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

3 See his article, " Three Early Doctrinal Modifications of the Text of the Gospels," in The Hibbert Journal (Oct. 1902), pp. 98- 113. J. R. Wilkinson's few remarks (H. J., Ap. 1903, pp. 575, brings forward very strong evidence that the original reading was: "Call thou me not Good; One only is Good, God the Father/'— a reading known to Marcion, the Clementine Homilies, Athanasius, Didymus, Tatian, and Origen (the two last inferentially).

If we compare this with our text, "Call not thou, therefore, aught else Good, for thou would'st impious be ; nor any thing at all at any time call Good but God alone," and " He is Good alone and nothing else," — we cannot fail to be struck with the precise similarity of the phrasing and blend of ideas.

If, further, we take this in connection with the still more striking contrast, "God is not Spirit," with the Johannine "God is Spirit," we might at first sight almost persuade ourselves that our treatise had these Christian declarations immediately in mind. But the general phenomena of similarity of diction and idea of the Trismegistic literature with those of the New Testament documents is so much more satisfactorily explained by the fact that both literatures use mainly the common Hellenistic theological phrases of the time, that we need not distress ourselves with any suggestions either of plagiarism or of direct controversy.

Doubtless the declaration, " God is Spirit," was a commonplace among the religio-philosophical circles of the time, and Hermes is here simply refining on a common idea. The reading, " Call thou not me Good," which appears to have been preserved mainly in Gnostic tradition, may also as easily have come from a similar general idea that the One and Only One was Good alone.

It is, moreover, of special interest to notice that the second clause of the Marcionite reading runs : " There is one [only] Good, God the Father," while in our

576) on Conybeare's criticism of this synoptic passage do not seem to me to be of any weight.

treatise the two names of God are given as Good and Father; and so we read (§ 16): "God, then, is Good, and Good is God "; and immediately after (§ 17) : " The other name of God is Father." 1

Striking however, as are those coincidences, we are nevertheless wholly unpersuaded that there was any immediate literary contact between those two sets of Scripture. All that can be said is that their literary similarities are due to a common theological language and their many points of contact in ideas to a generally common atmosphere of theological conceptions.

HE WHO is WITHOUT A WIFE is HALF A MAN

Again, the doctrine of the duty to beget children (§17) seems at first sight to be an interpolation by a Jewish editor, the Jews holding that "he who is without a wife is half a man." We must, however, remember that the Egyptian priests were married, and that the rule with them, as with the Pythagoreans, was that a man should first of all discharge his duty to society and live the " practical," " political " or " social " life, before retiring into the life of contemplation. He must first beget children, not only that the race might be continued, but also that bodies might be supplied by parents devoted to the ideal of the religious or philosophic life, so that advanced souls might find birth in favourable conditions, and so the Order be continued.

This also is the ancient rule laid down by the Manu of the Aryan Hindus in the Mdnava Dharma Shdstra. The duties of the householder station of life (Grihastha ashrama) must first be performed, before the parents can retire to the contemplative life (Vanaprastha

1 Cf. the expression, "God, Father and the Good," G. H., x.
(xi.) l.

ashrama). In special cases, however, exceptions could be made.

It may then be that Asclepius stands for those pupils who were still living the married life.

The scribe of the thirteenth century, Codex B. (Parisinus, 1220), has laconically written on the margin of this paragraph the single word " nonsense " (<j>\vapia) ; he was presumably a monk

COKPUS HERMETICUM III. (IV.)

THE SACRED SERMON

OF HERMES

(Text: P. 31-33; Pat. 8b-9.)