Emerald Tablet

The Emerald Tablet (Latin for " emerald table" ) is traditionally the text attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, which forms the philosophical basis of Hermetics and is regarded as the basic text of alchemy.

The Tabula is one of the most famous texts of alchemical and hermetic literature. In the approximately twelve dark, allegorical sets up the idea of ​​a connection between the microcosm and the macrocosm is reflected. That which is below is like that which is above and that which is above is like what is below, an ever- lasting miracle of the One.

The oldest surviving text version can be found in the appendix to an Arabic manuscript of the sixth century. Translated into Latin in the 12th century, the tab in the Middle Ages and reinforced commented and received during the Renaissance by many alchemists was. Even with the beginning of the modern natural sciences and the discrediting of alchemy was her fascination at least occultist and esoteric unbroken to the present day.

• 3.1 Comments from the Middle Ages and the early modern period
• 3.2 Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment
• 3.3 19th and 20th centuries
• 3.4 Reception in music

Legends of the discovery of the panel

According to legend, the text should - have been under a statue of Hermes at the grave of Hermes, said to have been in the Cheops pyramid, found - written on two columns or slabs of emerald. In other versions, is told Sarah, the wife of Abraham have discovered the tablets in the grave of Hermes in the valley of Hebron in the hands of the corpse of Hermes.

Sources and texts

Around the 3rd or 2nd century dip in Hellenistic Egypt in Greek language fonts that map to the mythical Hermes Trismegistus author, owner of secret knowledge and the author of inaccessible texts. In summary, these texts astrological, magical, medical and religious- philosophical content are entitled Corpus Hermeticum. In one of the oldest parts of the Copus, the Kore Kosmou ( pupil \ daughter of the world), a dialogue between Isis and Hermes is mentioned that Hermes " was all he knew, engraved in a stone which he had hidden and the all later ones should be looking to get to the knowledge. " hermetic tradition was in Egypt about the christian Coptic, Byzantine and get down to the time of the Arab conquest in the 7th century.

Until the early 20th century only in Latin translations of the Tabula were known to the English historian EJ Holmyard (1891-1959) and the Orientalist Julius Ruska discovered the first versions in Arabic ..

Emerald Tablet, Issue Chrysogomus Polydorus, Nuremberg 1541

Dutch translation, 1657

Arabic manuscripts

From the Emerald Tablet twenty Arabic translations from the Middle Ages have survived. The oldest version is found in the appendix to the treatise Secretum secretorum and in a copy of 825. As an author, here the Greek mystic Apollonius of Tyana appears, though under his Arabic name Balînûs. The advocated by some authors thesis that there had been an original Greek text, is indeed likely, but could not yet be confirmed by finding the original text. The adoption of Apollonius as a writer is not to keep, but was accepted into the Middle Ages as safe.

Latin translations

The Liber de Secretis naturae was transferred to the early 12th century for the first time from the court of the Bishop of Tarazona make Translator Hugo of Santalla from Arabic into Latin. This version was, however, hardly been received due to the low penetration of the manuscript.

The second, abridged Latin translation of 1140 with the title Secretum Secretorum comes from John Hispalensis or Hispaniensis; it was followed in 1220 a longer partial translation by Philip of Tripoli. This book became one of the most famous medieval manuscripts at all. A third Latin translation is contained in an alchemy treatise, which was probably written in the 12th century. The original manuscript of this text has not been preserved; only copies from the 13th and 14th centuries have survived. This version, also vulgata (Latin for " the commonly held " ) called, is the most widely used of the Liber Secretorum ..

Latin text and German translations

Translations, comments, Reception

Comments from the Middle Ages and the early modern period

The Tabula and its legendary discovery are mentioned for the first time in the literature of the astrologer and translator of Arabic texts Hermann of Carinthia in the treatise De essentiis of 1143. Albertus Magnus mentions at 1256 De Rebus Metallicis et de mineralibus. Between 1275 and 1280 translated and commented on Roger Bacon the Secretum secretorum.

A common comment comes from the hand of an unknown alchemist named Hortulain ( = the gardener ), who lived in the first half of the 14th century.

From 1420 circulated excerpts in Latin as manuscripts, including the illuminated manuscript Aurora consurgens. One of the illustrations shows the discovery of the tabs in a chapel -like building. The panel is provided with alchemical symbols, with bow and arrow armed black eagle aimed at the scholar and his students. The eagle represent in the theory of the elements of the volatile element air, which is associated with Hermes, and how they should declare Claudius Ptolemy in his astrological basic work Tetrabiblos, the first dean in the sign of Sagittarius is ruled by Mercury.

Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment

The year 1462 marked the founding of the Platonic Academy in Florence by Marsilio Ficino. On behalf of Cosimo de ' Medici translated Ficino not only Plato's writings and made them that way the Latin -speaking scholars of his time available, he also translated a Greek version of the Corpus Hermeticum into Latin, which in 1471 under the title Pimander, Mercurii Trismegisti liber de sapientia et potestate Dei Marsilio Ficino interprete Asclepius, ejusdem Mercurii liber de voluntate divina L. Apuleio interprete was printed. Ficino's translation set the stage for a broader discussion of the humanists, naturalists and physicians with the hermetic world of thoughts. Ficino dated the corpus nor in the days before Plato; he kept the lyrics for a very old theological source. In his assessment of the embodied philosophy of Plato was just as old as Moses and the prophets declining Christian religion, and he saw the two of them do not contradict each other.

During the Renaissance, the idea of Hermes Trismegistus prevailed as the founder of Alchemy, at the same time, therefore, in which the legend of the discovery Tabula widespread and was mixed with stories from the Bible, such as in the case of the treatise Livre de la philosophy of métaux naturelle ( 1574 ) of the Bernhardus Trevisanus. The alchemists considered Hermes Trismegistus as the founder of their science and as one who is owner of all knowledge about the cosmos, the world of minerals, plants and animals.

Wilhelm Christoph soldier wrote his treatise on the Emerald Tablet in 1657.

The legend of the finding of the panel and their attribution to a mythical Hermes Trismegistus lasted until the 18th century. In connection with his employment with alchemy Isaac Newton translated the text into English and wrote in the late nineties of the 18th century a commentary on the Tabula.

19th and 20th centuries

Appeared in 1869 in Bonn, the comprehensive book The Alchemy of the physician and scholar Gottlieb Latz, in which a section of the Tabula is dedicated. The book has been launched again and again, the most recent edition was published in 2010: Nabu Press, an Internet publishing. It has been translated into English and Dutch and enjoys to this day one unbroken interest of esoteric, occult followers teachings and those interested in the history of alchemy. The spiritualist and founder of the Theosophical Society, Madame Blavatsky 's Isis Unveiled in her book describes in detail the Emerald Tablet. as well as the Swiss Sufiforscher and followers of a Philosophia perennis, Titus Burckhardt.

In the early 20th century alchemy was new interest in some representatives of surrealism. André Breton took over some of the axioms of the Emerald Tablet in his second " Surrealist Manifesto" of 1930 James Joyce parodied in Finnegans Wake the first set of tabs. From the English translation of " That which is below is as That Which is above, and did Which is above is as That Which is below, to perform the miracles of the one thing " is in Joyce " The tasks above are as the flasks below, saith the emerald canticle of Hermes and all's loth and pleasestir, are we told, on excellent inkbottle authority "

The first sentence of the Tabula has also in the minds of CG Jung input found. The sentence " It ascends from earth to heaven and again it descends to the earth and receives the force of the Upper and Lower. " Describes his idea of ​​a " mystery coniunctionis ", the idea of ​​climbing up and down as the process of union of the forces of the Lower with those of the upper.

Reception in music

• Manfred Kelkel: Emerald Tablet. Hermétique Ballet, for piano, chorus and orchestra, Op 24 1975 / 77th
• Yan Maresz: Emerald Tablet, for mixed chamber choir a cappella, 2004.