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INITIATION IN THE HERMETICA
possibility that they could play a significant role in a real spiritual initiation
process.’ I call this mode of interpretation the “spiritualization of the ritual,”
as van Moorsel did.?
Before proceeding to a detailed analysis, we have to bear in mind that since
there is no external evidence of the existence of Hermetic groups or of religious
communities which regarded the Hermetic writings as their sacred books,
we have to analyse the texts themselves as well as some parallel evidence in
order to venture further conclusions. In recent years, some detailed analyses
have appeared concerning the nature of the Hermetic spiritual ritual,* but as
far as I can judge, Gerard Van Moorsel laid down the foundation for this kind
of research, based on linguistic investigation, in his book The Mysteries of
Hermes Trismegistus.°
There is yet another essential similarity between the Hermetica and
the mysteries. This feature can be called “individualization.” In the case
of mysteries, there are public rituals accessible to the non-initiated, while
the purpose of the real, non-public initiation is the total transformation of
the person, of the inner self. As Walter Burkert’s definition runs, mysteries
were initiation rituals of a voluntary, personal, and secret character which
aimed at a change of mind through experience of the sacred.° I am asserting
that the same holds true of the Hermetic initiation.’
There is an old debate about the nature of the Hermetic ritual. Some scholars considered
the texts as sacred documents for religious groups. Richard Reitzenstein, in his pioneering
work about Hermetica, tried to prove the existence of a so-called ‘Poimandres-community’,
on which see R. Reitzenstein, Poimandres: Studien zur griechisch-aegyptischen und
frühchristlichen Literatur, Leipzig, Teubner, 1904. On Reitzenstein’s method, see Anthony
Grafton, Forgers and Critics. Creativity and Duplicity in Western Scholarship, Princeton,
Princeton University Press, 1990. For the opposing view, see Festugiére’s famous book,
La revelation d’Hermes Trismegiste, 4 vols., Paris, Gabalda, 1950-1954. Apart from
the references in the citations, see J.-P. Mahé, Hermés en haute-Egypte, 2 vols., Quebec,
Presses de l’Université Laval. 1978-1982. In recent times, scholars do not exclude
the possibility of Hermetic religious groups as definitely as Festugiére did. For more on
the socio-cultural background, see R. Gurgel-Pereira, The Hermetic Logos: The Hermetic
Literature from the Hellenistic Age to Late Antiquity, Saarbriicken, LAP, 2011.
Gerard Van Moorsel, The Mysteries of Hermes Trismegistus. A Phenomenologic Study in
the Process of Spiritualisation in the Corpus Hermeticum and Latin Asclepius, Utrecht,
Kemink en zoon, 1955; and idem, Die Symbolsprache in der hermetischen Gnosis, Symbolon,
1960/1, 128-137.
The following books are the most thought-provoking in this respect: J. P. Södergärd,
The Hermetic Piety of the Mind: A Semiotic and Cognitive Study of the Discourse of Hermes
Trismegistos, Stockholm, Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2003 (Coniectanea Biblica:
New Testament series 41); Anna Van den Kerchove, La Voie d’Hermeés. Pratiques rituelles et
traités hermétiques, Leiden, Brill, 2012 (Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies 77).
See my footnote above.
® Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, 11.
Giovanni Filoramo, The Transformation of the Inner Self in Gnostic and Hermetic Texts,
in Jan Assmann — Guy G. Strousma (eds.), Transformations of the Inner Self in Ancient
Religions, Leiden, Brill, 137-149.
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