Science of Images – Bronze Age to Neoplatonism

Part 1: Astronomy, Symbolism and Civilization 

Contents: 

Egypt’s Antiquity

Images and Forms in Ancient Metaphysics

Decline and Shifts

Intuitive Symbolism to Linear Logic

Adaptations Over Time

The writings of Greek philosophers were responsible for the important advancements made in the medieval period that carried on into the Renaissance.  The Ptolemaic era and Alexandria are what brought the use of the tropical zodiac into the western world. It also saw the emergence of an esoteric movement centered around an enigmatic figure called Hermes Trismegistus, which claimed to be the wisdom of Egypt that had been passed down through the ages.

Hermeticism enjoyed an enormous prestige for over a thousand years until the 1600s. Linguists began to attack it as a purely Greek invention with a superficial Egyptian appearance, and some of its popular mystique was lost. But what if it was a deliberately crafted vessel for the remnants of Egyptian spirituality to survive?

The priesthoods of Egypt started to face a serious dilemma during the Iron Age (1200 to 600 BC), the foreseeable and inevitable demise of their civilization which had thrived for thousands of years. Egypt reached a critically weak point at the end of the Iron Age and the region was undergoing more changes that further jeopardized their survival. The Achaemenid Persian Empire annexed Egypt and provided relative stability, but all empires fall and the chaos that follows is unpredictable.

Egypt was quickly taken by Alexander the Great in 332 BC one of his generals, Ptolemy Soter, began the final dynasty of Pharaohs. The Greek language and their system of thought had been adopted across the entire region, collectively called the Hellenistic world. Hellenization was exemplified in the city of Alexandria; people from Europe all the way to central Asia freely mingled and exchanged ideas like never before. Its size, influence and sophistication rivaled Rome.

Egypt adapted its theology into a form that this new world could comprehend and ensure that it would not perish completely. This Egyptian theology, called Hermeticism, laid some of the groundwork for what would become the Ghayat al Hakim or Picatrix almost a thousand years later. The Greco-Egyptian culture also provided a welcoming environment for the later philosophers of Plato’s Academy after the destruction of their school in Athens in 86 BC.

The Roman Catholic Church took increasing control during the long decline of the Western Roman Empire’s government and instituted a theocracy which extended to Roman-occupied Egypt. Justinian I enacted similar laws in the Byzantine world. In 529 AD, Greek philosophers were invited to live and teach in Harran and other parts of Persia. They established a small continuation of the Academy that existed alongside Harran’s ancient star religion, effectively making a time capsule of the Bronze Age through the Middle Ages.

In 717 CE, the first Muslim University was founded in Harran and the Caliph brought many scholars from Alexandria to run the university. Ibn Washiya, author of Nabatean Agriculture, wrote a century later that Harran was home to a thriving school of Hermeticism that was highly secretive about its practices. When the House of Wisdom was founded in Baghdad, pagan scholars from Harran played a significant role in the translation of Greek and Latin texts into Arabic. Baghdad would quickly become the center for a revival of Platonism and Hermeticism that would later spread to Europe, along with astrology itself which had largely disappeared for over five centuries.

The fall of Rome and the Middle Ages was not the first struggle to preserve and adapt during periods of upheaval. It had occurred many times before and appears to have been one of the driving forces that helped rebuild civilization after periods of decline and disaster.

The Bronze Age Collapse that occurred around 1200 BCE left Egypt as one of the few major kingdoms that survived intact, and many faded into legend or were simply forgotten. The Siege of Troy and even the city’s existence was regarded as fictional until it’s discovery in the late 1800s.

Egypt’s Antiquity

The true depth of antiquity and mystery of Egypt is hard to fathom. In Timaeus, Plato records an exchange between Solon and the priests of Sais who told him that they had already inhabited the area for eight thousand years (8,500 BC) and that the Greeks had forgotten their own history.

Over 9,000 years ago in Nabta Playa, what is now desert was tropics and astronomers were performing advanced calculations using a circular stone calendar. Just under 5,000 years ago, the Giza pyramids that have become synonymous with Egypt were built. This was a sudden explosion of unbelievably sophisticated engineering that drives endless debate to this day. It coincided with Menes uniting upper and lower Egypt and creating the first dynasty around 3100 BC. Very little is known of this period and even less before then.

Manetho was an Egyptian priest who compiled his History of Egypt or Aegyptiaca early in the Ptolemaic period. He provided a complete list of Egyptian kings and the dates they reigned back to the first dynasty. He also wrote that numerous gods and demigods ruled Egypt in the ages before the first dynasty. On the other hand, the Palermo Stone, over 4,000 years old, records the names from the Old Kingdom dynasties and nine kings before them. The stone is unfortunately broken and appears to have had more. It’s a rare instance of predynastic records surviving and being recognizable.

At the same time in Mesopotamia, the Sumerians built cities with all the advanced tools of civilization, including paved roads. We still use the timekeeping system they established; the 360 degrees of the ecliptic and the base 60 division (60 minutes) is credited to them. Like Manetho’s history, the Sumerian Kings List states that divine beings ruled for ages before the mortal kings.

Phoenician (or Canaanite if you prefer) cities sprang up along the coast of the Levant with an impressive region-wide seafaring trade network. The stars and many aspects of their religions all appear to be intimately related. The perplexing combination of extremely advanced knowledge combined with countless religious writings about “star gods” has spawned an entire subculture that maintains these people were guided and controlled by extraterrestrials. Egyptology and archaeology have filled in a lot of gaps, but its fair to say that this part of history is still largely unknown.

For the next three thousand years throughout the Nile Valley, temples were built that make most modern architecture look amateurish. Egypt was ruled by a highly secretive class of priests who were polymaths and possessed incredible skills in every field of learning, to include magic and spiritual development. They were the advisors and administrators for the Pharoah, who was head of state and the spiritual leader of the nation, being a physical incarnation of divinity.

Today, Egypt is known for its architecture and advanced engineering, but in the ancient world it was most revered for magic. King Solomon, the wisest man in Jewish lore, was said to be “in no way inferior to the ancients”, with Egypt likely among the ancients referred to. Exactly how and why Egypt’s rulers did what they did is still a mystery due to their extreme secrecy around all their knowledge, and spiritual practices were said to be the highest form of wisdom they possessed.

Something very important in human history has disappeared and many things point to that “something” being their spirituality. This is an uncomfortable idea for most people to deal with for many reasons, not least the strong opinions that have always surrounded it. The possibility that any useful information can come from psychic senses is vehemently rejected by many. Extensive scientific studies of ESP have established that human intuitive faculties are real but weak and unreliable.

We subconsciously associate the spiritual with modern religions. We think in terms of materialism and the very existence of something beyond the physical is hard to handle, even for those who want to believe it. We have been bombarded with the dogma of constant progress or the idea that everything before our age is inferior.

Popular opinion paints Greek philosophers not as devout mystics, but modern sensibilities personified. We are told that depictions of animal-like beings as divine must be the attempts of savages to cope with fear of the unknown. “Superstitions” and myth couldn’t possibly have value aside from being curiosities of a bygone era. This narrative has been used to devalue ancient thinkers for a long time.

Images and Forms in Ancient Metaphysics

According to Picatrix, within its pages are instructions for the “Science of Images”. Paintings, drawings, sculptures and even modern photographs and videos are images. The techniques of an artist or photographer could fit that loose definition. What is significant about the image created as an astrological talisman? The word “image” in English seems unremarkable but a deeper look through a different lens shows that it is anything but ordinary. The answer is in the Theory of Forms which was at the core of philosophy and metaphysics.

Plato’s metaphysical ideas of the Forms are clearly stated to be foundational in Picatrix.

“Plato says as much in the book he wrote called Timaeus, which goes on at great length in words and reasoning about Forms”.

The author alludes to the Science of Images being an interdisciplinary endeavor and that understanding it comes in stages. There are hidden aspects that can’t be communicated, not because of a desire to withhold knowledge, but because it can’t be grasped in the ways that other subjects are learned. It reveals itself as a process of unfolding insights, just as the Forms are discussed in Plato’s dialogues. “This science of magic is divided into two parts… The part deeply hidden is profound, and there are profound perceptions that cannot be grasped except with others that come before them through hard work…”.

The phrase “Science of Images” in Picatrix is the Arabic phrase ʿilm al-ṣuwar (علم الصور) and its Latin counterpart scientia imaginum. The Greek words used by Plato that have become collectively translated as “Form” are εἶδος (eidos) and ἰδέα (idea). This is the root of the English word “idea”.  At first glance, the word “Form” may appear to be a poor choice of translation for the Greek, but this seeming discrepancy perfectly conveys what Plato was attempting to teach his readers.

“Form” implies something visible and tangible that can be seen or touched. “Idea” is something that has no physical existence and can only be grasped internally. The relationship between what can be known through the senses and what can only be known through the mind and soul is at the heart of the Theory of Forms. Plato’s Forms are, in fact, transcendent and pure ideas. The outward appearance of the word Form ἰδέα or idea is the visible representation or image of something that exists as pure, divine idea. This paradoxical relationship within the word itself perfectly embodies the Theory of Forms.

By pursuing knowledge of the Forms, the philosopher awakened the highest faculties of the mind and soul. The Forms can be likened to the pure thoughts within the mind of God, the root of all things. Images or outward appearances are a distorted reflection of their pure source which cannot be seen, heard or touched. Words themselves are an outward appearance in the form of sound, a representation or reflection of an idea. The pure idea that a word represents has the nature of the Forms. Plato often examined words from this perspective to illustrate this intangible principle of reality. The Theory of Forms is a key concept in the theologies and mystic traditions of many different people during the Hellenistic period, and arguably before. It can be recognized at the heart of Kabbalah, Sufism, Hermeticism, Christian mysticism, and every practice that recognizes a single source of creation and aims to bring the practitioner closer to it. The concepts inherent in the Theory of Forms is conveyed through the framework of different holy books, languages and cultures.

The roots of the word talisman were used by medieval Arab philosophers to contemplate the Forms. The Kitab al-Nukhab is part of the Jabirian Corpus, a large and diverse collection of medieval Arabic manuscripts that contain important developments in science and mathematics as well as Hermeticism, alchemy and other occult practices. Some are training manuals used by the Brethren of Purity. This was a secret society of Muslim philosophers that emulated and continued the Platonist tradition in Baghdad and the surrounding areas. Kitab al-Nukhab is a dialogue between a teacher and student that is intended to provide the knowledge base for making talismans. Its first definition is relatively simple and straightforward.

“A talisman is the likeness of artificial actions to natural actions […] Every talisman is a crafted thing that is like something natural, yet not every artificial likeness to something natural is a talisman. The meaning of talisman is distinguished by the celestial observation that characterizes it.”

The astrological timing is the distinguishing factor. But as the dialogue continues, the teacher cryptically connects the making of talismans to geometry, astronomy, natural sciences, philosophy and practically all branches of learning. He explains that talismans are the culmination of all of these and asks the student again what a talisman is. The student ponders the question for an entire year and reveals that he can’t even attempt to provide an answer. The teacher urges the student to begin his search for deeper understanding by searching for the deeper meanings of image and hints that the Greek philosophers had some of the answers he is seeking.

In ancient Hebrew, the word צֶלֶם, pronounced “tselem”, is used in the first chapter of the Book of Genesis. The primordial human Adam was made “in our image” with a divine utterance. Its root word in ancient Hebrew means “shade” or casting a shadow, the underlying symbolism being an illusionary appearance created by manipulating light, partially mirroring or reflecting the original. A literal translation of Genesis 1:26 reads,

“And Elohim uttered we make man in image of us”.

ויאמר אלהים נעשה אדם בצלמנו

Elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible this word is used to denote a phantom, illusion, idol, or spiritual appearance. The tselem is a core concept in Kabbalistic traditions and is related to the astral body and the composition of the human soul. In other ancient Semitic languages like Akkadian, Aramaic and Old Syriac the word is used to denote an engraved image, sacred image or statue.

The Arabic word طِلَّسْم or “tillasm” means magical image, related to the ancient Greek word telesma (τέλεσμα) which means “completion” or “fulfill” in the context of a ritual. In the Septuagint, the Greek translation of Hebrew scriptures that was done at the behest of Ptolemy II Philadelphus, the Pharoah of Ptolemaic Egypt from 285 to 247 BC, the word “tselem” is translated as εἰκών or “eikon”, a word which is frequently found in the writings of Platonic philosophers and having a related meaning.

In Greek cosmology, the word eikon is only used in the context of the metaphysical. In the New Testament it has similar connotations, for example in Colossians 1:15 when Christ is said to be the eikon of the invisible God, meaning a replica or copy.

Images or eikons in Greek metaphysics is a key part of the Theory of Forms. This is itself a deep subject, but it can be summarized as: the physical world is a realm of appearances or shadows, while true reality exists in a higher, immaterial realm of perfect, eternal, and unchanging Forms that are beyond human perception. Eikons or sacred images serve as mediators between the physical and the perfect World of Forms by participating in the Form it represents. It does so by imitation, creating an invisible but real link through cosmic sympathy. The human soul is an image or eikon of the cosmos, according to Pythagorean teachings and the cosmos according to Plato. The Sun is an image of the Form of the Good according to Socrates, with “the Good” being a Platonist term for God’s benevolence.

When we look at the ancient writings, it becomes even more of a labyrinth. Images and talismans have a wide range of uses and meanings from Plato to Late Antiquity. Adding to the complexity is the importance of statues in Greek cosmology. Human beings are statues made by the divine; this concept was part of Greek thought before the philosophers. In the Iliad, Hephaestus was the god of craftsmen and forged “animated statues” that were intelligent and had souls. Hephaestus was also distinguished from the other Olympian gods because he felt pain. In Plato’s Timaeus, the Demiurge (Creator God) crafts human beings as his living statues. Aristotle elaborates further in Laws I when commenting on the Allegory of the Cave; he says that human beings are ensouled puppets and the strings from the unseen world are emotions.

Early in the Common Era, the Greek philosophers wrote entire treatises on the use of statues, divine images, symbols, talismans, letters and more with many different terms. The precise meanings are sometimes difficult to discern. The vast number of medieval translations from Greek to Arabic are an enormous web that hasn’t been unraveled and may remain that way.

During the Hellenistic era, the philosophers of Plato’s Academy (Old, Middle, and New) used eight different Greek words that have some relationship to sacred images or talismans. The Neoplatonist writings (3^rd to 6^th century) were much more overt about the mysticism in Plato’s tradition and used an additional five terms. The Neoplatonists were forced to defend their tradition more and more and wrote details that their forebears had little need to explain. This will be explored more in another chapter.

The Greek concept of the world being statues and images crafted by the divine has parallels with the Egyptians. Ptah is depicted as a sculptor fashioning creation with a potter’s wheel, and in the Hermetica’s Perfect Sermon Hermes tells Asclepius about statues ensouled by divine spirits.

The best written sources to consult would be that of the ancient Egyptians themselves, but this is a unique problem in and of itself. Even with the benefit of translations enabled by the Rosetta Stone and the survival of the Coptic Egyptian language, today there is difficulty comprehending certain ancient Egyptian writings. Texts that deal with philosophical and spiritual concepts are impossible for the modern person to relate to. This is not specific to Egypt, but the entire ancient world. Records of wars, taxes, and daily living are generally understandable but the worldview in sacred writings is almost alien. Human consciousness underwent a deep change between 1000 BC and the common era, and the use of language and writing reflects it. The only relatable hints that we can hope to approach them are from Hermes Trismegistus.

Like Christ described as an eikon or image of the invisible God, the Pharoahs fulfilled the same role in Egypt. According to a spell in the Old Kingdom’s Pyramid Texts § 406 – 407, the hieroglyphic writing translates to:

“For Pharaoh is the great power that overpowers the powers.
Pharaoh is a sacred image, the most sacred image
of the sacred images of the Great One.“

In the Memphis Theology (700 BC), line 53, the creation of Atum is narrated in the divine writing of hieroglyphs. Atum is the Primordial Man, analogous to Adam Kadmon in Kabbalah, or the World Soul (collective human soul) of Greek metaphysics.

“There comes into being in the mind; there comes into being by the tongue as the image of Atum.
Ptah is the very great, who gives life to all the gods and their kas. It all in this mind and by this tongue.
Horus (as mind) came into being in him (Ptah); Thoth (as tongue) came into being in him as Ptah.”

Atum is composed of the speech and thought of Ptah, who is equivalent of the Greek Demiurge, depicted as a mouth speaking or as a potter shaping clay. Ptah fashions Horus and Thoth, and in Atum they have a microcosmic image that connects them all. The entire universe is connected through a single source that creates with principles of multiplicity.

The phrases of the Pyramid Texts and Memphis Theology would be more incomprehensible without Hermes explaining it:

“Mind, my son Tat, is of the very substance of God, if indeed there is a substance of God; and of what nature that substance is, God alone precisely knows. Mind then is not severed from the substantiality of God, but is, so to speak, spread everywhere from that source, as the light of the Sun is spread far and wide.” (Corpus Hermeticum, Libellus 12, 1)

It’s becoming clearer that “images” held a far deeper meaning than works of human art. The concept of divine images reaches back to the oldest writings of Egypt, when that knowledge was exclusive to royalty and high-ranking priests. The science of the stars, both astronomy and astrology, has far more depth than most realize. It’s in the foundations of all sciences. The Hellenized Egyptian astrologer Hephaestion of Thebes said of it,

“The science of the stars has granted us knowledge of divine matters, magic, divination, teaching, meteorology, mathematics, alchemy and medicine, thus of the sowing of seed, hunting, fishing, navigation, military strategy, architecture, construction, literature, philosophy and the arts. Those who slander this truth will be cursed with their ignorance and weakness while those who understand this truth will be blessed.”  Apotelesmatica, Book 2, VII (Ben Dykes translation)

Decline and Shifts

“Do you not know, Asclepius, that Egypt is an image of heaven? Or, to speak more exactly, in Egypt all the operations of the powers which rule and work in heaven have been transferred to earth below? No, it should be said that the whole Cosmos dwells in our land as in its sanctuary.” (Lament of Hermes, 100-300 AD)

The advanced engineering in ancient Egypt is a vast subject, but a few things are worth noting considering the Asclepius dialogue. Hermes says that Egypt is an image of the heavens and celestial powers dwell there.

On the top left is the Great Pyramid, constructed around 2500 BC, seen from the air during the equinox. In 1940, a pilot flew over Giza during the equinox and saw the Great Pyramid with its four sides showing eight sides. After the equinox passed it no longer made this incredible optical illusion.

The photo on the bottom left is the Great Pyramid as it normally appears. It was discovered that the builders had carefully engineered the pyramid so that its four sides, appearing perfectly flat, had a subtle irregularity that was never noticed until then. Only on the day of the spring and autumn equinox, when the distribution of light and dark is perfectly equal, the solar rays cast shadows on the pyramid.

The solar light of the equinox shows an eight-sided architecture hiding in plain sight. Not only did the builders construct something that has never been equaled, but they also hid within its design another grandiose display specifically for the equinox.

Why would they have gone these extreme lengths to make an optical illusion of eight sides on an already magnificent four-sided structure? They’re not functional for anything other than the light and shadow display. What is significant about 4 and 8 together?

The creation story of the Ogdoad, the “Eightfold” is encapsulated here. These were eight primordial gods arranged in four pairs of male and female.

The oldest direct reference to them comes from temple inscriptions in Hermopolis, meaning “the city of Hermes” in Greek. The queen-regent Hatshepsut made the engravings around 1500 BC and the city itself was founded in the Old Kingdom. Its Egyptian name is Khemenu which means “Eight Town” in reflection of the Ogdoad’s eight gods.

In the Hermopolis cosmology, four primary powers create the cosmos from primordial chaos, and each of the four takes on a male and female aspect, making eight. These eight primordial gods collectively give birth to Atum in the form of the Sun. From himself, Atum births four gods (air, moisture, earth, sky) that establishes the world’s structure. The coupling of earth and sky births an additional four gods: Osiris, Seth, Isis and Nephthys, which all govern the cycles of nature.

Atum and these eight gods are known as the Ennead or Great Ennead. They are the most widely known Egyptian deities and have been depicted in a variety of forms.

The underlying numbers in this cosmology are: 4 becomes 8 and light is created. The singular light of the sun, One, then creates 4 which becomes 8. Seeing the Great Pyramid, the primordial mound, briefly becoming eight-sided only when light and dark are in perfect balance has much deeper meaning in this context. The connection between the Ogdoad and the Great Pyramid is my own personal speculation and no direct links are known, but it is an extremely odd coincidence.

The Ogdoad and Ennead were the foundations of the Egyptian cosmos dating back to the Old Kingdom, eight primordial beings who bring forth nine gods. Over time the creation stories changed, with the specific gods of the Ennead being syncretized or supplanted, but the Ogdoad stayed and the underlying structure of the Ennead stayed the same. In 1945, a large collection of ancient papyrus books was found sealed in jars inside a cave.

The books, collectively called the Nag Hammadi texts, became known for its Christian Gnostic writings that had been lost until then. Among these were three short texts written in Coptic, one called The Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth. In it, Hermes Trismegistus teaches his pupil how to attain spiritual visions of the eighth and ninth spheres of the heavens, after he advanced past the seven spheres of the planets. The conspicuous use of eight and nine in the cosmological structure and used by native Egyptians shows some continuity from older Egyptian traditions.

The pyramids of Giza are perfectly aligned with north, south, east and west. They’re also perfectly aligned with true north, not magnetic north, within one tenth of a degree. True north is lines of longitude that all converge at the north pole, and accurately mapping it requires precise knowledge of the earth’s spherical measurements, or spherical trigonometry, which has only been perfected in the past few centuries.

Global maps before the 18^th century were inaccurate because those calculations were missing. The earliest known work on spherical trigonometry is Menelaus of Alexandria, a Greek astronomer and mathematician who lived in the 1^st century AD. Little is known of his life other than he resided in Alexandria and Rome.

Using his work as a foundation, it took mathematicians and cartographers over 1,700 years to develop spherical trigonometry to the point of accurately determining true north. Whether the alignment of the pyramids is simply coincidence, the Old Kingdom possessed advanced spherical trigonometry five thousand years ago or determined it through simpler but ingenious methods of star observations that are now lost remains one of Egypt’s many mysteries.

Hermes tells Asclepius that Egypt itself is an image of the heavens and the forces that govern the cosmos had dwelled in it. This is a photo of the Giza pyramids seen from above with the belt stars of Orion as seen from earth superimposed on it. Some independent researchers have speculated that these three pyramids were constructed, at least in part, to reflect the stars. The Sphinx and its lion shape suggest a correlation with the Leo constellation rising in the east with the Sphinx directly facing it.

Looking at the Giza layout as a reflection of the stars, the location of the Nile roughly corresponds to the Milky Way, universally depicted as a river in ancient star lore. This theory is intriguing but is still debated and regarded by most Egyptologists as speculation. If nothing else it’s a fascinating coincidence among countless others that aren’t easily disputed, like the incredible alignments of important temples with the solstices and equinoxes. For example, the Karnak temple is carefully constructed so that a narrow beam of the rising sun briefly illuminates the face of Amun in the Holy of Holies before brightly spreading across the sanctuary. This only occurs on the morning of the winter solstice.

This obsession with capturing the light of the sun and stars in physical objects with laser-like precision brings to mind De Radiis (On the Stellar Rays), written sometime in the medieval period. It was regarded as a companion text to the Ghayat al-Hakim and describes astral rays as having similar properties to visible light and in many ways anticipated modern electromagnetic theory. De Radiis, in turn, draws on older Greek studies of optics.

Whatever the case, it’s clear that the ancient Egyptians were not just incredibly advanced astronomers, but that they were obsessed with the sky to an extent that goes far beyond religious devotion. New discoveries continue to show their temples routinely had advanced astronomical knowledge ingeniously embedded within their architecture, and this was done throughout the ancient world in all corners of the globe. Adding a deeper layer of mystery to an enigma is the remarkable consistency of these temple designs across vast stretches of distance and time.

Left: Pyramid of Kukulkan in Chichen Itza, Mexico on the equinox. Right: Aerial photo of Giza on the equinox.

The Great Pyramid of Giza is the only eight-sided pyramid known to exist, but another pyramid also casts a special shadow with the light of the equinox. On the other side of the globe, in what is now Mexico in the Mayan city of Chichen Itza, the Pyramid of Kukulkan forms a serpent using shadows only on the spring and autumn equinox. At the base of the pyramid is the feathered serpent’s head carved from stone. The pyramid was constructed to align with the Sun’s position on the equinoxes with unfathomable precision. The sunlight casts shadows in the form of a serpent’s body. It causes the snake to slither down from the top of the pyramid two days out of the year.

The Pyramid of Kukulkan is itself a representation of the solar year. Each of its four sides has 91 steps and combined with the platform on top makes 365 steps, one for each day of the solar year. This pyramid is believed to have been constructed around 700 AD, but it has been discovered to contain even older pyramids underneath that was repurposed and repaired. The Mayans and other ancient American people had incredibly advanced astronomical knowledge that they incorporated into their temples, just as the people of the old world did.

Many theories have been proposed about the remarkable similarities between civilizations like the Mayans and Egyptians as evidence of extensive contact across the Atlantic in ancient times or a lost “mother culture”. In my opinion, it further demonstrates that stargazing was primarily responsible for developing sophisticated civilizations. The efforts to continuously improve the precision of star charts and calendars led to increasingly sophisticated discoveries in mathematics and geometry, which easily carried over into other fields like engineering, not to mention the astrological themes that would naturally find its way into divination and religion. Everyone on the planet sees the Sun, Moon and stars, and all experience the passing of time and seasons. There are differences depending on the location, but overall, it is a shared experience common to all.

Even more incredible is the strong similarities in the visions of shamans across the world which became the basis of their religious rites. Astrological elections were not unique to the Hellenized world. It is well documented that the Mayans engaged in warfare primarily based on astrological calculations of the planets. These wars were not fought over resources or territory but were carried out because the heavens showed conflict emanating from the astral world. If nothing else, this validates many of Carl Jung’s ideas about the collective unconscious and is interesting food for thought.

Intuitive Symbolism to Linear Logic

Possibly most significant is the widespread and apparent change in human consciousness that was taking place in the region. Whether it was due to the spread of writing, an effect of evolution, or a combination of factors, the minds of human beings were becoming starkly different and after the Hellenistic age it became a permanent change. One of the plainest examples is the eradication of animism, which is the way human beings perceived and experienced life throughout most of history.

Animism is a term in modern anthropology that means the belief that all objects, creatures and places possess their own spiritual essence. Animals, plants, rocks, lakes, weather, mountains, and all of nature is a vast ecosystem of spirits. Objects created by human beings also have spiritual properties, along with the words we speak and actions we take. Simply put, everything has spirit and is alive in some way. This word came into use in the 1800s and isn’t necessarily demeaning but has connotations of primitive superstitions and illogical thinking. Nowadays it is considered a belief, like dualism, monotheism, and atheism, but this was once the way that people experienced life itself. This innate and intuitive sense of universal connection slowly declined and reached its ultimate antithesis in materialism and with it a sense of separation and being disconnected with everything.

Animism’s long decline and the emergence of a new consciousness is seen in the language of the Bronze and Iron Age compared to Late Antiquity. The Iliad features the gods interacting directly with human characters from start to finish, but rarely in the Odyssey. In the case of Egypt, can be seen in the Pyramid Texts and the Corpus Hermeticum.

In earlier times, thought and language were heavily symbolic, intuitive and almost “spherical” for lack of a better description. Spheres and circles signify a lack of linear, tight patterns yet can contain all of them simultaneously. A word or phrase can have many meanings at once and all of them be “true”.

When the Macedonian Empire came to be, human thought was becoming linear in ways that it had never been before. Something is this or that, true or false, one or the other, all or none. I refer to the former as symbolic language and symbolic thought, the language of mythology, and the latter as linear thought and linear language, which is the way we think and express ourselves today.

A fitting example of this is the way in which we today think of time itself. Time is always expressed in linear terms and timelines. It’s divided into past, present, and future with us eternally stuck in the ongoing present and helplessly trudging on into the future. There is very little attention given to the relationship between the cyclical movements of the skies and time aside from niche specialties.

For ancient people, time was cyclical. Time was a direct reflection of the stars that made their eternal cycles as was all life itself. Time itself was a living thing, a force of nature that could be understood through astronomy, the laws of the stars, and astrology, the knowledge of the stars.

How and when did this transformation occur?

Human consciousness has undergone profound transformations since ancient times, evolving from a deeply participatory state to the analytical mindset of the modern age. In earlier human thought, consciousness was holistic and interconnected, perceiving humanity as part of a unified cosmos. Myth, symbol, and imagination dominated this worldview, fostering a deep sense of participation in the rhythms of nature and the divine. Ancient cultures like ancient Egypt, demonstrated a symbolic mode of thought that prioritized intuition and what René Schwaller de Lubicz described as the “intelligence of the heart,” contrasting starkly with the analytical reasoning that characterizes modern consciousness​.

This began to shift during the Axial Age, roughly 800 to 200 BCE, a period marked by the emergence of critical and reflective thinking and overlapping with the Iron Age. Humanity began to see itself as distinct from the cosmos, engaging in the rational analysis of existence and the search for universal truths. This intellectual shift marked the rise of individuality and a gradual departure from the collective mythic consciousness of earlier times. Karl Jaspers famously called this period the “Axial Age,” emphasizing its global significance​.

The writings of Plato and Aristotle have a degree of duality in them. Plato’s philosophy introduced a sharp distinction between the physical and the transcendent, viewing the physical world as a shadow of eternal, ideal Forms. Aristotle grounded his approach in empirical observation, seeking to categorize and understand the natural world. This marked a pivotal moment in the evolution of consciousness, with Plato’s cosmology depicting a unity that experiences a sense of separateness. Aristotle built on Plato’s Theory of Forms by anchoring thought in what is measurable, focusing on categorization, logic and the development of natural sciences. For Aristotle, physical and transcendent were best understood and observed on their own terms. This contrast is documented by philosophers such as Francis Cornford and later revisited by Iain McGilchrist in his study of left- and right-brain dynamics​.

With the rise of Aristotle’s rationalist framework, language increasingly shifted from symbolic expression to descriptive precision. Aristotle’s focus on categorization and logical argumentation required a form of language that could define, classify, and differentiate. Concepts like the syllogism and the law of non-contradiction demanded that language be used in precise, consistent, and unambiguous ways. While this advance allowed for rigorous philosophical and scientific study, it also constrained the flexibility and multiplicity of meaning that had characterized earlier symbolic languages​.

In ancient thought, words were seen as having spiritual properties and certain words had the ability to influence spirit, and to some degree, matter. In the Egyptian language, Heka was the goddess of magic and the word for magic itself, and the term for “spoken word” was hekau. The intricate symbolic relationship of a dung beetle, roosters, gold, and lions was easily and intuitively understood as sharing a relationship with the sun. All of them were different expressions of the same thing and none were better or more true descriptors than the others. All of them participated in the same thing. Egyptian language and culture was so deeply rooted in this ancient mode of thought that it couldn’t easily adapt to the changes of the Hellenistic age.

This shift in thinking had begun centuries before, but Aristotle established the groundwork for important advancements that solidified in the Hellenistic era and continues to the present. The pursuit of spiritual and physical knowledge had been closely intertwined in a holistic perspective in ages past. This shift brought with it significant changes in language and a widespread upheaval in spirituality. This upheaval resulted in a widespread synthesis of the ancient world. According to Emperor Julian (the Apostate), Hellenistic philosophy was uniquely valuable because it consolidated into a cohesive whole the immense achievements developed to mastery by many ancient cultures: the geometry of Egypt, the arithmetic of the Phoenicians, and the Babylonian sciences of the stars.

This upheaval was also accompanied by numerous disasters, endless wars, political instability and social problems stemming from the rapid spread of countless Christian sects which began to threaten the older traditions. The social instability of Christians versus pagans coincided with the collapse of the Roman Empire, and Nicene Christianity seized control of the power vacuum left by the Caesars. The pagan gods and the Monad of the philosophers actively created and participated in all aspects of life. The Christian Gnostics sought to know and experience the transcendent. The One God of Nicene Christianity was remote, unknowable and existed apart from everything. This concept drove another wedge between humans and nature that continued to worsen over time.

The knowledge of the Hellenized pagans was reframed and reconciled with monotheism during the medieval period. The Islamic Golden Age and European Renaissance brought about a renewed enthusiasm for Hermeticism and Neoplatonism but it was not to last.

The Enlightenment brought a total shift toward pure rationality and left-brain dominance. Analytical reasoning, materialism, and empirical science began to overshadow symbolic and intuitive modes of thought. The modern world, defined by technological advancement and reductionist science, fragmented consciousness and reduced existence to what could be quantified and measured​. This mechanistic view of the universe excludes notions of spirit, meaning, or purpose, leaving most feeling alienated. As Iain McGilchrist argued, this represents a takeover of the analytical left brain, at the expense of the holistic right​. In the effort to break the stranglehold of enforced superstitions and ignorance, the Enlightenment and Industrial Age threw many proverbial babies out with the bathwater.

The focus on left-brain rationality has brought unparalleled technological and scientific progress but at the cost of a fragmented collective psyche. People have never had more material comforts and conveniences but are profoundly miserable. Mental illness and neurosis are rampant in first-world countries. This is not to say that the rest of recorded history was free of misery, far from it. Real utopias and perfect golden ages only exist as ideals, but something big is amiss.

Adaptations Over Time

I believe that one of the broader goals of the Persian Empire may have been large-scale social engineering of the region and that Egypt’s elite classes, namely the priesthoods, had similar ideas. The priests of Egypt recognized that their time was drawing short and saw in Greek students the means to prevent a total loss of the knowledge that had been passed down for thousands of years. All signs pointed towards the end, and this was no doubt devastating for them. The Lament of Hermes, an early Hermetic dialogue, eloquently expresses this situation.

In the centuries prior to Alexander, some key Greek thinkers likely studied in Egypt and the ultimate effect was Greeks advancing in all areas. Pythagoras had proven to be successful, perhaps not in his lifetime, but his lasting impact set enormous wheels in motion. His teachings were fully incorporated into Plato’s Academy. His school produced Aristotle, who educated Alexander.

Alexander then seized control of the international trade network founded by Darius I and made Koine Greek the international language. This, coupled with the desirability of a Greek education, embedded the teachings of the Greek philosophers permanently into the collective psyche of billions. A small number of men and women around five centuries before the time of Christ managed to rescue ancient traditions like Orphism from decline and adapt them to a new era. Not only the Greek traditions, but Egyptian, Babylonian and Persian teachings were adapted into the universalist doctrines of Pythagoras.

The life of Pythagoras was not mentioned in writing until a century after his death, around 400 BC. The Athenian educator Isokrates wrote a story set in Egypt and mentions as common knowledge that Pythagoras was a student of Egyptian priests for many years Later biographers wrote that he spent two decades in Egypt and around a decade with the Babylonian Magi, and others provide impossible or conflicting accounts. He was born on the island of Samos and much later in life established his school in what is now Italy.

The Pythagorean Theorem was recently discovered on a clay Babylonian tablet dated around 1500 BC, a thousand years before him. Egypt’s engineering accomplishments require highly advanced knowledge of mathematics. Both Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus visited Egypt in the 5^th century BCE and many priests told them of famous Greeks having studied there. Either Pythagoras rediscovered it independently or it had been taught to him.

By the Common Era, the biographies of many earlier philosophers had been embellished and read like hagiographies of saints. Many historians long rejected the idea that Egyptians had any significant influence on the Greeks, but some are making a strong case that Egypt was a primary influence. Joseph Manning has published a great deal of new evidence, much of it archaeological, showing Greek culture transforming around 600 BC when close, continuous cooperation with Egypt began. This culminated with Alexander and the Ptolemies as the consummation of a long relationship.

When Alexandria reached its peak, all the knowledge Egypt had to offer was available and the Greek thinkers were eager to get as much as possible. Whether this was planned and put in motion centuries prior or was a fortunate accident for Egypt will never be known, but the ultimate effect was favorable to Egypt for over seven centuries.

While the syncretic Serapis was Alexandria’s presiding deity, three key events took place: the emergence of Coptic writing, the introduction of the tropical zodiac and the appearance of Hermes Trismegistus.

Above: Statue of Serapis and Cerberus

Religion and civilization are intimately intertwined and an essential pair. Religion is extremely powerful. It gives people a collective identity, governs their behavior and can exert psychological influences on people more powerful than any living authority figure. A monarch with divine authority and a pious population had total and willing obedience. A large upheaval in religion can easily bring with it the downfall of an entire nation, especially when its rulers’ legitimacy and authority to rule is believed to be divinely ordained.

The region was experiencing a vacuum that saw old gods take on new identities, seemingly new ones appear, and conflicting ideas about one spiritual source that surpasses all others. The change was not welcomed by all. Some people feared the loss of their identity and traditions. Some were outraged by the customs and practices of other people, like the divide between Christians and pagans that eventually strained Rome to the breaking point. Syncretism was perhaps one of the main causes of the strict and narrow interpretations that have come to accompany monotheism in the west.

The Greek Magical Papyri (PGM) is a collection of occult texts written between 100 BCE and 400 CE in Egypt. It contains spells, hymns, and rituals in Demotic, Coptic, and Koine Greek for calling and petitioning Egyptian and Greek gods, as well as Jewish and Mithraic rites. Animated or ensouled images were used for oracles, bowl divination, dream incubation, and conjuration, which was common practice for temple priests in the Greek, Egyptian and Roman world. (PGM I.1–42; IV.3125–3171; V.370–446; VII.628–642.)

The PGM states that images, engravings, and carved stones can be “made alive” when the petitioned gods “give spirit” and “give breath” to the prepared object. The terminology used is also found in Hermetic literature like the Perfect Sermon (or Asclepius) which speaks of temple statues and other objects ensouled by gods.

‘Are you speaking of statues, 0 Trismegistus?’ ‘Yes, statues, Asclepius. Do you see how you lack faith? These statues are made alive by consciousness, and they are filled with breath. They do mighty deeds. They have knowledge of the future which they predict through oracles, prophets, dreams and in many other ways. They bring illnesses to men and cure them. They give sadness and happiness according to merit. Do you not realise, Asclepius, that Egypt is the image of heaven; or to speak more precisely, all things which are set in motion and regulated in heaven have been transferred, or have descended, into Egypt? More truthfully still, our land is the temple of the whole cosmos.” (Translation by Clement Salaman)

The powers attributed to these images include communicating with spirits, bringing and sending dreams, and giving prophecies. These served as a physical conduit through which a deity or attendant spirit is approached. The ensouled image was a ritual tool used alongside lamps, divination bowls, incense, and so on. These images were often a crucial component of dream-incubation spells. (PGM XII.270–350.)

The “consecration for all purposes” ensouls a stone or other sacred object and the rite concludes with the declaration, “The one Zeus is Sarapis.” A separate dream-oracle procedure requires an engraved image of Sarapis. The image is handled before a lamp and then held against the left ear during sleep. For waking divination, the “Oracle of Sarapis” summons Zeus-Helios-Mithra-Sarapis through a lamp, saucer, bench, and child medium. The bowl oracle directs the practitioner to use river water when calling Osiris or Sarapis. An ensouled Sarapis talisman may thus preside over the operation to receive incense and petitions, then be placed beside the operator for dream incubation, sending dreams to another person, or waking divination. (PGM IV.154–285; IV.1596–1715; V.1–53; V.447–458.)

Temple relief of the Egyptian holy Trinity (left to right): Isis, Horus and Sarapis.

In the Demotic spells, Osiris is in his boat with Isis at his head and Nephthys at his feet. Isis is asked to speak to Osiris so that the god may be sent to answer the question. The operator calls, “O Isis, O Nephthys, O noble soul of Osiris Wennefer, come to me,” and asks the gods to arrive in a dream and teach the operator about the matter. The image placed beside the sleeping practitioner serves as the conduit for the god petitioned. The Greek ring consecration in which the operator declares, “I am Osiris, called water” and “I am Isis, called dew” is another example of conjuration via clairvoyant dreams. (PGM XII.201–269; PDM xiv.150–231; PDM Supplement 130–138.)

The talisman should be installed in a shrine or ritual space, offered incense and libation, placed beside the head for dream incubation, or positioned near a lamp or bowl during conjuration. The operator addresses the deity, states the question or request clearly, requests a truthful manifestation rather than a deceptive phantasm, and performs the proper dismissal when the rite is complete. Astrological timing should be observed when using these images. The lunar or solar return is recommended by Hephaestion of Thebes as well as the Book of the Treasure of Alexander. For example, if the image was crafted while the Moon was in the sign of Taurus, it will perform optimally when the Moon enters that sign, provided that it is not harmed by malefics or the eclipse.

These same techniques for attaining spiritual communication through dreams using astrological talismans are found in the Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy. The Fourth Book also recommends the practitioner factor their own natal chart into the operation, if possible, specifically the ninth house which governs dreams and knowledge.

“But he that is willing always and readily to receive the Oracles of a Dream, let him make unto himself a Ring of the Sun or of Saturn for this purpose. There is also an Image to be made, of excellent efficacy and power to work this effect; which being put under his head when he goes to sleep, does effectually give true dreams of what things the mind has before determined or consulted on. The Tables of Numbers do likewise confer to receive an Oracle, being duly formed under their own Constellations.

“…and put a ring upon his finger, of the things above spoken of: let him take either some image, or holy table, or holy paper, and place the same under his head: then having made a devout prayer, let him go unto his bed, and meditating upon that thing which he desires to know, let him so sleep; for so shall he receive a most certain and undoubted oracle by a dream, when the Moon goes through that sign which was in the ninth House of his nativity, and also when she goes through the sign of the ninth House of the Revolution of his nativity; and when she is in the ninth sign from the sign of perfection. And this is the way and means whereby we may obtain all Sciences and Arts.” (Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy, Chapter 11, translated by Joseph Peterson)

To purchase images related to this article, please see our selection of Greek, Egyptian, & Roman Talismans.

Sources:

Hans Dieter Betz, ed., The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, Including the Demotic Spells (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986).

Skinner, Stephen. Techniques of Graeco-Egyptian Magic. (Golden Hoard Press, 2014).

Asclepius. The Perfect Discourse Of Hermes Trismegistus Translated by Clement Salaman

Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa: his Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy translated by Joseph Peterson, 2000.

Serapis was the patron god of the Greco-Egyptian city of Alexandria. He combined the life-giving qualities of Jupiter-Ammon with the benefic aspects of Hades or Pluto in the underworld (wealth, good harvests, order). He was also called Userhapi or Osiris-Apis and fully represented Osiris. He was sometimes depicted with ram horns to associate him with the ecstatic attributes of Dionysius. In short, Serapis was the world of matter bestowing people with all its best gifts. He was credited with many healing miracles like Asclepius, and visiting people in dreams to announce a miracle that he would soon create.

Egyptian pendant with image of Serapis.

In the centuries following Alexander’s conquest into the Roman era, Serapis and Osiris were both conflated with countless other gods and planets. One prominent cult revolved around merging Dionysius with Serapis and another did the same with Osiris. During the 3,000 years before this, Osiris was identified with a multitude of planets in Egyptian lore. Simply put, Osiris could embody all gods and all planets and stars when he chose to in the same way that Zeus did. Zeus in his Empyrean form of Sky-father was not confined to the sphere of the planets. Zeus is most frequently depicted as the planet Jupiter because it is the Greater Benefic, or the Sun.

The image of Serapis was often a mummified man with the head of a bull, a common depiction of Osiris, or a bearded king on a throne with the Cerberus hound sitting at his feet, like Hades. In his Greek likeness of Hades, he had a basket of grain and/or a grain measure on his head, symbolizing the harvest, land of the dead, and judgement/balance.  Similar to Abraxas, Serapis was widely identified with the Agathodaimon (Good Spirit) and Aion, frequently invoked in the Greek Magical Papyri (PGM) and Gnostic literature.

The Egyptian Apis or Hapis was a bull or multiple bulls, which was used in predynastic Egypt and even by the prehistoric astronomers at Nabta Playa. The bull was chosen to represent the providing of milk and nourishment. Isis was depicted nourishing the cosmos with drops of milk. Hathor and Nuit were depicted as bulls, sometimes symbolizing the Moon or the entirety of space. Over their thousands of years of history Hathor and Nuit were identified as the same goddess and assigned a multitude of different functions.

The bull represents Taurus. It is the fixed earth triplicity that produces growth and the exaltation of the Moon.

History

Serapis became extremely popular in Rome during the reign of Hadrian. His temples were reestablished with his statue and Isis placed together. Isis is another goddess who has been depicted as multitudes of celestial bodies but she is most frequently the Moon. During this period she took on the form of the “Black Virgin” that survived into medieval Europe. Black is the color of fertile muddy soil for which Egypt was famous, and this is another indicator of Taurus as the exaltation of the Moon.

According to Plutarch, the Greek Pharoah Ptolemy Soter had powerful dreams of the god. He instructed him to bring his statue from Sinope, a city in Asia Minor, to Alexandria.  The Eumolpidae family pronounced in public that the spirit within the statue was Serapis, together with the respected Egyptian priest Manetho.

The Eumolpidae family had been the guardians of the Eleusinian Mysteries since prehistory, the secret cult that celebrated rites of Demeter and Persephone. They were also the officially recognized heirs of the rites of Dionysus. The hierophant of the cult had always been a member of this family; they were arguably more venerated than any royal lineage.

The Roman Emperor Vespasian performed miraculous healings credited to Serapis. Two Egyptian commoners, one blind and one with a crippled hand, claimed to have had a dream of Serapis and publicly asked Vespasian to heal them, per the god’s instructions. Although Vespasian was skeptical and reluctant, he rubbed his spit on the blind man’s eyes and he regained his sight. He placed his foot on the other man’s hand and spectators saw his hand fully healed.

This event occurred in July of the year 70 AD, according to the historian Tacitus. The dates are significant because the Sun would have been in Cancer or Leo, which corresponds to the writings of Hephaestion of Thebes. He writes that images of Serapis were fashioned under the signs of Taurus, Leo and Sagittarius, which are all fixed signs.

It’s important to consider that Egypt had a unique agricultural cycle that allowed them highly fertile farmland in an otherwise barren desert. Their fertile soil depended on the flooding of the Nile. Theirs was based on three seasons of four months.

1. Flood Season (Akhet): From June to September, marked by the Nile’s flooding, depositing fertile silt for farming.
2. Growth Season (Peret): From October to February, characterized by planting and cultivation.
3. Harvest Season (Shemu): From March to May, the time for crop harvesting and storage.

Leo is the sole domicile ruler of the Sun and Sagittarius is the rulership of Jupiter. Both share triplicity rulership in each sign. Salutius writes, “and Jupiter, you yourself rule Leo with the Mother of the Gods.”

The latter two signs and planets are rulers of the fire triplicity and would be interchangeable for an image of Serapis. A trine aspect between the Sun and Jupiter in either sign would be mutually received by triplicity and satisfy the requirements that Hephaestion establishes at the start. Leo signifies the light of summer at its most radiant, and plant life at its fullest. Sagittarius is the benefic joyful aspects of the underworld. With Leo rising, Sagittarius is in the fifth house of Good Fortune. The Moon in Taurus in the midheaven signifies the gifts of the underworld springing up from the earth.

Sagittarius can be considered the chthonic temple of the Sun. He has fully matured here. He enters Sagittarius well after the autumn equinox and his light has decreased to its lowest proportions just before the winter solstice. In Capricorn the Sun will die and his path in the sky becomes erratic for three days. He will also be reborn here in the womb of the earth, and his light increases again.

In the context of Egypt’s agricultural cycle, the Sun in Leo would signify the Nile flooding in summer ushering in a new cycle of life, Sagittarius the growth season in autumn and winter, and Taurus the harvest season of spring.

The Greek Magical Papyri (PGM) contains many operations petitioning Serapis, from receiving oracles to ensouling images and talismans.

Sources:

King, Charles William. Gnostics and Their Remains. 1887

Plutarch, Isis and Osiris

Tacitus, Hist. IV.81

Betz, Hans Dieter. Greek Magical Papyri in Translation.

Skinner, Stephen. Techniques of Graeco-Egyptian Magic. Golden Hoard, 2014.

Astronomy, Symbolism and Civilization

“The science of the stars has granted us knowledge of divine matters, magic, divination, teaching, meteorology, mathematics, alchemy, and medicine—thus of the sowing of seed, hunting, fishing, navigation, military strategy, architecture, construction, literature, philosophy, and the arts. Those who envy and slander this truth will be cursed with their ignorance and weakness, while those who worship this truth will be blessed and mighty.” —Hephaestion of Thebes, 400 AD

Today, we exist in sensory overload. Our lives are saturated with artificial things. Manmade objects fill our world, disconnecting us from nature. Most people fear the natural world, and many outright reject it. The stars and the earth are no longer perceived as alive. Those in populated areas rarely even see the stars due to air and light pollution. We can travel continents in hours and communicate globally, yet paradoxically, we feel more isolated than ever.

Where did this technological world come from? Mathematics, science, and imagination made it possible through the efforts of countless generations. But where did that knowledge originate? Everything we possess today is the result of knowledge accumulated, refined, and passed down for eons. And yet, humanity has practically no knowledge of its past before the Common Era. Through the lens of mythology, we can see the evolution of human consciousness from its earliest stages through the Hellenistic era, when mythology merged with the rational thinking we use today. While modern humans are no different from those who lived thousands of years ago, their environments shaped their consciousness and understanding of reality in ways that we have forgotten.

Hephaestion of Thebes wrote that the science of the stars was the origin of practically every branch of human learning, from agriculture to mathematics to military strategy. We will explore the remnants of prehistoric people through myth, symbolism, and reconstruct the beginnings of astronomy. In doing so, the reader can better understand some of the sophisticated symbolism and advanced mathematics underlying ancient star lore.

Part Two will examine stellar alignments in Egypt and their relationship to astrological and Hermetic symbolism. For a historical overview, see Exploring the Origins and Evolution of Astrology and Magic – Cosmic Artifacts.

Contents

Introduction

Ancient Perception of the Cosmos

Evolution of Knowledge: From Intuition to Rationality

Hellenistic Age: Bridge Between Worlds

Suppression and Survival of Ancient Knowledge

Reclaiming Lost Modes of Thought

Consciousness, Mythology, History and Civilization

Revolutions Above and Below

Development of Civilization and Myth

The First Astronomer-Priest

Direction, Dimension, Mapping and Signs

Gods Above and Below – Reason Meets Intuition

The Ancient Perception of the Cosmos

Ancient civilizations perceived spirit as a tangible reality. The physical world was just one layer of existence, interwoven with an invisible but structured network of forces. These forces governed space, time, matter, mind, and body, forming a vast cosmic geometry that could be understood and engaged to benefit humanity. This knowledge, passed down through generations, has since been dismissed as superstition and relegated to the occult. Today, mainstream religions remain the only socially accepted form of ancient magical practice.

Astrology, once considered among the highest sciences, has been condemned as either heretical or absurd, despite its foundational role in civilization. Our modern worldview teaches that human beings were once superstitious savages who slowly evolved into rational beings, culminating in the Enlightenment and the Scientific Age. According to this view, rational thought began in Greece 2,500 years ago, and before that, humanity existed in a state of mystical delusion despite many achievements still unequaled today. Their leading thinkers believed strongly in the ability to interact with the forces governing nature, or magic. Its most advanced forms were deeply interconnected with astronomy and astrology.

Hephaestion of Thebes, a Hellenized Egyptian, wrote that the science of the stars gave human beings advanced knowledge in every field, from agriculture and fishing to theology, warfare and magic. He compiled three volumes of astrology around 400 AD in Roman-occupied Egypt that consolidated the astrological techniques used at the time. In his third volume, he gives a short list of instructions for incorporating sophisticated astrological timing in temple rites using images.

This is among the most obscure and guarded occult sciences in history. It is mentioned in the Corpus Hermeticum as one of the secrets of the ancient world but does not fully explain how to do it. The Neoplatonist philosophers of this period wrote of it but not in depth.

An anonymous occultist in the medieval Arabic period produced the Ghayat al Hakim or Picatrix as it was called in Latin. It is four volumes of instructions in ritually petitioning the stars and creating astrological talismans. It was compiled from numerous older sources, most of them unknown now, and many of its cryptic images resemble ancient Mesopotamian and Greek deities. Hephaestion of Thebes preserved a Greco-Egyptian record of this occult science in the form of seventeen ancient gods and goddesses. Julianus of Laodecia wrote a short treatise in Athens roughly during the lifetime of Proclus, and the Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius contains images of the Decans from the 1st to 4th century.

Evolution of Knowledge: From Intuition to Rationality

The Hellenistic Age (323–30 BCE) undeniably shaped the linear, abstract thinking we depend on now, but where did its knowledge base come from? Historians often portray early humans as scattered tribes until the Bronze Age brought them under centralized rule. Yet, the Bronze Age (3000–1000 BCE) produced achievements that remain astonishing and, in many cases, still unexplained. The Mediterranean and surrounding regions were ruled by priesthoods that possessed sophisticated knowledge, particularly in astronomy and astrology, which sat at the pinnacle of learning and wrapped in mythology.

Today, we associate shamans with primitive cultures, imagining them as relics of a barbaric past. Yet, the shamans of early tribes evolved into priests and philosophers, and their methods remained the same. The only difference was scale: shamans served small communities, while priests oversaw empires. Even philosophers of the Hellenistic Age, revered for their rationalism, employed the same techniques of altered states of consciousness, divination, and symbolic interpretation.

The Bronze Age Collapse (circa 1200 BCE) triggered a dramatic shift in consciousness, culminating in the Axial Age (800–200 BCE). Societies declined, literacy waned, and for centuries, knowledge was lost. Thinking itself changed. Human thought transitioned from overwhelmingly symbolic and intuitive to highly analytical and structured. The right-brain dominated perception of the world, which saw holistic connections, gave way to left-brain-dominant thought: logical, detailed, but unable to see the whole picture. This is the basis of the Divided Brain Theory proposed by the neuroscientist and psychiatrist Iain McGilchrist.

Hellenistic Age: Bridge Between Worlds

By the time of Herodotus (484–425 BCE), history was being recorded in a way that separated mythology from factual events. Even then, the distant past, especially the Bronze Age, was already shrouded in mystery. Hellenistic scholars sought to reconstruct lost knowledge by blending reason with inherited traditions. Ancient mythology became intellectualized, interpreted literally rather than experienced. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, the Dark Ages saw centuries of decline in the Roman world until the reintroduction of Hellenistic thought in the early medieval period.

This medieval era saw the continued use of astrology and mystical traditions and advancements in all areas, particularly in governance. Court astrologers were employed by rulers across Europe and the Islamic world, tasked with predicting wars, famines, natural disasters, and political intrigues. Failed predictions often resulted in death, imprisonment or banishment. This was common practice during the reign of Tiberius two thousand years ago. Their methods were not the vague astrology of popular culture but sophisticated applications of mathematics and observation. Figures like Abu Ma’shar, Guido Bonatti, and Jean-Baptiste Morin demonstrated remarkable accuracy and securing royal patronage. Astrology’s persistence, despite relentless attacks, indicates that it provided something of immense practical value.

Jean-Baptiste Morin enjoyed a successful career as a court astrologer after accurately predicting when the king would become severely ill. His colleagues predicted the same, except they concluded the king would die. Morin predicted that the king would be dangerously close to death but would survive. The king fell deathly ill, exactly as predicted, but he unexpectedly recovered. The other astrologers were sent to prison and Morin was promoted.  The Medici family, one of the most prominent families in Europe, employed gifted astrologers and seers for centuries and used their political power to shield them from the Inquisition.

There were highly educated skeptics who publicly challenged prominent astrologers to prove that their practice worked. Many accepted the challenge and were successful. Abu Mashar in the Abbasid Caliphate was highly sought out by kings in the region and took on such challenges. Guido Bonatti in medieval Italy was similarly famous, eventually rising to the position of advisor to the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II. Bonatti’s expertise became well known after he used astrology to help a minor Italian noble defeat vastly superior enemies, military victories that were by all accounts impossible. Bonatti used astrology to formulate a strategy that not only achieved a stunning victory but saved his employer’s life in the process.

Another discipline that has faded into obscurity was the Art of Memory or Memory Palace, a technique allowing individuals to memorize vast amounts of knowledge with perfect recall. Giordano Bruno, a Hermetic mystic and Catholic priest executed for heresy, mastered this practice, using it to develop his groundbreaking ideas on the nature of the universe. It had predecessors in older priestly lineages who refused to commit any secret lore to writing.  The Art of Memory enabled a person to perfectly memorize volumes of information quickly and to retrieve all of it, in any order, indefinitely. The varieties of memory palaces are potentially infinite but Bruno’s On the Shadows of Ideas is notable for its overt astrological and Hermetic imagery.

A skilled practitioner was essentially a computer search engine in human form that could perfectly memorize entire books, letter for letter, even immense holy books like the Bible and the Quran. The fundamentals of the Memory Palace were taught in all of Europe’s universities and provided the potential for all of the knowledge taught there to be fully memorized for a lifetime, if that person was dedicated enough. An eidetic memory isn’t magic, strictly speaking, but it is extraordinary and can be learned by anyone. Why this technique wasn’t offered or even attempted in public education, which evaluates students largely on memorizing information should raise questions.

Memory palaces, like astrology, were reserved for the few who had access to education. After the advent of the Scientific and Industrial Age, anything relating to consciousness or spirit was tossed aside as useless superstition.  By the time literacy had become widespread in the 20^th century, the occult sciences were largely lost and the Art of Memory is a fringe pursuit, perhaps best known for the annual World Memory Championship. Most of the books that were once used in these practices long ago are only recently becoming available to all.

Suppression and Survival of Ancient Knowledge

Despite periods of suppression, esoteric traditions survived into the European Renaissance. Astrology remained embedded in European universities, where only the most privileged students could access the full body of knowledge. It endured because it worked and yielded results well enough to be defended by scholars and clergy alike, sometimes at great personal risk.

Royalty and the higher ranks of the priesthoods held a total monopoly on knowledge. Knowledge is power and this was the main method of control over the populace. People learned only what they needed to perform the job they were born into, through apprenticeship. This was the model of society established in the Bronze Age kingdoms. Very few people could even read or write until the last century, well after the printing press was invented and the oldest astrology texts had been cast into the collective dustbin. What was made available by William Lilly in the 17^th century was lacking in many ways, translated from incomplete sources. Despite this, Lilly still made excellent use of his techniques and was extremely effective, as evidenced by his important role in the English Civil War. Ancient astrology was a skill that was never made fully available to anyone who wished to learn. It’s only in recent decades that medieval books have begun to see the light of day.

Reclaiming Lost Modes of Thought

What we call “science” and what we call “magic” were once intertwined, forming a unified approach to understanding reality. The study of the stars, divination, and ritual practice were not irrational superstitions but highly developed sciences that demanded precision, contemplation, and discipline. The key to their effectiveness was also in altered states of consciousness, a capability that modern industrialized society has largely suppressed in a myriad of ways.

All these cultures were obsessed with the stars. Whether or not astrology and occult practices is “real” is irrelevant. The learning process and practice itself required visualization skills that few people today would even consider attempting. Astrologers were required to build a highly accurate visual map of the cosmos within their minds that could be accessed with ease. This was the foundation of Giordano Bruno’s Art of Memory. In the Bronze Age, this skill appears to have been achieved by many without the aid of writing. If nothing else, the ability to visualize at that magnitude would naturally endow a person with a high degree of intuition and unique problem-solving abilities. Even astrology’s biggest detractors would likely agree that intense visualization coupled with deeply contemplating endless chains of cause and effect will alter consciousness in profound ways. It has changed the course of history too many times to count.

While the modern world developed, some held onto their old way of life. In parts of the world like the Amazon, shamans are now being recognized for their incredible knowledge of plants obtained purely through intuition. Shamans enter an altered state of consciousness and communicate with nature on a purely intuitive level. It’s being discovered that these people developed plant medicines that not only work as intended but went undiscovered by science.

First, we will explore how human consciousness evolved alongside civilization from the most remote times until the Bronze Age brought rapid developments in all areas. Civilization and consciousness declined in the Iron Age and the Hellenistic era was an attempt to reconstruct and resurrect what remained.  This challenges the assumption that rational thought is the pinnacle of human development. The development and integration of reason and intuition was held to be the peak of consciousness by the greatest thinkers of the ancient world. Ancient cultures did not separate spirit from science; they saw the world as a living, interconnected whole. By examining their knowledge, through mythology, history, astrology, and esoteric traditions, we may rediscover a lost dimension of human experience.

We will examine the most important discoveries in human history and their representations in mythology. This will provide a much deeper understanding of mythology and why it was considered sacred and help the reader to build a spiritual worldview like that of the ancients with a thorough knowledge of the most important symbolism in mythology and ancient astrology.  All these developments culminated in the Hellenistic and Roman era, when ancient spiritual practices were combined with rational thinking and more thorough written explanations. The writings of the Neoplatonist philosophers will prove to be an invaluable resource.

Consciousness, Mythology, History and Civilization

We will probably never know the origins of humanity with full certainty, but we can understand consciousness and thought processes. Most everyone has experienced intuition at some point in their lives and uses imagination to some extent. Some experience it more strongly than others, but it’s an innate ability we are all born with whether we value it or not. We can use this as a starting point to understand how consciousness developed with the science of the stars and observing the natural world.

Astrologers of the Hellenistic era used terms that depict our individual life as a ship on a journey. The ascendant is the most important point in an astrological chart and it symbolizes the individual person experiencing the world from birth to death. It was called the “helm” which is the wheel used to steer a ship.

Egyptians depicted Re, the Sun, as a king on his ship who makes eternal journeys through heaven and earth, encountering obstacles represented as a giant serpent or dragon. Re’s boat is powered by 24 men rowing the oars, the hours of one day. One of the oldest Greek stories is Jason and the Argonauts, who sail in search of the Golden Fleece and must overcome a dragon and other creatures. Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey have the same symbolism. Both these poems are divided into 24 books each. Odysseus sails an immense ocean, having many battles with monstrous creatures and endures cruel treatment from gods before he finally reaches his home. Most of the key events in these Greek stories have been depicted as groups of stars in ancient maps of the sky.

The symbolism of the helm and our lives as a ship has a lot of depth when we really think on it. The astrological chart is a map of the chaotic paths it’s destined to take. Why would any of this ultimately matter if everything is fated?  An astrological chart interpreted as an individual following Odysseus’s or Jason’s dangerous but ultimately successful journey takes on a new meaning.

In ancient times, magic was considered a very real thing. Egyptians called it Heka and it was a force of nature in and of itself, binding everything together It did not resemble magic as imagined today, where a person gains special abilities that allow them to exert their will on everything, avoid all hardships and defy the laws of nature. Far from it. For ancient people, magic was an invisible but very real connection between everything, from God and human beings to the smallest grain of sand and countless intermediary beings in between. Everything, no matter how different it appeared, emanated from the same source and followed the same underlying patterns. Those patterns were universal laws that were impossible to circumvent because they’re necessary for everything to exist in the first place. Duality is one of these unbreakable laws. Everything that has a beginning has an end. The value of magic was that it offered some degree of participation. Rather than experiencing life as the result of random and chaotic events, those learned in it could understand their place, and that of others, in the grand scheme. Magic allowed for choices in how the path was traveled… if the practitioner was skilled enough to recognize opportunities and how to use them.

Everything is fated to end, but the journey from point A to point B doesn’t have to be a straight line. The seasons are fated to happen, but if we understand them well enough, we don’t have to blindly fumble our way through into winter months with no hope of the cold letting up. The time that passes can be made more comfortable and some hardships minimized by knowing what to expect and when.

At the helm of a ship, we have no control of what happens outside of it. The winds and the currents obey their own laws.  But if we have a map we can prepare for what’s on the way, or even steer the boat around some things rather than crashing into them. Knowing how to predict the winds and currents can even make the journey better. Using sails and going with the currents makes them allies rather than obstacles. This is what magic was for the ancients. They saw the patterns underlying all of existence, connecting everything, and did their utmost to exist in harmony with it.

Under certain circumstances, it was possible to perform actions that influenced nature and the course of events. In other words, it was a science of prayer.  Intimately knowing one’s place in the grand scheme of things was the key to magic, and if done properly there was a reasonable expectation of success. Rather than imposing one’s will on the world, magic was aligning the self with the divine order. In doing so, beneficial things occurred, and the forces of nature became allies rather than foes. The study of the stars was directly responsible for seafaring, navigation and agriculture and its symbolism heavily reflects this. The science of the stars was a means of understanding one’s place in creation handed down from prehistoric times and served as a map for navigating life in the mortal body and in the afterlife.

This is the basis of a complex occult practice centered around ancient astrology.  Studying the movements of the stars to select a time when the cosmos favors that activity is called electional astrology, or inceptions in Hellenistic terms. Inception means “foundation”, “birth”, “the creation of” or “beginning of”.

Hellenistic astrologers used terms that are more descriptive of gods interacting with each other. What is now called an aspect, or planets forming geometric relationships to each other, was called “beholding” or “seeing”. The planets were referred to as their older pagan names. When the aspects are expressed in these terms, a myth can be seen occurring in the stars. Everything was understood to be linked together in an infinite web of space and time, and what occurred amongst gods spilled over into the physical world. If a war was brewing, it was a much better option to engage with Ares (Mars) favoring the land you inhabited. This form of astrology was frequently applied in warfare for thousands of years and influenced many battles that changed the course of world history.

The principles of inceptions or elections extended to prayer and ritual magic as well. In the ancient world, most gods had a counterpart in the sky, either a planet, star or group of stars. The source of all (the one God of monotheism) encompassed the entire cosmos with no individuality and created through a chain of separate personas, gods who oversaw specific functions of creation. There was no way to alter fate, but it was possible to get more favorable conditions if that part of creation was positioned to help. Astrology could be used to amplify the effects of prayer and ritual. Appealing to Helios to help a sick person could be done at any time, but he was far better equipped to act when his physical body, the Sun, was emanating its light in spring. The influence of the Sun’s rays brought new life and growth at that time, while it was weak in winter. This is a simple example of what was a highly complex practice called “petitions”.  Simply put, if the astrological chart of a particular moment could be interpreted as the desired event happening, a prayer was offered, and the gods could easily influence that outcome to occur.

(Interior shrine illuminated by the equinox sunlight in the Great Abu Simbel temple of Pharaoh Ramses II)

There was one more aspect to this practice of magic: sacred images. These were objects crafted at a specially chosen time based on similar principles. The underlying idea was that the gods could ensoul the object with astrological influences. The subtle energies around that specific moment of time were imprinted into the object. Using Apollo again as an example, if his image was crafted at a moment when the Sun was giving abundant life to the earth, that influence was absorbed in the image permanently. It had the potential to help a sick person who approached it. If a priest of Apollo was charged with establishing a new shrine, he would use careful astrological timing to choose the moment that a statue or engraving of Apollo was created. In this way, people who visited the shrine would encounter a small physical replica of the Sun’s life-giving astral rays. Temple priests also employed deep meditation, contemplation, dreams and altered states of consciousness in the shrines to gain knowledge and communicate with the unseen world.

This principle of synchronizing earthly and celestial events was used in some form as far back as 2000 BC. The true extent of its antiquity will probably never be known but some written instructions survive from early in the Common Era. The rise of Christianity posed a severe threat to it in the areas under Roman control and it was eventually reabsorbed into Europe a thousand years later.

During the early years of Islam’s Golden Age, this tradition was eagerly adopted by philosophers and esoteric circles after the city of Harran was annexed by the Abbasid Caliphate over a thousand years ago. This city was the center of a star religion that had been a home for Persian, Babylonian, Egyptian and Greek occultists for centuries.

Revolutions Above and Below

Shamans studied the skies and over epochs developed a form of consciousness that combined deep intuition and spirituality with highly sophisticated logic and reasoning processes. The ultimate result was the civilization of the Bronze Age whose achievements still baffle many people today and seem almost otherworldly. Remains of it can be found in the occult practices of the Hellenistic and early Medieval period, especially in the cryptic lore of astrology and myths.  In the hopes of gaining a more complete picture, we should start at the earliest possible point in time and try to understand how and why the heavens came to be the object of obsessive veneration and worship, and why some symbols were sacred.

In the process, the reader can hopefully understand their own consciousness a little better and see it from a new perspective, as the collective product of countless bursts of intuition and problem solving over vast spans of time. Our ancestors were clear on where these bursts of insight originated: from the gods.

In this hypothetical scenario, we will take the point of view of a person in a remote age long, long ago. These scenarios are based on people who still exist today that deliberately have no contact with the outside world and choose to preserve their way of life as it has always been, with no modern technology of any kind. These communities are collectively referred to as “uncontacted peoples” and the largest groups reside deep in the Amazonian jungle. What is known about them is mostly secondhand accounts from neighboring people who live in similar conditions but don’t fully isolate themselves. These people live in a way that is alien to us, and vice versa. They are totally immersed in nature and their communities are led by shamans with no use of metallurgy or agriculture. They provide a window into how people would have lived in times before recorded history.

With a little imagination, we can better relate to the people who inherited traditions from priesthoods that claimed to have passed their knowledge down from the dawn of time itself. The practice of observing the stars is showing up in prehistoric cave art from 20,000 years ago or more, and some of the constellation images are the same as we use today. The ancient astrology books we can read now are not prehistoric in the literal sense, but the practice and overall tradition itself is. This will go beyond comparative mythology and examine the close relationship between myth and astrology in the Hellenistic world. Most people are aware that many of the constellations still used in modern star maps originated with ancient Greek mythology, but the specific details are largely forgotten. We will begin with the most relevant and widespread themes so that the reader becomes familiar with the important symbols that carried civilization into the Bronze Age and remained at the core of the Hellenistic world. This worldview is crucial to the study of myths in the Neoplatonist schools.

Development of Civilization and Myth

This scenario is based partially on the works of Joseph Campbell, the 20^th century mythologist who made extensive studies of myths and folklore around the world and identified recurring themes shared by all people. Influenced by Carl Jung, he proposed that the collective unconscious has a “psychic unity” that exerts an effect on every human mind throughout time. It contains archetypes that gradually emerged in the human mind as important ideas and discoveries. The same gods and characters wore different “masks” or “garments” depending on the peculiarities and environment of the people whom they originated with. The dying and resurrecting god is a good example of this archetypal being, who became heavily syncretized as the Hellenistic world expanded. Their myths are symbolic visual forms that allow them to become deeply embedded within the mind. “Hamlet’s Mill” took these ideas further and proposed that most myths are symbolic representations of complex astronomical cycles and their corresponding events in nature. Through mythology we can see recordings from the dawn of history. The discovery of fire, agriculture, metals and architecture are contained in these myths and embody the civilizations that grew around them. According to many philosophers of Late Antiquity, the myths are both of these: archetypal beings that exist within the collective psyche while also encoding complex ideas regarding time, space, and nature.

The intent is to give the reader a perspective outside of the modern world. Much of this is akin to a language barrier, but deeper. We think in terms of purely linear logic while our ancient ancestors thought in terms of intuitive symbolism. Even if the ancient language itself is largely intact, the interpretation is often a matter of opinion, and many different interpretations can be “correct” simultaneously. This older form of consciousness is in the ancient science of the stars. It’s a unique lens of intuition and logic that reveals everything in existence is interconnected and ultimately alive. Nature, the cosmos and human beings are all part of a whole. One source becomes many through an endless chain of combinations and cycles. The explosion of light that created the universe is ultimately within everything. Everything is connected at some level, whether it is understood through modern science or ancient philosophy and metaphysics.

Even though I’m telling a hypothetical story of nameless people who are long dead, we are all capable of relating to them. In our early childhood years, we all exist in a totally different state of consciousness. It is so different that most of us only remember fragments. We are fully absorbed in our imagination and have no idea how to navigate the world around us; if nobody instructs us we rely on intuition along with trial and error. The earliest humans on earth shared this experience too, but they had to navigate the world in its natural, unaltered state through pure intuition. If food, clothing, water and protection from the elements wasn’t secured, they died. If this is hard to relate to, imagine a group of small children being alone in a remote area with no possible way of getting to civilization. This is the life our ancient ancestors had to adapt to. They had developed a small language by pointing at something and making sounds to get others’ attention. The observers first had to use intuition for the most part to understand the intended meaning, the tone of the noise and what was being pointed to. At some point, correlations were made. It was noticed that people could make different sounds and if the same one was used consistently with a specific thing, there was no need to gesture at it. The sound itself conveyed the meaning through a shared understanding, and a spoken word took shape.

We must assume that at some point, human beings had only instinct and the most basic means of survival. Making fire, stone tools, and direct observation of nature and intuition. Gorillas in the Congo’s rainforests were recently discovered to have an innate knowledge of natural medicines, eating tree bark that has stronger antibiotic properties than medicines developed in laboratories. This is one of countless examples of the animal kingdom possessing intuition that arguably meets the criteria of supernatural and shows us some of what intuition is capable of.

The first languages would develop through a recognition of patterns in sound and gestures. The very first people to understand spoken words would have been forced to rely primarily on pure intuition. Gestures and intuition are the only thing they had at that point. The first person to conceive of a spoken word could only hope to be understood if others intuitively understood their intent.

The First Astronomer

You are a person who is living completely at the mercy of nature, with only your own intuition, instincts, crude tools and whatever ideas and ingenuity you can muster. Your senses and intuition are sharp from living off the land, moment to moment. You live in a group to help survive because there is strength in numbers. Everyone gets their food by picking plants, hunting animals and catching fish. You live in small structures made of wood and stone and keep warm with fire.

Shamans are in the community, and they have expert knowledge of plants and animals that has been passed down for ages. They communicate with the animals and plants in dreams. This knowledge was all developed through pure instinct and intuition over generations. People further hone their intimate knowledge of plants and animals simply by observing them endlessly. Understanding nature is a matter of life and death. Basic needs are met, that being food, clothing and shelter, but there is little comfort to be found and nothing to ponder except for nature. Nobody travels further than necessary. Being lost in the wilderness means death.

The words everyone speaks are related to nature. That is the only common reference point and experience that everyone has. Everyone knows what water is and there is a common word for it, but differentiating types of water is a matter of relating it to something else. A river is water like a big snake, it constantly moves and winds just like a snake slithering on the ground. The word for it is a blend of water and snake. A waterfall is water like a storm because its loud and chaotic. The word for it is a mixture of water and storm. Abstract words that we use today like “strength” don’t exist. The idea of strength is conveyed by comparison to a large powerful animal. In our scenario everyone thinks this way and it’s a natural, intuitive thought process that only requires some imagination. Unlike today, there was no suppressing imagination. Children are pressured to stop daydreaming and focus purely on their physical senses, but people of this time relied on visualization to survive. Memorizing every plant and rock was crucial. If something is disturbed, it means that a predator may have been there. If personal thoughts were experienced as “imaginary beings” there was nobody to pressure them into ignoring it.

In this tribe, some priests know how to use special plants to make the world become a waking dream for a while. When that happens, useful knowledge is sometimes obtained. The world takes on strange shapes and beings unlike any person or animal become visible. Everyone has a basic and practical knowledge of numbers. Simple addition and subtraction are common because all people have ten fingers for easy reference. It makes rationing supplies more efficient, especially when the world gets cold and dark and food is scarce.

You start to notice that the animals and plants always react the same way to the warm and cold spells. It has something to do with the bright lights above. When it’s warm and life thrives, there is more light. When the plants die and animals go away, the cold nights are long. You have noticed that the two big lights move in the same way endlessly and have a hunch that there may be something more to it. Your senses are highly attuned to everything around you because that’s all you have; much of it is spent in utter silence and your mind is still. This is a life that depends on pure instinct or intuition.

One night you have a dream that is incredibly vivid. The two big lights in the sky come down to you and take on an appearance unlike anything else. They look like bright people accompanied by animals. They seem friendly and point to the sky with their hands, motioning with their fingers that they’re counting things in it. They stare at it and move their hands endlessly, counting amounts you’ve never attempted to. You decide to follow this example and examine the sky for yourself. In a short period of time you find that there is indeed some regularity there. When the Moon has grown and vanished twelve times the weather has become the same again. This has transformed the life of everyone in the group and is a realistic portrayal of obtaining knowledge through dreams.

Your interest is growing, and you fall asleep waiting for more dream encounters after long periods of watching the Moon glowing in the sky. The world’s first astronomer/astrologer now exists. The knowledge obtained would be considered astronomical now, but for an animist who doesn’t think of the Moon as a dead rock, it is one and the same. The Moon gave knowledge to the observer and this perception adds a spiritual dimension.

A discovery like this would quickly be merged with the existing knowledge of animals and plants, what is typically associated with shamanic practices. In further dreams, the sky beings place a staff in the ground upright and watch themselves as the bright orbs from there, counting. Counting and always watching from one place while the plants die and grow back, and the animals come and go. Everything is related to something else and the more you watch, the more there seems to be a rhythm and pattern with everything. Your mind has just grasped a principle of measurement through pure intuition and visualization. You also notice how shadows move and contemplating it reveals a close relationship to light. Night itself is a giant shadow.

Either way, you are the first astronomer-priest living in the most primitive of conditions. This is an important distinction because it’s not only the earth that you devote yourself to, but its deeper connection to the heavens above. Each one gives a different kind of knowledge. The heavens require mastering numbers. You have reached a level of consciousness that will grow over countless generations through teachers and apprentices and eventually lead to people walking on the Moon itself. For now, we will focus on the immediate effects of measuring and tracking the Moon’s movements by people who had no knowledge of it before. We will walk through the immediate discoveries that would follow. These are the foundations of ancient astronomy and of civilization itself. I am using the term astrology in its ancient sense (astrologia in Greek) when it was one and the same practice as astronomy, just as alchemy encompassed metallurgy and chemistry.

Direction, Dimension, Mapping and Signs

You place a marker, a wooden pole, and use it as a reference point. You begin watching it in spring when everything has just started to grow. You notice the shadow of your pole and how it moves. It moves, growing and shrinking, while the Sun moves. When the Sun is directly over your head the shadow disappears for a moment, then starts growing the other way until the night comes.

This has conceptualized the idea of directions. When it has been fully worked out it is a reliable way of determining north, south, east and west. When these imaginary lines are visualized connecting landmarks, the ability to make simple maps is now there. The moment that the Sun’s shadow disappears is what is called the midheaven in astrology. It has reached its absolute zenith overhead and fills the entire sky with its light. With the total disappearance of the shadow, it has vanquished all darkness in that moment. Turning away from the Sun at that moment is facing north. North is also where the Pole Star eternally appears every night. In astrological charts, the underworld or Imum Coeli is in the north and the midheaven is south. While it rises in the east, the ascendant, the darkness slowly gives way until it is totally conquered for a brief time. The shadow slowly grows back but it reaches in the opposite direction. The Sun descends in the opposite end of the earth, west, and darkness returns.  The eternal cycle of light and dark is all found in this simple method.

This is also the invention of the sundial, or the clock. Whenever future astronomers take an interest in closely observing and measuring the length of the shadow, hours have been conceptualized. All of this is from a simple piece of wood in sunlight and careful measurements of the shadow. This is one of the practical functions of obelisks.

There’s an even deeper concept found within this simple tool: the shadow itself, a duplicate illusion made from light. This is simple enough at the surface level, but later on the concept of shadows will have profound significance. The light from the heavens creating illusions in the world below is at the core of most mystery traditions.

Sundial from the Valley of the Kings, 1500 BC (University of Basel)

The directions found from the shadow has given people the capability to navigate and explore outside of their immediate areas. Without a reliable means of determining direction, travelers depend entirely on memorizing landmarks. This made navigating through mountains, large forests and plains impossible if they wanted to find the way back. Once you have traveled past the last recognizable landmark you’re lost. Knowing north, south, east and west gives a point of reference and with some time and exploration, maps are possible, either drawn or purely from memory.

Signs are the next development from this discovery. Cairns, a vertical stack of stones, have been used all over the world as trail markers. They’re easy to build and easy for others to identify, more pronounced than carving into trees. Roads exist because of them, and with them the origins of a crossroads as a spiritual concept. The idea of a crossroads as a meeting point between worlds is an ancient one. Cairns and similar stone markers were also used to mark graves in prehistoric times and continues today. A crossroads connects different worlds.

This idea of direction goes even deeper. All your surroundings are limited to a circular view. You can turn and look everywhere and it’s always you centered inside a circle.  The idea of a circle becomes a foundation in your mind. The Sun is also a circle, and the Moon creates a circle in cycles. This makes sense because birds, snakes and other animals lay eggs that bring new life. Many of the fruits that are good to eat are circular too. There’s a relationship in it all, and you can imagine this wide world around you as being contained inside of an enormous egg. Over a few years you notice that when the Moon has turned from dark to light three times, the seasons change dramatically. After it happens twelve times the world turns back the way it was, the animals return, the rain comes back and the plants grow again.

The number 12 has been revealed to have a very special meaning. The ability to make small maps and give directions for traveling is available because of a tradition devoted to studying the sky. There is an underlying order to the world. The mystery is endless but enough is known so that people not totally at the mercy of random events. Now you can plan and know when food will be plentiful. Numbers are now of utmost importance because you discovered these things by counting. Numbers are the key to discovering order in chaos, and it’s clear that the lights above give rewards if you pay attention.  Looking closer, the Moon makes 28 different crescent shapes in its growth cycle. The lunar calendar has been established, and this would fully serve the needs of a tribe who lived by following herds of animals to hunt and gathering edible plants when available. Those who lived in different climates near water would have had a more settled life, getting their food primarily from fishing. The lunar calendar would have been equally valuable for them in preparing for winter. With no dependence on agriculture, a lunar calendar would be sufficient for most people’s survival.

The concept of time (beginning, middle and end) has become part of human consciousness and with it, space (directions). Both come from the same source: close study of how the lights above connect to the world below.

As generations pass, math and astronomy have become a vital part of life. It’s a gift directly from the gods above. The priests use it to know some of the future. Life is simple and survival revolves around knowing what nature will do, and when. Other people who live far away can be visited thanks to this gift. Traveling is dangerous but it’s feasible, and life improves by trading with other people. Knowledge can be exchanged as well. Journeys are accomplished by looking for the signs above in the heavens and the signs below that mark the route, and we can see the astrological attributes of Mercury here in the foundations of travel, merchants, and long-distance communication.

Bronze statue of Hermes for marking a road, 500 BC (Metropolitan Museum of Art)

You grow curious about secrets that may lie beyond the Moon. The groups of stars at night move in circles too as the seasons progress. Each season has different groups in the night sky. They’re much slower and don’t have the same paths as the Sun and Moon. Those two big lights move in opposite directions of the countless little lights. The stars move like they’re revolving under a huge dark dome and in the center is one that never, ever moves. They all move in circles around it. This star is in the same direction that you’ve determined north to be with the Sun’s shadow. You’ve discovered the North Star or Pole Star. The land you’re on and the stars above are all spinning around that star like a pole runs from it into the ground.

With some thoughts of up and down, the directions have been mapped much more accurately than before. These are the stakes or angles of the astrological charts we use today and one of the sacred functions of the number four. Three-dimensional thought has fully emerged here.

Practical benefits of three-dimensional thought extend to many things. In only one lifetime, arithmetic could become much more sophisticated with the determined astronomer having little trouble calculating figures in the hundreds and thousands. More advanced geometry is also possible, and with it, architecture and further sophistication in maps.  Over the next generation the apprentices would regularly use multiplication and long division while they compare observations and study their calendars. The two lights follow the number 12 but not exactly.  What appears to be perfect harmony between the Sun and Moon is revealed to have a small imbalance. It only shows itself over many years but when it happens it causes the calendar to fail. Over two decades it causes the prediction of seasons to be off track by an entire lunar cycle, or month. One month is enough to be disastrous if everyone plans for food being available at a certain time. This forces the astronomers to study the Sun and Moon deeper, looking for slight irregularities that can solve it. To solve this mystery, fractions must be conceptualized in some form. Consciousness has now advanced to a much higher level and the capacity for problem solving of all kinds has expanded immensely.

Close study of the stars as groups reveals an even more accurate method of measuring time, the heliacal rising. Meaning “near dawn”, this is the moment just before the first rays of the Sun make the stars vanish. Closely observing the star clusters on the eastern horizon at this moment is a reliable way to mark specific times of year. Mapping these tiny stars into constellations opens up even more opportunities for human life to improve.

Distinctive star clusters have been used in this way for longer than anyone knows. Because the Sun moves through the stars throughout the year, a different group is visible in the night sky just before dawn every few weeks. Using the Pleaides as an example, they will appear on the eastern horizon right before the Sun’s first rays only in late spring. As the Sun progresses through summer, the Pleaides will appear higher in the sky, little by little, before sunrise. Tracking the heliacal rising of stars is a way to ensure that the irregularities of the lunar year and solar year (354 and 365 days, respectively) do not result in mistakes. For practical concerns, if a plant requires its seeds to be sowed only at the end of May, the heliacal rising of the Pleaides would be an excellent sign. In ancient Greece, the Pleaides were used to mark the beginning of spring.

When the use of numbers was applied to the earth and the things in it, life became much better. The ability to measure carries over into every aspect of life that we take for granted now, but were once unavailable, like construction. Even with the crudest tools, the capacity to chop wood into even lengths brings with it sturdy walls and roofs. Simple dwellings could become bigger and stronger, and with simple geometry it was possible for durable houses to be built of wood and stone.

In our prehistoric scenario, traveling on water wouldn’t always be limited only to carved canoes. Large sturdy rafts could be made with planning and teamwork. If the tribe chose to follow the animals for hunting, they would know when they’ll hibernate or migrate. The animals’ patterns can be discerned, their movements mapped, and people know what to expect. The causes and effects are clear for everyone to see.

Here we can begin to understand how religions developed around the stars. Closely studying the lights above reveals secrets and they lead to people having more power over their surroundings. The heavens offer gifts that are endless if people are willing to do the work to receive them. The patterns reveal eternal laws that all the world obeys, and the more these invisible laws were studied the more wise people became. The thought process of solving these celestial mysteries gave the capacity to think deeply about cause and effect, the foundation of science. Numbers and ratios were applied to material goods and economics was born from it.  Thinking in three dimensions, along with an excellent knowledge of the constellations’ movements and direction, allowed for the most perilous journeys to be undertaken: sailing the ocean. From the start of the Bronze Age five thousand years ago, long-distance trade between Egypt and the Indus Valley occurred with ships. The Phoenicians or Canaanites established a vast maritime trade network across the entire region, from Byblos to the British Isles and the coasts of northwest Africa.

Remarkably, the study of the stars produced the first analog computer…over two thousand years ago. The Antikythera Mechanism was discovered in the remains of a shipwrecked Greek vessel and was a sophisticated mechanical device that could be used to predict the positions of stars, planets and even eclipses many decades in advance with an incredible degree of precision.

In only a few generations, the capacity to use simple numbers could become a common skill with astronomers developing and refining solar and lunar calendars. Countless human lives were transformed and it’s the result of the men and women who devoted themselves to the heavens and understanding the gods who made themselves known through it.  The heavens have gifted humanity with innumerable gifts.

Perhaps the biggest difference between us and them is that they attributed everything to God or a group of gods. If someone discovers something today, they want to be credited for it. An ancient person would have credited the discovery to a god generously leading them to it. If a person in archaic Greece figured out how to make a better boat, he’d have thanked Poseidon for that good fortune. The community would have likewise attributed the new boat to Poseidon and that’s how it would be remembered by their descendants. Over the generations, their lore would be Hephaestion, the patron god of craftsmen, giving them their tools long ago, along with other significant turning points.

Gods Above and Below- Reason Meets Intuition

For people who experience everything as alive and having a spirit, this scenario presents an entirely new dimension to life. A deep sense of connection to everything can be experienced intuitively, and some people today still have it. Raw intuition can be felt by anyone but prolonged study of the heavens and earth as interlinked gives a structure and order to that intuition. The Industrial Age severed that aspect of life for most people.

The ability to use numbers, our basis for reason, is unlike anything else. A person who has only the natural world as a reference point will at some point recognize that the process of mathematics is something intangible. It can be expressed and conveyed by gathering a certain number of objects, like pebbles or fingers, and the principles conveyed visually. Subtraction under ten digits can be conveyed simply by holding out all ten fingers and closing the number of fingers that are subtracted. Division can be conveyed simply by putting several pebbles together and separating them into groups. The idea of division by half is simply a matter of making two separate groups of equal number or cutting something. But the process itself is beyond the senses. It can only be perceived by its effects. Symbols can be assigned to represent numbers, but they’re just that: symbols. The mind must first perform the mathematical process before its meaning is understood. The process is invisible, a work of pure thought and is an underlying cause that cannot be perceived. It has no form itself but instead makes itself knowable by embodying everything that can be sensed. This is the concept of divinity according to the Pythagoreans that came to be part of the Theory of Forms.

Deep study and contemplation of the circle and all the possible divisions of it would lead to pondering what is outside of it sooner or later. If everything is contained in a sphere, the question of what lies beyond that and what its source is brings the human mind to its limits. This riddle is still used in various mystical traditions to lead its practitioners to higher states of consciousness.

At this point, pure intuition and instinct have given birth to reason and linear thought. Both managed to coexist with remarkable sophistication like we see in the remains of Bronze Age kingdoms. The astronomer-priests of remote prehistoric times would sooner or later be forced to contend with assigning labels to the increasingly sophisticated math found in the skies. Until the Hellenistic era, learning appears to have relied on the apprentice being presented with symbolic images and arriving at the solution through contemplation and observation.  With a little imagination and mental flexibility, we can begin to understand some things about the gods of the ancient world and the seemingly bizarre fables or myths that were sacred. The sacred properties of the circle and sphere begin to have much more meaning. The circular grid pattern found within the Temple of Osiris that has become popularly termed the Flower of Life can be verbally illustrated as a birth process of two circles.

As the properties of symmetric circle patterns are examined deeper, the five Platonic Solids can be found contained within. These are the very building blocks of reality, according to Plato.

As stated already, everything was alive and had a spirit. The most advanced cultures of the ancient world possessed highly sophisticated sciences but equally valued intuition, divination and extrasensory perception. Priesthoods were the keepers of knowledge in every ancient civilization and they enabled governments with kings and queens to function. Priests were scientists, astronomers, physicians, engineers, mathematicians, historians and much more. Some specialized more in certain fields but at the center of their order was gods. Specially trained people, oracles, seers and diviners, had the ability to communicate with them more effectively than others.

Not only gods, but spirits of long-dead ancestors were part of this “other world”. The names of ancient ancestors who accomplished something important in their earthly lives were often given to gods who oversaw that part of life. One example is Imhotep, an Egyptian priest and vizier from the Old Kingdom who was an architect, astrologer, and physician. After he died, his spirit was often consulted on matters that he excelled in during his life. His mortal life was an incarnation of Ptah and Nuit helping to further develop Egypt, especially with medicine. From the afterlife Imhotep could continue his work as an intermediary between the world of matter and the unknowable world of the divine. In this way Imhotep’s soul became a full-fledged god and was one of only two Egyptians to do so, the other being Amenhotep.

Imhotep is one prominent example among many of what is now termed “ancestor veneration” that was a universal practice until relatively recently. Each family performed rites in memory of their forebears and many people buried them in or around the family home so they’d be close. Notable leaders, warriors, priests and people who made important contributions in the past could be venerated by an entire kingdom. As long as their memory remained alive, they could be reached through dreams, divination and gifts left at their graves. If statues or other depictions of them existed, that person could become an archetype in that group’s “collective unconscious” in Carl Jung’s model of human psychology. The stronger that memory was held and the longer it lasted, the more of a driving force it became over time. Even if that person’s legend was not completely real or historically factual, it undeniably exerted an immense influence on others. Such people were called “Heroes” by Greek philosophers, minor gods that were below gods and archangels but above human souls.

In our scenario of astronomers in remote prehistory, the same would apply. The apprentices who learned the craft carried on the work of those who came before. Even when their teacher passed on, part of them remained in the work itself. A burst of intuition that found a solution to a difficult problem could naturally be attributed to their assistance. Even more, the gods themselves could be petitioned to reveal themselves further. This could go beyond bursts of intuition in the form of intense visions. If there was a mystery involving the Moon and the solution was elusive, one course of action would be to hold a ceremony under the Moon’s light, enter an altered state of consciousness and ask her directly. Some participants would find themselves whisked away to experience a vision of the heavens directly, in terms of what they encountered in their daily life.

The shamanic earth practices could integrate with astronomy in this way, giving rise to the first astronomer-priests that would eventually develop highly advanced civilizations five thousand years ago and leave future generations puzzled.

The gods below, in nature, provided knowledge such as the medicinal properties of plants. The gods above in the heavens provided knowledge of a different sort, that gave people some semblance of power over nature as abstract thought developed.  Memories of this tradition and the gifts it brought are seen in the Book of Enoch, an ancient Jewish text that had been excluded from the Christian and Jewish scriptures. It describes angelic beings in the heavens called Watchers who taught humans all the arts and crafts of civilization: agriculture, astrology, architecture, metallurgy and more. Like Prometheus, they wanted to improve our lives. The book contains detailed explanations of the divisions of space, time and angels who govern it. Enoch ascends to the heavens and underworld through many dream visions, seeing the souls of angels as both stars and humanoid forms, followed by a history of the Israelites in the form of various animals. This book is mostly known for its stories of angels mating with human women, but it may be an uncensored depiction of an ancient astral tradition that existed in Judea.

Part 2 – Egyptian Temples

Hellenistic Astrology & Plato’s Metaphysics

-Theurgy and Animated Images

Introduction

1. Cosmos as a Living Statue
2. Eikons, Talismans and Symbols in Greek Philosophy
3. Theurgy and Animated Images

In the previous article we examined astrology and sacred images in the Hellenistic and Roman period, which shows roots of talismanic magic in the pagan temples of the Mediterranean. We will now explore some of its theoretical foundations in Plato’s teachings and its role in the works of Proclus.

1. Cosmos as a Living Statue

In his five books of commentaries on Plato’s Timaeus, Proclus repeatedly refers to the cosmos as a statue of the gods and living beings as “statues in motion”. This recalls the first book of Genesis and Elohim forming the archetypal Man in the divine “image” or tselem from primordial earth.

“But Plato says that the world was made the statue or resemblance of the perpetual gods, not that it is the image of the mundane gods; for he does not alone speak about the corporeal-formed nature of the universe, but also about the animated and intellectual animal, which comprehends in itself the mundane gods……The nature of animal itself was eternal, and this is impossible to adapt perfectly to that which is generated. Hence, he (the Demiurge) formed a certain moveable image of eternity and while he was adorning the universe, he made this eternal image according to number, of eternity abiding in one, which we call ‘time’.” – Proclus, On the Timaeus of Plato, Book 4, (Thomas Taylor translation)

This may shed some light on the criticism that Iamblichus heaped on image makers who he said mistakenly believed they were aided by the stars. He also said that their craft seemingly mimics the Demiurge. He doesn’t explain why or how they are mistaken, and with all his other praise for using divine symbols and sympathetic materials, it’s obvious that we don’t have the full context. Here, in the words of Proclus, we have an eloquent description of the Demiurgic process Iamblichus refers to.

The process of creating a divine statue or other image was likely an important learning process for the ancient priests. The knowledge required appears to be considerable from the Hermetic and Neoplatonist writings and required a combination of skills. The emphasis on deep contemplation and attaining visions indicates that could have been one part of a larger ritual procedure.

Throughout his writings, Proclus emphasizes that the primary goal was and always will be development and purification of the soul until it achieves divine union. Proclus describes several ways that it occurs and multiple paths for the philosopher to take in the process, including theurgy and visions along with rituals, devotion, study and contemplation.

The soul has within it divine images that can invoke those entities, and it makes a journey from sense perception, imagination and belief to Nous and pure intuition. Finally, it awakens the image of the One. I think that Iamblichus was simply scorning people who had no knowledge and experience of what he believed to be the most important parts of theurgy or falsely claimed to. It simply makes no sense otherwise.

Like Iamblichus, Proclus places more emphasis on gnosis and “raising” the human soul and only speaks in general terms about “bringing down” divinity and establishing direct links through matter. Proclus, living in the 400s, uses the same terminology as the author of Picatrix when discussing the linking of material and divine, namely that it was done by “wise men of old” and are implied to have possessed a considerably high level of skill, beyond both writers. Proclus does not claim this was done through astrology, but this statement is intriguing, nonetheless.

“The wise men of old (hoi palai sophoi) brought together various things down here with their heavenly counterparts and brought down Divine Powers into this mortal place, having drawn them down through Similarity (homoiotētōs): for Similarity is powerful enough to attach beings to one another.” – On the Priestly Art

Theurgists like Iamblichus and Proclus had extensive, firsthand knowledge of the theory and practice surrounding the use of sacred images. Astrology, eikons (images), and sympathetic materials were central to theurgy but detailed instructions for making astrological talismans aren’t in their surviving works. Regardless, there are a considerable amount of writings that have survived (see Julianus of Laodicea) and Proclus led the last of Plato’s Academy in its purely pagan form.

Links between Platonic philosophy of this period (500 AD) to Ghayat al-Hakim (1000 AD) is a gap of five centuries and a translation from Greek to medieval Arabic. I’m making this link primarily from the phrase “Science of Images”. Science is a broad term that means a system of knowledge. In the medieval context its now called “natural philosophy”, encompassing a wide range of subjects. The word “image” is more direct, but in the context of theurgy and Neoplatonist thinking it still opens more doors in its Greek form. I’ll begin with the medieval Arabic word and work backwards to the Greek equivalent five centuries earlier.

2. Eikons, Symbola and Talismans in Greek Philosophy

The medieval Jābirian text “Kitab al-Nukhab” provides some background information on what skill sets were needed to understand the Science of Images. The definitions of a talisman or tillasm is given in a dialogue between teacher and student in a way that’s designed to provoke more thought.

“A talisman is the likeness of artificial actions to natural actions […] Every talisman is a crafted thing that is like something natural, yet not every artificial likeness to something natural is a talisman. The meaning of talisman is distinguished by the celestial observation that characterizes it.” (3)

“The meaning of talisman is distinguished by the celestial observation that characterizes it” points to the use of astrological timing as its most defining feature. That’s the key factor but it encompasses a great deal more.

The Science of Images is further explained to the student as the culmination of multiple branches of knowledge, albeit in cryptic terms. A lengthy dialogue takes place where the student cannot give an adequate definition of what talisman means, and for every answer the teacher continues to steer the dialogue to other subjects: astronomy, astrology, geometry, philosophy, and practically all the natural sciences of the medieval period. Throughout the dialogue, the word “talisman” encompasses all these fields. The teacher emphasizes that it’s the culmination of them all and has been since ancient times, using Plato as the example of who the student should strive to emulate. They were continuing in Arabic what was practiced before in Greek philosophy, and the transitions across languages, cultures and eras creates a bit of confusion today. The Ghayat al Hakim was written by a Muslim and its translation Picatrix was circulated in Latin in Christian Europe. Both religions had prohibitions on images that the Greek philosophers had no need to circumvent.

Starting with the key word itself, the Arabic word Tilsam (طلسم) means magical symbol or charm. The Hebrew word Tselem (צֶלֶם) means “image” and its root word is “shadow”. A shadow is a form made by obstructing light. One of the ancient Hebrew words for the ghosts of departed human beings is “shades”. This has parallels in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, where the world is mistakenly perceived as the shadows cast on the cave walls.

When we look at the Greek writings, it becomes even more of a labyrinth. Images and talismans have a wide range of uses and meanings from Plato to Late Antiquity. Adding to the complexity is the importance of statues in Greek cosmology. Human beings are statues made by the divine; this concept was part of Greek thought before the philosophers. In the Iliad, Hephaestus was the god of craftsmen and forged “animated statues” that were intelligent and had souls. In Plato’s Timaeus, the Demiurge crafts human beings as his living statues. Aristotle elaborates further in Laws I when commenting on the Allegory of the Cave; he says that human beings are ensouled puppets and the strings from the unseen world are emotions. Statues and shadows are both expressions of the nature of reality as a series of imperfect reflections of something unseen.

The Demiurge as a sculptor has parallels with creation according to the Egyptians. Ptah is depicted as a sculptor fashioning creation with a potter’s wheel, and in the Hermetic Perfect Sermon to Asclepius, Hermes tells Asclepius about statues ensouled by divine spirits. The same overall concept is in the Book of Genesis where Elohim fashions Adam in the divine image and likeness from earth, often translated as clay or dust.

The Neoplatonist philosophers wrote entire treatises on the use of statues, divine images, symbols, talismans, letters and more with many different terms. The precise meanings are often unclear and it’s difficult to discern if they were part of Ibn Qurra’s Science of Images, a related practice or if they’re something else altogether. The vast amount of medieval translations from Greek to Arabic are an enormous web that hasn’t been unraveled and may remain that way.

They also wrote volumes of commentaries on Plato’s books and many of the older foundational works of philosophy like Aristotle. These commentaries often have valuable information related to medieval occult practices and many English translations don’t always have this in mind. I’m compiling all the Koine Greek words here for reference in the hopes it may be of use to others who are pursuing similar research.

The older Greek terms related to divine images are:

1. Eikōn (εἰκών) (1)

    o English Equivalent: Image, likeness, representation.
o Meaning: A material reflection of the Form. In the Allegory of the Cave (Republic, Book VII) the shadows on the wall are eikons of the objects behind prisoners. The objects are closer to the Forms, but not true reality.

2. Sunthemata (σύνθημα) (4)
o Common English Translation: Token, magical symbol, sign.
o Meaning: Embedded by the gods into the fabric of the universe that can link to the gods. They can be sacred words, symbols, geometric forms, natural objects like stones or plants, ritual gestures, or combinations of all. The Egyptian hieroglyphs are sunthemata.

3. Charaktēr (χαρακτήρ) (4)

    o Common English Translation: Mark, engraving, seal.
o Meaning: A divine or mystical imprint, symbolic of the essence of a higher reality. They carry the essence of the divine reality they reflect. Astrological configurations can be understood as divine charakteres in the heavens. If inscribed on ritual objects the link and anchor divine presence.

4. Telesma (τέλεσμα) (1)
o Common English Translation: Talisman, consecrated object, completed ritual object.
o Meaning: Completed and consecrated vessel for the divine. In the early Common Era it becomes primarily used in the context of occult objects.

5. Agalma (ἄγαλμα) (1)
o Common English Translation: Sacred image, sacred statue, offering, ornament.
o Meaning: Spiritual treasures or inner alignment with the divine. In Symposium (212a), Socrates describes the soul as a statue housing divinity and a person’s virtue and knowledge are agalmata (treasures).

6. Phantasma (φάντασμα) (4)
o Common English Translation: Apparition, phantom, illusion, false reality
o Meaning: Distorted or incomplete appearance. False appearance generated by the imagination (phantasia) that misleads. Phantasia is required for divine visionary ascent as a mediator. Proclus and Iamblichus say phantasma reflects the higher intellect but easily misleads when influenced by base desires.

7. Symbolon (σύμβολον) (1)
o Common English Translation: Symbol, sign, token of recognition
o Meaning: Similar to tokens; part of a divided object that connects to a greater whole. Divinely embedded by the gods and carry their essences. Does not rely on human interpretation. Tokens are often human made and signify a concept. A specific tree can be a symbol because its very nature participates in something higher and has power in itself. Symbolon more often refers to an object, such as a cross, that signifies an idea pertaining to a god.

These words are used by all Greek philosophers. They’re used frequently by the Neoplatonists (Iamblichus, Proclus, Plotinus) who are much more explicit about the mysticism in Plato’s tradition than their predecessors. Oftentimes translators don’t differentiate between these words and use generic terms and this can create difficulties when trying to discern more details. The Neoplatonists began using more technical terms which will be examined next.

Sources:

1. Proclus. On the Sacred Art. Translated by Thomas Taylor.

2. Quack, Joachim Friedrich. “Dekane und Gliedervergottung: Altägyptische Traditionen im Apokryphon Johannis.” Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 38 (1995): 97–122.

3. Saif, Liana. “The Jābirian Kitāb al-Nukhab and Teaching the Science of Talismans in the Abbasid Era.” Journal of Abbasid Studies (2024): 1–26.

4. Shaw, Gregory. Theurgy and the Soul: The Neoplatonism of Iamblichus. Penn State University Press, 1995.

5. Piperakis, Spyros. “Decanal Iconography and Natural Materials in the Sacred Book of Hermes to Asclepius.” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 57 (2017): 136–161.

3. Theurgy and Animated Images

The medieval teacher-student dialogue in Kitab al-Nukhab begins to take on a new perspective when we look at the relationship with statues and shadows. The meaning of “talisman” is distinguished by the celestial factors and that is easily understood by the student. But when pressed to examine it deeper from the perspective of a philosopher, the student attempts to answer for an entire year and is confounded at every turn.

Images encompassed not only the natural sciences of Greeks but all of metaphysics and occult practices as well. Images of various types, symbols and statues, were used to induce visions by Iamblichus and to purify the soul by Plotinus.

When attempting to draw direct correlations between astrological talismans of the medieval Arabic world and the metaphysics of the Neoplatonists, the lines get more blurry. Iamblichus, Proclus, Simplicius, Damascius, and the other philosophers of this era are the most detailed sources for the esoteric side of their tradition. “Idolatry” and the superstitions of old had become unfashionable and the works of Plotinus were a product of this trend but still sheds light on the Science of Images.

Plotinus is considered the first of the “Neoplatonists” and his work prompted Iamblichus to bring theurgy and ancient traditions back into focus. Plotinus had a practice of creating and cultivating an “inner statue”. In the Enneads (I.6.9, 7ff) he explains that a reflection of the Demiurge is cultivated within the human mind and soul. This was a way to reconnect the microcosmic soul of the philosopher to the macrocosm through intense visualization, contemplation and meditation. Plotinus reinterpreted the rites around statues as instructions for visualization so that divinity could dwell within the human being, itself a statue crafted by the Demiurge. This practice of developing the astral body or light body is foundational for the Kabbalistic practices in Sefer Yetzirah and many Sufi orders.

Even though Picatrix is mainly a manual of instructions for using physical materials, one of its prerequisites is inner spiritual work. Book 3, chapter 6 contains the Operation of Perfect Nature which is comparable to the “inner statue” of Plotinus. Elsewhere it states that “The spirit of the magician furthers the effects of the heavens just as the harvests of nature—that is, in the way that harvests are furthered by plowing and cultivating the earth.”(Book 4, Chapter 4, Warnock & Greer)

Connecting the medieval Science of Images directly to the Neoplatonists becomes more complicated with the Chaldean Oracles of Zoroaster. This was a highly influential book in the Neoplatonist circles, used and quoted extensively. Sadly, it only survives in fragments and commentaries. It makes for a lot of guesswork. Chaldean Oracles is often quoted and the words themselves are cryptic poems, but it proscribes the use of timing in rituals. One passage briefly instructs the theurgist in crafting a statue of Hekate.

“Says Hekate:

‘Complete my animal image purged as I shall instruct you: Make a body from field rue; ornament with delicate small beast forms (such as spotted lizards that live about the house);

Pound storax, myrrh, and frankincense with these beasts into a mixture and under a waxing moon in the clear light of ether finish the telestics’.”

Proclus himself made use of it and briefly mentions the experience in his Commentary on the Timaeus. The participants, while in a trance, witnessed Hekate surrounding the statue with an otherworldly light. Some only saw dim impressions while others saw her smiling and laughing. Hekate spoke through a participant in a trance acting as a medium. This same rite of Hekate was what drew the interest of the Emperor Julian. The Chaldean Oracles say the rite should be performed at night and to take the Moon into account.

Proclus says:

“The ensouled statue, for example, participates by way of impression in the art which turns it on the lathe or polishes it and shapes it in such and such a fashion, while from the universe it has received reflections of vitality which even cause us to say it is ensouled; and as a whole it has been made like the God whose statue it is. For a telestic priest who sets up a statue as a likeness of a certain divine order perfects the symbola of its identity with reference to that order, acting as does the craftsman when he makes a likeness by looking to its proper model.”(Commentary on Timeaus)

Around the time the Chaldean Oracles and early Hermetic books started to circulate, the Neoplatonist philosophers became far more open about their practices that would today be termed occultism and not philosophy. Christianity was becoming widespread, political stability questionable, and philosophers were increasingly forced to defend their traditions. The life work of Plotinus was a practice of pure contemplative mysticism while Iamblichus wanted to keep philosophy’s roots in ancient rites from being forgotten. Both were reconciled by the last philosophers of the Academy in Athens.

Telestikē is a major point of discussion for divine images in the theurgy of Iamblichus and Proclus. In the Chaldean Oracles, telestikē is ritual acts intended to draw down the divine into the material world through sunthemata (tokens, symbols) and invocations. One fragment describes how sacred symbols (sunthemata) “draw down the divine light” into material forms, enabling the practitioner to animate statues and engage with the gods. Statues are not gods themselves but are transformed into living intermediaries through telestikē. The sunthemata functions as communication nodes, each carrying the essence of the deity it represents.

Iamblichus emphasizes that the telestikē art depends on the correct use of divine symbols and invocations:

“For it is not thought alone that connects us with the gods, but the entire theurgical action, which perfects sacred statues and renders them receptive to the divine.”  (De Mysteriis V.23, Emma Clarke translation)

Iamblichus introduces the term enpsychosis (ἐνψύχωσις) to describe how statues become ensouled. He asserts that physical objects are prepared to receive divine energy through ritual purification, inscription of sunthemata, and invocation of divine names. The statue becomes an empsychoi eikōn (ἔμψυχος εἰκών), a living image of the god.  Hagnos Eikōn (ἁγνὸς εἰκών) is the pure image or pure likeness.

Like Hermes Trismegistus, Iamblichus distinguishes between the divine essence and the material statue, rejecting criticisms that these practices were idol worship. The statue becomes a vehicle for the god. He uses as an example the “Opening of the Mouth” ritual of the ancient Egyptians to explain the statue animation, where the symbolic act “opens” the physical material of the mummy to receive the anima, the animating principle of spirit underlying physical life. (1)

This anima is the underlying principle of “animated statues”, and it is this terminology that obscures the real meaning. Animation in a literal sense brings to mind a mechanically moving object but in this context it simply means ensouled with a certain type of spirit. Whether or not it “moves” for the observer is irrelevant; in a ritual trance state the observer may perceive visions around it or they may not. The anima in the statue is present either way.

Proclus builds on Iamblichus’ foundation and further links telestikē to celestial correspondences. Proclus explains that telestikē uses symbols placed on sacred objects by the theurgist; these symbols have a likeness to the celestial bodies. What exactly the likeness is, he doesn’t explain; it could be a simple color correspondence or very old names and symbols whose full meanings were lost, like the barbarous names that Iamblichus wrote of.

“The symbols placed upon sacred objects receive divine power through their likeness to the celestial bodies, reflecting the harmony of the universe.” (Proclus, Commentary on Plato’s Timaeus, I.28)

Proclus emphasizes that sunthemata are not arbitrary; they correspond to the divine forces and channel celestial energies. Statues and shrines are consecrated carefully to align with the specific deities and the sympathetic materials used.  Proclus makes telestikē a mirror of the Demiurge forming living statues, as the cosmos was explained by Plato a thousand years earlier and by Homer’s story of Hephaestion before him.

For the purposes of utilizing the Science of Images in medieval writings, specifically the crafting of astrological talismans, the works of the philosophers seemingly have little to offer from a practical perspective. They show that the tradition has a multitude of ancient roots, deeper even than the Neoplatonists. Like the student in the Brethren of Purity, we can look at Picatrix as an instructional manual for making talismans that are defined strictly by astrological configurations, or we can look deeper and find a bigger perspective.

Sources:

• Iamblichus. De Mysteriis. Translated by Clarke, Dillon, and Hershbell. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003.
• Proclus. Commentary on Plato’s Timaeus. Translated by Thomas Taylor.
• Majercik, Ruth. The Chaldean Oracles: Text, Translation, and Commentary. Leiden: Brill, 1989.
• Shaw, Gregory. Theurgy and the Soul: The Neoplatonism of Iamblichus. Penn State University Press, 1995.
• Proclus, commentary on the Chaldean Oracles, as discussed in Flower of Fire: Hekate in the Chaldean Oracles, pp. 16-18
• Algis Uždavinys, Philosophy as a Rite of Rebirth, pp. 91, 137
• On Magic: Epistles of the Brethren of Purity, pp. 85-95​