(The Way of La Toabey)
Chimia-Alchemy
Victor. Arturo. Cabello. Reyes.
"When certain traditions of the metal age allude to 'trade secrets' in connection with mining, metallurgy and the manufacture of weapons, it would be unwise to believe that this is an unprecedented invention..."
(Mircea Eliade)
Now, it is alchemy {Sacred Science} that has the real, practical and operative sense of secret and initiatory teaching = Arte Regio Ars Regia.
Man, regenerates inwardly when he ritualizes in himself the process of creation in the athanor—inner and outer—by being able to embody the appropriate energies according to his particular astrological nature.
Paracelsus calls it his personal microcosm, his star.
Spiritual alchemy acquires meanings within the possibilities of the inner experience of ascension-transformation.
Energies that potentially reside in us, analogous to cosmic-astrological correspondences. Ostanés knew it as 7 stages or distillations related to 7 planets and 7 operations or degrees.
Thus, the old wisdom of the Persian Octanes in the art of stone is consolidated in the Nile Delta with Bolos of Mendes, the pseudo-Democritus [250 B.C.] in his Physika et Mystika, where mythos-philosophical aspects are unified in a practical way.
In reality, the Physica et mystica is made up of three essential fragments: one is magical, the other refers to the valuable tincture of Purple, and the last one about the best work for the "imitation" of silver or gold.
''L' École Démocritaine d'Égypte a créé une tradition scientifique, spécialement en alchimie; Tradition qui s'est prolongée jusqu'au VII Siécle de notre ére...''(1)
But in addition, in ancient Egypt the priests of Thoth the sacred Baboon – cult of Hermopolis Magna – met in the house of knowledge = House of Life where there was the library, the papyrus archive and the scriptorium of teaching. (2)
It is the 'Mystery of the Priests of Egypt' who, through the Arte Regio, communicated ideas of ritual purification associated with the work and concrete procedures of an alchemical-operative art.
In papyrus V=[bilingual], there appear in Greek and Demotic "writings of the alchemist Zosimus" with alchemical characteristics, magical formulas, and Egyptian doctrines and invocations. (3)
It is in this series of ancient papyri that the names of Bolos of Mendes, Synesius, Ostanes, pseudo-Democritus, and Zosimus of Panopolis appear.
Gnosticism, Kabbalah, Neoplatonism, and theurgy all fused to ideas from an ancient primordial tradition of Egyptian-Alexandrian nature.
''The fact that the earliest alchemists are not mentioned by their non-alchemical contemporaries suggests that, for the first two or three centuries of its life, alchemy was semisecret though written tradition, pursued by a few obscure persons in the vast city of Alexandria, the home of strange branches of learning and the meeting-place of Eastern, Western, and old Egyptian creeds and practices''. (4)
Zosimus of Panopolis {Akhmim} inspects the ancient sacred objects of the temple of Memphis and in his 'fragmentary' writings reveals alchemical elements of considerable value, resulting in an eclectic fusion of the oriental knowledge and wisdom of Thoth-Hermes and Zoroastro, between powerful recurring dreams and optical illusions of the staircase (7 or 15 steps) to Aion, priest of the temple, who ritually dismembers it into parts "according to the Rule of Harmony". (5)
''These archetypal dream-figures appear to embody or symbolize technical, alchemical processes... The dismembering, flaying, apparent death, resurrection and piercing would return in graphic form in seventeenth century Rosicrucian-inspired works such as Atalanta Fugiens (1618), by Count Michael Maier, to baffle the uninitiated''. (6)
Zosimus ''sees'' the priest [mixing bowl], first in copper and then in his transformation of colors changing to silver.
''... If you wish, after a little time you will have him as a man of gold''.
(Fowden, 121)
For Zosimus, all things, material or spiritual, are endowed with the elements of powers of universal sympathy, with 'divine powers inherent' in the universe; whose experiences of the spirit are characterized by alchemical metaphors of occult and inner properties of man and his soul.
''Zosimos spirituality is clearly the product of his contact with the philosophical Hermetica''. (7)
''Zosimos held the magical view that the material and spiritual find their kinship in a universal pattern of powerful sympathetic links, with the corollary the spiritual experiences may be expressed in material metaphors...'' (#8)
And he exhorts his "spiritual sister" Theosebia to beware of evil spirits [daemons], who lurk cautiously in the least expected places. '... and not confined in the smallest place like the daemons, will come to you.''
He recommends calming down passions and desires, pleasures and anxieties by taking control of yourself.
By taking control of herself, she facilitates the proper reception of the divine.
According to Georges le Syncelle [an eighth-century polygraph], Zosimus expounds in his book IMOUTH=Imhotep dedicated to his sister Theosobeia alchemical concepts of the ancient Egyptian tradition.
Both Zosimus and Olympiodorus achieve the reproduction of Gnostic speculative elements about the nature of the Primordial Adam, identified as Universal Man and with the Egyptian Thoth and representing his 4 letters, the 4 elements. (9)
The fundamental point is that alchemy, together with the practical forms of theurgical and astrological magic, form an essential part of the alchemical treatises= [Chrysopée or Cleopatra's Art of Making Gold]. It expresses the sense of the Unity of matter = ''One the All''. (10)
Therefore, the true symbolism of Magnum Opus derives from the sacred essence and 'qualitative' perfection of Gold.
A sacred thousand-year-old operation of ancient "archaic" blacksmiths who, having to tame fire, found the alchemical unity between fire and man in the ignition and extraction of metals.
Symbols and concepts of the internal transformation of man - metallurgical - in a personal mysticism of ascension and inner purification.
We can say that the Ouroboros, the recurring and eternal circle of energy, bites its tail = cosmic serpent form, as we can see in the Martian Codex.
(Codex Márcianus, Ms.2325, f.188 b.)
The process of making Gold is known = Chrysopoei [from the Greek-chryson poien = to make Gold] and Argyropoei = to make Silver.
Iconographic part of these processes in Alexandria can be seen in the famous Codex Marcianus graecus 299, fol. 188v.
(Chen to pan=One the All)
"Nature rejoices nature, nature overcomes nature, and nature dominates nature". (11)
Thus, alchemy is the individual search and the process of inner initiation where the Self is studied and refined through rigorous study and a pure life of reintegration, where fall and redemption are part of the macrocosmic cycle of creation. Ordo at Chaos.
"However, we can affirm that the esoteric played a very important role before Constantine, that is, until the year 312. At this time, Christian esotericism developed in Alexandria, where Egyptian, Jewish and Hellenic cultures converged".
(Antoine Faivre)
For thousands of years, men have been searching for empirical and practical ways to convert metals into gold and silver.
A papyrus from the Twelfth Dynasty in Egypt describes Chemi or Chema [Greek=chyma], and the operation of manipulating metals considered a sacred operation for ancient civilizations. (12)
In the same way, Sacred Art is a legacy of oral Art and its transmission is exclusive to a master-disciple relationship.
We see, then, that Isis, in her famous Discourse to her son Horus, acknowledges that the revelation of Opus Dei was given to her by the angel Amnael as a reward for the sexual-angelic trade. (13)
The Treatises of pseudo-Dionysus with his Celestial Hierarchies that interpenetrate the scaled levels of the cosmos between emanations of Light = Word intimately related to a practical alchemy and Royal Art.
Zosimus, Synesius, Olympiodorus, and Mary the Jewess, among others.
However, it is an alchemy based on analogies and projections of the ancient science of solar emanation in the search for coniunctio, the union of opposites and ''Hierosgamos of Light-Darkness'' = perfect marriage of the Sun-Moon.
The pseudo-Democritus and his identity are pointed out by Pliny who repeats the name of Bolos de Mendes about the vitrification of colors and anonymous recipes for the manufacture of precious stones and magic elixirs.
(appear on stelae and papyri, according to Berthelot)
Chimia-Alchemy
Victor. Arturo. Cabello. Reyes.
Bibliography:
1. Marcelin Berthelot, Introduction A L'Etude de la Chimie des Ancients et du Moyen Age, p.201.
2. Lesley Jackson, Thoth, 162.
3. Papyrus V, Col.1-8: Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris.
4. F. Sherwood Taylor, The Alchemists, p.28.
5. Garth Fowden, The Egyptian Hermes, p.121.
6. Tobias Churton, The Golden Builders, p.23.
7. Garth Fowden, The Egyptian Hermes.
8. Tobias Churton, p.23 and Zosimus of Panopolis, On apparatus and Furnaces: Authentic Commentaries on the Letter Omega, fr. gr. 228-35.
9. Berthelot, Les Origines De L'Alchimie, p.64.
10. Codex Marcian, Ms.2325, f.188b.
11. Democritus: in Berthelot, Alch. Grecs. II, I; 3.
12. Mircea Eliade, Forgerons et Alchimistes.
13. Manuscript No. 2,327 National Library, fol.256. Paris.
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