Poemandres, The Shepherd Of Men
Notes
on the text: This is the most famous of the Hermetic documents, a
revelation account describing a vision of the creation of the
universe and the nature and fate of humanity. Authors from the
Renaissance onward have been struck by the way in which its
creation
myth seems partly inspired by Genesis, partly reacting against it.
The Fall has here become the descent of the Primal Man through the
spheres of the planets to the world of Nature, a descent caused not
by disobedience but by love, and done with the blessing of
God.
The
seven rulers of fate discussed in sections 9, 14 and 25 are the
archons of the seven planets, which also appear in Plato's Timaeus
and in a number of the ancient writings usually lumped together as
"Gnostic". Their role here is an oddly ambivalent one,
powers of Harmony who are nonetheless the sources of humanity's
tendencies to evil.
1.
It chanced once on a time my mind was meditating on the things that
are, my thought was raised to a great height, the senses of my body
being held back - just as men who are weighed down with sleep after
a
fill of food, or from fatigue of body.
Methought
a Being more than vast, in size beyond all bounds, called out my
name
and saith: What wouldst thou hear and see, and what hast thou in
mind
to learn and know?
2.
And I do say: Who art thou?
He
saith: I am Man-Shepherd (
Poemandres
),
Mind of all-masterhood; I know what thou desirest and I am with
thee
everywhere.
3.
[And] I reply: I long to learn the things that are, and comprehend
their nature, and know God. This is, I said, what I desire to
hear.
He
answered back to me: Hold in thy mind all thou wouldst know, and I
will teach thee.
4.
Even with these words His aspect changed, and straightway, in the
twinkling of an eye, all things were opened to me, and I see a
Vision
limitless, all things turned into Light - sweet, joyous [Light].
And
I became transported as I gazed.
But
in a little while Darkness came settling down on part [of it],
awesome and gloomy, coiling in sinuous folds, so that methought it
like unto a snake.
And
then the Darkness changed into some sort of a Moist Nature, tossed
about beyond all power of words, belching out smoke as from a fire,
and groaning forth a wailing sound that beggars all
description.
[And]
after that an outcry inarticulate came forth from it, as though it
were a Voice of Fire.
5.
[Thereon] out of the Light [...] a Holy Word (Logos) descended on
that Nature. And upwards to the height from the Moist Nature leaped
forth pure Fire; light was it, swift and active too.
The
Air, too, being light, followed after the Fire; from out of the
Earth-and-Water rising up to Fire so that it seemed to hang
therefrom.
But
Earth-and-Water stayed so mingled with each other, that Earth from
Water no one could discern. Yet were they moved to hear by reason
of
the Spirit-Word (Logos) pervading them.
6.
Then saith to me Man-Shepherd: Didst understand this Vision what it
means?
Nay;
that shall I know, said I.
That
Light, He said, am I, thy God, Mind, prior to Moist Nature which
appeared from Darkness; the Light-Word (Logos) [that appeared] from
Mind is Son of God.
What
then? - say I.
Know
that what sees in thee and hears is the Lord's Word (Logos); but
Mind
is Father-God. Not separate are they the one from other; just in
their union [rather] is it Life consists.
Thanks
be to Thee, I said.
So,
understand the Light [He answered], and make friends with
it.
7.
And speaking thus He gazed for long into my eyes, so that I
trembled
at the look of him.
But
when He raised His head, I see in Mind the Light, [but] now in
Powers
no man could number, and Cosmos grown beyond all bounds, and that
the
Fire was compassed round about by a most mighty Power, and [now]
subdued had come unto a stand.
And
when I saw these things I understood by reason of Man-Shepherd's
Word
(Logos).
8.
But as I was in great astonishment, He saith to me again: Thou
didst
behold in Mind the Archetypal Form whose being is before beginning
without end. Thus spake to me Man-Shepherd.
And
I say: Whence then have Nature's elements their being?
To
this He answer gives: From Will of God. [Nature] received the Word
(Logos), and gazing upon the Cosmos Beautiful did copy it, making
herself into a cosmos, by means of her own elements and by the
births
of souls.
9.
And God-the-Mind, being male and female both, as Light and Life
subsisting, brought forth another Mind to give things form, who,
God
as he was of Fire and Spirit, formed Seven Rulers who enclose the
cosmos that the sense perceives. Men call their ruling Fate.
10.
Straightway from out the downward elements God's Reason (Logos)
leaped up to Nature's pure formation, and was at-oned with the
Formative Mind; for it was co-essential with it. And Nature's
downward elements were thus left reason-less, so as to be pure
matter.
11.
Then the Formative Mind ([at-oned] with Reason), he who surrounds
the
spheres and spins them with his whorl, set turning his formations,
and let them turn from a beginning boundless unto an endless end.
For
that the circulation of these [spheres] begins where it doth end,
as
Mind doth will.
And
from the downward elements Nature brought forth lives reason-less;
for He did not extend the Reason (Logos) [to them]. The Air brought
forth things winged; the Water things that swim, and
Earth-and-Water
one from another parted, as Mind willed. And from her bosom Earth
produced what lives she had, four-footed things and reptiles,
beasts
wild and tame.
12.
But All-Father Mind, being Life and Light, did bring forth Man
co-equal to Himself, with whom He fell in love, as being His own
child; for he was beautiful beyond compare, the Image of his Sire.
In
very truth, God fell in love with his own Form; and on him did
bestow
all of His own formations.
13.
And when he gazed upon what the Enformer had created in the Father,
[Man] too wished to enform; and [so] assent was given him by the
Father.
Changing
his state to the formative sphere, in that he was to have his whole
authority, he gazed upon his Brother's creatures. They fell in love
with him, and gave him each a share of his own ordering.
And
after that he had well learned their essence and had become a
sharer
in their nature, he had a mind to break right through the Boundary
of
their spheres, and to subdue the might of that which pressed upon
the
Fire.
14.
So he who hath the whole authority over [all] the mortals in the
cosmos and over its lives irrational, bent his face downwards
through
the Harmony, breaking right through its strength, and showed to
downward Nature God's fair form.
And
when she saw that Form of beauty which can never satiate, and him
who
[now] possessed within himself each single energy of [all seven]
Rulers as well as God's own Form, she smiled with love; for it was
as
though she hadd seen the image of Man's fairest form upon her
Water,
his shadow on her Earth.
He
in turn beholding the form like to himself, existing in her, in her
Water, loved it and willed to live in it; and with the will came
act,
and [so] he vivified the form devoid of reason.
And
Nature took the object of her love and wound herself completely
around him, and they were intermingled, for they were
lovers.
15.
And this is why beyond all creatures on the earth man is twofold;
mortal because of body, but because of the essential man
immortal.
Though
deathless and possessed of sway over all, yet doth he suffer as a
mortal doth, subject to Fate.
Thus
though above the Harmony, within the Harmony he hath become a
slave.
Though male-female, as from a Father male-female, and though he is
sleepless from a sleepless [Sire], yet is he overcome [by
sleep].
16.
Thereon [I say: Teach on], O Mind of me, for I myself as well am
amorous of the Word (Logos).
The
Shepherd said: This is the mystery kept hid until this day.
Nature
embraced by Man brought forth a wonder, oh so wonderful. For as he
had the nature of the Concord of the Seven, who, as I said to thee,
[were made] of Fire and Spirit - Nature delayed not, but
immediately
brought forth seven "men", in correspondence with the
natures of the Seven, male-female and moving in the air.
Thereon
[I said]: O Shepherd, ..., for now I am filled with great desire
and
long to hear; do not run off.
The
Shepherd said: Keep silence, for not as yet have I unrolled for
thee
the first discourse (logoi).
Lo!
I am still, I said.
17.
In such wise than, as I have said, the generation of these seven
came
to pass. Earth was as woman, her Water filled with longing;
ripeness
she took from Fire, spirit from Aether. Nature thus brought forth
frames to suit the form of Man.
And
Man from Light and Life changed into soul and mind - from Life to
soul, from Light to mind.
And
thus continued all the sense-world's parts until the period of
their
end and new beginnings.
18.
Now listen to the rest of the discourse (Logos) which thou dost
long
to hear.
The
period being ended, the bond that bound them all was loosened by
God's Will. For all the animals being male-female, at the same time
with Man were loosed apart; some became partly male, some in like
fashion [partly] female. And straightway God spake by His Holy Word
(Logos):
"Increase
ye in increasing, and multiply in multitude, ye creatures and
creations all; and man that hath Mind in him, let him learn to know
that he himself is deathless, and that the cause of death is love,
though Love is all."
19.
When He said this, His Forethought did by means of Fate and Harmony
effect their couplings and their generations founded. And so all
things were multiplied according to their kind.
And
he who thus hath learned to know himself, hath reached that Good
which doth transcend abundance; but he who through a love that
leads
astray, expends his love upon his body - he stays in Darkness
wandering, and suffering through his senses things of Death.
20.
What is the so great fault, said I, the ignorant commit, that they
should be deprived of deathlessness?
Thou
seemest, He said, O thou, not to have given heed to what thou
heardest. Did I not bid thee think?
Yea
do I think, and I remember, and therefore give Thee thanks.
If
thou didst think [thereon], [said He], tell me: Why do they merit
death who are in Death?
It
is because the gloomy Darkness is the root and base of the material
frame; from it came the Moist Nature; from this the body in the
sense-world was composed; and from this [body] Death doth the Water
drain.
21.
Right was thy thought, O thou! But how doth "he who knows
himself, go unto Him", as God's Word (Logos) hath declared?
And
I reply: the Father of the universals doth consist of Light and
Life,
from Him Man was born.
Thou
sayest well, [thus] speaking. Light and Life is Father-God, and
from
Him Man was born.
If
then thou learnest that thou art thyself of Life and Light, and
that
thou [happenest] to be out of them, thou shalt return again to
Life.
Thus did Man-Shepherd speak.
But
tell me further, Mind of me, I cried, how shall I come to Life
again...for God doth say: "The man who hath Mind in him, let him
learn to know that he himself [is deathless]."
22.
Have not all men then Mind?
Thou
sayest well, O thou, thus speaking. I, Mind, myself am present with
holy men and good, the pure and merciful, men who live
piously.
[To
such] my presence doth become an aid, and straightway they gain
gnosis of all things, and win the Father's love by their pure
lives,
and give Him thanks, invoking on Him blessings, and chanting hymns,
intent on Him with ardent love.
And
ere they give up the body unto its proper death, they turn them
with
disgust from its sensations, from knowledge of what things they
operate. Nay, it is I, the Mind, that will not let the operations
which befall the body, work to their [natural] end. For being
door-keeper I will close up [all] the entrances, and cut the mental
actions off which base and evil energies induce.
23.
But to the Mind-less ones, the wicked and depraved, the envious and
covetous, and those who mured do and love impiety, I am far off,
yielding my place to the Avenging Daimon, who sharpening the fire,
tormenteth him and addeth fire to fire upon him, and rusheth upon
him
through his senses, thus rendering him readier for transgressions
of
the law, so that he meets with greater torment; nor doth he ever
cease to have desire for appetites inordinate, insatiately striving
in the dark.
24.
Well hast thou taught me all, as I desired, O Mind. And now, pray,
tell me further of the nature of the Way Above as now it is [for
me].
To
this Man-Shepherd said: When the material body is to be dissolved,
first thou surrenderest the body by itself unto the work of change,
and thus the form thou hadst doth vanish, and thou surrenderest thy
way of life, void of its energy, unto the Daimon. The body's senses
next pass back into their sources, becoming separate, and resurrect
as energies; and passion and desire withdraw unto that nature which
is void of reason.
25.
And thus it is that man doth speed his way thereafter upwards
through
the Harmony.
To
the first zone he gives the Energy of Growth and Waning; unto the
second [zone], Device of Evils [now] de-energized; unto the third,
the Guile of the Desires de-energized; unto the fourth, his
Domineering Arrogance, [also] de-energized; unto the fifth, unholy
Daring and the Rashness of Audacity, de-energized; unto the sixth,
Striving for Wealth by evil means, deprived of its aggrandizement;
and to the seventh zone, Ensnaring Falsehood, de-energized.
26.
And then, with all the energisings of the harmony stript from him,
clothed in his proper Power, he cometh to that Nature which belongs
unto the Eighth, and there with those-that-are hymneth the
Father.
They
who are there welcome his coming there with joy; and he, made like
to
them that sojourn there, doth further hear the Powers who are above
the Nature that belongs unto the Eighth, singing their songs of
praise to God in language of their own.