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ENDRE ÁDÁM HAMVAS
3. SPIRITUALIZATION OF EMPIRICAL RITUAL PRACTICES
IN THE HERMETICA
3.1 Baptism
In the following section, I will offer evidence in support of my contention
that there are important passages in the Hermetic texts which refer explicitly
to cultic practices. To support my thesis, I will give some further textual
evidence which is found in early Christian literature to demonstrate the
meaning of Hermetic ritual.
There is a famous example of initiation in the Hermetic Corpus. Inthe fourth
treatise, called the Krates, a mixing bowl plays the chief role. This krates is
filled with mind (nous) by God, who wants people to immerse themselves in
it: “Immerse yourself in the mixing bowl if your heart has the strength, if it
believes you will rise up again to the one who sent the mixing bowl below,
if it recognizes the purpose of your coming-to-be.”!? Those who understand
this proclamation, says the text, will partake in mind and knowledge and will
become perfect individuals. In the Greek text, the term “perfect” is teleios,
which is a terminus technicus in the language of the mysteries and refers to
the person who has already gained initiation, that is to say, to the initiate.
There is plain evidence here that the mysteries influenced the Hermetica,
and this remind us that the Latin Asclepius has Logos teleios as its Greek
title, which, again, means that the text is one of initiation, so whoever reads
it (or uses the text during an initiation process) will be a perfect—teleios—
person. Now what does “perfect” mean in the Hermetica? As one reads in
CH IV, a perfect person is someone who “received mind”, which is a gift of
God. Itisan important point that this gift is a “prize for the souls to contest”—
that is to say, the human souls have to struggle for it, they have to go along
the Hermetic way, they have to prepare themselves for the rising of the soul,
the anodos psychés. This is why Hermes says the following:
Those who participate in the gift that comes from God, o Tat, are immortal rather
than mortal if one compares their deeds, for in a mind of their own they have
comprehended all—things on earth, things in heaven and even what lies beyond
heaven. [...] This, Tat, is the way to learn about mind, to resolve perplexities in
divinity and to understand God. For the mixing bowl is divine.”
1° CH IV, 4; in Copenhaver, Hermetica, 1992, 15.
20 CH IV, 5, in Copenhaver, Hermetica, 1992, 16.
+ 20 +
Daréczi-Sepsi-Vassänyi_Initiation_155x240.indb 20 6 2020.06.15. 11:04:10