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Corpus Hermeticum

 

Also known as the Hermetica, the Corpus Hermeticum is a collection of 17 Greek writings whose authorship is traditionally attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus, a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth. The treatises were originally written between c. 100 and c. 300 CE, but the collection as known today was first compiled by medieval Byzantine editors. It was translated into Latin in the 15th century by the Italian humanist scholars Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499) and Lodovico Lazzarelli (1447–1500).

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Although the Latin word corpus is usually reserved for the entire body of extant writings related to some author or subject, the Corpus Hermeticum contains only a very small selection of extant Hermetic texts (texts attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, commonly known as Hermetica). Its individual treatises were quoted by many authors from the second and third centuries on, but the compilation as such is first attested only in the writings of the Byzantine philosopher Michael Psellus (c. 1017–1078).​

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The treatises contained in the Corpus Hermeticum are:

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  • I. Discourse of Poimandres to Hermes Trismegistus

  • II. Hermes to Asclepius

  • III. A sacred discourse of Hermes

  • IV. A discourse of Hermes to Tat: The mixing bowl or the monad

  • V. A discourse of Hermes to Tat, his son: That god is invisible and entirely visible

  • VI. Hermes to Asclepius: That the good is in god alone and nowhere else

  • VII. That the greatest evil in mankind is ignorance concerning god

  • VIII. Hermes to Tat: That none of the things that are is destroyed, and they are mistaken who say that changes are deaths and destructions

  • IX. Hermes to Asclepius: On understanding and sensation: [That the beautiful and good are in god alone and nowhere else]

  • X. Hermes to Tat: The key

  • XI. Mind (Nous) to Hermes

  • XII. Hermes to Tat: On the mind shared in common

  • XIII. Hermes to Tat, a secret dialogue on the mountain: On being born again, and on the promise to be silent

  • XIV. Hermes to Asclepius: health of mind

  • XVI.[a] Asclepius to King Ammon: Definitions on god, matter, vice, fate, the sun, intellectual essence, divine essence, mankind, the arrangement of the plenitude, the seven stars, and mankind according to the image

  • XVII. Asclepius to King Ammon

  • XVIII. Tat to a king: On the soul hindered by the body's affections

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​*Link To Corpus Hermeticum (Full Text)

 

 

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