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The Gnostic Society Library


Thrice-Greatest Hermes - Volume 2

by G.R.S. Mead


p. ix

Contents

I. CORPUS HERMETICUM

CORP. HERM. I.

PŒMANDRES, THE SHEPHERD OF MEN

3-20

Commentary

     Of Vision and Apocalypsis

20

     The Great and Little Man

23

     The Presence

24

     The Vision of Creation

25

     The Descent of the Logos

27

     The Revelation of the Pleroma

28

     The Second Emanation

33

     The Descent of Man

34

     The First Men

37

     “Increase and Multiply”

38

     Love

39

     The Way of Deathlessness

39

     The Ascent of the Soul

41

     The Eighth Sphere

42

     The Three “Bodies” of the Buddha

44

     The Preaching of the Gnosis

47

     A Hymn of Praise and Prayer for the Gnosis

49

     The Name “Poimandres”

50

     The Good Shepherd

52

 

CORP. HERM. (II.)

THE GENERAL SERMON

58

 

CORP. HERM. II. (III.)

TO ASCLEPIUS

59-68

Commentary

     “An Introduction to the Gnosis of the Nature of All Things”

68

     Space is a Plenum

70

     The Spouse of Deity

71

     God is Cause that Spirit is

71

     He who is without a Wife is Half a Man

73

 

CORP. HERM. III. (IV.)

THE SACRED SERMON

75-77

Commentary

     Text and Title

78

     The Trinity

78

     From the System of the Nicolaïtans

79

     The “Books of the Chaldæans”

81

     The “Flood”

83

 

CORP. HERM. IV. (V.)

THE CUP OR MONAD

85-91

Commentary

     The Title

92

     The Baptism of the Mind

93

     The Holy Grail

94

     The “Hating of the Body”

95

     The Gnosis and its Blessings

97

     The Ancient Path

98

 

CORP. HERM. V. (VI.)

THOUGH UNMANIFEST GOD IS MOST MANIFEST

99-106

Commentary

     The Title

106

     Māyā

106

     The Higher Pantheism or Panmonism

108

     Hymn to All-God

108

 

CORP. HERM. VI. (VII.)

IN GOD ALONE IS GOOD AND ELSEWHERE NOWHERE

110-114

Commentary

     The Title

115

     Dualism?

115

     God the Pleroma of Good

117

 

CORP. HERM. VII. (VIII.)

THE GREATEST ILL AMONG MEN IS IGNORANCE OF GOD

120-121

Commentary

     A Preaching

122

     The Probable Completion of an Oxyrhynchus Logion

122

 

CORP. HERM. VIII. (IX.)

THAT NO ONE OF EXISTING THINGS DOTH PERISH, BUT MEN IN ERROR SPEAK OF THEIR CHANGES AS DESTRUCTIONS AND AS DEATHS

124-127

Commentary

     The Cosmos as “Second God”

127

     The Law of Apokatastasis

128

 

CORP. HERM. IX. (X.)

ON THOUGHT AND SENSE

129-136

Commentary

     Title and Ordering

136

     “Sense-and-Thought”

137

     “Those in Gnosis”

137

     The True Gnostic

138

     The Goal of the Gnosis

139

     The Possibility of Knowing God

140

 

CORP. HERM. X. (XI.)

THE KEY

141-158

Commentary

     The Consummation of the “General Sermons”

159

     The Will of God

160

     Of Gnosis and Ecstasis

161

     Of Apotheosis

163

     The Metamorphoses of the Soul

163

     The Ladder of Being

165

     Concerning Transmigration

166

     Gnosis the Virtue of the Soul

167

     The Vehicles of the Soul

167

     The Dual Soul

169

     “He who Stands”

170

     The Olympian Path

171

     “When Mind becomes a Daimon”

171

     The “Scourge” of the Christ

173

     The Dispensation of the Universe

173

 

CORP. HERM. XI. (XII.)

MIND UNTO HERMES

175-189

Commentary

     Title and Form

190

     The Æon-Lore

191

     The Root of Form

193

     “Become all Things”

194

     The Good’s own Path

196

     Concerning India

197

 

CORP. HERM. XII. (XIII.)

ABOUT THE COMMON MIND

199-212

Commentary

     The Sayings of the Good Daimon

213

     Hermes and Basilides

215

     The Sermons on Fate

217

     Materiality and Corporality are Energies of God

218

 

CORP. HERM. XIII. (XIV.)

THE SECRET SERMON ON THE MOUNTAIN

219-233

THE SECRET HYMNODY

230-232

Commentary

     Concerning the Title

234

     The Term “Apocryphon”

234

     The Three Stages of Probation

236

     The Mount of Initiation

238

     The Birth from Above

239

     The Virgin-Birth

240

     The Race of the Logos

241

     The Self-taught

242

     The New Creation

243

     The Way of Birth in God

244

     Of the Ten and the Twelve

245

     The Dawn of Cosmic Consciousness

249

     The Vow of Silence

250

     Of the Ogdoad

251

     A Hymn for Morning and for Evening Prayer

252

     A Theurgic Praise-Giving

253

     “Through the Word”

255

 

CORP. HERM. XIV. (XV.)

A LETTER TO ASCLEPIUS

257-263

Commentary

     Asclepius and Tat

263

     Compare with “Mind unto Hermes”

265

     The Good Husbandman

265

 

CORP. HERM. (XVI.)

THE DEFINITIONS OF ASCLEPIUS UNTO KING AMMON

266-276

Commentary

     The Title

277

     A Tradition Concerning the Trismegistic Literature

278

     A Speculation as to Date

281

     The Delineation of the Sun

282

     Concerning the Daimones

282

 

CORP. HERM. (XVII.)

OF ASCLEPIUS TO THE KING

285-286

Commentary

     On the Adoration of Images

286

 

CORP. HERM. (XVIII.)

THE ENCOMIUM OF KINGS

288-298

Commentary

     The Apology of a Pœmandrist

298

     Speculation as to Date

299

     The Story of the, Pythic Grasshopper

300

     The True King

302

     The Fellow-Rulers of the Height

302

 

II. THE PERFECT SERMON; OR THE ASCLEPIUS

307-390

Commentary

     The Title

390

     The Old Latin Translation and the Greek Original

391

     Of the Writer and the Persons of the Dialogue

393

     The Doctrine of the Will of God

395

     Concerning Spirit and the All-Sense

396

     The Prophetic Utterances

398

     The Proscription of the Worship of the Gods

399

     The Last Hope of the Religion of the Mind

401


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