Emerald Tablet on which all later versions are based.

Arabic magical Hermetica

• The Kitāb al-Isṭamākhīs, Kitāb al-Isṭamāṭīs, Kitāb al-Usṭuwwaṭās, Kitāb al-Madīṭīs, and Kitāb al-Hādīṭūs, dubbed by Kevin van Bladel the Talismanic Pseudo-Aristotelian Hermetica, are a number of closely related and partially overlapping texts. Purporting to be written by Aristotle in order to teach his pupil Alexander the great the secrets of Hermes, they deal with the names and powers of the planetary spirits, the making of talismans, and the concept of a personal "perfect nature". Extracts from them appear in pseudo-Apollonius of Tyana's Sirr al-khalīqa wa-ṣanʿat al-ṭabīʿa ("The Secret of Creation and the Art of Nature", c. 750–850, see above), in the Epistles of the Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ ("The Epistles of the Brethren of Purity", c. 900–1000), in Maslama al-Qurṭubī's Ghāyat al-Ḥakīm ("The Aim of the Sage", 960, better known under its Latin title as Picatrix), and in the works of the Persian philosopher Suhrawardī (1154–1191). One of them was translated into Latin in the twelfth or thirteenth century under the title Liber Antimaquis.
• The Cyranides is a Greek work on healing magic which treats of the magical powers and healing properties of minerals, plants and animals, for which it regularly cites Hermes as a source. It was translated into Arabic in the ninth century, but in this translation all references to Hermes seem to have disappeared.
• The Sharḥ Kitāb Hirmis al-Ḥakīm fī Maʿrifat Ṣifat al-Ḥayyāt wa-l-ʿAqārib ("The Commentary on the Book of the Wise Hermes on the Properties of Snakes and Scorpions"): a treatise on the venom of snakes an other poisonous animals.
• The Dāʾirat al-aḥruf al-abjadiyya (The Circle of Letters of the Alphabet"): a practical treatise on letter magic attributed to Hermes.

The religio-philosophical Hermetica

Contrary to the so-called 'technical' Hermetica, whose writing began in the early Hellenistic period and continued deep into the Middle Ages, the extant religio-philosophical Hermetica were for the most part produced in a relatively short period of time, i.e., between c. 100 and c. 300 CE. They regularly take the form of dialogues between Hermes Trismegistus and his disciples Tat, Asclepius, and Ammon, and mostly deal with philosophical anthropology, cosmology, and theology. The following is a list of all known works in this category:

Corpus Hermeticum

First Latin edition of the Corpus Hermeticum, translated by Marsilio Ficino, 1471 CE.

Undoubtedly the most famous among the religio-philosophical Hermetica is the Corpus Hermeticum, a selection of seventeen Greek treatises that was first compiled by Byzantine editors, and translated into Latin in the fifteenth century by Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499) and Lodovico Lazzarelli (1447–1500). Ficino translated the first fourteen treatises (I–XIV), while Lazzarelli translated the remaining three (XVI–XVIII). The name of this collection is somewhat misleading, since it contains only a very small selection of extant Hermetic texts (whereas the word corpus is usually reserved for the entire body of extant writings related to some author or subject). Its individual treatises were quoted by many early authors from the second and third centuries on, but the compilation as such is first attested only in the writings of the Byzantine philosopher Michael Psellus (c. 1017–1078).

The most well known among the treatises contained in this compilation is its opening treatise, which is called the Poimandres. However, at least until the nineteenth century, this name (under various forms, such Pimander or Pymander) was also commonly used to designate the compilation as a whole.

In 1462 Ficino was working on a Latin translation of the collected works of Plato for his patron Cosimo de' Medici (the first member of the famous de' Medici family who ruled Florence during the Italian Renaissance), but when a manuscript of the Corpus Hermeticum became available, he immediately interrupted his work on Plato in order to start translating the works of Hermes, which were thought to be much more ancient, and therefore much more authoritative, than those of Plato. This translation provided a seminal impetus in the development of Renaissance thought and culture, having a profound impact on the flourishing of alchemy and magic in early modern Europe, as well as influencing philosophers such as Ficino's student Pico della Mirandola (1463–1494), Giordano Bruno (1548–1600), Francesco Patrizi (1529–1597), Robert Fludd (1574–1637), and many others.

Asclepius

The Asclepius (also known as the Perfect Discourse, from Greek Logos teleios) mainly survives in a Latin translation, though some Greek and Coptic fragments are also extant. It is the only Hermetic treatise belonging to the religio-philosophical category that remained available to Latin readers throughout the Middle Ages.

Definitions of Hermes Trismegistus to Asclepius

The Definitions of Hermes Trismegistus to Asclepius is a collection of aphorisms that has mainly been preserved in a sixth-century CE Armenian translation, but which likely goes back to the first century CE. The main argument for this early dating is the fact that some of its aphorisms are cited in multiple independent Greek Hermetic works. According to Jean-Pierre Mahé, these aphorisms contain the core of the teachings which are found in the later Greek religio-philosophical Hermetica.

The Stobaean excerpts

In fifth-century Macedonia (northern Greece), Joannes Stobaeus or "John of Stobi" compiled a huge Anthology of Greek poetical, rhetorical, historical, and philosophical literature in order to educate his son Septimius. Though epitomized by later Byzantine copyists, it still remains a treasure trove of information about ancient philosophy and literature which would otherwise be entirely lost. Among the excerpts of ancient philosophical literature preserved by Stobaeus are also a significant number of discourses and dialogues attributed to Hermes. While mostly related to the religio-philosophical treatises as found in the Corpus Hermeticum, they also contains some material that is rather more of a 'technical' nature. Perhaps the most famous of the Stobaean excerpts, and also the longest, is the Korē kosmou ("The Daughter of the Cosmos").

Hermes among the Nag Hammadi findings

Among the Coptic treatises which were found in 1945 in the Upper Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi (the Nag Hammadi library), there are also three treatises attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. Like all documents found in Nag Hammadi, these were translated from the Greek. They consist of some fragments from the Asclepius (VI,8; mainly preserved in Latin, see above), The Prayer of Thanksgiving (VI,7) with an accompanying scribal note (VI,7a), and an important new text called the Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth (VI,6).

The Oxford and Vienna fragments

A number of short fragments from some otherwise unknown Hermetic works are preserved in a manuscript at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, dealing with the soul, the senses, law, psychology, and embryology. Four short fragments from what once was a collection of ten Hermetic treatises, one of which was called "On Energies", are also preserved in a papyrus now housed in Vienna.

History of scholarship on the Hermetica

During the Renaissance, all texts attributed to Hermes Trismegistus were still generally believed to be of ancient Egyptian origin (i.e., to date from before the time of Moses, or even from before the flood). In the early seventeenth century, the classical scholar Isaac Casaubon (1559–1614) demonstrated that some of the Greek texts betrayed too recent a vocabulary, and must rather date from the late Hellenistic or early Christian period. This conclusion was reaffirmed in the early twentieth century by the work of scholars like C. H. Dodd. More recent research, while reaffirming the dating of the earliest Greek treatises in the period of syncretic cultural ferment in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt, suggests more continuity with the culture of ancient Egypt than had previously been believed. The earliest Greek Hermetic treatises contain many parallels with Egyptian prophecies and hymns to the gods, and close comparisons can be found with Egyptian wisdom literature, which (like many of the early Greek Hermetica) is characteristically couched in words of advice from a "father" to a "son". It has also been shown that some Demotic (late Egyptian) papyri contain substantial sections of a dialogue of the Hermetic type between Thoth and a disciple.

In contradistinction to the early Greek religio-philosophical Hermetica, which have been studied from a scholarly perspective since the early seventeenth century, the 'technical' Hermetica (both the early Greek treatises and the later Arabic and Latin works) remain largely unexplored by modern scholarship.

See also

• Alchemy
• Ancient, Hellenistic, and Roman Egypt
• Astrology
• Hellenistic Judaism
• Hellenistic period (general)
• Hellenistic philosophy
• Hellenistic religion
• Hermes Trismegistus
• Hermeticism
• Emerald Tablet
• Magic (Hellenistic, medieval European, Renaissance)
• Middle Platonism
• Sage (philosophy)
• Stoic cosmology and theology
• Syncretism
• Talisman
• Theurgy
• Wisdom literature

Bibliography

English translations of Hermetic texts

Some pieces of Hermetica have been translated into English multiple times by modern Hermeticists. However, the following list is strictly limited to scholarly translations:

• Copenhaver, Brian P. 1992. Hermetica: The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin Asclepius in a New English Translation, with Notes and Introduction. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-42543-3
• Litwa, M. David 2018. Hermetica II: The Excerpts of Stobaeus, Papyrus Fragments, and Ancient Testimonies in an English Translation with Notes and Introductions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Mahé, Jean-Pierre 1999. "The Definitions of Hermes Trismegistus to Asclepius" in: Salaman, Clement et al. (eds.). The Way of Hermes. London: Duckworth, pp. 99–122.
• Robinson, James M. 1990. The Nag Hammadi Library in English. 3th, revised edition. New York: HarperCollins. (contains translations of some fragments from the Asclepius (VI,8), The Prayer of Thanksgiving (VI,7) with its accompanying scribal note (VI,7a), and the Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth (VI,6) by James Brashler, Peter A. Dirkse and Douglas M. Parrott, pp. 321-338)
• Waegeman, Maryse 1986. Amulet and Alphabet: Magical Amulets in the First Book of Cyranides. Amsterdam.

Secondary literature

• Bull, Christian H. 2018. The Tradition of Hermes Trismegistus: The Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom. Leiden: Brill.
• Ebeling, Florian 2007. The Secret History of Hermes Trismegistus: Hermeticism from Ancient to Modern Times. Ithaca: Cornell university press.
• Festugière, André-Jean 1944-1954. La Révélation d'Hermès Trismégiste. Vol. I-IV. Paris: Gabalda.
• Festugière, André-Jean 1967. Hermétisme et mystique païenne. Paris: Aubier Montaigne.
• Fowden, Garth 1986. The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical Approach to the Late Pagan Mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Jasnow, Richard and Zausich, Karl-Th. 1995. "A Book of Thoth?", paper given at the 7th International Congress of Egyptologists, Cambridge, 3–9 September 1995.
• Jasnow, Richard 2016. "Between Two Waters: The Book of Thoth and the Problem of Greco-Egyptian Interaction" in: Rutherford, Ian (ed.). Greco-Egyptian Interactions: Literature, Translation, and Culture, 500 BCE - 300 CE. Oxford University Press.
• Kraus, Paul 1942-1943. Jâbir ibn Hayyân: Contribution à l'histoire des idées scientifiques dans l'Islam. I. Le corpus des écrits jâbiriens. II. Jâbir et la science grecque. Cairo: Institut français d'archéologie orientale. (vol. II, pp. 270-303 about pseudo-Apollonius of Tyana's Sirr al-khalīqa or "The Secret of Creation")
• Lucentini, Paolo et al. (eds.). Hermetism from Late Antiquity to Humanism. La tradizione ermetica dal mondo tardo-antico all'umanesimo. Atti del Convegno internazionale di studi, Napoli, 20-24 novembre 2001. Turnhout: Brepols.
• Mahé, Jean-Pierre 1978-1982. Hermès en Haute-Egypte. Vol. I-II. Quebec: Presses de l'Université Laval.
• Mahé, Jean-Pierre 1996. "Preliminary Remarks on the Demotic 'Book of Thoth' and the Greek Hermetica" in: Vigiliae Christianae, 50(4), pp. 353-363.
• Nock, Arthur Darby and Festugière, André-Jean 1945-1954 (eds.). Corpus Hermeticum. 4 vols. Paris: Belles Lettres. (critical edition of the Greek text of the Corpus Hermeticum and the Stobaean excerpts; critical edition of the Latin text of the Asclepius)
• Pearson, Birger 1981. “Jewish Elements in Corpus Hermeticum I (Poimandres)” in: Van den Broek, Roelof and Vermaseren, Maarten J. (eds.). Studies in Gnosticism and Hellenistic Religions presented to Gilles Quispel on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday. Leiden: Brill, pp. 336-348.
• Plessner, Martin 1954. “Hermes Trismegistus and Arab Science” in: Studia Islamica, 2, pp. 45-59.
• Ruska, Julius 1926. Tabula Smaragdina. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der hermetischen Literatur. Heidelberg: Winter.
• Van Bladel, Kevin 2009. The Arabic Hermes: From Pagan Sage to Prophet of Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Vereno, Ingolf 1992. Studien zum ältesten alchemistischen Schrifttum. Auf der Grundlage zweier erstmals edierter arabischer Hermetica. Islamkundliche Untersuchungen, band 155. Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag.
• Weisser, Ursula 1980. Das Buch über das Geheimnis der Schöpfung von Pseudo-Apollonios von Tyana. Berlin: De Gruyter.

External links

• The Gnostic Society Library hosts translations of the Corpus Hermeticum, the Asclepius, the Stobaean excerpts, and some ancient testimonies on Hermes (all taken from Mead, George R. S. 1906. Thrice Greatest Hermes: Studies in Hellenistic Theosophy and Gnosis. Vols. 2-3. London: Theosophical Publishing Society; note that these translations are outdated and were written by a member of the Theosophical Society; modern scholarly translation are found above), as well as translations of the three Hermetic treatises in the Nag Hammadi findings (reproduced with permission from the translations prepared by James Brashler, Peter A. Dirkse and Douglas M. Parrott as originally published in: Robinson, James M. 1978. The Nag Hammadi Library in English. Leiden: Brill).