Emerald Tablet of Hermes

by Hermes Trismegistus

  Burckhardt: "dissolution of consciousness from all formal ‘coagulations' is

  followed by the ‘crystalisation' of the Spirit, so that active and passive are perfectly united."

  Schumaker: "Separate the volatile part of the substance by vaporization but continue heating until the vapour reunites with the parent body, whereupon you will have obtained the Stone".

  On #9

  Trithemius: When the ternary has returned to Unity cleansed of all impurities "the mind understands without contradiction all the mysteries of the excellently arranged arcanum".

  Bacstrom: the black matter becomes White and Red. The Red "having been carried to perfection, medicinaly and for Metals" is capable of supporting complete mental and physical health, and provides "ample means, in finitum multiplicable to be benevolent and charitable, without any dimunation of our inexhaustable resources, therefore well may it be called the Glory of the whole World". Contemplation and study of the Philosopher's Stone ("L. P.") elevates the mind to God. "The Philosophers say with great Truth, that the L.P. either finds a good man or makes one". "By invigorating the Organs the Soul makes use of for communicating with exterior objects, the Soul must aquire greater powers, not only for conception but also for retention". If we pray and have faith "all Obscurity must vanish of course".

  Burckhardt: "Thus the light of the Spirit becomes constant..[and] ignorance, deception, uncertainty, doubt and foolishness will be removed from consciousness".

  On #10

  Trithemius: The Philosopher's Stone is another name for the ‘one thing', and is able to "conquer every subtile thing and to penetrate every solid". "This very noble virtue... consists of maximal fortitude, touching everything with its desirable excellence".

  Bacstrom: "The L.P. does possess all the Powers concealed in Nature, not for destruction but for exhaltation and regeneration of matter, in the three Departments of Nature". "It refixes the most subtil Oxygen into its own firey Nature". The power increases "in a tenfold ratio, at every multiplication". So it can penetrate Gold and Silver, and fix mercury, Crystals and Glass Fluxes.

  Burckhardt: "Alchemical fixation is nevertheless more inward... Through its union with the spirit bodily consciousness itself becomes a fine and penetrating power". He quotes Jabir "The body becomes a spirit, and takes on... fineness, lightness, extensibility, coloration... The spirit... becomes a body and aquires the latter's resistance to fire, immobility and duration. From both bodies a light substance is born , which.. precisely takes up a middle position between the two extremes".

  Schumaker: The product of the distillation and reunion will "dominate less solid substances, but because of its own subtlety it will ‘penetrate' and hence dominate, other solid things less pure and quasi-spiritual than itself".

  On #11

  Burckhardt: "the little world is created according to the prototype of the great world", when the human realises their original nature is the image of God.

  Schumaker: "The alchemical operation is a paradigm of the creative process. We may note the sexual overtones of what has preceeded"

  On #12

  Burckhardt: "In the Arabic text this is: “This way is traversed by the sages".

  On #13

  Hortulanus: "He here teaches in an occult manner the things from which the stone is made." "the stone is called perfect because it has in itself the nature of minerals, ofvegetables and of animals. For the stone is three and one, tripple and single, having four natures.... and three colours, namely black, white and red. It is also called the grain of corn because unless it shall have died, it remains itself alone. And if it shall have died... it bears much fruit when it is in conjunction..."

  Newton: "on account of this art Mercurius is called thrice greatest, having three parts of the philosophy of the whole world, since he signifies the Mercury of the philosophers.... and has dominion in the mineral kingdom, the vegetable kingdom, and the animal kingdom".

  Bacstrom: the wisdom of the world (?) is hidden in "Chiram and its Use". Hermes "signifies a Serpent, and the Serpent used to be an Emblem of Knowledge or Wisdom."

  Burckhardt: "The three parts of wisdom correspond to the three great divisions of the universe, namely, the spiritual, psychic and corporeal realms, whose symbols are heaven, air and earth".

  Schumaker: "The usual explanation of Tristmegistus.. is that Hermes was the greatest philosopher, the greatest priest, and the greatest king".

  05. General

  Trithemius: "our philosophy is celestial, not worldly, in order that we may faithfuly behold, by means of a direct intuition of the mind through faith and knowledge, that principle which we call God...."

  Trithemius: "Study generates knowledge; knowledge prepares love; love, similarity; similarity, communion; communion, virtue; virtue, dignity; dignity, power; and power performs the miracle".

  Newton "Inferior and superior, fixed and volatile, sulphur and quicksilver have a similar nature and are one thing, like man and wife. For they differ from one another only by degree of digestion and maturity. Sulphur is mature quicksilver, and quicksilver is immature sulphur: and on account of this affinity they unite like male and female, and they act on each other, and through that action they are mutually transmuted into each other and procreate a more noble offspring to accomplish the miracles of this one thing". "And just as all things were created from one Chaos by the design of one God, so in our art all things... are born from this one thing which is our Chaos, by the design of the Artificer and the skilful adaptation of things. And the generation of this is similar to the human, truly from a father and mother".

  Blavatsky: the mysterious thing "is the universal, magical agent, the astral light, which in the correlations of its forces furnishes the alkahest, the philosopher's stone, and the elixir of life. Hermetic philosophy names it Azoth, the soul of the world, the celestial virgin, the great Magnes, etc" It appears to be that which gives organisation ("the maze of force-correlations"), and form i.e. the perfect geometry of snowflakes.

  Sherwood Taylor: "the operation of the Sun.. was carried out by a ‘spirit', universal, the source of all things, having the power of perfecting them. Its virtue is integral [# 6a] (ie having the power to convert the diverse into a single substance), if it be turned into earth (ie. solidified). This conveyed that the Stone was to be a solidified pneuma. Pneuma was the link between earth and heaven, having the virtue of the celestial and subterranean regions- the power of the whole cosmos from the fixed stars to the centre of the earth. It overcomes every nature and penetrates every solid. It is the source of the whole world and so it can be the means of changing things in a wonderful way. The three parts of the philosophy of the whole world are presumably of the celestial, terrestrial, and subterranean regions".

  Shah: The table is "the same as the Sufi dictum... ‘Man is the microcosm, creation the macrocosm - the unity. All comes from One. By the joining of the power of contemplation all can be attained. This essence must be separated from the body first, then combined with the body. This is the Work. Start with yourself, end with all. Before man, beyond man, transformation'".

  06. A Commentry Of Ibn Umail

  HERMUS said the secret of everything and the life of everything is Water.... This water becomes in wheat, ferment; in the vine, wine; in the olive, olive oil.... The begining of the child is from water.... Regarding this spiritual water and the sanctified and thirsty earth, HERMUS the great, crowned with the glorious wisdom and the sublime sciences, said [#1] Truth it is, indubtible, certain and correct, [#2] that the High is from the Low and the Low is from the High. They bring about wonders through the one, just as things are produced from that one essence by a single preparation. Later by his statement [#4] Its father is the Sun and its mother the Moon he meant their male and their female. They are the two birds which are linked together in the pictures given regarding the beginning of the operation, and from them the spiritual tinctures are produced. And similarly they are at the end of the operation. Later in his statement [#7
?] the subtle is more honourable than the gross, he means by the subtle the divine spiritual water; and by the gross the earthly body. As for his later statement [#8] with gentleness and wisdom it will ascend from the earth to the sky, and will take fire from the higher lights, he means by this the distillation and the raising of the water into the air. As for his later statement [#8a] It will descend to the earth, containing the strength of the high and the low, he means by this the breathing in (istinshaq) of the air, and the taking of the spirit from it, and its subsequent elevation to the highest degree of heat, and it is the Fire, and the low is the body, and its content of the controlling earthly power which imparts the colours. For there lie in it those higher powers, as well as the earthly powers which were submerged in it.

  The natural operation and decay causes it to be manifest, and hence the strength of the earth, and of the air, and of the higher fire passed in to it. Later he said [#9] it will overcome the high and the low because it in it is found the light of lights: and consequently the darkness will flee

  from it. [See Stapleton et al. p 74, 81.]

  Appendix

  Translation from Roger Bacon's edition of Secretum Secretorum made c 1445

  1)Trouth hath hym so, and it is no doubt,

  2) that the lover is to the heigher, and the heigher to the lower aunsweren.

  The worcher forsoth of all myracles is the one and sool God, of and fro Whom Cometh all meruelous operacions.

  3) So all thynges were created of o soole substance, and of o soole disposicion,

  4 ) the fader wherof is the sone, and the moone moder,

  5) that brought hym forth by blast or aier in the wombe, the erthe taken fro it,

  6) to whom is seid the increat fader, tresour of myracles, and yever of vertues.

  7) Of fire is made erthe.

  7a) Depart the erthe fro the fire, for the sotiller is worthier than the more grosse, and the thynne thynge than the thik. This most be do wisely and discretly.

  8) It ascendith fro the erth into the heven, and falleth fro heven to the erthe, and therof sleith the higher and the lower vertue.

  9)And yf it lordship in the lower and in the heigher, and thow shalt lordship aboue and beneth, which forsoth is the light of lightes, and therfor fro the wolle fle all derknesse.

  10) The higher vertue ouer-cometh all, for sothe all thynne thyng doth in dense thynges.

  11a) After the disposicion of the more world rynneth this worchyng.

  13) And for this prophetisyng of the trynyte of God Hermogenes it called Triplex, trebil in philosophie, as Aristotle seith.

  [See Manzalaoui 1977: 65 -6.]

  Translation of same source, made c. 1485.

  1) The trwthe is so, and that it is no dowght,

  2) that lower thyngis to hyer thyng, and hyer to lower be correspondent. But the Werker of myraclis is on Godde alone, fro Home descendyth euiry meruulus werk.

  3)And so alle thyngis be creat of one only substauns, be an only dysposicion,

  4) of home the fadyr is the sonne, and the mone the modyr,

  5 ) qwyche bar her be the wedyr in the wombe. The erthe is priuyd fro her-to.

  6 )This is clepyd or seyd the fadyr of enchauntmentis, tresur of myracclys, the

  yessuer of vertuys.

  7) Be a lytil it is made erthe.

  7a) Depart that qwyche is erthly fro that qwyche is fi Fry, for that qwyche is sotel is mor wurthy han that qwyche is grose, and that rar, porous, or lyght, is mor bettyr than qwiche is thyk of substauns. This is done wyseli or dyscretly.

  8) It ascendyth fro the erth in-to heuyn and fallyth fro heuyn in-to erth, and ther-of it sleth the ouyr vertu and the nedyr vertu, so it hath lorchyp in the lowe thyngis and hye thingis,

  9) and thu lordschyppist vppeward and downward, and with the is the lyght of lyghtys. And for that alle derkness schal fle fro the.

  10) The ovyr vetu ouircomyth alle, for euiry rar rhyng werkyth in to euiry thyk thyng.

  11a) And aftyr the dysposicion of the mor world rennyth thys werking.

  13) And for that Hermogines is clepyd threfold in filosophye, and of the meruellys of he world.

  [See Manzalaoui 1977: 174-5]

  Bibliography

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  Blavatsky, H.P. Isis Unveiled. Theosophical University Press, 1972. pp 507-14.

  Burckhardt, T. Alchemy. Stuart and Watkins, London 1967 pp 196 -201.

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  de Jong, H.M.E. Michael Maiers's Atlanta Fugiens: Sources of an alchemical Book of Emblems. E.J. Brill, Leiden, 1969.

  Dobbs, B.J. "Newton's Commentary on the Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus" in Merkel, I and Debus A.G. Hermeticism and the Renaissance. Folger, Washington 1988.

  Fulcanelli. Les Demeures Philosophales. Jean Jacques Pavert, Paris, 1964.

  Hall, M.P. The Secret Teachings of all Ages. Philosophical Research, L.A. 1977 pp CLVII -CLVIII.

  Holmyard, E.J. "The Emerald Table" Nature, Oct 6th pp 525-6, 1929.

  Holmyard, E.J. Alchemy, Pelican, Harmondsworth 1957. pp95-8.

  Linden, Stanton J. ed. "The Mirror of Alchimy Composed by the Thrice-Famous and Learned Fryer Roger Bacon (1597), Garland, NY. 1992.

  Manzalaoui, M.A. Secretum Secretorum: Nine English Versions, Early English Text Society. OUP, 1977.

  Needham, J.Science and Civilisation in China vol 5, part 4: Spagyrical discovery and invention: Apparatus, Theories and gifts. CUP, 1980

  Read, John Prelude to Chemistry, G Bell, London, 1939 pp15, 51-5

  Redgrove, S. Alchemy: Ancient and Modern. William Rider, London, 1922. pp40-42.

  Sadoul, J. Alchemists and Gold. G.P. Putnams, N.Y. 1972 pp 25-6.

  Schumaker, Wayne. The Occult Sciences in the Renaissance. University of California, Berkely 1972, pp 179-80

  Shah, Idres. The Sufis. Octagon, London 1977, p 198

  Sherwood Taylor, F. The Alchemists. Paladin, London, 1976, pp77- 8.

  Stapleton, H.E., Lewis, G.L, Sherwood Taylor, F. "The sayings of Hermes quoted in the Ma Al-Waraqi of Ibn Umail. " Ambix, vol 3, pp 69-90, 1949.

  Steele, R. and Singer, D.W. "The Emerald Table". Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine vol 21, 1928.

  See also:

  McLean, A & Tahil, P. Ampitheatre Engavings of Heinrich Kunrath. pp. 28, 73-6,

  Anon, Secret Symbols of the Rosicrucians (i.e. Paul Allen A Christian Rosenkreutz Anthology, Steinerbooks, third edition pp228-30)

  AMORC Supplementary Monograph: Hermetic Teachings RAD-13, Lecture Number 2, Inner hermetic teachings.