Contents

Contents

I. CORPUS HERMETICUM

CORP. HERM. I.

PŒMANDRES, THE SHEPHERD OF MEN

3-20

Commentary—

Of Vision and Apocalypsis

20

The Great and Little Man

23

The Presence

24

The Vision of Creation

25

The Descent of the Logos

27

The Revelation of the Pleroma

28

The Second Emanation

33

The Descent of Man

34

The First Men

37

“Increase and Multiply”

38

Love

39

The Way of Deathlessness

39

The Ascent of the Soul

41

The Eighth Sphere

42

The Three “Bodies” of the Buddha

44

The Preaching of the Gnosis

47

A Hymn of Praise and Prayer for the Gnosis

49

The Name “Poimandres”

50

The Good Shepherd

52

CORP. HERM. (II.)

THE GENERAL SERMON

58

CORP. HERM. II. (III.)

TO ASCLEPIUS

59-68

Commentary—

“An Introduction to the Gnosis of the Nature of All Things”

68

Space is a Plenum

70

The Spouse of Deity

71

God is Cause that Spirit is

71

He who is without a Wife is Half a Man

73

CORP. HERM. III. (IV.)
THE SACRED SERMON

75-77

Commentary—

Text and Title

78

The Trinity

78

From the System of the Nicolaïtans

79

The “Books of the Chaldæans”

81

The “Flood”

83

CORP. HERM. IV. (V.)

THE CUP OR MONAD

85-91

Commentary—

The Title

92

The Baptism of the Mind

93

The Holy Grail

94

The “Hating of the Body”

95

The Gnosis and its Blessings

97

The Ancient Path

98

CORP. HERM. V. (VI.)

THOUGH UNMANIFEST GOD IS MOST MANIFEST

99-106

Commentary—

The Title

106

Māyā

106

The Higher Pantheism or Panmonism

108

Hymn to All-God

108

CORP. HERM. VI. (VII.)

IN GOD ALONE IS GOOD AND ELSEWHERE NOWHERE

110-114

Commentary—

The Title

115

Dualism?

115

God the Pleroma of Good

117

CORP. HERM. VII. (VIII.)

THE GREATEST ILL AMONG MEN IS IGNORANCE OF GOD

120-121

Commentary—

A Preaching

122

The Probable Completion of an Oxyrhynchus Logion

122

CORP. HERM. VIII. (IX.)

THAT NO ONE OF EXISTING THINGS DOTH PERISH, BUT MEN IN ERROR SPEAK OF THEIR CHANGES AS DESTRUCTIONS AND AS DEATHS

124-127

Commentary—

The Cosmos as “Second God”

127

The Law of Apokatastasis

128

CORP. HERM. IX. (X.)

ON THOUGHT AND SENSE

129-136

Commentary—

Title and Ordering

136

“Sense-and-Thought”

137

“Those in Gnosis”

137

The True Gnostic

138

The Goal of the Gnosis

139

The Possibility of Knowing God

140

CORP. HERM. X. (XI.)

THE KEY

141-158

Commentary—

The Consummation of the “General Sermons”

159

The Will of God

160

Of Gnosis and Ecstasis

161

Of Apotheosis

163

The Metamorphoses of the Soul

163

The Ladder of Being

165

Concerning Transmigration

166

Gnosis the Virtue of the Soul

167

The Vehicles of the Soul

167

The Dual Soul

169

“He who Stands”

170

The Olympian Path

171

“When Mind becomes a Daimon”

171

The “Scourge” of the Christ

173

The Dispensation of the Universe

173

CORP. HERM. XI. (XII.)

MIND UNTO HERMES

175-189

Commentary—

Title and Form

190

The Æon-Lore

191

The Root of Form

193

“Become all Things”

194

The Good’s own Path

196

Concerning India

197

CORP. HERM. XII. (XIII.)

ABOUT THE COMMON MIND

199-212

Commentary—

The Sayings of the Good Daimon

213

Hermes and Basilides

215

The Sermons on Fate

217

Materiality and Corporality are Energies of God

218

CORP. HERM. XIII. (XIV.)

THE SECRET SERMON ON THE MOUNTAIN

219-233

THE SECRET HYMNODY

230-232

Commentary—

Concerning the Title

234

The Term “Apocryphon”

234

The Three Stages of Probation

236

The Mount of Initiation

238

The Birth from Above

239

The Virgin-Birth

240

The Race of the Logos

241

The Self-taught

242

The New Creation

243

The Way of Birth in God

244

Of the Ten and the Twelve

245

The Dawn of Cosmic Consciousness

249

The Vow of Silence

250

Of the Ogdoad

251

A Hymn for Morning and for Evening Prayer

252

A Theurgic Praise-Giving

253

“Through the Word”

255

CORP. HERM. XIV. (XV.)

A LETTER TO ASCLEPIUS

257-263

Commentary—

Asclepius and Tat

263

Compare with “Mind unto Hermes”

265

The Good Husbandman

265

CORP. HERM. (XVI.)

THE DEFINITIONS OF ASCLEPIUS UNTO KING AMMON

266-276

Commentary—

The Title

277

A Tradition Concerning the Trismegistic Literature

278

A Speculation as to Date

281

The Delineation of the Sun

282

Concerning the Daimones

282

CORP. HERM. (XVII.)

OF ASCLEPIUS TO THE KING

285-286

Commentary—

On the Adoration of Images

286

CORP. HERM. (XVIII.)

THE ENCOMIUM OF KINGS

288-298

Commentary—

The Apology of a Pœmandrist

298

Speculation as to Date

299

The Story of the, Pythic Grasshopper

300

The True King

302

The Fellow-Rulers of the Height

302

II. THE PERFECT SERMON; OR THE ASCLEPIUS

307-390

Commentary—

The Title

390

The Old Latin Translation and the Greek Original

391

Of the Writer and the Persons of the Dialogue

393

The Doctrine of the Will of God

395

Concerning Spirit and the All-Sense

396

The Prophetic Utterances

398

The Proscription of the Worship of the Gods

399

The Last Hope of the Religion of the Mind

401

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