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The 'thrice-great' Hermes, a fusion of the Greek Hermes and Egyptian Thoth, credited with the Hermetica: the Greco-Egyptian texts of magic, astrology, and alchemy whose maxim 'as above, so below' underlies the Western occult tradition...
The 'thrice-great' Hermes, a fusion of the Greek Hermes and Egyptian Thoth, credited with the Hermetica: the Greco-Egyptian texts of magic, astrology, and alchemy whose maxim 'as above, so below' underlies the Western occult tradition, from Ficino's 1463 translation for the Medici through Casaubon's debunking to the Golden Dawn.
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A body of Greek texts on magic, astrology, alchemy, and the divine mind is composed in Roman Egypt and attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, the 'thrice-great' Hermes, a fusion of the Greek Hermes and the Egyptian Thoth. These Hermetica became the scripture of Western esotericism.
A short cryptic text ascribed to Hermes, the Emerald Tablet, circulates in Arabic and later Latin, its maxim 'as above, so below' becoming the founding principle of alchemy and astrology. The heavens and the earth, the great and the small, were held to mirror one another.
Cosimo de' Medici has Marsilio Ficino set aside Plato to translate the newly rediscovered Corpus Hermeticum first, so precious was Hermes thought to be. The translation ignited the Renaissance revival of magic, astrology, and Hermetic philosophy that shaped Bruno, Dee, and the whole Western occult tradition.
Alchemists credited Hermes with the art of making an airtight seal, and the phrase 'hermetically sealed' entered everyday English. A fragment of the ancient occult tradition survives, unnoticed, in a common modern word.
The scholar Isaac Casaubon shows by their language that the Hermetic texts were written in the Christian era, not by an ancient Egyptian sage before Moses. The historical myth collapsed, but the Hermetic tradition rolled on regardless in alchemy and the occult.
The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn is founded, drawing on the Hermetica, Kabbalah, and alchemy to build the system behind most modern Western occultism. The word Hermetic still names a living esoteric tradition, from Tarot to ceremonial magic.