Alchemy

Alchemy, being a sacred science (a marriage of science and spirituality, flourishing at times when there is no seperation made between the two), is often misrepresented as a strictly medieval European phenomenon. Quite to the contrary, it has thrived across the globe, in many different countries, rooting itself in the histories of various cultures. Egypt, India, China, Greece, Rome, and the Islamic Empire all at one time or another were home to the furnaces and laboratories of devoted alchemists.

For the sake of brevity, however, this article will focus on alchemy as it is known in the West, during the medieval and Rennaisance periods of history, which has its origins in the Graeco-Egyptian culture.

History

The oldest alchemical text known to date was written by the Gnostic Christian, Zosimus of Panopolis, sometime around 300 A.D. Despite his title, Zosimus lived in Alexandria, home to the famous Library of Alexandria (the burning of which was perhaps one of the greatest tragedies in history; many other alchemical treatises most probably were lost forevern in this same fire).

This text, named "Isis the Prophetess to Her Son Horus" claims that the origins of alchemy come from the Nephilim, the Fallen Angels, who taught it to Isis in exchange for sexual intercourse. Not to be confused with any kind of demonic entities, the Nephilim were said to be great teachers and guides for the human race, helping us along with everything from war to cosmetics. Although such a story may be deemed untrue, Zosimus is here telling us that he was not the first alchemist, as he also claims as his sources the writings of the Persians and the Jews.

Around the same time, in the same area of Hellenized Egypt, thrived the Hermetic tradition which still remains vital and alive even today, having provided fertile ground for the Rosicrucian Order, which in turn gave rise to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Although its roots reach back into the ancient, inner esoteric pantheism of the Egyptian religious polytheism, it was around the first couple centuries AD that the actual body of Hermetic writing arose, known as the Corpus Hermeticum, authored by the mythical Hermes Trismegistus.

While one can certainly say that Western alchemy is not Hermeticism and Hermeticism is not alchemy, it would also be ignorant to say that the two have no relationship. Far from it, Hermeticism seems to have lain the spiritual and philosophical ground for the experiments of future alchemists. Both concern themselves with what is known as the Great Work, the spiritual transformation of mankind from our confused and degraded state to a return to grace and unity with the divine. Both affirm that the microcosm in the human being reflects and contains within it all that is in the macrocosm of the universe.

The Corpus Hermeticum, an extremely important body of writing for both the ancient and modern alchemist, .

The Emerald Tablet, the "cornerstone of the Hermetic movement" was

probably influenced by the Egyptians and the Greek Philosophy of Democritus.

The Four Elements and the Three Essentials

It is based on the idea that the world is composed of the four elements fire, air, water and earth. These elements are considered to be contained in all things, the most common example being wood which "obviously" contained earth (which was why it was hard) and water (sap when squeezed out) and air (smoke when lit) and fire (you could light it). It was a nice little theory...

The basic idea of the atom as the "smallest unit of divisibility" was also formed during this time - though this truly bears little relation to the present-day concept of the atom (which is merely named after the Democritian concept). Atoms were considered to be tiny, perfect spheres and made up of one of the four above-mentioned elements...considering the scientific state-of-the-art up to that point, not a bad theory, and one which lasted surprisingly long.

One of the concepts was that, because lead and gold (the perfect metal) were from the earth element, earth could therefore be turned into lead and gold using an "appropriate catalyst" known as the Philosopher's Stone. This was a magical substance which could turn water into wine, heal the sick, and as mentioned, turn really boring lumps of metal into gold and silver. Most of it though was just processes like mixing copper with arsenic to give it a silver finish, or a philosophical trick by which the alchemist's apprentice, through years of hard work and training, was turned from lead (i.e. an ignorant klutz) into gold (i.e. an alchemically educated klutz).

The quest to turn lead into gold was also a spiritual one, as it represented the change of an impure substance into a pure substance - the equivalent of returning Man from his current state of sin to a state of Grace last known before the Fall.

Despite never discovering the Philosopher's Stone, alchemists did come up with a number of interesting reactions and the knowledge gathered eventually led to the foundations of modern chemistry.

Alchemy also gave rise to concept of the panacea, the "medicine" to cure all illnesses - also never found, but a search for it led to an interesting number of ways to poison oneself (mercury, silver and lead poisoning being numbered under the chief ways that alchemists died).

Links

The Alchemy Website (mirrored at www.levity.com/alchemy)

A site for modern alchemists; do not expect that modern alchemy is necessarily related to period alchemy.