Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. I — G. R. S. Mead (1906)

"If ye have eaten dead things and made living ones, what will ye make if ye eat living things ? " 6

And by " living things " they mean logoi and minds and men — the "pearls" of that Inexpressible [Man] cast into the plasm below,6

C. This is what He saith (H. he says) :

"Cast not the holy thing to the dogs nor the pearls to the swine." 7

H. For they say that the work of swine is the intercourse of man with woman.

(24 8) S. This same [Man] (H. he says) the Phrygians also call Ai-polos ; 9 not because (H. he says) He feeds c This may possibly be assigned to C. ; but C. usually comments on J. and does not lead, and the terminology is that of J. and not of C.

1 Cf. Matt. iii. 10= Luke iii. 9. Of. also Hipp., Philos., vi. 16, in his maltreatment of the " Simonian " Qnosis.

2 That is, Sons of the Logos.

3 Cf. note on the third Ruler in § 17 C.

* Presumably the Phrygians.

6 If our attribution of this to J. is correct (R. gives it to C.), we have perhaps before us a logos from the Phrygian Mysteries.

7 A simple form of Matt. vii. 6. Is it by any means possible an underlying mystical word-play on the Eleusinian logos " S« Kvt" ; hence 5j (pig) — a synonym of xolpos — and KVW (dog)?

8 This section seems to be misplaced, and § 25 probably followed § 23 immediately in the original ; the antithesis of Fruitful and Unfruitful following one another, as above (§ 22), the antithesis of Dead and God.

9 a*'-ir<5\oy, vulg. = " goat-herd."

she-goats and he-goats, as the (C. — psychics l ) interpret the name, but because (H. he says) He is Aei-polos — that is, "Always-turning" (Aei-polon),2 revolving and driving round the whole cosmos in [its] revolution ; for polein is to " turn " and change things.

Hence (H. he says) all call the two centres3 of heaven poles. And the poet also (H. he says) when he says : " Hither there comes and there goes (poleitai) Old Man of the Sea, whose words are e'er true — Egypt's undying Proteus." 4

1 S. had probably " ignorant."

2 afnr<f\os, rovrfffTi iel vo\S>». Cf. Plato, Cratylus, 408 c, D.

3 This is not very clear. But see Mozley's article, " Polus," in Smith, Wayte, and Marindin's D. of Gk. and Rom. Antiquities (London, 1891), ii. 442, 443: "Both in [Plato's] Timceus, 40 B. and [Aristotle's] De Ccelo, ii. 14, ic6\os is used, not for the entire heaven, but for the axis of heaven and earth, around which the whole revolved. Again in the De Ccelo, ii. 2, the v6\oi are the poles, north and south, in our sense of the word." Compare also the rubric in one of the rituals in the Greek Magic Papyri— C. Wessely, Griechische Zauberpapyrus, in Denkschr. d. Akad., ph. hist. Kl., xxxvi. (Vienna, 1888) — where it is said that the Sun will then move towards the Pole, and the theurgist will see Seven Virgins (the Seven Fortunes of Heaven) approach, and Seven Youths, with heads of bulls (the Pole-lords of Heaven), who make the axis turn (661-670). Compare this with the " cylinder " idea in the fragment of K. K. Then there will appear the Great God " in a white robe and trowsers, with a crown of gold on his head, holding in his right hand the golden shoulder of a heifer, that is the Bear that sets in motion and keeps the heaven turning in due seasons." This God will pronounce an oracle, and the theurgist will then receive the gift of divination. The special interest of this tradition is that it contains a Magian element (to wit, the "trowsers"), and this connects closely with Phrygia and the cult that was wedded most closely with the Mithriaca, namely, that of the Mother of the Gods.