The Corpus Hermetica

By: Grs Mead

The Hermetica are Egyptian-Greek wisdom texts from the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD, which are mostly presented as dialogues in which a teacher, generally identified as Hermes Trismegistus ("thrice-greatest Hermes"), enlightens a disciple. The texts form the basis of Hermeticism. They discuss the divine, the cosmos, mind, and nature. Some touch upon alchemy, astrology, and related concepts.With his choice of language, Mead tries to convey both the ambiguity and the the elevated, visionary intensity of the material. He correctly understood the Hermetic writings as the distillations of profound spiritual and psychological experiences -- experiences the texts themselves call "Gnosis". These are not philosophical tracts. Their core impetus was communication of a visionary reality. The tradition that produced the Corpus Hermeticum embrased an imaginative, prophetic voice common in Gnostic scriptures; and the insights this "Gnosis" produced are not easily expresssed in Greek, or Latin, or any pedestrian dialect of English. But they can by understood, if one has an ear for the core experience. It is the desire to communicate their experience of interior reality that motivated these ancient authors.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1515348598
• ISBN13: 9781515348597
• Release Date: August 2015
• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Length: 64 Pages
• Weight: 0.33 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.1" x 6.0" x 9.0"