“The Egyptian Hermes”: Philosophical Mysticism and Revealed Knowledge

Abstract

The tendency to historicity is an important tendency in the modern history of philosophy. Hence a question: to which extend the treatises of Hermetic corpus seem to us historical, and properly connected with Egypt? Is it possible, taking into account the universal and mystical character of these texts, nevertheless to identify in them some elements, which would allow us to understand Hermeticism in the context of Hellenistic Egypt proper, and not broadly defined Hellenism? Does the traditional division of Hermeticism into “high” philosophical and “low” practical make sense in this context, or does this division represent another prejudice, which is better abandoned for a better understanding of the phenomenon under study? This article presents several positions on this subject matter developed over the past century, and offers certain observations that we believe allow us to better understand Hermeticism in the context of Alexandrian religious philosophy. For this purpose we examine in detail the origins of the legend of Thoth, which in the Greek context goes back to Plato, and then turn to an important hermetic text, the Definitions, which has survived only in its medieval translation into Armenian, and only partially preserved in the Greek. Indeed, only the aphoristic form of precepts allows the student to stop being distracted by the lectures of his celestial preceptor and begin to reflect independently on the universal truths expressed in the brief maxims. If this hypothesis is true, then the various Gnostic elements in hermetic treatises, often inappropriate, will appear as later additions by commentators to texts already in circulation in Hellenistic Egypt even before Gnosticism arose.