Hermes and the 32 Ways of Wisdom

Editor’s Note.— This text forms the second subsection of Section II of the surviving “Würzburg Manuscript,” an early draft of The Secret Doctrine prepared by H. P. Blavatsky principally during 1885–1886, before the work was extensively reorganized into the form published in 1888. It belongs to the historical and occult material that originally formed part of the projected introductory volume and was later largely reassigned to the projected third volume.

“Hermes and the 32 Ways of Wisdom” was first published from the manuscript in The Theosophist in three installments: January 1933, pp. 397–401; February 1933, pp. 538–542; and March 1933, pp. 623–624. Much of its subsequently revised material was included by Boris de Zirkoff in H. P. Blavatsky: Collected Writings, vol. XIV, particularly “Hermetic and Kabalistic Doctrines,” pp. 86–94, with related passages appearing elsewhere in that volume. The complete surviving Würzburg section was published in The Secret Doctrine Würzburg Manuscript (Eastern School Press, 2014), pp. 43–51.

The principal body of this early draft was later revised into Section IX of the posthumous 1897 Secret Doctrine, Volume III, especially pp. 91–97, but substantial portions were separated from their original context and redistributed into Sections IV, XX, and XXXV. Some passages were omitted altogether, while others had already appeared in Isis Unveiled and were again reworked here. The Würzburg version is therefore especially valuable for preserving as a single continuous essay material that was later divided and dispersed among several sections of Volume III.

1 [2]—Hermes and the 32 Ways of Wisdom. Confessions.

Hermes has also a Cosmogony, as veiled but more scientifically so. Says the thrice great Trismegistus:

“In the beginning of time the great invisible one had his holy hands full of celestial matter which he scattered throughout the infinity; and lo behold! It became balls of fire and balls of clay; and they scattered like the moving metal quicksilver into many smaller balls, and began their ceaseless turning; and some of them which were balls of fire became balls of clay; and the balls of clay became balls of fire; and the balls of fire were waiting their time to become balls of clay; and the others envied them and bided their time to become balls of pure divine fire.”

Here we have the distribution of matter throughout space; then its concentration into the spherical form; the separation of smaller spheres from the greater ones; axial rotation; the gradual change of orbs from the incandescent to the earthy consistence; and finally, the total loss of heat which marks their entrance into the state of planetary death. The change of the balls of clay into balls of fire would be understood by materialists to indicate some such phenomenon as the sudden ignition of the star in Cassiopeia, A.D. 1572, and the one in Serpentarius, in 1604 which was noted by Kepler. But, do the Chaldeans evince in this expression a profounder philosophy than of our day. Does this change into balls of “pure divine fire” signify a continuous planetary existence, correspondent with the spirit life of man, beyond the awful mystery of death. If worlds have, as the astronomers tell us, their periods of embryo, infancy, adolescence, maturity, decadence, and death, may they not, like man, have their continued existence in a sublimated, ethereal, or spiritual form? The Magians so affirm. They tell us that the fecund Mother Earth is subject to the same laws as every one of her children. At her appointed time she brings forth all created things; in the fullness of her days she is gathered to the tomb of worlds. Her gross material body slowly parts with its atoms under the inexorable law which demands their new arrangement in other combinations. Her own perfect vivifying spirit obeys the eternal attraction which draws it toward that central spiritual sun from which it was originally evolved, and which we vaguely know under the name of God.

“And the heaven was visible in seven circles, and the planets appeared with all their signs, in star form, and the stars were divided and numbered with the rulers that were in them, and their revolving course was bounded with the air, and borne with a circular course, through the agency of the divine SPIRIT.[”]¹ Science tells us of a liquid non-permanent shell of uncongealed matter; enclosing a “viscous plastic ocean,” within which “there is another interior solid globe rotating.[”]² We, on our part, turn to the Magia Adamica of Eugenius Philalethes, published in 1650, and at page 12, we find him quoting from Trismegistus in the following terms: “Hermes affirmeth that in the Beginning the earth was a quackmire or quivering kind of jelly, it being nothing else but water congealed by the incubation and heat of divine spirit; cum adhuc (sayeth he) Terra tremula esset, Lucente sole compacta esto.”

In the same work Philalethes, speaking in his quaint, symbolical way, says, “The earth is invisible . . . on my soul it is so, and which is more, the eye of man never saw the earth, nor can it be seen without art. To make this element invisible, is the greatest secret in magic . . . . as for this faeculent gross body upon which we walk, it is a compost, and no earth, but it hath earth in it, . . . in a word all the elements are visible but one, namely the earth, and when thou hast attained to so much perfection as to know why God hath placed the earth in abscondito, thou hast an excellent figure whereby to know God Himself, and how He is visible, how invisible.[”]³ Isis Unveiled.

Thus while the “revealed word” says to us through the mask of its dead letter: “the world was created ex nihil” an Initiate of the Kabala in the same sacred volume is made to speak of the “Hand, that made the world of formless matter.”⁴

All this is contained within the small compass of the Sepher Jezirah, in its “32 wonderful Ways of wisdom signed Jah Jehovah Sabaoth.” This signature becomes more comprehensible and trustworthy when one learns that with Moses, the “God-names Elohim and Jehovah (were) numerical indices of geometrical relations and stood “(for one meaning) for a diameter and a circumference value, respectively.”⁵ Of this however, more anon. Truly says the wise Book, of Jezirah . . . “the cup of purity and the cup of sin and the tongue of doctrine vacillating between them.” (Ch. II, 1, Sect.) And, it disposes of every dead letter doctrine by teaching us that the 30th Way is called “the gathering understanding and is so called because thereby gather the Celestial Adepts’ judgements of the stars and celestial signs, and their observations of the orbits are the perfection of science”; while the 32nd and last “is called the serving understanding, and is so called because it is a disposer of all those that are serving in the work of the Seven Planets, according to their hosts.”

The work of the Seven Planets is Initiation, during which all the mysteries concerning these, our seven planets are divulged fully. How symbolical and purposely veiled is the Bible may be inferred from these words of the Zohar (111, 152; and Franck, 119): “Wo[e] be to the man who says that the Doctrine delivers common stories and daily words! For if this were so, then we also in our time could compose a doctrine in daily words which would deserve far more praise . . . Therefore, we must believe that every word of the Doctrine contains in it a loftier sense and a higher meaning. The narratives of the Doctrine are its cloak. The simple look only at the garment . . . the instructed, however, see not merely the cloak, but what the cloak covers.” “If we hold to the letters,” exclaims Origen, “and must understand what stands written in the law (the Bible) after the manner of the Jews and common people, then I should blush to confess aloud that it is God who has given these laws; then the laws of men appear more excellent and reasonable.” (Origen, Homil. 7 in Levit.) Then again . . . [“]What man is found such an idiot as to suppose that God planted trees in Paradise, in Eden! . . . . Every man must hold these things for images under which a hidden sense lies concealed.” (Origen; Venet’s Originiana, 167; Franck, 121, quoted from Sod. “Genesis,” p. 175.)⁶

But the most explicit of all the Church Fathers is certainly Clemens Alexandrinus, who, while in search of the two Masters “for Divine and Satanic Magic,[”] seems to repudiate his own, for all those who are unable to understand the secret meaning of his words. Says he, in his Stromata: “THE MYSTERIES OF THE FAITH are not to BE DIVULGED TO ALL. But since this is not published alone for him who perceives the magnificence of the word; it is requisite, therefore, to hide in a Mystery the wisdom spoken, which the Son of God taught.” (12) [“]. . . For we shall find that very many of the dogmas that are held by such sects (of barbarian and Hellenic philosophy) as have not become utterly senseless, and are not cut out from the order of nature, are held in common with us, the token of recognition being by CUTTING OFF CHRIST.[”] (Strom. 13.)⁷

The greatest of the Kabalistic works of the Hebrews—the Sohar [Zohar] זחר—we say in Isis was compiled by Rabbi Simeon Ben-Iochai. According to some critics, this was done years before the Christian era; according to others only after the destruction of the temple. However it was completed only by the son of Simeon, Rabbi Eleazar, and his secretary, Rabbi Abba; for the work is so immense and the subjects treated so abstruse that even the whole life of this Rabbi, called the Prince of Kabalists, did not suffice for the task. On account of its being known that he was in possession of this knowledge, and of the Mercaba which insured the reception of the “Word” his very life was endangered, and he had to fly to the wilderness, where he lived in a cave for twelve years, surrounded by faithful disciples, and finally died there amid signs and wonders.⁸

But voluminous as is the work, and containing as it does the main points of the secret and oral tradition, it still does not embrace it all. It is well known that this venerable Kabalist never imparted the most important points of his doctrine otherwise than orally, and to a very limited number of friends and disciples, including his only son. Therefore without the final initiation into the Mercaba the study of the Kabala will be ever incomplete, and the Mercaba can be taught only in “darkness, in a deserted place, and after many and terrific trials.” Since the death of Simeon Ben-Iochai this hidden doctrine has remained an inviolate secret for the outside world.

In Die Kabbala by Franck, the author following its “esoteric ravings,” as he expresses it, gives us, in addition to the translations, his commentaries. Speaking of his predecessors, he says that Simeon Ben-Iochai mentions repeatedly what the “companions” have taught in the older works. And the author cites one “Ieba, the old, and Hamnuna, the old.”⁹ But what the two “old” ones mean, or who they were, in fact, he tells us not, for he does not know himself.

Among the venerable sect of the Tanaim or rather the Tananim, the wise men, there were those who taught the secrets practically and initiated some disciples into the grand and final mystery. But the Mishna Hagiga, 2nd Section, say that the table of contents of the Mercaba “must only be delivered to wise old ones.”¹⁰ The Gemara is still more dogmatic. “The more important secrets of the Mysteries were not even revealed to all priests. Alone the initiates had them divulged.” And so we find the same great secrecy prevalent in every ancient religion.

The Synthetic and Kabalistic Studies on the Sacred Book of Enoch—the Taro (Rota) is before us. It is the MSS copy of a Western Occultist and it is prefaced by these words: “There is but one Law, one Principle, one Agent, one Truth and one WORD—That which is above, is analogically as that which is below. All that which is, is the result of quantities and of Equilibriums.”

The axiom of Eliphas Levi and this triple Epigraph show the identity of thought between the East and the West with regard to the Secret Science which, as the same M.S.S. tells us is:—“The KEY of things concealed; the key of the Sanctuary,[”] and adds: “This the Sacred Word which gives to the adept the supreme reason of Occultism and its mysteries. It is the quintessence of Philosophies and of Dogmas; it is the Alpha and Omega; it is the Light, Life and Wisdom universal.”

The Taro of the Sacred Book of Enoch, or Rota, is prefaced, moreover, with this explanation: —

“The antiquity of this Book is lost in the night of time. It is of Indian origin and goes back to an epoch long before Moses.”

“It is written upon detached leaves, which at the first were of fine gold and precious metals . . . It is symbolical, and its combinations adapt themselves to all the wonders of the Spirit. Altered by its passage across the ages, it is nevertheless preserved—thanks to the ignorance of the curious,—in its types and its most important primitive figures.”

This is the Rota of Enoch, now called TARO of Enoch, to which de Mirville alludes as the means used for “bad magic,” the “metallic plates (or leaves) escaped from destruction during the Deluge” and attributed by him to Cain. They have escaped the Deluge for the simple reason that it was never “Universal.” And it is said to be “of Indian origin” because its origin is with the Indian Aryans of the first sub-races of the 5th Root-race before the final destruction of the last stronghold of Atlantis. But if it originated with the forefathers of the primitive Hindus, it was not in India that it was first used. Its origin is still older and has to be traced beyond and into the Himaleh¹¹ the snowy range. It was born in that mysterious locality which no one knows where to locate and which is the despair of both geographers and Christian Theologians—the region in which the Brahmin places his Kailas, the mount Sumeru, and the Parbati-Pamer transformed by the Greeks in Paropamison.

On this locality that still exists, the traditions of the garden of Eden were built. From these, the Greeks obtained their Parnassus¹² and thence proceeded most of the Biblical personages, some of them in their day—men, some demi-gods and heroes, several—though very few myths, the astronomical doubles of the former. Abram was one of them. A Chaldean Brahman,¹³ says the legend, transformed later, after he had repudiated his Gods and left his Ur (pur—town) in Chaldee into A-brahm,¹⁴ (or A-braham), “no-brahman[”] who emigrated; and thus, his becoming “the father of many nations”—is explained. The students of occultism have to bear in mind, that invariably every Biblical personage and most of the locality-names are connected at one and the same time, with astronomical, numerical and psychic subjects and qualifications. This is shown not only by the secret teaching but by strictly mathematical methods. They are all related to measures, geometrical figures and time calculations; principal period durations being founded on them.¹⁵ They are connected with Heaven and Earth—truly. For, in the Hindu Pantheon, the oldest, as in the Jewish—the youngest (but one)—their prototypes are the “mind-born” Sons of Light, as they are themselves the “Sin-born” ancestors of our present Humanity. One of such is Abram or Abraham into whose bosom every orthodox Jew hopes to be gathered after death¹⁶—that “bosom” being localized heaven, “in the clouds” Abhra (Sanskrit), in Loka Palas.

As Abraham has to be noticed further on in his relation to other universal symbols we need not go out of the way to speak of him here more than necessary. The name itself has a very strong Kabeirian look. The words Heber, Gheber (applied to Nimrod and the Giants of Genesis (VI), and Kaber all sound like the mysterious word, for all the Mystery Gods were Kabeir. The Phoenicians were Φο ν κεϛ or Ph’-Anakes as being of the Anakim, Kabeirian, kingly or divine Race, which race was the Second Race of our humanity as shown in the Secret books in which all the transformations of Brahma throughout the æons of time are given. Brahma was born with the Fourth race; the first—that of unwritten Rig-Veda knew him not and he is not even mentioned in this archaic Aryan Bible written in Tibet in the beginning of Tretta [Treta]-Yuga on Lake Manassorovara [Manasarovara]. It is but in the third Race only that the “wheel” of Enoch was invented as a first attempt at symbology, though Enoch No. 1 had naught to do with it.

There are two taros—the wheel purely Esoteric, and the Western tarot—Kabalistical[ly] remodeled by Shimites, a branch so much younger than the Aryans and even the Hamites. The latter tarot (tarot) is to be read from right to left like Arabic and Hebrew writing. The former, primitive “Wheel” is in Cuneiform characters and astrological signs. One of the oldest in the world is made on a kind of tolla leaves of some chemically prepared and indestructible material which makes them look like burnished metal.

Thus as we see, neither the Sohar nor any other Kabalistic volume contains merely Jewish wisdom. The doctrine itself being the result of whole millenniums of thought, is therefore the joint property of adepts of every nation under the sun. Nevertheless, the Sohar teaches practical Occultism more than any other work on that subject; not as it is translated though, and commented upon by its various critics, but with the secret signs on its margins. These signs contain the hidden instructions, apart from the metaphysical interpretations and apparent absurdities so fully credited by Josephus, who was never initiated, and gave out the dead letter as he had received it.

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