Emerald Tablet - Textual history

The Emerald Tablet, also known as Smaragdine Table, Tabula Smaragdina, or The Secret of Hermes, is an ancient text purporting to reveal the secret of the primordial substance and its transmutations. Its claims to be the work of Hermes Trismegistus ("Hermes the Thrice-Great"), a legendary Egyptian sage or god, variously identified with the Egyptian god Thoth and/or the Greek god Hermes. This short and cryptic text was highly regarded by European alchemists as the foundation of their art, ...

Including:

• Emerald Tablet - The Tablet itself
• Emerald Tablet - Textual history
• Emerald Tablet - Influence
• Emerald Tablet - External link
• Emerald Tablet - Bibliography

Read more here: » Emerald Tablet: Encyclopedia - Emerald Tablet

The oldest documentable source for the text is the Kitab Sirr al-Asrar, a pseudo-Aristotelian compendium of advice for rulers authored by Abd al-Qadir al-Jilani in around 800 AD. This work was translated into Latin as Secretum Secretorum (The Secret of Secrets) by Johannes "Hispalensis" or Hispaniensis (John of Seville) ca. 1140 and by Philip of Tripoli c. 1243. In the 14th century, the alchemist Ortolanus wrote a substantial exegesis on "The Secret of Hermes," which was influential on the subsequent development o ...

See also:

Emerald Tablet, Emerald Tablet - The Tablet itself, Emerald Tablet - Textual history, Emerald Tablet - Influence, Emerald Tablet - External link, Emerald Tablet - Bibliography

Read more here: » Emerald Tablet: Encyclopedia II - Emerald Tablet - Textual history

One translation, by Isaac Newton, found among his alchemical papers, runs as follows: 1. Tis true without lying, certain & most true. 2. That wch is below is like that wch is above & that wch is above is like yt wch is below to do ye miracles of one only thing. 3. And as all things have been & arose from one by ye mediation of one: so all things have their birth from this one thing by adaptation. 4. The Sun is its father, the moon its mother, 5. the wind hath carried it in its bell ...

See also:

Emerald Tablet, Emerald Tablet - The Tablet itself, Emerald Tablet - Textual history, Emerald Tablet - Influence, Emerald Tablet - External link, Emerald Tablet - Bibliography

Read more here: » Emerald Tablet: Encyclopedia II - Emerald Tablet - The Tablet itself

In its several Western recensions, the Tablet became a mainstay of medieval and Renaissance alchemy. Commentaries and/or translations were published by, among others, Trithemius, Roger Bacon, Michael Maier, Aleister Crowley, Albertus Magnus, and Isaac Newton. C.G. Jung identified "The Emerald Tablet" with a table made of green stone which he encountered in the first of a set of his dreams and visions beginning at the end of 1912, and climaxing in his writing the Seven Sermons to the Dead in 1916. Because of its longstanding popularity, the Emerald Tablet is the only piece of non-Greek Hermetica ...

See also:

Emerald Tablet, Emerald Tablet - The Tablet itself, Emerald Tablet - Textual history, Emerald Tablet - Influence, Emerald Tablet - External link, Emerald Tablet - Bibliography

Read more here: » Emerald Tablet: Encyclopedia II - Emerald Tablet - Influence