Podcast episode
October 14, 2020
Episode 104: Wouter Hanegraaff on the Poimandres
Wouter Hanegraaff has been poring over the text of C.H. I with some attention. Hanegraaff’s reading seeks to penetrate the layers of literary genre and philosophical materials to get at the vision at the heart of the text and the spiritual practices engaged in by the ‘Hermetics’ of antiquity. Cosmogenic myth and philosophical speculation went hand in hand with intensive meditation practices aimed at profound transformations of consciousness. In the Poimandres, Hermes recognises that he himself is part of the universal noetic light, and is sent back into the world at large, forever changed, to preach the teaching imparted to him by the nous.
Interview Bio:
Wouter J. Hanegraaff is Professor of History of Hermetic Philosophy and related currents at the University of Amsterdam. From 2005 to 2013 he was President of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE), and in 2006 he was elected member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW). Since the mid-1990s, Hanegraaff has been active at the forefront of the academic study of History of Hermetic Philosophy and related currents, also known as “Western Esotericism”.
Check out Wouter’s profile here, and his Creative Reading blog and Western Culture and Counter-culture project are both worth checking out. Wouter is currently hard at work on a major study of Hermetic spirituality in antiquity, forthcoming.
Works Cited in this Episode:
- A.-J. Festugière. La révélation d’Hermès Trismégiste. Les Belles Lettres, Paris, 2014.
- P. Hadot. Philosophy as a Way of Life. Blackwell, Oxford, 1995. Translated by Michael Chase.
- Idem. Exercices spirituels et philosophie antique. Études Augustiniennes, Paris, 2nd edition, 1981.
- Richard Reitzenstein. Poimandres: Studien zur griechisch-aägyptischen und fruhchristlichen Literatur. Teubner, Leipzig, 1904.
Recommended Reading:
- Christian H. Bull. The Tradition of Hermes Trismegistus: the Egyptian Priestly Figure as a Teacher of Hellenized Wisdom. Brill, Leiden, 2018 [pp. 121-131 and 136-154].
- Garth Fowden. The Egyptian Hermes: A Historical Approach to the Late Pagan Mind. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1986.
- Ernst Hänchen. Aufbau und Theologie des ‘Poimandres’. Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche, 53:149–91, 1956.
Themes
Apocalyptic, Cosmic Ascent, Cosmology, Fate, Hermes, Nous, Poimandres, Spiritual Practices
Mystieke School
October 16, 2020
Thanks for this very interesting insights by Professor Hanegraaff which I agree totally with.
The Poimandres is not about any Fall of Mankind. It is indeed a beautiful and positive love story between God, Nature and Human(ity).
Kenneth Selens
October 16, 2020
Man, I’m craving some serious expert speculation on these techniques of altered states of consciousness… I’d rather have wildly irresponsible stabs into the dark than nothing at all. It seems to me that these spiritual disciplines were the most secretive and successfully hidden aspects of antique esoteric traditions… Not simply rhetorical covert operations. I do not think I have ever run across a definitive statement from any scholar that these are in fact some of the most heavily guarded secrets in antiquity, much less why this may be? The nitty-gritty of actual methodology for cultivating altered states of consciousness may be a little easier to ferret out because of the perennial nature of human physiology, but there may be some things that we are still missing…? in fact, I am certain there are many missing pieces that are not wholly lost to us.
Earl Fontainelle
October 16, 2020
I feel your pain, but the evidence, the EVIDENCE!
(But when we discuss the Discourse on the 8th and the 9th and CH XIII we shall of course speculate irresponsibly).
Kenneth Selens
October 16, 2020
I always look forward to the irresponsible speculation if it’s the only leg we have to stand on…
Kenneth Selens
October 16, 2020
The more I think about this the more this is a serious catch 22. The more successful these ancients are at keeping things secret the more there is no evidence. The more there is no evidence, today’s historians believe that there is no reality to it…
Earl Fontainelle
October 16, 2020
The more today’s historians believe that there is no reality to it, the more it stays esoteric.
Thomas Kiefer
October 22, 2020
I think the reason they kept the altered-state techniques so secret is because if they were done wrong, or incorrectly, or too fast, or without enough preparation, or without a guide, they did significant psychic damage– aka they messed people up.
James Lomas
October 18, 2020
Wow! Nous as pure light, with darkness coming from light. Nous as God presenting himself to man. Nous as perception beyond logos, defined here as sight/sound. Staring into the eyes of God, no difference between observer and observed. Mankind as product of Nous falling mutually in love with nature.
And secret altered states of consciousness as a component of meditative spiritual practices.
ALL this in ~30 minutes. Stunning.
Tamara Sanders
October 19, 2020
is there a relationship between Hermes, Hermetica, and “Hermit” and ancient Christian hermit monks?
Earl Fontainelle
October 19, 2020
Dear Tamara,
Sadly, no. ‘Hermit’ goes back to the Greek erêmitês, from erêmia, ‘desert’, basically someone who hangs out alone in the wilderness.
Thomas Kiefer
October 22, 2020
It made me so happy to hear Prof. Hanegraaf state that nous is a kind of perception. I’ve argued in print that in Aristotle’s De Anima, nous for him is non-discursive thinking. In contrast, any logos is the content of the different kinds of discursive thought. One needs nous first, before one can form a logos–this applies to the most abstract or universal subjects of thought of course (if one is a Platonist, the Forms), not everyday-world stuff, which is the concern of perception. Going from the other direction, one needs perception before one can form a logos. (Phantasia is like the storage bank or generator of non-occurrent perceptions.)
So if my interpretation of Aristotle is right, what is the connection between his non-discursive nous that not only thinks “the Forms” (Aristotle had a non-Platonic conception of them, of course) but is also identical to “the Forms” as well as makes “the Forms”, and which it seems all rational beings shared in the same single one, and the nous of the Hermetica and Neoplatonism?
Travis Wade ZINN
November 5, 2020
Fantastic episode! I’m looking forward to the book Wouter!