We are now going to present the historical narrative, as complete as we can make it, in reverse order, from the school established by Agrippa in London, to the farthest back we can go. If we miss some group or another, we hope to make it up to you in the future.
What we are about to detail in this narrative, pertains not only to the Sabians of Harran, but to the entire Western Esoteric Tradition, aka the Hermetic Tradition. This is a telling of the antiquities of the Hermetic Tradition, at least as far as how it was transmitted, from the East, to Florence, and the rest of Europe.
New materials for 11 March 2002: The Communauté des Mages, London, 1510; new remarks from Ambelain; more on the Boghdadiens.
According
to Robert Ambelain, in Le Martinisme, some new information is
coming to light as to the origins of the R+C which are not very far off from
what we have been piecing together from the materials made available to us.
It is not entirely possible for us at least, to find the proofs which Ambelain
asserts regarding Agrippa, but here we go with a quote:
"Dès le debut du XVI° siècle, nous voyons fonctionner l'association secrète de la "Communauté des Mages", fondée par Henri Cornélius Agrippa, association qui groupait les maîtres contemporains de l'Achimie et de la Magie.
"Lorsqu'Agrippa arriva à Londres, en 1510, il fonda, ainsi qu'il résulte de sa correspondance (Opuscula, t. II, page 1073), une société secrète semblable à celle qu'il avait fondée en France. Les membres étaient dotés de signes particuliers de reconnaissance, de 'mots' de passage. Ces membres fondèrent alors, dans divers autres états de l'Europe, des associations correspondantes, dénommées Chapitres, pour l'étude des sciences 'interdites'." -- p. 48.
We looked up page 1073 in our copy of Agrippa's Works, Volume II. We couldn't find any references. However, this is interesting, since it is a sort of second opinion on what we have been posing in our thesis: The Rosicrucians, the true Rose+Croix, predated the manifestoes at least by a century, if not longer. This tells us:
1. Agrippa was being taught by Trithemius and others in the Tübingen circle. He set up a sodality in France, while he lived there, and while he was writing his magnum opus, De Occulte Philosophia.
2. When Agrippa goes to London to labor in the Court of Henry VIII, he meets up with Dean Colet, a cleric, who educates him in the Pauline Epistles. At the same time, Agrippa is said to have established a body, known as the Communauté des Mages.
3. Later on, this would be known as the Frères de la Rose+Croix d'Or, or the Gold Rosicrucians, around 1570.
4. Also related to this group would be the Militia Crucifera Evangelica, founded in 1598 at Nuremburg by Simon Studion.
5. Also, at some point, around the time of Robert Fludd, a split occurred, in which the Golden Rosicrucians went their way, and another group was created, simply the Rosy Cross, Rose+Croix, etc. It is said in Ambelain's work that Initiates such as Jakob Böhme, were of the Gold R+C stamp, while Vaughan, Ashmole, etc., were of the Rosicrucian current.
Tübingen School.Whether or not there was an actual group going by this name, there existed at Tübingen, Germany, a very active cell of Initiates, late 15th / early 16th Century c.e. Some of the most notable members of this grouping included Johann Reuchlin, Johann Trithemius, Johann Stöffler von Justingen, Henry Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim, Ulrich von Hutten. Some of these learned directly from the Florence Academy, set up by Cosimo de Medici, from adepts such as Giovanni Pico della Mirandola. Reuchlin and Trithemius owe a debt to the Florence Academy for the wealth of information they learned.
According to Christopher McIntosh, The Rosicrucians: The History, Mythology, and Rituals of an Esoteric Order, pages 11 – 12:
"When the Hermetic-Qabalistic-Neoplatonic tradition reached Germany, therefore, it fell on ripe soil. One of the greatest German Hebraists and Qabalists was Johannes Reuclin (1455 – 1522), from Pforzheim in the Black Forest. Reuchlin drew his knowledge of the Qabalah to a large extent from Pico della Mirandola and from two Jewish teachers, Obadiah Sforno and Jacob Loans. He also leaned heavily on the writings of Joseph ben Abraham Gikatilla, a Spanish Qabalist who wrote at the end of the 13th century and taught that divine power emanates in a series of permutations of the holy name YHWH. Reuchlin’s most influential Qabalistic work was his De Arte Cabalistica (1517). He also wrote a book on the Hebrew language, Rudimenta Hebraica (1506). Reuchlin’s Hebrew sympathies provoked strong hostility from opponents of the Jews, especially from a fanatical convert from Judaism, Johannes Pfefferkorn. The humanists came to the aid of Reuchlin and attacked his clerical opponents in a series of satirical writings, thus striking an important blow against intolerance.
"Another German, Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim (1486 – 1533), was one of the most influential figures in the whole history of occultism. Born at Cologne as Heinrich Cornelis, which he later Latinized to Cornelius, adding the name of the Roman founder of Cologne (the ‘von Nettesheim’ refers to a place near Cologne), Agrippa passed most of his life as a soldier and envoy in the service of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V. He led a roving life during which he pursued wide-ranging scholarship and came into contact with many leading minds in different parts of Europe. He lectured on Reuchlin in Dole, stayed with the English philosopher Dean Colet in London, and worked as physician to Queen Louisa of Savoy. His outspokenness got him into trouble with the Church and with King François I who had him thrown into prison at Lyon. Shortly after his release, he died in poverty.
"Agrippa was one of the main exponents of Ficino’s Neoplatonic school of thought. This and other elements went into his main work, De Occulta Philosophia, first published at Cologne in 1531. The work consisted of three parts, each part examining one of three realms: the elemental, the intellectual, and the celestial. The first contains a survey of natural magic, the second deals with number symbolism, and the third, which owes much to Reuchlin, treats of the divine names.
"One of the things that brought Agrippa fame and notoriety was his defense of magic – defined as the wisdom of the Magi and not as the sorcery of the popular imagination. In his De Occulta Philosophia, he writes: ‘[a] Magician doth not amongst learned men, signify a sorcerer or one that is superstitious or devilish; but a wise man, a priest, a prophet; and that the Sybils were Magicianessesm and therefore prophesied most clearly of Christ; and that Magicians, as wise men, by the most wonderful secrets of the world, knew Christ, the author of the world, to be born, and came first of all to worship him; and that the name of Magic was received by philosophers, commended by divines, and is not unacceptable to the Gospel.’"
In Encyclopaedia Britannica, 14th Edition, 1959, we read, concerning Reuchlin:
"On his return to Germany he was engaged as interpreter by Count Eberhard of Württemberg, for a tour in Italy. They started for Florence and Rome in February 1482. His connection with the count became permanent, and after his return to Stuttgart he received important posts at Eberhard’s court. About this time he appears to have married, but little is known of his married life. He left no children; but in later years his sister’s grandson Melancthon was almost as a son to him till the Reformation estranged them.
"In 1490 he was again in Italy. Here he saw Pico della Mirandola, to whose Cabalistic doctrines he afterwards became heir, and also made the friendship of the pope’s secretary, Jakob Questenberg. On an embassy to the emperor Frederick at Linz in 1492, he began to read Hebrew with the emperor’s Jewish physician Jakob ben Jehiel Loans. In 1494 his rising reputation had been greatly enhanced by the publication of De Verbo Mirifico.
"In 1496 Eberhard of Württemberg died, and Reuchlin was glad to accept the invitation of Johann von Dalberg (1445 – 1503), bishop of Worms, to Heidelberg, which was then the seat of the ‘Rhenish Society.’ In this court of letters Reuchlin made translations from the Greek authors. He was during a great part of his life the real centre of all Greek teaching as well as of all Hebrew teaching in Germany."
On Agrippa and his contemporaries, Donald Tyson writes, in the historical introduction to his excellent translation of Three Books of Occult Philosophy, pages xvi – xviii:
"While at Paris, Agrippa gathered around him, as he was often to do later in life, a group of scholars pursuing studies into the occult mysteries. .."
Later, after describing one of those pivotal military events in Agrippa’s life, which involved members of this Paris circle:
"In a letter he expressed his wish to draw once again his companions from Paris around him: ‘Nothing now remains but that, after so many dangers, we insist upon a meeting of our brother combatants, and absolve ourselves from the oath of our confederacy, that we may recover our old state of fellowship and have it unmolested’ (epistle 9, bk. 1).
"There can be little doubt that the Paris circle was more than just a political marriage of convenience. It was an occult brotherhood of young men drawn around Agrippa by his knowledge of, and enthusiasm for, the mysteries of magic and religion. Although the term ‘Rosicrucianism’ has no meaning before its appearance in a pamphlet published in Cassel, Germany in 1614, Agrippa’s group of aspirants might be looked upon as a prototype for this movement. Magic for Agrippa was the highest and most sacred of disciplines, capable of transforming the soul. He would certainly have communicated this belief to his followers, and would never have tolerated anything less than reverence toward the study of the magical arts.
"This was a time of intense debate and study of the mysteries for Agrippa. Even when his friends could not be with him, they referred others with a similar interest as potential members of the brotherhood: ‘The bearer of these letters,’ writes one friend to Agrippa, ‘is a German, native of Nuremberg, but dwelling at Lyons; and he is a curious inquirer after hidden mysteries, a free man, restrained by no fetters, who, impelled by I know not what rumour concerning you, desires to sound your depths’ (epistle 11, bk. 1).
"When he was financially able Agrippa rode to Lyons, where his friends awaited him, and continued his studies, which at this time probably centered on the learning of Hebrew and the Kabbalah from the works of Johannes Reuchlin: De verbo mirifico, published in Germany in 1494, and Reuchlin’s Hebrew grammar and dictionary, published in 1506. Reuchlin had an enormous influence at that time on such minds as Erasmus and Luther. His writings set the philosophical tone of the Reformation."
Ultimately, these adepti would serve as masters to those who came after them, and in due time, this included the real Rosicrucians of the early 17th Century in Germany.
In 1439 George Gemistius Plethon came to Florence as a part of an entourage that sought to unite the two Churches in one unit, due to the grief caused by the Turks. Also, it was Plethon’s objective to create a Universal Reformation, like the Rosicrucian manifesto, and create a society in which a Philosophical Paganism replaced Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. This is for the most part, what Frater CRC also intended to do. Pletho made friends with Cosimo de Medici, and the latter immediately put his young friend, Marsilio Ficino, under Plethon’s influence, and Plethon became Ficino’s Instructor. Ficino, in turn, along with several others, became teachers of the Holy Doctrine. One of these people, Aldus Manutius, typographer and printer, established a publishing house for the express purpose of rendering all these classic texts into the Latin, printing them, and making them available to members of the Academy. We have a facsimile copy of Ficino’s translations of Iamblichus, Proclus, Porphyry and others, on Magic and Theurgy. It was printed by Manutius.
Another of Ficino’s students was Giovanni Pico della Mirandola.
In Holy Blood, Holy Grail, we find the following, on page 139 of the paperback edition:
"It would not be inaccurate to regard René d’Anjou as a major impetus behind the phenomenon now called the Renaissance. Owing to his numerous Italian possessions he spent some years in Italy and through his intimate relationship with the ruling Sforza family of Milan established contact with the Medicis of Florence. There is good reason to believe that it was largely René’s influence that prompted Cosimo de Medici to embark on a series of ambitious projects – projects destined to transform Western civilization.
"In 1439, while René was resident in Italy, Cosimo de Medici began sending his agents all over the world in quest of ancient manuscripts. Then, in 1444, Cosimo founded Europe’s first public library, the Library of San Marco, and thus began to challenge the Church’s long monopoly of learning. At Cosimo’s express commission, the corpus of Platonic, neo-Platonic, Pythagorean, Gnostic, and Hermetic thought found its way into translation for the first time and became readily accessible. Cosimo also instructed the University of Florence to begin teaching Greek for the first time in Europe for some seven hundred years. And he undertook to create an academy of Pythagorean and Platonic studies. Cosimo’s academy quickly generated a multitude of similar institutions throughout the Italian peninsula, which became bastions of Western esoteric tradition."
The year 1439, of course, was the year of the great council at Florence, at which Plethon and Bessarion were present.
"About 1460, a Greek manuscript was brought to Florence from Macedonia by a monk, one of those many agents employed by Cosimo de Medici to collect manuscripts for him. It contained a copy of the Corpus Hermeticum, not quite a complete copy, for it included fourteen only of the fifteen treatises of the collection, the last one being missing. Though the Plato manuscripts were already assembled, awaiting translation, Cosimo ordered Ficino to put these aside and to translate the work of Hermes Trismegistus at once, before embarking on the Greek philosophers. It is Ficino himself who tells us this, in that dedication to Lorenzo de Medici of the Plotinus commentaries in which he describes the impetus given to Greek studies by the coming of Gemistus Pletho and other Byzantine scholars to the Council of Florence, and how he himself was commissioned by Cosimo to translate the treasures of Greek philosophy now coming into the West from Byzantium. Cosimo, he says, had handed over to him the works of Plato for translation. But in 1463 word came to Ficino from Cosimo that he must translate Hermes first, at once, and go on afterwards to Plato..." – Yates, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, pp. 12 – 13.
McIntosh, in The Rosicrucians:
"The most important center of this rediscovery was the Florentine court of Cosimo de Medici, who conceived a passion for Hermetic and Neoplatonic literature after meeting a mysterious Greek scholar, Georgios Gemistos, who went by the name of Pletho (from the Greek, plethon, meaning ‘the full’). Pletho gave a series of lectures in Florence in 1439 tinged with Gnostic and Neoplatonic ideas.
"It is believed that these lectures inspired Cosimo de Medici to found his Platonic academy and to commission the best available scholars to gather and translate classical texts. The most prominent of these scholars was Marsilio Ficino (1433 – 1499) who, besides works by Plato, translated the Corpus Hermeticum, which he saw as containing a core of teachings handed down from very ancient times through Orpheus, Pythagoras, Plato, and Hermes himself, whom Ficino accepted as a real person. It appears to have been Ficino who introduced the vocabulary of special terms describing wisdom handed down from sage to sage. In time, the list of sages came to include Moses, Dionysius the Areopagite, and even Saint Augustine.
"Ficino’s influence extended throughout Europe. This belief in an inherited core of secret wisdom captured many imaginations and reappeared prominently, as we shall see, in the Rosicrucian writings.
"Ficino’s pupil, Pico della Mirandola (1463 – 1494) was among these responsible for stimulating interest in the Qabalah. His Nine Hundred Conclusions (1486), which used Qabalistic and Neoplatonic ideas in an attempt to find common ground between Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, brought accusations of heresy against him. For some time Pico was plagued by Church authorities, until Pope Alexander VI absolved him of heresy in 1493." – p. 7.
In a work in French, entitled Le Quattrocento: Essai sur L’histoire littèraire du XV° siècle italien, we find some invaluable information on the circle established at Florence.
"Gémiste Pléthon austère figure de législateur, de prophète et de sage, riche d’une pensée haute et ample, y triomphe. "Combien s’étonnaient les Latin, écrit Hieronymos, de la sagesse, de la vertu, de la force de discours de cet homme! Plus brillant que le soleil. Il resplendissait parmi eux. Les uns l’exaltaient comme le maitre et bienfaiteur des hommes; les autres le nommaient Socrate et Platon." A son tour, Pléthon trouve à qui parler dans cette Italie effiné, toute de sang et de nerfs; le camaldule Traversari, l’humaniste Bruni, le bibliomane Aurispu, le pédagogue Guarino, le médecin Benzi, le cardinal Césarini lui paraissent des esprits d’avant-garde, propres à hàter la Renaissance qu’il prévoit. "J’ai lié commerce avec eux, répond-il gravement à Scolarios, et je sais ce que vaut leur sagesse." Grâce à ce contact journalier des deux peuples, l’union peut se faire.
"Elle fut proclamée le 6 juillet 1439, dans le dôme de Florence, en un cérémonie auguste oú le Pape et L’Empereur êtaient présents, les deux clergés, les dignitaires, les gentilshommes, la foule..."
In other words, this was the cutting edge thing happening at the time. It led, as referred to earlier, several schools of esoteric thought, and several schools of translators of Classical texts. In 1500, at Venice, Aldus Manutius established his own school of savants, for the express purpose of making these texts available.
Finally, in a work on the sources for Sanchoniathon’s Cosmogony, also in the French language, found in Journal asiatique, July – December 1859, it is said that Sanchoniathon’s Cosmogony culminated in the learning that existed at Florence during the Renaissance.
As a result of the invasion of Constantinople by the Turks, Plethon retired to Mistra, Greece, and established a school there. It didn’t last long, about 40 years or so. One of his pupils was Joannes Bessarion, who also accompanied Plethon to the gathering at Florence in 1439.
Speaking of influences on the Renaissance in Italy, Will Durant, in The Story of Civilization, Volume VI: The Reformation, writes the following, on page 176:
"In philosophy the old contest between the Platonists and Aristotelians recaptured the stage. Emperor John VI Cantacuzene defended Aristotle, while Plato remained the God of Gemistus Pletho. This most renowned of the new Greek Sophists studied philosophy at Brusa in Asia Minor, when that city was already the capital of the Ottoman advance. From a Jewish teacher there he learned the lore of the Zoroastrians; and when he returned to his native Peloponnesus – then renamed Morea – he had probably abandoned the Christian faith. Settling down at Mistra, he became both a judge and a professor. In 1400 he wrote a treatise bearing Plato’s title, The Laws, in which he proposed the replacement of both Christianity and Mohammedanism by the religion of ancient Greece, merely transforming all Olympians but Zeus into symbolic personifications of creative processes or ideas; Pletho did not know that religions are born, not made. Nevertheless pupils gathered around him eagerly; one of them, Johannes Bessarion, was destined to become a humanist cardinal in Italy. Both Gemistus and Bessarion accompanied Emperor John VIII to Ferrara and Florence (1438) to attend the council in which the Greek and Roman churches were for a moment reconciled in theology and politics. At Florence Gemistus lectured on Plato to an elite audience, and almost touched off the Italian Renaissance. It was there that he added the cognomen Pletho (complete) to his name, playing upon both gemistos (full) and Platon. Returning to Mistra he subsided theologically, became an archbishop, and died at ninety-five (1450)."
The encyclopaedia entry on Plethon is as follows:
"GEMISTIUS PLETHO, GEORGIUS (c. 1355 – 1452), the leading scholar and philosopher of the last century of the Byzantine empire, is chiefly notable for his influence upon the Renaissance in western Europe and for the attempt that he made in his principle work, the Laws (Nomoi), to establish a new polytheistic religion based upon Platonic and Neoplatonic principles, which, he hoped, would supersede both Christianity and Islam. He was born and trained in Constantinople but spent the most important years of his life in Mistra, then an important citadel in the Peloponnese.
"During the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1438 – 39), which, despite his hostility to the proposed union between the Greek and Roman churches, he attended as lay adviser to the Greek delegation, he fired the humanists with new interest in Plato (who had been ignored in the West during the middle ages because of the preoccupation with Aristotle) and inspired Cosimo de Medici with the project of founding the Platonic Academy of Florence.
"More momentously, in his talks with the astronomer Paolo del Pozzo Toscanelli and others and by his Excerpts from Strabo, Pletho introduced the Geography of Strabo to the west (where it had hitherto been unknown) and led the way to the overthrow of Ptolemy’s erroneous geographical theories. He thus greatly affected the Renaissance conception of the configuration of the earth and so played an important, if indirect, role in the discovery of America by Christopher Columbus, who cites Strabo among his principal authorities.
"Besides the Laws, he composed orations, two memoirs advocating social and economic reform for the defense of the Peloponnese, numerous excerpts from ancient Greek authors and essays on the differences between Plato and Aristotle, on Zoroaster, on the Oracula Chaldaica and on astronomy, music, history, rhetoric, the virtues and various theological subjects. Nearly all his writing is marked by passionate devotion to Greece and a desire to restore its ancient glory." – EB-10:100b-c.
Speaking of Columbus, another important figure in the discovery and colonization of America, Amerigo Vespucci, was listed among the intelligentsia who belonged to the Neoplatonic society established at Florence.
In 1050 c.e., when the Harranians of Baghdad fade out of view, the Hermetica shows up at Constantinople, where Michael Psellus takes an interest in them. For roughly 400 years, a school exists at Constantinople, or its environs. We have nothing to go by as to who would have been involved with it, for the duration of this period, save for that of Plethon, who, it is said, was initiated by a rather old and wise man, into Zoroastrianism, Kabbalah, Neo Platonism, et al.
Quoting Scott’s notes to his Testimonia:
Now the time at which the Sabians disappear at Bagdad (c. A. D. 1050) is just about the time at which documents of the Corpus Hermeticum, after an interval of five centuries during which nothing has been heard of them in Europe, reappear at Constantinople, in the hands of Psellus. Is there not something more than chance in this? It may be that one of the Sabians of Bagdad, finding that his position under Moslem rule was becoming unendurable, migrated to Constantinople, and brought in his baggage a bundle of Greek Hermetica – and that our Corpus is that bundle. If so, the line along which the libelli of the Corpus have been transmitted to us from Egypt runs through Harran and Bagdad. This is merely an unapproved hypothesis; but it is one that agrees well with the facts known to us. The Pagans of Harran almost certainly possessed the whole collection of Hermetica (including many documents that are not now extant) in Greek, at the time when they adopted these writings as their Scriptures, in A. D. 830; and there can be little doubt that Thabit, who was a good Greek scholar, still had a copy of them in Greek at the end of the ninth century. During the 150 years which had since elapsed, knowledge of Greek must have almost, if not quite, died out at Bagdad, and the Hermetica must have been now read only, or almost only, in Syriac or Arabic translations. But a man such as the Sabian I am supposing would, even if he did not himself know the Greek language, have good reason to preserve with care, and to take with him when he migrated to a place where Greek was spoken, any portions of his Scriptures, in the original Greek, that had chanced to escape destruction and to come into his hands; and it is just such a chance collection of specimens that we have in the Corpus.
Moreover, if we choose to indulge in yet further conjectures, there is nothing to prevent us from supposing that it was the arrival in Constantinople of a few such Sabian Neoplatonists from Bagdad, and the writings which they brought with them, that first started the revival of Platonic study in which Psellus took the leading part. This would be very much like what took place four centuries later, when Neoplatonism, conveyed by Greeks who migrated westward, passed on from Constantinople to Florence, and again carried with it the Corpus Hermeticum.
It is almost surprising that no extracts or quotations from the Hermetica (except the insignificant scrap which I call Fragment 37) have been found in Arabic writings. Possibly some such passages may yet be discovered. There may be in existence unpublished MSS. containing treatises on philosophic or religious subjects, written by Thabit b. Qurra or by other Sabians of Bagdad; and it might be expected that these men would sometimes quote from the documents which were regarded as their Scriptures.
So, for about 350 years, a tradition existed in the vicinity of Constantinople, Asia Minor, and Greece. Not that it didn’t exist elsewhere, because most certainly it did, in different versions of the Authentic Tradition. The South of France, Southern Germany, Spain. At this time, then, the last remaining Sabians from Baghdad secure the survival of their teachings, and pass the mantle on to the Greeks.
Recently,
(i.e., early February 2002), we came across a work, in French, by Robert Ambelain,
Le Martinisme: Histoire et Doctrine (1946), which tells us at
least two important things which relate to the Harranians.
First, we are told that a fraternity existed at Constantinople, entitled "The Brothers of the East" [Frères d'Orient], which was established circa 1090 c.e. We are not given much else on this group. However, it is given as one of the immediate ancestors of a) The Brotherhood of the Rosy Cross [Rose+Croix] (16th Century), and the Society of Unknown Philosophers (1643 c.e.).
"...issue des 'Frères d'Orient', ordre initiatique, constitué à Constantinople, en 1090, sous le patronage de l'empereur Alexis Comnés, une fraternité mystique secrète groupait les adeptes de toute une école rosicrucienne, du type évangélique et protestant." -- p. 97.
Secondly, we are told that one of the most important currents in Martinez Pasqually's teachings was that imparted to Enoch / Hermes Trismegistus. It relates to the "Wrong of the Beginning" and its repair, aka "Original Sin", the return to wholeness that is written of in Treatise on the Reintegration of Beings. Furthermore, the Sons of God and the Daughters of Men are mentioned in connection with all this.
"Nous noterons, avant tout, que le nom même de l'Ordre théurgique fondé par Martinez de Pasqually, est suject à une interprétation ésotérique. En effet, anagrammatiquement, et selon l'usage de la Cabale, les Elus Cohen sont aussi les Elus d'Hénoc, peu importe qu'on écrive ce nom sous l'une quelconque des trois formes: Enoch, Hénoc, ou Hénoch.
"Qui est Hénoch, personnage sur lequel insiste particulièrement Martinez de Pasqually en son 'Traité de la Réintégration des Etres'? Là est la clé de l'énigme, à notre avis.
"D'abord, -- premier du nom -- c'est l'ainé des fils de Cain, (Genèse IV, 17). Ce serait lui le constructeur de la première cité: Hénochia.
"Ensuite, ce nom est porté par le septième patriarche, en partant d'Adam, le fils de Jared, (Genèse V, 22, 24). Voici ce que nous dit la Bible à ce sujet:
"'Et tous le temps qu'Hénoch vécut sur la terre furent de 365 ans. Il marcha avec Dieu, et il ne parut plus, car Dieu l'enleva.' (Genèse, V, 23, 24).
"'Hénoch plût à Dieu. Il a été transféré dans le Paradis, pour faire entrer les Nations futures dans la pénitence...' (L'Ecclesiastique: XLIV, 16).
"D'autre part, c'est ce seul homme, réintégré de son vivant dans le Royaume d'Eden, (ou Paradis), qui est choisi par Dieu pour annoncer aux Anges déchus leur condamnation et pour les garder captifs, selon l'apocryphe éthiopien du 'Livre d'Énoch'. C'est donc lui qui est le maître du divin 'Royaume', et le geôlier des 'veilleurs du Ciel', tombés par leur union incubique avec les filles des Hommes. Or, c'est justement là le rôle que Martinez de Pasqually assigne primitivement à Adam Kadmon, dans son 'Traité de la Réintégration'. Car, en hébreu, sans tenir compte des points-voyelles massorétiques, Hénoch signifie, -- tout comme Adam --, l'Homme....
"Dans les traditions de l'Orient, Hénoch est fréquemment confondu avec le fils de Cain du même nom, sous le mystonyme d'Idris. Pour les chrétiens d'Asie-Mineure, Hénoch est l'équivalent du Trismegistos grec et de l'Hermes égyptien. Pour les cabalistes et les rabbins, c'est aussi Metatron Serpanim, ('Principe de Lumière') ou Mikaël ('Qui est comme Dieu'). On en fait un génie, cosmique ou silaire, par le fait qu'il a vécu 365 années, nombre symbolique du cycle solaire. On l'apparente à Adam-démiurge, par le fait que son homonyme bàlit la première ville. Et comme il doit revenir, à la fin des temps, il est donc aussi 'l'Alpha et l'Omega', le premier et le dernier." -- pp. 63-64.
This has been dealt with earlier in the work, but for a brief recap, here is what we have.
The Isma’ili movement proper, really begins in Persia.
The Persians, crushed by the second successor of Mohammed, submitted in appearance, and bode their time until they could get a plan together to crush Islam. In the second month of the 9th Century, the stars looked favourable upon this plan. A rich Persian, named Mohammad ben Hosain, and surnamed Zaidan, well-read in Philosophy, astrology, and sorcery, enraged against Islam, looked to the stars for that which would finally remove the power from the hands of the Arabs and place it into those of his compatriots. The instant having come, did he accomplish the prediction of heaven? Zaidan encountered a man, Persian like himself, originally from Susiana, who also like himself, was vehemently opposed to Islam. This was ‘Abdallah ibn Maymun.
To cut a long story short, this man, Zaidan, was really angered over the fact that the Moslems had overrun the Persians. He found a man like himself, ‘Abdallah, and together they hatched a plan that would tear Islam apart from within. It was at this time, roughly that the curtain began to fall on Islamic contributions to Western science and philosophy. Tolerance was almost a thing of the past, the Asherites were coming, and Orthodox Sunni Islam, as we know it today, came into being, and all groups like the Harranians had better find safe haven elsewhere.
The philosophical and religious elements of the plan were derived, it is said, from Gnosticism and from the Sabians of Harran. They received from the Sages of Greece, the five principles of Reason, the Soul, Prime Matter, Space and Time. And the fourth and fifth were as practiced in the doctrines of the Sabians of Harran, in Mesopotamia., and the Pleroma and Kenoma of the Gnostics.
These doctrines won over Zaidan even moreso, and they started promulgating them. ‘Abdallah found himself persecuted by the governor of Susiana, so he removed to Salamiyyah in Syria, and there he established his base of operations.
Much later, Hamdan ibn Karmat came into the picture, and the sect of the Carmathians was born. Following this, the Fatimites came into being in Egypt, and from them, the Assassins, the Druzes and others. The Nusairis came under the influence of the Isma’ilis from the 9th Century on – that is to say, from the beginning of the movement. The Nusairis simply grafted the Sevener Isma’ili doctrines and symbols over their more ancient cultus, and employed it as a survival mechanism, much like the Isma’ilis themselves utilized the same technique, within Islam.
Picatrix and Rasa’il Ikhwan as-Safa
Eventually a cell of Isma’ili philosophers would be settled at Bosra, Syria, and in the 9th – 10th Centuries, the Rasa’il Ikhwan as-Safa was compiled. This must have had an influential effect upon either the Harranians, or the person or persons involved with the compilation of the Picatrix, because the latter derives a great deal from the former, and the latter is said to come from the Harranians to some extent.
At about 872 c.e., there was a schism amongst the Harranians, and one group, led by Thabit ibn Qurra, moved on to Baghdad, and was installed at the court of Al-Mamoun. This school lasted until the time when Islam became the completely intolerant and slave-oriented belief system that it is today. There was no place, among the Asharites and followers of al Ghazali, for the excellent pagan philosophers of Harran, so ideally typified by great men like Thabit ibn Qurra. To quote Scott’s notes:
The most famous of them is Thabit ibn Qurra, who was born A. D. 835, and died c. A. D. 901. During the earlier part of his life he resided in Harran, as a money-changer. But shortly before A. D. 872, there was a schism in the community of ‘Sabians’, as the Harranian Pagans were now called; Thabit’s party was defeated, and he was expelled, and forced to leave the city. After some years he settled at Bagdad, and was introduced to the caliph, and attained to high favour at court; and he got the government to recognize him and his companions as a separate and independent community of ‘Sabians, with a head of its own. Most of the learned men of Harran probably migrated to Bagdad and joined him. The community thus established at Bagdad must have been a sort of school of Pagan Neoplatonism which had flourished at Athens until suppressed by Justinian about 350 years before. But there were doubtless considerable differences; and one of the differences was this, that whereas the Neoplatonists of Athens had ignored the Hermetica, the Harranian Neoplatonists of Bagdad recognized the Hermetica as their ‘Scripture’, and regarded the Hermetic teaching as the source whence their philosophy was derived.
Thabit lived on at Bagdad, occupied in teaching and writing, till his death about A. D. 901. We are told that towards the end of his life he was forced to become a Mohammedan; but his sons remained Pagans, and the Pagan community which he had founded in Bagdad continued its activities after his death.
Thabit’s work as a writer extended over a wide range of subjects. He is spoken of as highly distinguished in mathematics, astronomy, logic, and medicine, as well as in philosophy. His mother tongue was Syriac, but he knew also the Greek and Arabic languages. Barhebraeus says that Thabit wrote about 150 works (translations included?) in Arabic, and 16 in Syriac. He translated Greek writings, and corrected earlier translations made by others; and according to an Arabic writer, it was said that ‘no one would have been able to get any benefit from the philosophic writings of the Greeks, if they had not had Thabit’s translations’. Among his writings on philosophy and logic were the following: a Tractatus de argumento Socrati ascripto; a Tractatus de solutione mysteriorum in Platonis Republica obviorum; a translation of part of Proclus’s commentary on the Aurea carmina of Pythagoras; an Isagoge in logicam; commentaries on Aristotle’s Peri ermhneiaj, and a part of Aristotle’s fusikh akroasij; extracts from Arist. Cat., Anal. prior., and Peri erh. But he was, like the Neoplatonists of Athens, interested in Pagan cults (more especially, perhaps, but not exclusively, the local cults of Harran), as well as in philosophy; and under this head may be placed the following titles given in the list of his writings: Liber de lege et canonibus (ceremonial law and ritual?) ethnicorum; Liber de sepultura mortuorum; Liber de confirmatione religionis ethnicorum; Liber de munditie et immunditie; Liber de animalibus sacrificio aptis; Liber de horis precum; Liber de lectionibus recitandis ad singulas septem planetas accommodatis; Liber de poenitentia et deprecatione; Liber de religione Sabiorum; Liber de legibus (ceremonial regulations?) Hermetis, et de orationibus (prayers) quibus utuntur ethnici. From one of these books (perhaps the Liber de confirmatione religionis ethnicorum) must have been taken the following passage, quoted from Thabit by Barhebraeus: ‘We are the heirs and propagators of Paganism.... Happy is he who, for the sake of Paganism, bears the burden (of persecution?) with firm hope. Who else have civilized the world, and built the cities, if not the nobles and kings of Paganism? Who else have set in order the harbours and the rivers? And who else have taught the hidden wisdom? To whom else has the Deity revealed itself, given oracles, and told about the future, if not to the famous men among the Pagans? The Pagans have made known all this. They have discovered the art of healing the soul; they have also made known the art of healing the body. They have filled the earth with settled forms of government, and with wisdom, which is the highest good. Without Paganism the world would be empty and miserable'.
Thabit seems to have also dabbled in the ‘occult’ sciences; he paid some attention to astrology, and he wrote a commentary on a ‘Book of Hermes’ concerning doctrina litterarum et nominum – probably a treatise dealing with the cryptic significance or magical efficacy of letters of the alphabet. It is very likely that he knew other books also on such subjects (e.g. on astrology) that were ascribed to Hermes, and assumed them to have been written by the same Hermes that he believed to be the author of the teachings recorded in the religious and philosophic Hermetica.
Thabit’s son Sinan was a physician of high repute, and held by official appointment the position of head of the medical profession in Bagdad. Masudi says that Sinan had a thorough knowledge of mathematics, astronomy, logic, metaphysic, and the philosophical systems of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.
Chwolsohn (i. 577 sqq.) enumerates twenty-seven other ‘Sabians’ (i.e. Harranian Pagans) whose names have been preserved. One of them, al-Battani (A. D. 877-918), was a famous astronomer and mathematician, known as Albategnius in medieval Europe.
It appears that the ‘Sabians’ lived on at Bagdad, and continued to be known there as a separate sect, for about 150 years after the death of Thabit (A. D. 900-1050). At that time the ‘Golden Age’ of the great caliphs (al-Mansur, ar-Rashid, and al-Mamun, A. D. 754-833) was past, and the vast empire over which they had ruled had fallen to pieces. The declinemay be said to have begun in the reign of Mutawakkil, c. A. D. 850. There was a period of confusion, in the course of which caliphs and provincial governors made themselves independent and established local dynasties. But shortly before A. D. 950 one of these local rulers, a son of Buwayh, who had got possession of a large part of Persia, made himself master of Bagdad; and thenceforward (until the coming of the Seljuks in 1055) the Buwayhids governed there as ‘Mayors of the Palace’, and the caliphs, reduced to impotence, retained only a shadowy dignity as pontiffs. Thus during the greater part of the century A. D. 950 – 1050 Bagdad was under a tolerably firm and settled government, and though shorn of much of its earlier glory, was still the chief city of a considerable dominion (Mesopotamia, Iraq, and western Persia).
During these political changes, students pursued their work without intermission, some at Bagdad, and others at the place of residence of this or that local dynast; and it was not until after the political decline had begun that Arabic learning reached its highest level.
In the intellectual activity of A. D. 900 – 1050 the Sabians of Bagdad took their part. During that time, or at least during the earlier part of it, there was still under Moslem rule much freedom of thought; and non-Moslems, though subject to occasional illusage or annoyance, were often well-received at court, and found the highest careers open to them. But from about A. D. 1050 we hear no more of these Sabians; and their disappearance is probably to be accounted for as the result of a gradual increase in the strictness with which Mohammedanism orthodoxy was enforced.
The Hastings’ article tells us:
"The first mention of them as a sect seems to be in the Chronicle of Dionysius of Tell-Mahre (ed. Chabot, Paris, 1895, p. 69), composed about A. D. 840; he confuses them with the Manichaeans, and records an occurrence of the year 764 in which they were concerned."
However, we are in possession of the Hammer-Purgstall article, which enumerates a list of Chiefs of the Harranians, as follows,
The seated Harraniens on the seat of the primat, in the time of islam, to begin at with reign Abdal-Melik, are the following:
[Our note: The reign of Abd al Malik was from 685 – 705 c.e. Since Hammer didn’t state whether the list begins with the first or last year of this reign, we shall use the median, i.e., 695 c.e.]
1° Sabit, son of Ahosa, chief, twenty-four years; c 695 – 719
2° Sabit ben-Tayoun, six years; c 719 – 725
3° Sabit ben-Karscha, chief, seventeen years; c 725 – 742
4° Sabit ben-Ilia, chief, twenty years; c 742 – 762
5° Kora ben Sabit ben-Ilia, chief, twenty-one years; c 762 – 783
6° Dschabir ben-Kora ben-Sabit, ten years; c 783 – 793
7° Sinan ben-Dschabir ben-Kora, chief, nine years; c 793 – 802
8° Amrous ben Thaiba, chief, 17 years c 802 – 819
9° Michel ben-Eher ben-Tahra, chief, thirteen years; c 819 – 832
10° Takin ben-Kassduba, fifty years; c 832 – 882
11° Moghlis ben Thaiba, chief, five years; c 882 – 887
12° Osman ben-Mali, chief, twenty-four years; c 887 – 911
13° Kora ben-el-Uschtur, chief, nine years; c 911 – 920
14° El-Kasem ben-el-Kokayi, chief, nine years. This one went first to Samaria and returned after being in Persia, four years. c 920 – 929
15° Costas ben Yahya ben-Sonak, forty-two years. c 929 – 971
Now, if we take the starting years to coincide with the beginning of the reign of Abd al-Malik, we get one interesting factor.
10° Takin ben-Kassduba, fifty years; c 832 – 882
adjusted c 822 – 872.
Now, why is this interesting?
Quoting Scott’s notes to his Testimonia:
"The most famous of them is Thabit ibn Qurra, who was born A. D. 835, and died c. A. D. 901. During the earlier part of his life he resided in Harran, as a money-changer. But shortly before A. D. 872, there was a schism in the community of ‘Sabians’, as the Harranian Pagans were now called; Thabit’s party was defeated, and he was expelled, and forced to leave the city.."
One can only conjecture, but perhaps Takin ben-Kassduba reigned for too long, or, perhaps, his successor wasn’t sympathetic to the wishes of the Adepti among the group. 872 is also the date given by Nesta Webster, for the foundation of the Batiniyya by Abdallah ibn Maymun. That is an interesting story in itself, particular with what we have unearthed in some French journals.
"The earliest Ismailis, who formed themselves into a party at about the time of the death of Mohammed, son of Ismail (i.e., circ. A. D. 770), still remained believers, declaring only that the true teaching of the Prophet had descended to Mohammed, who was not dead but would return in the fulness of time and that he was the MAHDI whom Moslems must await. But in about A. D. 872 an intriguer of extraordinary subtlety succeeded in capturing the movement, which, hitherto merely schismatic, now became definitely subversive, not only to Islamism, but of all religious belief."
Another interesting factor, is the travel itinerary of El-Kasem ben-el-Kokayi. Harran – Samaria – Persia – Harran. This seems to tell a story, relating to contacts between the Persian Isma’ili and the Syrian Isma’ili. That was an important period, too. See what we have written regarding the Batiniyya, the Carmathians, the Fatimites, and the Brethren of Purity.
Boghdadiens.
At least before 685 c.e., then, and probably before Islam came into being, there existed at Baghdad, a sect which is said to have given the city its name. In one place the name Baghdad is given as meaning Garden of God. Yet, in another place, Boghdadiens (as rendered in the French), means Gift of God. Gift of God is the same exact thing that Dositheos means. That is a key connection. Aboulfatah states that the Dositheans lasted in Syria and Mesopotamia up to the 14th Century, and perhaps there is a connection to these Boghdadiens.
Bogh is said to be a Persian word, denoting a Bull God. In the Fihrist extract we have, in French: [sorry for those who can’t read French, but, try http://www.freetranslation.com/ ...]
Le nom de Boghdadiens, que le prètre fonctionnaire donne à la assemblée, sa accorde avec la tradition historique connue, qu’a la endroit ou Mamoun bâtit la ville de Bagdad il y avait autrefois un temple consacré à une idole ‘Bogh’
Le nom de Boghdadiens, c’est à dire "dieu donnés", que le prètre donne à ses coreligionnaires, prouve que cette secte de harraniens ou sabéens, au commencement de la islam, ne se bornait pas à Harran et à ses environs, mais se entendait jusqu’à la endroit ou Bagdad remplaça le temple des Boghdadiens, dont la ville prit le nom.
Ainsi, le deux étymologies sur le origine du nom de Bagdad dont le une dérive des vignes (bogh), et le autre de le idole Bogh, la seconde est confirmée par ce morceau. Il se pourrait aussi que le pelerinage des Yezidis au tombeau du cheikh Hadi, que les voyageurs nomment Adi et Addi, datàt originairement du pelerinage kjazi.
Basically, the Sabians of Harran did not necessarily start, or limit themselves to, Harran. This group was in Baghdad. When al Mamoun builds the city of Baghdad, there was formerly a temple consecrated to an idol named Bogh. The name means "God – Given", but also refers to "drift of vines" – hmmm... also said to mean "Garden of God", and this other meaning, referring to the Idol, "Bogh". It is also possible that the pilgrimage of the Yezidis to the tomb of Sheikh ‘Adi, that the voyagers name Adi and Addi, dates originally to the pilgrimage "kjazi". We need more information here. Is this a hint that there may be a relationship to the Yezidis? There may, indeed.
Since we published this piece in January 2002, we have come across another piece in the Journal Asiatique, that talks about the name Bagdad. It states that this word is attributable to the name of a deity adored by the Bogdadiens, a Syrian sect that is a remnant of paganism. A certain idol, named Bogh was adored in a village that once was occupied by the Persians. The name means given by the gods, or gift of the gods, or gift of God. That in mind, then, our Harranians, if they were originally Boghdadiens, were truly The Brethren of the GIFT!
This is where we might make some Gnostic connections to the Boghdadiens. We rely here upon the map presented in Bentley Layton’s The Gnostic Scriptures, pages 6-7.
This shall form a skeletal basis for two of the volumes of Timeline of the Authentic Tradition. 3 and 4. [The Birth of the Johannite Tradition, and From Constantine to the Crusades.]
circa 90 c.e. Patmos. St. John attacks "Nicolaitans" of Pergamum and Ephesus.
Early Second Century c.e. Neapolis. Birth of Justin Martyr.
Second Century c.e. Antioch. Satorninos.
circa 130. Alexandria. Gnostics at Alexandria influence Valentinus.
circa 140. Rome. Gnostics of Rome influence Valentinus.
circa 150. Rome. Justin Martyr attacks Gnostics.
circa 180. Lyons. Irenaeus continues Justin’s attack.
Akhmim. Gnostic scripture translated into Coptic.
circa 250. Rome. Plotinus attacks contemporary Gnostics.
circa 330-340. Vicinity of Hamah. Borborites and Coddians.
Alexandria. Eighty Gnostics expelled.
Vicinity of Oxyrhynchus. Gnostic women entice Epiphanius of Salamis; Borborites, Phibionites, Sethians, and Stratiotics active.
Vicinity of Nag Hammadi / Pbou / Tebennytis. Secundians.
circa 340. Anazarbus. Aetius the Arian debates a Borborite.
circa 350. Ankara. Borborites.
Kapharbarikha, near Hebron. Eutaktos of Satala, returning from a pilgrimage to Egypt, meets Peter the Gnostic, who resided at Kokabe, near Bosra, before 350, when he is expelled. Eutaktos is converted to Gnostic Christianity and founds the sect known as the Archontics, and returns to Satala, in Armenia, passing through Edessa. Thus is born Armenian Gnosticism, and this would have an effect upon other groups in the area.
Nag Hammadi / Pbou. Gnostic Scripture manuscripts buried here. This is the Nag Hammadi Library. One of the codices bears the name Pachom, on a receipt, and references Diospolis, which is an earlier name for Chenoboskion, where Saint Pachomius first established a monastic Community. Pachomius was a Serapic Priest who was converted to Christianity, and he sought to fuse the Mysteries together with the new faith, much like it is said of Ormus.
circa 360. Satala. Eutaktos converts Armenian nobility to Archontic Christianity.
Greater Armenia. Archontic converts arrive from Satala.
circa 363. Edessa. Borborites.
circa 375. Salamis, Cyprus. Epiphanius publishes his exposé of Gnostic Christianity.
circa 400. Vicinity of Dyarbakir. Borborites expelled by Bishop Mesrob.
406 – 425. Constantinople. Borborites attend orthodox services.
412 – 436. Vicinity of Harran. Borborites expelled by Bishop Rabbula. Arrows on map indicate a wide dispersion, some going southwest, towards Dura Europus region, others going southeast, towards the Baghdad region.
circa 480. Vicinity of Emessa. Orthodox bishops invalidate Borborite baptisms.
565 – 578. Vicinity of Pumbeditha, Mesopotamia. Borborites flee persecution by King Chosroes I.
circa 590. To the southwest of Pumbeditha. Persian Borborite refugees occupy abandoned monasteries.
Vicinity of Nippur. Mandaean sect opposes Borborites.
What kind of picture emerges from this? A large number of Borborites are expelled from the Harran region, settle near Pumbeditha, where one of the most important schools of the Talmud was established, and then they are forced to flee to abandoned Christian monasteries. Eventually they end up in the vicinity of Nippur, where the Mandaeans are giving them trouble. This points the way to a migration to the Baghdad region, which might not be so out of the question. From there we can pick up the narrative given above.
Sithians
Before the Borborites / Ophites / Barbelo-Gnostics were known as such, they were known as Sethians, and the earliest spellings of Sethians is Sitheans. The Three Tablets of Seth refer to Dositheos, who received them. This makes much more sense than attributing the Seth to either the Egyptian God of Darkness or Seth son of Adam. Even so, if we identify Seth with the Son of Adam, then we have a relationship to the Agathodaimon, since the Harranians named as one of their Saints, Agathodaimon, and when syncretizing it with Islamic saints / prophets, they chose Seth, son of Adam.
Dositheans / Simonians / Samaritans
We shall be dealing with these in more detail in Book Three: Rose Croix: The GIFT.
For the present moment, we shall refer to some of the passages we came across while researching this work.
From the Al-Biruni work, The Chronology of Ancient Nations, we find a chapter devoted entirely to the Harranians. It is quoted in its entirety in the Readings section below. The chapter opens with the following remarks:
The ancient Magians existed already before the time of Zoroaster, but now there is no pure, unmixed portion of them who do not practise the religion of Zoroaster. In fact, they belong now either to the Zoroastrians or to the Shamsiyya sect (sun-worshippers). Still, they have some ancient traditions and institutes, which they trace back to their original creed; but in reality those things have been derived from the laws of the sun-worshippers and the ancient people of Harran.
As regards the Sabians, we have already explained that this name applies to the real Sabians, i.e., to the remnants of the captive Jews in Babylonia, whom Nebukadnezzar had transferred from Jerusalem to that country. After having freely moved about in Babylonia, and having acclimatized themselves to the country, they found it inconvenient to return to Syria; therefore they preferred to stay in Babylonia. Their religion wanted a certain solid foundation, in consequence of which they listened to the doctrines of the Magians, and inclined towards some of them. So their religion became a mixture of Magian and Jewish elements like that of the so-called Samaritans who were transferred from Babylonia to Syria.
The greatest part of this sect is living in Sawâd-al-‘Irâk. These are the real Sabians. They live, however, very much scattered and nowhere in places that belong exclusively to them alone. Besides, they do not agree among themselves on any subject, wanting a solid ground upon which to base their religion, such as a direct or indirect divine revelation or the like. Genealogically they trace themselves back to Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam.
In the first paragraph, mention is made of the Magians, basically dying out and becoming merged with the Shamsiyya sect. That is not without importance, since this is a variation of the name Sampsaean, which was the special sect that was attached to the Elkesaites, but clearly to be considered a separate movement. It is said of the Sampsaeans that they contained a Royal lineage, a Royal Jewish lineage. It is said of the Elkesaites and the Sampsaeans that the Desposynii (relatives of Jesus) concealed themselves within these two sects. Beausobré, in his work on the Manichaeans, states, after writing of the Yezidis,
"La seconde Secte est nommée par les Syriens Chamsi, & par les Arabes Shemsi, ou Shamsi, c’est-à-dire, les Solaires. Ce sont apparemment des restes des Samséens de S. Epiphane. Ceux-ci croyent un Dieu, un Paradis, un Enfer, un dernier Jugement, & bonorent J. Christ, qui a été crucifié pour nous. On dit qu’ils se sont unis aux Jacobites de Syrie. Ils sont vaillans, mais humaine, Hospitaliers, & vivent entre eux dans une grande concorde. Il faut qu’ils rendent quelque honneur, apparent au Soleil, puis qu’on les a nommez Solaires."
As to the rest, the real Sabians are considered by al-Biruni to be the remnants of the captive Jews who remained in Babylonia. Who would these be? That is a good question. It can’t be the Mandaeans, since the Mandaeans, by their own admission, claim a descent from Egypt, or at least a migration from Egypt and Palestine.
Next, it is stated that the real Sabians’ religion became a mixture of the Magian and Jewish religions, "...like that of the so-called Samaritans who were transferred from Babylonia to Syria..."
That would be the original Dostai and Sabbai, who headed a group of Assyrians who migrated to Samaria, during the exchange program. Also, it reminds us of the Nergals of Cuthah, who brought the Magic of Cuthah to Samaria. Interesting stuff. Several times in the Early Church Fathers, the Dosithean sect is referred to as the Samaritans. Finally, the writer states that the real Sabians are those living in the Sawad-al-Irak area. Now, we can’t find that on our maps. However, the description of them seems to indicate Mandaeans, which might have been the case, by the time al-Biruni was writing this material.
Pachomius/Ormus.
This is not the place to dwell on this extremely fascinating and important element in the Authentic Tradition.
The Agathodaimon concept, which was carried over into the philosophy and symbolism that prevailed amongst the Harranians, goes back to Egypt, to Phoenicia, to Sumer. The Gnostics received the symbolism from the School of Alexandria, where Serapis was the serpentine god of Healing. He was also called by the Greeks, Aesculapius, and this, in turn, was modified into Asklepios. In ancient Egypt, this Asklepius was also known as Imouthis (by the Greeks), or I-m-Hetep, son of Ptah and Sekhet, and a part of the Memphite triad. In Phoenicia, this personage, Asklepios, was known as Eshmun, and he was one of the persons responsible for carrying on the teachings of Taaut, who was known in Egypt as Thoth. Interesting parallels, here, because in the Hermetica, Hermes Trismegistus is Asclepius’ teacher, and in the Sabians of Harran, the two major prophets are Agathodaimon and Hermes. Agathodaimon being Hermes’ teacher, syncretized with Seth and Enoch. Worth pointing out, in re Serapis, is that Pachomius was a Serapic Priest before he became a monk. Similarly Ormus is said to have been a Seraphic priest before being converted by Saint Mark and fusing the Mysteries with Christianity and establishing a school of Solomonic Wisdom, thus creating the Rose-Croix.
Worth dealing with at length, here, is the system of the Phoenicians, since it doesn’t seem to show up much on the Internet for people interested in such subjects. To do this, we shall quote at length from Masters of the World, by Robert Charroux. We get a nearly complete version in English of the accounts from Eusebius and Philo Byblius:
The Phoenician History is the oldest non-coded document of our historical archives. Furthermore it is particularly valuable because its author was a free man who did not hesitate to denounce myths.
Here is what the Encyclopedie says about Sanchuniathon: "Judging from the fragments of the Phoenician History, he appears to have been a contemporary of Semiramis, two thousand years before Christ. If so, his book would go back into fabled antiquity. ...Sanchuniathon, like Vgasa in India, is said to have been a compiler of extremely ancient theogonic and historical documents that had been transmitted to him either by oral tradition or in writing."
I regret that the entire text has not come down to us because it is certain that Eusebius did not reproduce the plagiarized parts and that the essential element, that is, the beginning of historical times, is totally absent. This is no exception to the general rule, whether Genesis is a copy or not, since we have countless proofs that history has always been falsified.
Since the Phoenician History is a fundamental document of human culture, but the surviving fragments of it are hard to obtain, I believe the truth-seeking reader will appreciate an opportunity to study them. I will therefore reproduce them as they appear in Eusebius' Evangelical Preparation, where they are interspersed with long commentaries in several different chapters, which explains a certain lack of coherence.
In the extracts given below, the subheadings, footnotes and passages in italics are my own additions.
Eusebius Complains of Having Been Slandered
In the fourth chapter of his slanderous work directed against us, Porphyry mentions these things, testifying in favor of Sanchuniathon as follows:
Sanchuniathon of Berytus relates with great truthful- ness everything concerning the Jews because he alters neither places nor names, having had access to the writings of Jerombal, priest of the god Jeuo.
"Jerombal dedicated his history to Abibal, King of Berytus. It was accepted by him and by those he had instructed to examine it with respect to its veracity.
"The time when those men lived is earlier than the Trojan War and is very close to the time of Moses, as is shown by the successions of the Kings of Phoenicia.
"As for Sanchuniathon, whose name means 'Friend of Truth' in the Phoenician language, he gathered all the ancient history in the documents found in each city and formed it into a body of writings. He lived in the time of Semiramis, Queen of the Assyrians, whose reign is believed to have preceded or at least coincided with the events of Ilion.
"Philo Byblius translated Sanchuniathon's writings into Greek."
As he continues writing, he does not speak to us of the Supreme God, or even of the celestial gods, but of mortal men and women, and not even of those whose outstanding moral refinement makes them worthy of be.. being admired for their virtues or being taken as models because of their philosophical minds, but of persons guilty of all the perverse and shameful aspects of depravity. Yet he admits that it is these same persons who have been and still are regarded as gods by all men, in different cities and places. ...
Philo divided Sanchuniathon's entire collection into nine books. In his preface to the first book he writes as follows:
Taautos Was Thoth
"Things being thus, Sanchuniathon, a very studious and active man who desired above all else to know the principles of things and that of which all that exists is formed, diligently inquired into the writings of Taautos, having learned that of all the men who have ever appeared under the sun, Taautos was the first to conceive the invention of letters and open the way for written documents. He therefore made him the foundation of his entire discourse. It was Taautos whom the Egyptians called Toyt and the Alexandrians Thoth, which the Greeks translated as Hermes (Mercury)."
Having said these things, Philo denounces the new-comers who, after those writings, wrongly and untruthfully introduced allegories, theories and expositions of physics into fables concerning the gods.
He continues: "But more recent religious scholars destroyed all vestiges of events that occurred after the origin of things, inventing allegories within fables and combining them in such a way as to unite them with -the movements of the universe.
"That is how they instituted mysteries and spread such thick shadows over all those things that it was no longer easy to determine what had really occurred. But Sanchuniathon discovered the secret writings of the Ammonians, which were known to very few people, and studied everything they contained. He then achieved his goal by setting aside the fable based on allegories until in later times there appeared priests who wanted to dissimulate the truth and restore to honor that fable which was the origin of the mystery that had not yet penetrated among the Greeks."
After more observations, Philo continues in his preface:
"It must be stated at the outset, for greater clarity and partial knowledge of everything that follows, that the most ancient of the barbarians, notably the Phoenicians and Egyptians, who have served as guides for all other men, considered the greatest gods to be those who made discoveries to aid our existence, or who conferred benefits of any kind on various populations. They called them benefactors because of the many benefits they owed to them. They worshiped them as gods, and for that purpose they rededicated already existing temples to them. They erected pillars and branches to them, and worshiped those objects with great devotion. [4]
"The Phoenicians dedicated their greatest festivals to them and gave the constellations the names of their kings, some of whom were already regarded as gods. They recognized as natural gods only the sun, the moon, the planets, the stars and other things in that general category, so that there were mortal gods and immortal gods."
Theology of the Phoenicians
"He supposes that a dark and windy air, or a breath of dark air and a muddy, infernal chaos, were infinite in both time and extension. When that wind, he says, fell in love with its own principles a conjunction resulted, and that coming together was called desire. Such was the principle of the creation of all things.
"That wind had no knowledge of what it had produced. "From that cohabitation of the wind came Mot.
"Such was the sole germ of the creation and origin of all things.
"Animals appeared, but they were lacking in sensibility. They gave birth to intelligent animals named Zophasemin, that is, observers of the sky .
"Mot had the shape of an egg when he was formed. He became luminous and produced the sun, the moon, the stars and the great constellations."
Such is the cosmogony of the Phoenicians, which openly introduces atheism.
Next comes the generation of animals: the male and the female were on the earth and in the sea.
"These things," writes Philo, "were found in the cosmogony and dissertations of Taautos, supported by the conjectures and convictions which Sanchuniathon conceived and made known by means of his insight."
After speaking of the winds Notus and Boreas, which were deified, Philo adds:
"Such were the inventions of religious worship that were in conformity with the weakness and cowardice of their inventors."
Birth of Mortal Men of a Divine Race
"The mortal men Aeon and Protogonos were born of the wind Kalpia and his wife Baau. Aeon discovered the food provided by trees. They were the parents of Genos and Genea, who lived in Phoenicia. Great droughts came and they reached up their hands toward the sky and the sun."
He says that they regarded the sun as the master god of the sky and named him Beelsamen, which in Phoenician means "master of the sky." He was the Zeus of the Greeks. Then Philo attacks the error of the Greeks:
"It is not without reason that we make this distinction known: it is in order to establish the true meaning, which has been misinterpreted, of these names applied to objects. Misled by the uncertainty of translation, the Greeks took them in another meaning.
"From Genos, son of Aeon and Protogonos, were born new mortal children named Phos, Pyr and Phlox ("light." "fire" and "flame"). They invented fire by rubbing pieces of wood against each other, and taught its use. They had children of great size and marked superiority who gave their names to the mountains of which they were the sovereigns."
It was from them that Mount Casios, the Lebanon Mountains and the Anti-Lebanon Mountains took their name. They gave birth to Samemrumos and Hepsurianos ("celestial height").
Sanchuniathon observes that men were named after their mothers, and that women shamelessly gave themselves to any man they saw. Then he says: "Hypsurianos lived in Tyre and invented huts made of reeds, rushes and papyrus. He had a dispute with his brother Usus, who was the first to think of taking the skins of animals he had killed and making them into a covering for his body.
"Torrential rains and violent winds devastated Tyre and broke the trees. The forest was swept by fire. Usus took a tree, stripped it of its branches and was the first to venture onto the sea. He consecrated two steles to fire and the wind, and worshiped them by spilling on them the blood of animals he had taken in his hunts. ...
"Many centuries had gone by since the age of Hypsurianos when Agreus and AIieus, inventors of fishing and hunting, were born. It was they who provided those arts with their implements. From them came two brothers who invented iron and the production of all things that make use of it. One of them, Chrysor, devoted himself to sorcery, prediction and the composition of discourses."
He was the same as Hephaestus, who invented the fish- hook and bait, the fishing line and the raft. He was the first of 'all men to sail on the sea, and that is why he was worshiped as a divinity after his death. He was called Zeus Michius.
Birth of Men of an Earthly Race
Next, he says that from this race came two young men: Technites ("artisan") and Autochton [5] ("earthly"). They conceived the idea of mixing wet clay with hay, drying it in the sun and making bricks with it; they thus invented the construction of roofs.
Others came after them, including Agros, then Agrueros or Agrotes, whose statue and portable temple are highly venerated in Phoenicia. The inhabitants of Byblos regarded him as the greatest of the gods.
It was they who conceived the idea of placing court- yards in front of houses and forming enclosures and grottoes. From them are descended those who hunt with dogs; they are called wandering tribes and Titans.
They procreated Amunon and Magon, who invented market towns and sheepfolds, and from whom were born Misor ("dauntless") and Sydic ("just"); they discovered the use of salt.
From Misor was born Taautos, who discovered writing and formed the first letters. The Egyptians named him Thoor, the Alexandrians Tuth, the Greeks Hermes. [6]
From Sydys were born the Dioscuri, or Cabiri, or Corybants, or Samothracians. They invented the ship. From them were born other men who found medicinal plants for curing venomous bites and invented magic words. In their time were born Elium Hypsistos [7] and his wife Beruth, who settled in the land of Byblos. From them were born Epigeios or Autochthon, later named Uranos.
Uranos married his sister Ge and had four children by her: Ilus, known as Cronus, [8] Betyle, Dagon, known as Siton ("fish") , and Atlas. ...
Cronus Was a Mortal
Cronus had two daughters, Proserpine and Minerva. Proserpine died while still a virgin. Following the ad- vice of Minerva and Hermes, Cronus used iron to make a scythe and a spear. ...
In this time the descendants of the Dioscuri combined all the parts of rafts and ships and began sailing the sea. When they were driven back to Mount Casios they consecrated a temple there. The allies of Hel (Cronus) were called Eloim, which corresponds to Cronians. It was they who were thus named after Cronus. [9]
We learn from Philo's account that Uranos, a descendant of Hypsistos and his wife Beruth (the region of Byblos), was fought by Cronus and exiled. Where? It is not said.
In later times Uranos sent from the place of his exile his daughter Astarte and two of her sisters, Rhea and Dione, to kill Cronus.
The god Uranos invented and composed animated stones (abadir in Phoenician) .
After having discovered wheat and the plow, Dagon was surnamed Jupiter the Plowman.
Here, then, are the acts of Cronus and the venerable compacts of that life under Saturn, so celebrated by the Greeks that they declare it to have been the first age, the golden age of men endowed with the organ of the voice and the epoch of that felicity of the Ancients which is praised so highly.
The Coming of Astarte
The great Astarte, Jupiter Demarun and Adad, king of the gods, reigned over the earth with the consent of Cronus. [10]
As a sign of royalty, Astarte placed on her head the head of a bull.
Having traveled through the universe, she found a heavenly body that cut through the air and, having taken it, she consecrated it on the sacred island of Tyre. [11]
She whom the Phoenicians name Astarte is for us Venus.
Traveling through the universe, Cronus gave Athens and the kingdom of Attica to his daughter Minerva.
When a plague and a great loss of life occurred, Cronus sacrificed his only son to his father Uranos. He circumcised himself and made all his allies do the same. A short time later, after the death of the son he had had with Rhea and Pluto, he consecrated him; the son's name was Muth, and it is thus that the Phoenicians name death and Pluto. .
After this, Cronus gave possession of Byblos to the goddess Baaltis, the same as Dione, and he gave Berytus to Poseidon and the Cabiri, plowmen and fishermen. It was they who consecrated the relics of Pontus in the city of Berytus.
Before these things, Taautos, having initiated Uranos, traced in relief the facial expressions of the gods Cronus and Dagon and the others who are the sacred characters of letters. He also conceived, in favor of Cronus, the emblem of royalty : four eyes distributed in the anterior and posterior parts of the body, two of them slowly closing, and on the shoulders four wings, two spread and two folded.
The meaning of this symbol is that Cronus saw while asleep and slept while awake; and for the wings, that he flew while resting and rested while flying.
As for the other gods, he placed two wings on their shoulders to show that they accompany Cronus in his flight. He also gave Cronus two wings on his head, one to indicate commanding intelligence, the other to indicate sensation. [12]
Cronus having come from the regions of the south, he gave all of Egypt to the god Taautos so that it would be his empire.
The seven Cabin, sons of Sydysc, were the first of all men to record these facts in order to preserve their memory, as did their eighth brother Asclepius following the order of the god Taautos.
History Has Been Altered
Then the son of Thabion was the first hierophant of Phoenicia. Having allegorically translated these facts, and having mingled them with the physical movements of the universe, he transmitted them to the directors of orgies and the prophets of mysteries.
The latter, wishing to increase the obscurity of all those traditions, added new inventions to them and taught them to their successors and those they initiated.
"The Greeks, who excel among all peoples by their brilliant imagination, first appropriated most of these things and added various embellishments to them in order to give them a dramatic form; then, intending to beguile by the charm of fables, they completely transformed them.
"Hence Hesiod and the vaunted cyclical poets fabricated their own stories of gods, giants and castrations and carried them from place to place until all truth was extinguished.
"Our ears, accustomed from early childhood to hearing their false stories, and our minds, imbued with those preconceptions for centuries, preserve those fantastic suppositions as if they were a sacred trust, as I said at the beginning. When time had corroborated their work it made that usurpation almost impregnable, so that truth seems incredible, and adulterated stories have the appearance of truth."
Let us end here our quotation from the work of Sanchuniathon interpreted by Philo Byblius and recognized as true after examination by the testimony of the philosopher Porphyry.
A little farther on, we read:
In his work on the Jewish people, Philo reports the following:
"The genius of Taautos, whom the Egyptians call Thoth, surpassed that of all the Phoenicians. He was the first to regulate religious worship among them. He drew it out of coarse inexperience and made it into an en- lightened experience."
The Mysterious Serpent
This same Philo, in speaking of Phoenician letters and interpreting Sanchuniathon, says:
"Consider venomous reptiles and animals which are of no benefit to mankind; they cause death and loss of limbs to those in whom they inject their terrible poison. [13]
"Taautos, and after him the Phoenicians and Egyptians, deified the species of dragons and serpents as having the strongest breath of an crawling animals.
"He declares that the serpent belongs to igneous matter in that it has a speed that nothing can surpass, be- cause of its breath. [14] Without feet, hands or any of the external means that other animals have, it performs all movements and exemplifies the most varied shapes. It gives whatever speed it wishes to the helixes [15] it describes in its motion. That is what makes it an essential part of temples and mysteries. ...
"This animal does not die a natural death. ...The Phoenicians call it Agathodaemon, [16] the good spirit, and the Egyptians call it Kneph, giving it the head of a hawk because of the energy of that bird."
Epeis, the foremost Egyptian hierophant and temple scribe, who was translated into Greek by Areius of Heracleopolus, writes on the subject as follows:
"The first and most eminent divinity is the hawk- headed serpent which, when it opens its eyes, fills all the first-engendered earth with light; and when it closes them, light is succeeded by darkness."
Epeis used that grandiloquent language to convey the idea that, being brilliant, it illuminated everything, for the nature of light is to illurninate. [17]
Pherecydes, who took all his fundamental ideas from the Phoenicians, celebrated in his theology the god Ophioneus [18] and the Ophionides, of whom we shall speak later.
The Egyptians, representing the universe in accordance with the same concept, drew an airy, flaming circle with a hawk-headed serpent stretched across it. The entire figure resembles the Greek letter theta. They interpret the world by a circle, and the serpent at the center of it by the good deity Agathodaemon. [19]
In the sacred ritual of the Persians, Zoroaster says, "The hawk-headed god is the first, eternal, indivisible and peerless, the guide to all that is beautiful, never letting himself be won over by gifts."
Ostanes says the same things about him in a work entitled The Eight Prayers.
Taking this as their point of departure, philosophers built their system, as has been reported: in the sanctuaries of the temples they consecrated, they represented the first heavenly bodies in the form of serpents. They offered sacrifices to those reptiles, dedicated festivals and mysteries to them, and believed them to be the greatest gods and the moderators of all things.
Such are the traditions of Sanchuniathon concerning serpents.
Philo writes:
"Among the Ancients, in situations of grave danger, it was customary for the rulers of the city or the nation to ward off general destruction by sacrificing the most cherished of their children as an appeasement offering to the vengeful gods; their throats were cut in secret.
"When Cronus, whom the Phoenicians call Il [Hel, Bel], and who after his death was consecrated in the heavenly body that bears his name, was ruling the country, he had an only son, Jeud. He adorned him with the emblems of royalty and sacrificed him on an altar he had erected for that purpose."
If Sanchuniathon was born during the reign of Semiramis and if, as is generally agreed, she lived long before the time of Troy, then he also lived before that time; but it is said that he received documents by writers earlier than himself, and those writers are said to have lived at approximately the same time as Moses. Porphyry writes as follows in the fourth book of his diatribe against us:
"Sanchuniathon of Berytus relates with great truthfulness everything concerning the Jews because he alters neither places nor names, having had access to the writings of Jerombal, priest of the god Jeuo.
"Jerombal dedicated his history to Abibal, King of Berytus. It was accepted by him and by those he had instructed to examine it with respect to its veracity.
"The time when those men lived is earlier than the Trojan War and is very close to the time of Moses, as is shown by the successions of the Kings of Phoenicia.
"As for Sanchuniathon, whose name means 'Friend of Truth' in the Phoenician language, he gathered all the ancient history in the documents found in each city and formed it into a body of writings. He lived in the time of Semiramis, Queen of the Assyrians."
CHARROUX’ NOTES:
4 This passage clearly implies that gods are human inventions. And the cosmology of the Hawaiian Island (see Chapter 6) states that men were born before the gods.
5 This is highly significant. Technites was of an extrater restrial race, since only Autochthon was earthly! The problem of interbreeding with beings from another planet is posed here.
6 It is obviously Thoth who is being referred to here. Cf. the Norse god Thor. ,
7 Hypsistos: the Most High. He is Jupiter Hypsistos Hesychius (Melchizedek, according to Valckanaer).
8 The Latin version of his name is Saturn and the Orientals called him Bel or Baal. In Phoenician his name is Hil or Hel, notes seguier de Saint-Brisson, who makes this important remark: "Hil, Hel or Saturn has no relation to the sun. It seems likely that the city of Heliolopolis was a Greek fabrication of the god Saturn Hilo, or Heliolopolis, just as the Algabal of Emesa was Saturn mountain, mountain god or god Saturn."
The Algabal of Emesa was a black stone whose relation to Saturn is mysterious but obvious. Why, if not for the pur- pose of deceiving, was that name falsified by changing it to Heliogabalus (from helios, "sun'.)? The same procedure was successfully used in Peru and Mexico to change the Venusian cults into solar cults.
The primordial sky, say the documents consulted by Sanchuniathon, had four children: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars and Mercury. The fifth child, Astarte, or Venus, was born later. This is one more indication that the planet Venus did not exist in the solar system five thousand years ago.
9 The Hebrews were initiated by the Egyptians and the Phoenicians, whose myths they borrowed and disguised. The creators of the world, the Elohim or gods, would seem to be the Phoenician heroes mentioned by Sanchuniathon.
10 This seems to imply that they could have reigned else- where, and it evokes the question of intervention by beings from another planet, as in the Bible. Was it for this reason that Astarte wore the head of a bum Astarte is Venus, Sanchuniathon points out. Venus the planet and the queen who traveled through the universe in a spacecraft. We must not forget, as Sanchuniathon says quite specifically, that Astarte was not a goddess, but a mortal creature. She therefore needed a spacecraft to explore the sky.
11 This "heavenly body" was a meteorite. The Temple of Tyre and most other Phoenician temples have a black or green stone, often conical in shape, representing a heavenly body (Venus) The Syrian goddess Ashtoreth (Astarte) originally had the form of a conical stone. The Algabal, the sacred stone of Emesa in Phoenicia, was the stone of Venus, fraudulently related to sun worship under the name of Heliogabalus.
12 Sanchuniathon is quite explicit: two wings are symbols and he explains why. As for the other wings, they are used for flying, since these "gods" are mortal creatures, as has been said several times. They were deified after their death because they introduced inventions useful to mankind. That is what Sanchuniathon told us at the beginning. Thus Cronus flew and Astarte traveled through the universe.
13 It is clear from this passage that, for Sanchuniathon and the Phoenicians, serpents, dragons and other reptiles were hateful and noxious creatures. Why is it, then, that the serpent was universally venerated in the ancient world? Sanchuniathon explains this : the venerated serpent was not a venomous snake, such as the viper, but a luminous "serpent" that moved through the air with the speed of lightning.
14 Philo did not understand the meaning that Sanchuniathon gave to the "serpent" and to the powerful "breath" (the blast of an engine) that propelled it at "a speed that nothing can surpass."
15 In Phoenician mythology, as in all others, the serpent is usually a flying serpent, sometimes with the head of a ram. It is thus represented in a number of steles, bas-reliefs and columns in Phoenicia, Babylon, Phrygia, Egypt, Greece, Peru, Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia and the United States. It is always shown as a major symbol, with a meaning that archaeologists are reluctant to accept.
When it is not flying, the serpent speaks. It is the initiator. Among the Egyptians, by a deterioration of the original meaning, it became a cave of initiation in the shape of an incurvated serpent It is Eve's adviser in the earthly paradise. It is Satan, the good angel, the friend of man, the initiate who came to earth in a flying serpent with propellers or a jet engine-or both, which is precisely represented by a turbo-propeller airplane!
16 Agathodaemon (from agathos, "good," and daimon, "spirit") was a benevolent deity among the Greeks. It is also the Greek name of the Egyptian Kneph, god of fertility and beneficence, and symbol of the Nile. Kneph was repre sented in ancient Egypt in the form of a serpent whose head was crowned with a kind of diadem and whose tail ended with a lotus blossom or a sheaf of grain.
17 How could this refer to an actual serpent? Is a serpent brilliant, luminous, capable of illuminating solely by its presence? Or is this a reference, instead, to the "vessel brighter than the sun" that Garcilaso de La Vega speaks of, the extraterrestrial spacecraft that brought the Venusian Orejona to Peru?
18 Ophioneus was a Titan who reigned in the sky with his wife Eurynome, before Saturn and Rhea. Saturn vanquished him and cast him into Tartarus.
In the religious song that Apollonius of Rhodes puts into the mouth of Orpheus (Argonautica, 1, 503), Ophion the serpent-king is hurled into the ocean by Cronos. This tradition was known to Pherecydes of Syros, Pythagoras' teacher. I see the image as a representation of the comet Venus hurtling through the celestial ocean.
19 The Celts also placed the serpent in the middle of a circle, or on concentric circles, which signified the creation of the universe, or a stationary universe, by a vibratory wave.
Is the Agathodaemon a wave? Electricity? The Agathodaemon-serpent would seem to be something analogous to primordial energy-matter. It may be the nwyvre (serpent) of the Celts.
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