Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. II (the Corpus Hermeticum) — G. R. S. Mead (1906)

People like Scyths or Indians, again, if we are to suppose any historical reference, can hardly be imagined to refer to the Komans ; while the Goths under Alaric, who ravaged Greece in 395, 396 A.D., are too late even for Eeitzenstein. Moreover, we have already in our notes pointed to the strange conjunction of Scyth and Barbarian in our text as being also found in Colossians.

On the other hand, nothing but the entire State suppression of the Pagan Keligion in all its forms can satisfy xxv. 3, and this just suits the end of the fourth century.

If, however, we cannot entertain so late a date, and I do not think we can, there seems nothing for it but to give the writer some credit for his prognostication of the future ; for eventually things certainly turned out for him and all he held most dear very much as he imagined or feared they would.

THE LAST HOPE OF THE KELIGION OF THE MIND

At any rate the last hope of the Pure Love, the Religion of the Mind, is in the Trismegistic Communities, if indeed it is so permitted to interpret xxvii. 3:

" Yea, they who rule the earth shall be distributed [through all the lands], and finally be gathered in a state, — at top of Egypt's upper part, — which shall be founded towards the setting sun, and to which all the mortal race shall speed."

We need not insist upon details, for our translator

VOL. n. 26

may have gone wide of the original ; for instance, the " race " may, instead of being " mortal " in the original, have been the " Kace " of which we have already heard so much in Philo and these tractates ; but the similarity of the idea cannot fail to remind us of Philo when, in writing of the Eedeemed of Spiritual Israel, he says :

" Those who were but scattered in Hellas and non- Grecian (Barbarian) lands, over islands and over continents, shall rise up with one impulse, and from diverse regions flock together unto the one spot revealed to them." !

And with this further compare the famous passage on the Therapeuts:

" Now this Eace of men is to be found in many parts of the inhabited world, both the Grecian and non- Grecian world, sharing in the Perfect Good.

"In Egypt there are crowds of them in every province, or nome as they call it, and especially round Alexandria. For they who are in every way (or in every nome) the most highly advanced, come as colonists,2 as it were, to the Therapeutic fatherland." 3

Moreover, just as the Therapeuts in the immediately following lines of Philo are said to have their community on a hill, so too in our text we immediately find mention of the Trismegistic communities as having their chief centre on the Libyan Hill, — a community which is spoken of as " very large " in numbers, and so is somewhat of a contradiction to the numbers of the Pious given in xxii. 1, where we are told " they may be counted even in the world," unless the sentence is to be taken as rhetorical.

1 De Execrat., § 9 ; M. ii. 435, 436 ; P. 937 (Ri. v. 255).

2 Cf. in our Sermon, xxv. 1 : Egypt, " the sole colony of holiness."

3 D. V. a, C. 56 ff ; M. i. 474 ; P. 892. Cf. F. F. F., 69.

This Hill is called the Libyan Mount, a vague enough title ; nor is this vagueness removed when we find it again referred to (in xxxvii. 3) as the place of burial of the body of the First Asclepius, and obtain the additional information that it is " hard by the shore of crocodiles," for this can hardly refer to Crocodilopolis in the Fayyum, the most northern of the towns so named, seeing that the Libyan Mount is " at the top of Egypt's upper part," and " towards the setting sun."

This, however, corresponds admirably with the location of Philo's Therapeut community on the southern shore of Lake Mareotis, just south of Alexandria; but few indeed will be found to entertain the possibility even that Philo and our author may be speaking of the same people from different standpoints and under different names.

As far as I can see, there is no certainty in the matter; and, therefore, I leave it as a problem of immense interest that has not as yet found a solution.

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