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Iamblichus on the Mysteries of the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Assyrians (Second Edition 1895)/Introduction

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INTRODUCTION.

It appears to me that there are two descriptions of persons by whom the present work must be considered to be of inestimable worth, the lovers of antiquity and the lovers of ancient philosophy and religion. To the former of these it must be invaluable, because it is replete with information derived from the wise men of the Chaldeans, the prophets of the Egyptians, the dogmas of the Assyrians, and the ancient pillars of Hermes; and to the latter, because of the doctrines contained in it, some of which originated from the Hermaic pillars, were known by Pythagoras and Plato, and were the sources of their philosophy; and others are profoundly theological, and unfold the mysteries of ancient religion with an admirable conciseness of diction, and an inimitable vigour and elegance of conception. To ​which also may be added, as the colophon of excellence, that it is the most copious, the clearest, and the most satisfactory defence extant of genuine ancient theology.

This theology, the sacred operations pertaining to which called theurgy are here developed, has for the most part, since the destruction of it, been surveyed only in its corruptions among barbarous nations, or during the decline and fall of the Roman empire, with which, overwhelmed with pollution, it gradually fell, and at length totally vanished from what is called the polished part of the globe. This will be evident to the intelligent reader from the following remarks, which are an epitome of what has been elsewhere more largely discussed by me on this subject, and which also demonstrate the religion of the Chaldeans, Egyptians, and Greeks to be no less scientific than sublime.

In the first place, this theology celebrates the immense principle of things as something superior even to being itself; as exempt from the whole of things, of which it is nevertheless ineffably the source; and ​does not, therefore, think fit to enumerate it with any triad[1] or order of beings. Indeed it even apologizes for giving the appellation of the most simple of our conceptions to that which is beyond all knowledge and all conception. It denominates this principle however, the one and the good; by the former of these names indicating its transcendent simplicity, and by the latter, ​its subsistence as the object of desire to all beings. For all things desire good. At the same time, however, it asserts that these appellations are in reality nothing more than the parturitions of the soul, which, standing as it were in the vestibules of the adytum of deity, announce nothing pertaining to the ineffable, but only indicate her spontaneous tendencies towards it, and belong rather to the immediate offspring of the first God than to the first itself. Hence, as the result of this most venerable conception of the supreme, when it ventures not only to denominate it, though ineffable, but also to assert something of its relation to other things, it considers this as preeminently its peculiarity, that it is the principle of principles; it being necessary that the characteristic property of principle, after the same manner as other things, should not begin from multitude, but should be collected into one monad as a summit, and which is the principle of all principles.

The scientific reasoning from which this dogma is deduced is the following. As the principle of all things is the one, it is ​necessary that the progression of beings should be continued, and that no vacuum should intervene either in incorporeal or corporeal natures. It is also necessary that every thing which has a natural progression should proceed through similitude. In consequence of this, it is likewise necessary that every producing principle should generate a number of the same order with itself, viz. nature, a natural number; soul, one that is psychical (i. e. belonging to soul); and intellect an intellectual number. For if whatever possesses a power of generating, generates similars prior to dissimilars, every cause must deliver its own form and characteristic peculiarity to its progeny; and before it generates that which gives subsistence to progressions, far distant and separate from its nature, it must constitute things proximate to itself according to essence, and conjoined with it through similitude. It is, therefore, necessary from these premises, since there is one unity, the principle of the universe, that this unity should produce from itself, prior to every thing else, a multitude of natures characterized ​by unity, and a number the most of all things allied to its cause; and these natures are no other than the Gods.

According to this theology, therefore, from the immense principle of principles, in which all things causally subsist, absorbed in superessential light, and involved in unfathomable depths, a beauteous progeny of principles proceed, all largely partaking of the ineffable, all stamped with the occult characters of deity, all possessing an overflowing fulness of good. From these dazzling summits, these ineffable blossoms, these divine propagations, being, life, intellect, soul, nature, and body depend; monads suspended from unities, deified natures proceeding from deities. Each of these monads, too, is the leader of a series which extends from itself to the last of things, and which, while it proceeds from, at the same time abides in, and returns to, its leader. And all these principles, and all their progeny, are finally centred and rooted by their summits in the first great all-comprehending one. Thus all beings proceed from, and are comprehended in, the first ​being: all intellects emanate from one first intellect; all souls from one first soul; all natures blossom from one first nature; and all bodies proceed from the vital and luminous body of the world. And, lastly, all these great monads are comprehended in the first one, from which both they and all their depending series are unfolded into light. Hence this first one is truly the unity of unities, the monad of monads, the principle of principles, the God of Gods, one and all things, and yet one prior to all.

No objections of any weight, no arguments but such as are sophistical, can be urged against this most sublime theory, which is so congenial to the unperverted conceptions of the human mind, that it can only be treated with ridicule and contempt in degraded, barren, and barbarous ages. Ignorance and impious fraud, however, have hitherto conspired to defame those inestimable works[2] in which this and many other grand and important dogmas can ​alone be found; and the theology of the ancients has been attacked with all the insane fury of ecclesiastical zeal, and all the imbecile flashes of mistaken wit, by men whose conceptions on the subject, like those of a man between sleeping and waking, have been turbid and wild, phantastic and confused, preposterous and vain.

Indeed, that after the great incomprehensible cause of all, a divine multitude subsists, cooperating with this cause in the production and government of the universe, has always been, and is still, admitted by all nations and all religions, however much they may differ in their opinions respecting the nature of the subordinate deities, and the veneration which is to be paid to them by man; and however barbarous the conceptions of some nations on this subject may be, when compared with those of others. Hence, says the elegant Maximus Tyrius, "You will see one according law and assertion in all the earth, that there is one God, the king and father of all things, and many Gods, sons of God, ruling together with him. This the Greek says, and ​the Barbarian says, the inhabitant of the continent, and he who dwells near the sea, the wise and the unwise. And if you proceed as far as to the utmost shores of the ocean, there also there are Gods, rising very near to some, and setting very near to others."[3]

The deification, however, of dead men, and the worshiping men as Gods, formed no part of this theology, when it is considered according to its genuine purity. Numerous instances of the truth of this might be adduced, but I shall mention for this purpose, as unexceptionable witnesses, the writings of Plato, the Golden Pythagoric Verses,[4] and the Treatise of Plutarch Dissert. i. Edit. Princ.] ​on Isis and Osiris. All the works of Plato, indeed, evince the truth of this position, ​but this is particularly manifest from his Laws. The Golden verses order that the immortal Gods be honoured first, as they are disposed by law; afterwards the illustrious Heroes, under which appellation the author of the verses comprehends also angels and dæmons, properly so called; and in the last place, the terrestrial dæmons, i. e. such good men as transcend in virtue the rest of mankind. But to honour the Gods as they are disposed by law, is, as Hierocles observes, to reverence them as they are arranged by their demiurgus and father; and this is to honour them as beings not only superior to man, but also to dæmons and angels. Hence, to honour men, however excellent they may be, as Gods, is not to honour the Gods according to the rank in which they are placed by their Creator; for it is confounding the divine with the human nature, and is thus acting directly contrary to the Pythagoric ​precept. Plutarch too, in his above mentioned treatise, most forcibly and clearly shows the impiety of worshiping men as Gods.[5]

"So great an apprehension indeed," says Dr. Stillingfleet,[6] "had the Heathens of the necessity of appropriate acts of divine worship, that some of them have chosen to die, rather than to give them to what they did not believe to be God. We have a remarkable story to this purpose in Arrian and Curtius[7] concerning Callisthenes. Alexander arriving at that degree of vanity as to desire to have divine worship given him, and the matter being started out of design among the courtiers, either by Anaxarchus, as Arrian, or Cleo the Sicilian, as Curtius says; and the way of doing it proposed, viz. by incense and prostration; Callisthenes vehemently opposed it, as that which would confound the difference of human and ​divine worship, which had been preserved inviolable among them. The worship of the Gods had been kept up in temples, with altars, and images, and sacrifices, and hymns, and prostrations, and such like; but it is by no means fitting, says he, for us to confound these things, either by lifting up men to the honours of the Gods, or depressing the Gods to the honours of men. For if Alexander would not suffer any man to usurp his royal dignity by the votes of men; how much more justly may the Gods disdain for any man to take their honours to himself. And it appears by Plutarch,[8] that the Greeks thought it a mean and base thing for any of them, when sent on any embassy to the kings of Persia, to prostrate themselves before them, because this was only allowed among them in divine adoration. Therefore, says he, when Pelopidas and Ismenias were sent to Artaxerxes, Pelopidas did nothing unworthy, but Ismenias let fall his ring to the ground, and stooping for that, was thought to make his adoration; which ​was altogether as good a shift as the Jesuits advising the crucifix to be held in the mandarin's hands while they made their adorations in the Heathen temples in China.

Conon[9] also refused to make his adoration, as a disgrace to his city; and Isocrates[10] accuses the Persians for doing it, because herein they showed that they despised the Gods rather than men, by prostituting their honours to their princes. Herodotus mentions Sperchies and Bulis, who could not with the greatest violence be brought to give adoration to Xerxes, became it was against the law of their country to give divine honour to men.[11] And Valerius Maximus[12] says, "the Athenians put Timagoras to death for doing it; so strong an apprehension had possessed them, that the manner of worship which they used to their Gods, should be preserved sacred and inviolable." The philosopher Sallust also, in his Treatise on the Gods and the World, says, "It is not unreasonable to suppose that impiety is a species of punishment, and that those who have had a know​ledge of the Gods, and yet despised them, will in another life be deprived of this knowledge. And it is requisite to make the punishment of those who have honoured their kings as Gods to consist in being expelled from the Gods."[13]

When the ineffable transcendency of the first God, which was considered as the grand principle in the Heathen religion by the best theologists of all nations, and particularly by its most illustrious promulgators, Orpheus, Pythagoras, and Plato, was forgotten, this oblivion was doubtless the principal cause of dead men being deified by the Pagans. Had they properly directed their attention to this transcendency they would have perceived it to be so immense as to surpass eternity, infinity, self-subsistence, and even essence itself, and that these in reality belong to those venerable natures which are, as it were, first unfolded into light from the unfathomable ​depths of that truly mystic unknown, about which all knowledge is refunded into ignorance. For, as Simplicius justly observes, "It is requisite that he who ascends to the principle of things should investigate whether it is possible there can be any thing better than the supposed principle; and if something more excellent is found, the same inquiry should again be made respecting that, till we arrive at the highest conceptions, than which we have no longer any more venerable. Nor should we stop in our ascent till we find this to be the case. For there is no occasion to fear that our progression will be through an unsubstantial void, by conceiving something about the first principles which is greater and more transcendent than their nature. For it is not possible for our conceptions to take such a mighty leap as to equal, and much less to pass beyond, the dignity of the first principles of things." He adds, "This, therefore, is one and the best extension [of the soul] to [the highest] God, and is, as much as possible, irreprehensible; viz. to know firmly, that by ascribing to him the ​most venerable excellences we can conceive, and the most holy and primary names and things, we ascribe nothing to him which is suitable to his dignity. It is sufficient, however, to procure our pardon [for the attempt], that we can attribute to him nothing superior."[14] If it is not possible, therefore, to form any ideas equal to the dignity of the immediate progeny of the ineffable, i. e. of the first principles of things, how much less can our conceptions reach that thrice unknown darkness, in the reverential language of the Egyptians,[15] ​which is even beyond these? Had the Heathens, therefore, considered as they ought this transcendency of the supreme God, they would never have presumed to equalize the human with the divine nature, and consequently would never have worshiped men as Gods. Their theology, however, is not to be accused as the cause of this impiety, but their forgetfulness of the sublimest of its dogmas, and the confusion with which this oblivion was necessarily attended.

But to return to the present work. To some who are conversant with the writings of Porphyry, who know how high he ranks among the best of the Platonists, and that he was denominated by them, on account of his excellence, the philosopher, it may seem strange that he should have been so unskilled in theological mysteries, and so ignorant of the characteristics of the beings superior to man, as by his epistle to Anebo he may appear to have been. That he was not, however, in reality thus unskilful and ​ignorant, is evident from his admirable Treatise on Abstinence from Animal Food, and his (Greek characters)[Greek: Aphormai pros ta noêta], or Auxiliaries to Intelligibles. His apparent ignorance, therefore, must have been assumed for the purpose of obtaining a more perfect and copious solution of the doubts proposed in his Epistle, than he would otherwise have received. But at the same time that this is admitted, it must also be observed, that he was inferior to Iamblichus in theological science, who so greatly excelled in knowledge of this kind, that he was not surpassed by any one, and was equaled by few. Hence he was denominated by all succeeding Platonists the divine, in the same manner as Plato, "to whom," as the acute Emperor Julian remarks, "he was posterior in time only, but not in genius."[16]

The difficulties attending the translation of this work into English are necessarily great, not only from its sublimity and no​velty, but also from the defects of the original. I have, however, endeavoured to make the translation as faithful and complete as possible; and have occasionally availed myself of the annotations of Gale, not being able to do so continually, because for the most part, where philosophy is concerned, he shows himself to be an inaccurate, impertinent, and garrulous smatterer.

  1. ↑ According to this theology, as I have elsewhere shown, in every order of things, a triad is the immediate progeny of a monad. Hence the intelligible triad proceeds immediately from the ineffable principle of things. Phanes, or intelligible intellect, who is the last of the intelligible order, is the monad, leader, and producing cause of a triad, which is denominated [νοητος και νοερος [Greek: noêtos kai noeros] i. e. intelligible, and at the same time intellectual. In like manner the extremity of this order produces immediately from itself the intellectual triad, Saturn, Rhea, and Jupiter. Again, Jupiter, who is also the Demiurgus, is the monad of the supermundane triad. Apollo, who subsists at the extremity of the supermundane order, produces a triad of liberated Gods. (Θεοι απολυτοι [Greek: Theoi apolytoi.]) And the extremity of the liberated order becomes the monad of a triad of mundane Gods. This theory, too, which is the progeny of the most consummate science, is in perfect conformity with the Chaldean theology. And hence it is said in one of the Chaldean oracles, "In every world a triad shines forth, of which a monad is the ruling principle." (Παντι γαρ ε- κοσμῳ λαμπει τριας ης μονας αρχει [Greek: Panti gar en kosmô lampei trias ês monas archei]). I refer the reader, who is desirous of being fully convinced of all this, to my translation of Proclus on the Theology of Plato.]
  2. ↑ Viz. The Philosophical Works of Proclus, together with those of Plotinus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Syrianus, Ammonius, Damascius, Olympiodorus, and Simplicius.
  3. ↑ Ενα ιδοις αν εν πασα γῃ ομοφων νομον και λογον, οτι θεος εις παντων βασιλευς και πατηρ, και θεοι πολλοι, θεου παιδες, συναρχοντες θεῳ. ταυτα και ο ελλην λεγει, και ο βαρβαρος λεγει, και ο ηπειρωτης και ο θαλαττιος, και ο σοφος και ο ασοφος. κᾳν επι του ωκεανου ελθῃς τας ηϊονας, κᾳκει θεοι, τοις μεν ανισχοντες αγχου μαλα, τοις δε καταδυομενοι [Greek: Ena idois an en pasa gê omophônon nomon kai logon, oti theos eis pantôn basileus kai patêr, kai theoi polloi, theou paides, synarchontes theô. tauta kai o ellên legei, kai o barbaros legei, kai o êpeirôtês kai o thalattios, kai o sophos kai o asophos. kan epi tou ôkeanou elthês tas êionas, kakei theoi, tois men anischontes agchou mala, tois de katadyomenoi.]
  4. ↑ "Diogenes Laertius says of Pythagoras, that he charged his disciples not to give equal degrees of honour to the Gods and heroes. Herodotus (in Euterpe) says of the Greeks, That they worshiped Hercules two ways, one as an immortal deity, and so they sacrificed to him; and another as a Hero, and so they celebrated his memory. Isocrates (Encom. He- len. distinguishes between the honours of heroes and Gods, when he speaks of Menelaus and Helena. But the distinction is no where more fully expressed than in the Greek inscription upon the statue of Regilla, wife to Herodes Atticus, as Salmasius thinks, which was set up in his temple at Triopium, and taken from the statue itself by Sirmondus; where it is said, That she had neither the honour of a mortal nor yet that which was proper to the Gods. Ουδε ιερα θνη τοις, αταρ ουδε θεοισιν ομοια [Greek: Oude iera thêtois, atar oude theoisin omoia.] It seems by the inscription of Herodes, and by the testament of Epicteta, extant in Greek in the Collection of Inscriptions, that it was in the power of particular families to keep festival days in honour of some of their own family, and to give heroical honours to them. In that noble inscription at Venice, we find three days appointed every year to be kept, and a confraternity established for that purpose with the laws of it. The first day to be observed in honour of the Muses, and sacrifices to be offered to them as deities. The second and third days in honour of the heroes of the family; between which honour and that of deities, they showed the difference by the distance of time between them, and the preference given to the other. But whereinsoever the difference lay, that there was a distinction acknowledged among them appears by this passage of Valerius, in his excellent oration, extant in Dionysius Halicarnass. Antiq. Rom. lib. ii. p. 696. I call, says he, the Gods to witness, whose temples and altars our family has worshiped with common sacrifices; and next after them, I call the Genii of our ancestors, to whom we give δευτερας τιμας [Greek: deuteras timas], the second honours next to the Gods, (as Celsus calls those, τας προσηκουσας τιμας [Greek: tas prosêkousas timas], the due honours that belong to the lower dæmons.) From which we take notice, that the Heathens did not confound all degrees of divine worship, giving to the lowest object the same which they supposed to be due to the celestial deities, or the supreme God. So that if the distinction of divine worship will excuse from idolatry, the Heathens were not to blame for it." See Stillingfleet's Answer to a book entitled Catholics no Idolaters, p. 510, 513, &c.
  5. ↑ See the extracts from Plutarch, in which this is shown, in the Introduction to my translation of Proclus on the Theology of Plato.
  6. ↑ Answer to Catholics no Idolaters. Lond. 1676. p. 211
  7. ↑ Arrian. de Exped. Alex. 1. iv. et Curt. lib. viii.
  8. ↑ Vit. Artaxerx. Ælian. Var. Hist. lib. i. c. 21.
  9. ↑ Justin. lib. vi.
  10. ↑ Panegyr.
  11. ↑ Lib. vii.
  12. ↑ Lib. vi. cap. iii.
  13. ↑ Και κολασεως δε ειδος ειναι αθειαν ουκ απεικος. τους γαρ γνοντας θεους, και καταφρονησαντας, ευλογον εν ετερῳ βιῳ και της γνωσεως στερεσθαι, και τους εαυτων βασιλεας ως θεους τιμησαντας, εδει την δικην αυτων ποιησαι των θεων εκπεσειν. [Greek: Kai kolaseôs de eidos einai atheian ouk apeikos. tous gar gnontas theous, kai kataphronêsantas, eulogon en eterô biô kai tês gnôseôs zeresthai, kai tous eautôn basileas ôs theous timêsantas, edei tên dikên autôn poiêsai tôn theôn ekpesein.] Cap. xviii.
  14. ↑ (Greek characters)[Greek: kai chrê ton epi tas archas anabainonta zêtein, ei dunaton einai ti kreitton'tês ypotetheisês archês kan eurethê, palin ep ekeinou zêtein, eôs an eis tas akrotatas ennoias elthômen ôn ouketi semnoteras echomen kai mê zêsai tên anabasin. oude gar eulabêteon mê kenembatômen, meixona tina kai yperbainonta tas prôtas archas peri autôn ennoontes. ou gar dynaton'têlikouton pêdêma pêdêmai tas êmeteras ennoias, ôs parisôthênai tê axia tôn prôtôn archôn, ou legô kai yperptênai. mia gar autê pros theon anatasis arizê, kai ôs dynaton aptaizos. kai ôn ennoomen agathôn ta semnotata, kai agiôtata, kai prôtourga, kai onomata kai pragmata autô anatithentas eidenai bebaiôs, oti mêden anatetheikamen axion. arkei de êmin eis syngnômên, to mêden echein ekeinôn yperteron. Simplic. in Epict. Enchir. p. 207. Lond. 1670. 8vo.]
  15. ↑ Of the first principles, says Damascius in MS. (Greek characters) [Greek: peri archôn], the Egyptians said nothing, but celebrated it as a darkness beyond all intellectual conception, a thrice un- known darkness. (Greek characters)[Greek: Prôtên archên anymnêkasin, skotos yper pasan noêsin, skotos agnôzon tris toyto epiphêmixontes.]
  16. ↑ For farther particulars respecting this most extraordinary man, see the introduction to my translation of his Life of Pythagoras, and my History of the Restoration of the Platonic Theology.
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