Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. II (the Corpus Hermeticum) — G. R. S. Mead (1906)
The text is shown on its own: no facing layer is held for this issue.
There were, then, according to Hermes, already existing not one but several Sermons on Fate, and, as we learn from Stobseus, not only in the Tat-literature but also in the Ammon-literature. It seems, then, probable that in the collection used by Lactantius the Tat-Sermons on Fate immediately preceded our treatise, and that one of these sermons (the one immediately preceding our treatise, presumably) was entitled "On Justice," thus confirming the title I have prefixed to the Stobseus Extract xi.
MATERIALITY AND CORPORALITY ARE ENERGIES OF GOD
22. Finally, in § 22 it has to be noticed that with the express teaching that Matter and Body are so far from being evil that they are Energies of God — His materiality and corporality — the charge of dualism against our philosophers must for ever be abandoned. Their doctrine was that of pan-monism ; and, therefore, wherever we find signs of dualism, or even distinct statements of an indubitably dualistic nature, we must understand that this was a formal convenience for the better insistence upon the need of strenuous exertion to solve the mystery of the opposites, rather than an essential doctrine of the Gnosis.
COEPUS HEEMETICUM XIII. (XIV.)
THE SECRET SEKMON ON THE
MOUNTAIN
CONCERNING REBIRTH AND THE PROMISE
OF SILENCE
OF THRICE-GREATEST HERMES UNTO TAT
HIS SON
(Text: R. 339-348; P. 114-128; Pat. 15b-17b.)
1. Tat. [Now] in the General Sermons,1 father, thou didst speak in riddles most unclear, conversing on Divinity ; and when thou saidst no man could e'er be saved before Rebirth,2 thy meaning thou didst hide.
Further, when I became thy Suppliant, in Wending up the Mount,3 after thou hadst conversed with me, and when I longed to learn the Sermon (Logos) on Rebirth (for this beyond all with R. Gf. G. H., x. (xi.) 15 ; Jamb., D. M., viii. 6.
1 ev TO?S yevtKo'is. Of. C. H., x. (xi.) 1 and 7.
3 Reading e*l rrjs rov Zpovs fAfrapdffews with P., and not Kara-
other things is just the thing I know not), thou saidst, that thou wouldst give it me — " when thou shalt have become a stranger to the world." 1
Wherefore I got me ready and made the thought in me a stranger 2 to the world-illusion.
And now do thou fill up the things that fall short 3 in me with what thou saidst would give me the tradition 4 of Eebirth, setting it forth in speech or in the secret way.
I know not, 0 Thrice-greatest one, from out what matter and what womb Man comes to birth, or of what seed.6
2. Hermes. Wisdom that understands6 in silence 7 [such is the matter and the womb from out which Man is born], and the True Good the seed.
Tat. Who is the sower, father ? For I am altogether at a loss.
Her. It is the Will of God, my son.
Tat. And of what kind is he that is begotten, father ? For I have no share of that essence in not the air-fiSpiora of R.
1 KOfffMOV.
2 Reading dirrjAAoTpiWa with the majority of the editors, and
voepd. 7 Cf. G. H.t X. (XI.) 6.
3 T& vffTfp-fimara avairK-hpaiffov.
4 wopaSovj/cu, the word used for the giving of this lesson or inner instruction is the technical term for the "handing on" of a doctrine or being initiated into it.
5 R.'s reading would make this refer to Hermes : " I know not from what womb thou com'st to birth." But the whole instruction seems to favour the usually accepted reading.
me, which doth transcend the senses.1 The one that is begot will be another one from God, God's Son ?
Her. All in all, out of all powers composed.
Tat. Thou tellest me a riddle, father, and dost not speak as father unto son.
Her. This Kace,2 my son, is never taught; but when He willeth it, its memory is restored by God.
3. Tat. Thou sayest things impossible, 0 father, things that are forced. Hence answers would I have direct unto these things. Am I a son strange to my father's race ?
Keep it not, father, back from me. I am a true-born son ; explain to me the manner of Kebirth.
Her. What may I say, my son ? I can but tell thee this. Whene'er I see within myself the Simple Vision3 brought to birth out of God's mercy,4 I have passed through myself into a Body that can never die. And now I am not what I was before ; but I am born in Mind.
The way to do this is not taught, and it cannot be seen by the compounded5 element by means of which thou seest.
1 rrjs ev e/iol ovfftas TTJS I/OIJTTJS. 2 Cf. Ex. i. 3.