Ancient writers credited Hermes Trismegistus with thousands of books. What survives is far less and far more interesting: a small shelf of Greek, Latin, Coptic and Arabic texts written by many hands over several centuries. Scholars divide them into two families. The philosophical Hermetica teach a way of knowledge and salvation. The technical Hermetica teach the practical sciences of the stars, of metals and of the hidden properties of things. This page is a map of both.
In brief
- The core philosophical collection is the Corpus Hermeticum, seventeen short Greek treatises.
- The Asclepius, preserved in Latin, is the longest single Hermetic work.
- Further texts survive as quotations and in Coptic and Armenian translations.
- The Emerald Tablet belongs to the technical, alchemical branch of the family.
The texts at a glance
| Text | Language | Approximate date | Character |
|---|---|---|---|
| Corpus Hermeticum | Greek | 1st to 3rd century | Seventeen philosophical treatises and dialogues |
| Asclepius | Latin, from lost Greek | 2nd to 3rd century | A long dialogue on God, humanity and the cosmos |
| Stobaean fragments | Greek | Collected in the 5th century | About forty excerpts, among them the Kore Kosmou |
| Nag Hammadi Hermetica | Coptic | Copied in the 4th century | An initiation dialogue, a prayer and part of the Asclepius |
| Definitions of Hermes | Armenian, from Greek | Perhaps 1st century | Short sayings for memorization |
| Emerald Tablet | Arabic, then Latin | 6th to 9th century | The charter of alchemy |
| Picatrix | Arabic, then Latin | 10th to 11th century | A compendium of astral magic in the Hermetic spirit |
| The Kybalion | English | 1908 | A modern restatement in seven principles |
The Corpus Hermeticum
The Corpus Hermeticum is a collection of seventeen Greek treatises, assembled by Byzantine editors and brought to the Latin West in the fifteenth century. Because of an old editorial accident the treatises are numbered I to XIV and XVI to XVIII, with no number XV. Most are dialogues in which Hermes teaches a pupil, usually his son Tat or the physician Asclepius, and they are short enough to be read at a sitting. These are the ones a student should know.
- Treatise I: Poimandres
- The foundation. A visionary account in which the divine Mind shows Hermes the making of the cosmos, the fall of the first human into nature, and the way of return through the seven spheres. It ends with Hermes sent out to teach.
- Treatise IV: The Mixing Bowl
- God has sent down a great bowl filled with mind, and those who immerse themselves in it receive knowledge. A short and vivid statement of the choice between a life of the senses and a life of understanding.
- Treatise V: God Invisible and Most Visible
- A hymn in prose. God cannot be seen, yet is seen in everything that is made. The order of the stars and the forming of a child in the womb are offered as evidence.
- Treatise X: The Key
- A summary of the general teaching: the nature of the good, the soul and its vehicles, and the rule that the vice of the soul is ignorance and its virtue is knowledge.
- Treatise XI: Mind to Hermes
- Mind itself instructs Hermes in an exercise of the imagination: to expand the mind until it contains all places, all times and all things, because only like understands like.
- Treatise XIII: On Rebirth
- The secret discourse on the mountain. Tat is reborn as the ten powers of God drive out the twelve torments of matter. The treatise closes with a hymn to be sung at sunrise and sunset, and is the nearest thing in the collection to a ritual of initiation.
The Asclepius
The Asclepius, also called the Perfect Discourse, survives complete only in a Latin translation. It was the one Hermetic work known to western Europe throughout the Middle Ages. It contains the famous praise of the human being as a great wonder, a being worthy of reverence and honor, standing between the gods and the world and sharing in both.
Two passages made it notorious. One describes how the Egyptians drew divine powers down into temple statues by means of herbs, stones, scents and hymns. This is the classical text for the idea of talismanic magic, and it troubled Christian readers for centuries. The other is a lament in which Hermes foretells the abandonment of the temples and the death of the old religion of Egypt, written with a grief that is still affecting.
Fragments and discoveries
The Stobaean fragments are passages copied into a fifth century anthology. The longest and strangest is the Kore Kosmou, in which the goddess Isis teaches her son Horus how souls were made and embodied. The Armenian Definitions are a string of aphorisms that may preserve some of the earliest Hermetic material.
The Coptic texts found near Nag Hammadi in 1945 changed the picture. The Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth describes a teacher leading a pupil, by prayer and chanted vowels, into a vision of the spheres above the seven planets. With it was a Hermetic prayer of thanksgiving followed by a note that the worshippers embraced and shared a meal. Here at last was evidence that the philosophy was practiced: that there were groups, however small, who prayed and ate together.
The technical Hermetica
Older in origin than the philosophical treatises, and far more numerous, are the works on applied knowledge that circulated under the name of Hermes. They include handbooks of astrology that assign plants, stones and parts of the body to the signs and planets, collections of the occult virtues of animals and minerals, and the alchemical literature that grew around the Emerald Tablet.
These books share one conviction with the philosophical works: that the cosmos is bound together by sympathies, so that a star, a metal and an herb can belong to one family. The philosophical texts contemplate that order. The technical texts set out to use it. The later history of Western magick is the history of the two being joined.
Modern Hermetic books
Books continue to be written in the Hermetic name. The most influential is The Kybalion of 1908, the source of the seven principles. It is a modern work and should be read as one. The test for any such book is simple: does it send you back to the ancient sources better able to read them? If so, it has done a Hermetic service.
Where to begin reading
A workable order for the new reader is this. Read treatise I of the Corpus Hermeticum twice. Then read treatise XIII, which shows the teaching becoming an experience. Follow with treatises IV, V and XI. Then read the Asclepius straight through. By that point you will know whether you want the rest, and you will be able to tell a Hermetic idea from an imitation.
Read slowly. These texts were written to be heard, pondered and reread, and a single treatise is enough for a week. The reading list gives further guidance on choosing an edition and on what to read next.