You may have heard of the Hermetica, also known as
the Corpus Hermeticum. These are a collection of writings attributed to
Hermes Trismegistus—a legendary figure said to be a synthesis of the Egyptian
god Thoth and the Greek god Hermes. The lore says that these teachings were
carried into the Greek world by none other than Pythagoras, who traveled
through Egypt and Sumer to study the ancient mysteries. What he found there
would later seed the philosophical systems of Plato and, indirectly, much of
Christian mysticism.
At the heart of the Hermetic teachings lies the concept of
the Logos—not just as an abstract ordering principle, but as the very consciousness
behind creation itself. In the Hermetic worldview, the Logos and consciousness
are one and the same. Everything that exists is the unfolding of divine mind,
spoken into form through the Word.
Now, this may sound a lot like the beginning of John’s
Gospel: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
was God.” That’s not coincidence. These ideas were part of the intellectual and
spiritual atmosphere of the ancient Mediterranean world, and they didn’t belong
to just one tradition.
But somewhere along the way, the origins of these teachings
were called into question.
In the 17th century, a philosopher named Isaac Casaubon
argued that the Hermetica wasn’t ancient at all. He claimed it was a product of
the early Christian era—maybe the 2nd or 3rd century CE—written by
Neoplatonists rather than ancient Egyptians. Casaubon’s view carried weight,
especially since he was advising King James of England, who had little patience
for the more esoteric ideas that had flourished under Queen Elizabeth’s rule.
The damage was done. Hermetic teachings were labeled as
fringe, even fraudulent.
But that wasn’t the end of the story.
Modern scholars like Tim Freke and Peter Gandy have argued
that Casaubon got it wrong. When the Rosetta Stone was discovered and Egyptian
hieroglyphs were finally translated, it turned out that ideas closely aligned
with Hermetic thought were ancient. In fact, inscriptions found in the
Pyramid of Saqqara—dating as far back as 3,000 BCE—echoed the same themes and
language as the Hermetica. These weren’t late inventions; they were echoes from
a deep past.
And then came 1945.
That year, in the Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi, a farmer
unearthed a sealed jar containing a library of Gnostic Christian texts. Among
them was a document titled The Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth—and it
was unmistakably Hermetic. Here was proof that early Coptic Christians,
particularly Gnostic communities from the third and fourth centuries, were
reading and valuing Hermetic wisdom. These weren’t marginal texts. They were
part of the early Christian landscape.
The translators of this document—James Brashler, Peter
Dirkse, and Douglas Parrott—describe it as “a previously unknown and crucially
important Hermetic document.” It appears to be a ritual of initiation into
visionary consciousness, complete with vowel-based mantras like IAO, meant to
be chanted and intoned, just like sacred names.
And within the text itself, the spiritual intimacy is
striking. The disciple says to Hermes:
“I understand Mind, Hermes, who cannot be interpreted,
because he keeps within himself… And the universe rejoices. There is no
creature that will lack your life… Trismegistus, let not my soul be deprived of
the great divine vision.”
This isn’t just metaphysics—it’s mystical union.
Even more revealing is the account of Hermes’ own
initiation, found in The Hermetica: The Lost Wisdom of the Pharaohs by
Freke and Gandy:
“Suddenly everything changed before me. Reality was opened
out in a moment. I saw the boundless view. All became dissolved in Light—united
within one joyous Love… And I heard an unspeakable lament… The Light then
uttered a Word, which calmed the chaotic waters…”
The vision goes on to describe a trinitarian process—Mind
(the Father), Word (the Son), and the creative harmony between them—long before
church councils ever formalized such doctrine. The Logos emerges from the
Light, brings order to chaos, and then returns to unite with Mind. Creation, it
turns out, is not a one-time act, but a continual unfolding of divine
consciousness.
As Hermes' guide explains:
“I am that Light—the Mind of God, which exists before the
chaotic dark waters of potentiality. My calming Word is the Son of God—the idea
of beautiful order… Just as, in your own experience, your human mind gives
birth to speech, so too does divine Mind give birth to the Logos.”
This isn’t doctrine. It’s poetry. It’s a visionary framework
describing reality not as mechanical, but as conscious, alive, and intimate.
Now, bring that forward into today’s world, and what do you
see?
Modern science is starting to catch up. Physics is beginning
to suggest that matter may not be fundamental—that behind particles and waves
lies something deeper. Some call it a quantum field. Others call it
information. And still others, like certain physicists and philosophers of
mind, are starting to say the quiet part out loud: Consciousness might be
the foundation of everything.
And if that’s true, the Hermetica wasn’t fantasy. It was
foresight.
These texts teach us that what is seen comes from what is
not seen. That the Word of creation is not a voice booming from the clouds, but
the quiet utterance of divine intelligence forming reality itself. The Logos
isn’t just a theological term—it’s a description of how consciousness shapes
form, how divine Mind becomes the world we live in.
And that changes everything.
We are not strangers in a cold, dead universe. We are
expressions of it. Sparks of that same Light. As John wrote, the Logos is the
true Light that enlightens everyone coming into the world—not just one
person in one time, but all.
The Hermetica reminds us that we’ve always known this,
somewhere deep down. The Logos, the Light, the Word—it lives in us. Jesus came
to show us that. So did Hermes, in his own way. And now it’s up to us to awaken
to that same vision.
To remember what we’ve forgotten.
If this resonates with you, feel free to share, reflect,
or ask questions below. The Light we remember together shines brighter for all.
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