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

5. It follows from this reason, [then,] that these are always bodies.

Wherefore I say that "bodying"3 itself is an eternal [exercise of] energy.

1 Or energizing. 2 Lit. energize.

3 ffundruHriv, — cf. Ex. vii. 2 ; cf. also the ^VXOXTIS of K. K., 9.

If bodies are on earth, they're subject unto dissolution ; yet must these [ever] be [on earth to serve] as places and as organs for the energies.

The energies, however, [are] immortal, and the immortal is eternally, — [that is, that] bodymaking, if it ever is,1 is energy.

6. [The energies] accompany the soul, though not appearing all at once.

Some of them energize the man the moment that he's born, united with the soul round its irrational [parts] ; whereas the purer ones, with change of age,2 co-operate with the soul's rational part.

But all these energies depend on bodies. From godly 3 bodies they descend to mortal [frames], these body-making [energies] ; each one of them is [ever] active, either around the body or the soul.

Yea, they are active with the soul itself without a body. They are for ever in activity.

The soul, however, is not for ever in a mortal body, for it can be without the body ; whereas the energies can never be without the bodies.

1 That is, if it goes on continually.

2 jcaret /ueTa£oA.V TTJS ^AiKt'as, — generally supposed to be the seventh year. Compare the apocryphal logos : "He who seeks me shall find me in children from the age of seven years" — quoted by the Christian Overwriter of the Naassene Document from the Gospel according to Thomas (Hipp., Philos., v. 7 ; § 7 in "Myth of Man").

3 Or divine, — the bodies of the Gods, the heavenly bodies, or the spiritual and immortal bodies of the soul.

This is a sacred saying (logos), son : Body apart from soul cannot persist ; its being can.1

7. Tat. What dost thou mean, 0 father
[mine] ?

Her. Thus understand it, Tat ! When soul leaves body, body itself remains.

But [even] the body so abandoned,2 as long as it remains, is in activity, being broken up and made to disappear.

For body without [the exercise of] energy could not experience these things.3

This energy, accordingly, continues with the body when the soul has gone.

This, therefore, is the difference of an immortal body and a mortal one, — that the immortal doth consist of a one single matter, but this [body does] not.

The former's active, and the latter's passive.

For every thing that maketh active is the stronger ; and [every thing] that is made active is the weaker.

The stronger, too, being in authority and free, doth lead ; the [weaker] follows [as] a slave.

8. The energies, then, energize not only bodies that are ensouled, but also [bodies] unensouled, i p.ev au>/j.a x^pis 'J'ux*?5 °" Svuarai, rb 8^ tlvai SCOTCH,— 7

"its being" presumably refers to the abstract "bodying"
(ffufjuiruHns) referred to above.

2 Lit. this body. 3 Sc. dissolution and disappearance.

— stocks, stones,1 and all such things ; — both making [them] to grow, and to bear fruits, and ripening [them], dissolving, melting, rotting and crumbling [them], and setting up [in them] all like activities which bodies without souls can undergo.

For energy's2 the name, 0 son, for just the thing that's going on, — that is becoming.

And many things needs must for ever be becoming ; nay, rather, all things [must].

For never is Cosmos bereft of any of existent things, but being borne 3 for aye in its own self, it bears existent things, — [things] that shall never cease from being destroyed again.4

9. Know, then, that energy of every kind is ever free from death, — no matter what it is, or in what body.

And of the energies, some are of godly bodies, and some of those which are corruptible ; some [are] general, and some special. Some [are] of genera, and some are of the parts of every genus.

The godly ones, [accordingly], are those that exercise their energies through everlasting bodies. And these are perfect [energies], in that [they energize] through perfect bodies.

But partial [energies are] those [that energize] through each one of the [single] living things.

1 Cf. Naassene Document, § 4, and § 13 below. 2 Or activity.
3 Or conceived. Reading aS0is for auroO, with Heeren.

And special [energies are those that energize] through each one of existent things.