A Modern Inquiry into the Hermetic Mystery

Part III: Concerning the Laws and Vital Conditions of the Hermetic Experiment

Chapter 3: The Manifestation of the First Matter, Part 5

Introduction: The Hermetic art transforms the soul’s essence, the First Matter, into divine light, uniting it with eternity through sacred vision. This section unveils the mystical encounter with the divine mind, revealing the soul’s path to cosmic rebirth and universal truth.

The Vision of Divine Light

Hermes’ Pimander recounts a sacred vision where the soul, freed from sensory bonds, beholds the divine mind. Pœmander, the “Mind of the Great Lord,” appears as infinite light, sweet and radiant, emerging from dark, moist chaos. This light, the First Matter, is the holy Word uniting with nature, birthing a fiery spirit that ascends, leaving earth and water renewed below. This mirrors the alchemical process, separating the subtle from the gross to reveal the soul’s eternal spark.

Pœmander declares, “I am that Light, your God, before the darkness. The Word is the Son, and the Mind is the Father—united in life.” The soul, seeing and hearing this light, becomes a vessel of divine wisdom, as Paul’s analogy of the seed illustrates: “Sown in corruption, raised in glory.”

The Cosmic Rebirth

Hesiod’s Theogony echoes this, with Chaos birthing Erebus, Night, Ether, and Day through Love’s embrace. Ovid’s Fasti describes a primal mass separating into fire, air, water, and earth, shaped by divine will into a harmonious world. This cosmic rebirth symbolizes the soul’s alchemical transformation, where the purified essence becomes a crystalline vessel of divine light, uniting the microcosm with the macrocosm.

The divine will, as the Kabalistic interpreter notes, moves the formless abyss to create matter and attraction, birthing the cosmos through love. Solomon celebrates this wisdom as an “undefiled spirit,” guiding the soul to know the universe’s mysteries and the elements’ operations.

The Soul’s Eternal Union

The soul, purified through faith and love, ascends to the “eighth sphere” of intellect, singing praises with the cosmic powers. Freed from passion and illusion, it becomes one with the eternal source, as Pœmander instructs: “Know yourself, and pass back into Life.” This union, where the soul’s light merges with divine light, fulfills the Hermetic quest, transforming it into a radiant vessel of universal harmony.

Closing: This chapter unveils the First Matter’s rebirth into divine light, a sacred vision of cosmic and spiritual unity. The journey into its alchemical secrets deepens in our next post, unveiling further wonders of this sacred art.