We realize from our study of and, more importantly,
our encounter with the figure of Hermes Trismegistus
that the most difficult task we have as moderns who
wish to pursue a spiritual path is that we cannot simply learn new information
and fit it into our pre-existing World View, but we must learn a new World View,
a new framework in which to fit the Hermetic knowledge. We are handicapped
at every turn by the preconceptions we share of Reality, which are part of
the Modern World View. The emphasis on the historical truth of Hermeticism,
rather than its spiritual truth is but one trap. The attraction to
endlessly "study" the area without actually engaging with the material or
practicing the Hermetic arts is another. We do not follow this path
because we wish to write a thesis or out of idle or abstract interest.
Hermeticism is a means to an end and that end is union with the Divine.
So what is the method? Our first step is to
learn and actually practice one or more of the Hermetic arts of astrology, magic
and alchemy. At the same time we should study and meditate on the
Hermetic philosophy that underlies these arts.
We must constantly oscillate between theory and practice.
Practice without
theory leaves us blindly following our sources and our limited
experience. Practice alone also tempts us to focus on the results of our work, often
material, leading us astray with the prospect of wealth, influence and power from our
ultimate goal.
Theory without practice
is essentially an endless series of mental games.
By actually working with the Hermetic arts and obtaining results we can assure ourselves
of the efficacy and correspondence to Reality of these arts and the philosophy that
underlies them.
In choosing to follow the traditional methods of
practicing astrology, magic and alchemy, that is those methods used before 1700,
we can do our best to avoid the simplifications typical of "New Age" spirituality and
the distortions induced by the Modern World View. We do not accept the traditional
Hermetic teachings merely because they are ancient, but because they are true.
As interesting and useful as it is to predict the future with
astrology, to summon spirits with magic and to create the philosopher's stone with
alchemy, we find the true value in these arts is the transmutation that their successful
mastery causes in our World View. This is not to say that these are purely psychological
changes. No, astrology, magic and alchemy most assuredly do work and do causes changes
of both a material and spiritual nature. Rather, by observing these changes and
recognizing our ability to cause these results, we can know, by experience and for
ourselves, that materialism and atheism are false and that the title of agnostic, literally
one without knowledge, i.e. the ignorant, is properly bestowed on most moderns.
After having learned this knowledge intellectually, a slow
process of assimilation takes place and we begin to internalize and to embody this
knowledge. If astrology, magic and alchemy work, it can only be because the Cosmos is
indeed one great unified Being bound together by myriad chains of spiritual sympathy
and interconnection. Once we truly know this, once we have actually experienced the
reality of this, then we have truly begun the process of Hermetic gnosis.
If we wish to do the preparatory studies for Hermetic
gnosis we would be well advised to study these arts as they were practiced before
1700. We have already delved into the cul de sac that is academic study without
practice, but we also must beware of the Modern World View, that of atheism and
materialism, masquerading under the name of astrology, alchemy and magic.
Marsilio Ficino, the great Renaissance philosopher and
astrological mage has been taken by moderns as a "psychologist", alchemy as a study
of symbology and magic as a metaphor. The modern approach, even when attempting to
apply the Hermetic arts, has typically denied any actual effect outside the confines
of the individual psyche.
Another somewhat more popular modern approach is to see the
mechanism of astrology, magic and alchemy, as a sort of energy, field or magnetism,
and to approach the Hermetic arts as simply another form of technology. Certainly
the operation of interconnection and Cosmic sympathy has been seen in terms of rays
and light, in Al-Kindi's Stellar Rays, for example, but this energy is spiritual
and does not obey the laws governing matter and energy. The fact that spiritual energy
acts at a distance, moves infinitely far instantaneously breaking the 186,000 miles per
second limit of the speed of light and can be approach as either an impersonal force
or a personality, means that it cannot be understood in the Modern World View.
We need a new approach, which in fact, is the old one,
the pre-Enlightenment traditions. We should attempt as soon as possible in our
studies to stop using modern sources written about the Hermetic arts, i.e. secondary
sources, and start using primary sources, the actual texts written and used by
practitioners and traditional philosophers. Use the modern sources just to get oriented
as a bridge to a new way of thinking and understanding and use the traditional sources
to orient yourself and guide yourself in this new world.
With regard to traditional astrology we are privileged
to have a number of practicing astrologers who teach courses, Robert Zoller for natal,
Lee Lehman and John Frawley for horary and my own
Electional Course and Astrological Magic
Course as well as
Planetary Magic Mini-Course and
Lunar Mansions Mini-Course.
While it is theoretically possible to learn traditional astrology on ones own
I have yet to meet anyone with the dedication to do it.
Traditional magic is basically the ceremonial magic
of grimoires like the Greater and Lesser Key of Solomon and the
Picatrix. There are certainly practitioners of traditional ceremonial magic, but
they are somewhat reclusive and to my knowledge there are none that
offer set courses of study. Most magicians are of the modern variety of Golden Dawn,
Chaos or a myriad of other methodologies which are not necessarily compatible with
traditional Hermetic gnosis. Similarly many going under the name of alchemists are
not doing any practical laboratory work or using traditional sources. Caveat Emptor!
I discuss an additional practical technique for
assisting in Hermetic Gnosis in my article
Hermetic Dreaming.
