Mysteries of God, Cosmos, Humanity: realizing purification
Spiritual text: Corpus Hermeticum 14:26-37
Hermes: Purify yourself of the irrational castigations of matter.
Tat: Do I have castigators within me, Father.
Hermes: You have not a few, my son, and they are terrifying and numerous.
Tat: I do not know them, Father.
Hermes: This very ignorance is the first castigation, my son; the second one is grief and sorrow; the third intemperance; the fourth desire; the fifth injustice; the sixth greed; the seventh deceit; the eighth envy; the ninth guile; the tenth anger; the eleventh thoughtlessness ; the twelfth malice.
These castigations are twelve, but there are many more which, by means of the prison of the body, force the human being by their nature to suffer through the activity of the senses.
However, when God has had mercy on the human being, they desist, albeit not immediately. And the latter explains the nature and significance of rebirth.
But be quiet now, my son, and listen in respectful gratitude. God’s mercy will then no longer leave us. Rejoice my son, now that God’s power is purifying you thoroughly so that the segments of the Word can be joined.
The Gnosis of God has come to us: through its appearance ignorance has been banished. The Gnosis of joy has come to us. Through its appearance sorrow will flee to those who have a place for it. After joy the power I invoke is gentle courage.
O wonderful power! Let us receive it in great gladness, my son; behold how its arrival has expelled intemperance.
Fourthly I name self-control, a power that resists desire. The next step, my son, is the support of righteousness, for behold how without ceremony it has banished injustice. So we have become
the righteous ones, now that injustice has disappeared.The sixth power I invoke is the one that wages war against greed; it is the power of magnanimity, which imparts itself to all. And when greed has disappeared, I further invoke truth; as soon as falsehood flees, truth will approach us. See, my son, how The Good has become complete now truth has appeared, for envy has left us. The Good follows after truth, accompanied by life and light; and not a single castigation of darkness can affect us any longer, for, being vanquished, all have fled at whirl- wind speed.
Now you know, my son, the way in which rebirth takes place: through the advent of the ten aspects the spiritual birth is accomplished and the twelve aspects are expelled. Thus we are
deified by this process of birth. Whoever then, by God’s mercy, has achieved this birth- out-of-God and relinquished the physical senses, knows himself to be formed from divine forces and is filled with an inner joy.
Tat: Now I have achieved vision by divine dispensation, I see things no longer by means of the ordinary eyesight, but through the spiritual faculty of the powers received. I am in heaven, on
earth, in water, in the air; I am within animals, and in plants; I am before, during and after birth, yes, I am everywhere. But now tell me this: how are the castigations of darkness, which are twelve in number, driven out by ten forces? How does this come about, Trismegistus?
Hermes: The tent dwelling which we have left, is composed from the circle of the zodiac which, in turn, consists of twelve elements; one nature, but manifold of conception, in keeping with man’s erring thoughts. Among these castigations, my son, there are some that act in combination. For instance, undue haste and thoughtlessness cannot be separated from anger. They cannot even be distinguished. Thus it is understandable and logical that they will disappear together when they are driven away by the ten forces. It is these ten forces, my son, that give birth to the Soul. Life and light are united. And so the number of unity is born out
of the Spirit. Likewise, according to reason, the unity contains the number ten, tenfoldness, and the number ten again contains unity.
Tat: Father, I perceive both the entire All and myself in the Spirit-Soul.
Hermes: That is rebirth, my son: one cannot form any threedimensional concept of it. You know and experience it now thanks to this Discourse on Rebirth, which I have put in writing solely for
your benefit, since we would not divulge all this to the multitude, but exclusively to those whom God has chosen.
