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Alchemy! 12/Sept/2023

SOURCES

[1]: The Alchemical Choir: A History of Alchemy by P.G. Maxwell-Stuart

[2]: The Cambridge Core Alchemy Reader by Stanton J. Linden

C.T. KELLY’S SPEEDRUN GUIDE TO ALCHEMY V1.0 BETA

WHAT EVEN IS ALCHEMY?

Tat: “O pop-history esoterica blogger, what is Alchemy?”

C.T: “My student, alchemy can be neatly summed up as “proto-chemistry.” For most of history there have been people like yourself, those who wonder what the world is made of, how it fits together, and what are the rules that govern its transformations. These days, the people who study these questions are called chemists, but before there were chemists, there were alchemists.”

Tat: “So what’s the difference? What does a chemist have that an alchemist does not?”

C.T.: “The answer is roughly 1,700 years of accumulated knowledge and writing. Chemistry was built from the works of the alchemists.”

Tat: “Ah! So it is like how astronomy arose from astrology?”

C.T.: “Not quite. For astronomers and astrologers both still exist. Alchemy became chemistry. There are no more alchemists. Or, attempting to practice alchemy today, would simply be practicing chemistry.”

Tat: “But what about spiritual alchemy? Were alchemists not magicians?”

C.T.: “My student, there were thousands of alchemists throughout history, from dozens of time periods and cultures. Some were indeed mystics and magicians, but they were generally outliers. The vast majority of alchemists were more akin to glass-blowers and blacksmiths than oracles and magicians.”

Tat: “But alchemical writing speaks so much of gods and divinity!”

C.T.: “Many texts do! Many cartographers from history used elaborate biblical metaphors to describe their work, but you don’t see modern scholars claiming all medieval mapmakers were secretly mystics. The bible was something many were familiar with. Using biblical metaphors to explain complicated processes is simply good technical writing.”

Tat: “But, if most alchemists were not magicians or mystics, why discuss alchemy in this text? Isn’t this book about magic?”

C.T.: “Because few things have been more influential on western magical literature. Even entirely mundane, non-magical alchemical works are wondrously evocative. Even now, alchemical literature has a way of seizing the imagination. Many texts are literally occluded, written in code to protect the alchemists work. Even when alchemical literature is non-magical, it is deeply esoteric.”

Tat: “Why are they written that way?”

C.T. “To protect trade secrets! What if you discovered a new way to make stronger armor, or sharper swords? That information must be recorded, but it also cannot fall into enemy hands. Many alchemists protected their discoveries with intentionally complex metaphorical language that could only be understood by those with the required knowledge. This also makes them extremely difficult to translate into other languages!”

Tat: “I see! But how did it end? Chemistry is no longer discussed with esoteric metaphors, what changed?”

C.T. “It was a gradual change that took place over generations. But for the purposes of time, this text will consider the First Alchemist to be Maria Hebrea, and the Last Alchemist to be Sir Issac Newton.”

Tat: “But what about the alchemist-mystics? Will this text discuss them?”

C.T. “Indeed, my student. We will be discussing them at length.”

MARIA HEBREA, THE FIRST ALCHEMIST - 1 page

Alchemical history begins on the north shore of Egypt, in the city of Alexandria, with a Jewish woman named Maria.

It is around the 1st century A.D. Most alchemy in Egypt is heavily tied to the House of Life, the state temple system. Color was important to Egyptian religion. When one was building a statue of the gods, it was important to get the color just so. So, where later alchemists were concerned with the transformation of one metal into another, Egyptian alchemists were primarily concerned with the coloration of metal. The temple system was also effectively the government. This meant alchemical trade secrets were also state secrets.

The House of Life alchemists weren’t the only game in town. Alexandria also had a thriving Jewish quarter. Here, Maria likely would have worked with a guild associated with a local synagogue. Where the House of Life alchemists would have enjoyed state support, the Jewish alchemists likely needed to drive sales with entrepreneurship and innovation. Maria was one such innovator. She is credited with inventing several alchemical devices, as well as with laying out many of the foundational concepts of western alchemy itself.

The Tribikos: A type of alembic with three “arms” used to distill substances and collect their vapors.

The Kerotakis: When used properly, this device creates an airtight seal in which substances are continually distilled, congealed, and distilled again. This “circulation” process of purification is often depicted as an ouroboros, a serpent eating its own tail, which itself became a central image of alchemy. (for those familiar with chemistry, the kerotakis is essentially a Soxhlet extractor.)

The Bain Marie: If you’ve ever wondered who the “Marie” in “Bain Marie” was, here you go. What we now know of as the double boiler was used extensively by alchemists throughout the years when gentle heat was needed.

Let’s say you want to make a philosophers stone. Maria argued that the fundamental method was a process of distillation, sublimation, rectification.

The Inversion of Nature: To volatilize the fixed, and fix the volatile. Or, to make the solid into fluid, and to make the fluid into solids. This allows the alchemist to break apart substances into their constituent parts.

The Union of Opposites:

First and foremost, is the Axiom of Maria: “One becomes two, two becomes three, and out of the third comes the one as the fourth.” This describes the process of splitting a substance into its constituent parts so that it may be recombined into a new form.

THE PHILOSOPHERS STONE

Chrysopoeia! Is an ancient greek term that literally means “the production of gold.” It is the long term goal of every alchemist. Sure, some may have wished to produce acids capable of melting anything, or new and powerful furnaces, or divine mystical wisdom, but these were just side projects. The Holy Grail of alchemy was always chrysopoeia.

Its the second century. You’re an alchemist in the city of Alexandria. Let’s say a traveler from across the mediterranean has stopped by. They ask you “Can you really transmute metals into gold?” Your answer is of course! You’ve seen it happen! Transmutation happens by accident all the time! You’ve seen miners accidentally drop their steel tools into a vat of molten copper sulfide, and pull them out completely transmuted into copper! (Dropping steel into molten copper sulfide will give the appearance that the metal has actually transformed into copper.) So all alchemists had to do was find the right mixture of acids and metal baths to turn base metals into gold. Easy as pie.

That theoretical mixture of base metals came to be known as the Philosophers Stone. It assumed a number of mythological powers from curing disease to prolonging life, (but never immortality here in the west, eternal life is a sin.) While no alchemists ever figured out how to make a philosopher's stone, many of them tried. And we owe modern chemistry to their efforts!

CLEOPATRA THE ALCHEMIST

Not that Cleopatra. This is a different Cleopatra. Our cleopatra was probably writing some time around the 3rd to 4th centuries.

ZOSIMOS

THE EMERALD TABLET

The legend goes that someone, be it Apollonius of Tyanna, or Alexander the Great, or occasionally even the biblical figure Sarah, discovered a tomb. Sometimes the tomb is near the Palestinian city of Hebron, sometimes its not. Inside the tomb was the skeleton of legendary sage Hermes Trismegistus, and clutched in his arms was a mysterious tablet made of pure emerald. Inscribed in an ancient language, sometimes Aramaic, sometimes Phonecian, was a poem that contained all of his earthly and divine wisdom.

Before we can discuss what we know about the Emerald Tablet, we must discuss its mangled and mysterious textual history. There is no emerald tablet. Or, more accurately, there is no singular emerald tablet. The likely earliest edition comes from the Kitab Sirr Al-Khaliqa, The Book of the Secrets of Creation, a 9th century text ascribed to Apolonius of Tyanna. The Arabic form of the tablet claims to be a translation from Syriac, which itself was a translation from classical Greek. This claim is considerably debated. Partially, because there are two more Arabic translations from the same period, which differ significantly. One from the Secretum Secretorum, and another from the Jabirian corpus, which is notably shorter and corrupt.

Generally, when you translate an alchemical text from Greek to Arabic, your translation will have words associated with the Greek terminology. What all these Arabic emerald tablets have in common, is a lack of Greek alchemical terms. So while they are likely based on an earlier text, their origins are firmly in the Arabic world, most likely the Isma’ili esoteric circles. This goes even further. Europe knows the tablet via the Latin translation of the Secretum Secretorum, the most corrupt Arabic original. This formed the basis for centuries of dead-end attempts at decoding by western esotericists.

So! We have no idea what the tablet means! Why are we talking about it?

What the tablet was interpreted to mean had a significant effect on occult history. Isma’ili Shia esotericists treated Trismegistus as a pseudo-prophetic figure who revealed knowledge in the form of scientific literacy. This also paralleled him with Idris, the Islamic parallel for Enoch, who ascended up to heaven to become an Angel. The Isma’ili helped to develop interpretations of Hermetic literature from a more mystical, gnostic transcendence angle.

THE EMERALD TABLET - NOTES

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qa4woIz_Ag&list=PLZ__PGORcBKxjPgYQaK1DEi5TmPQVP9xC&index=5&ab_channel=ESOTERICA

MARIA HEBREA / MIRRIAM OF ALEXANDRIA NOTES

SOURCES: Patai - The Jewish Alchemists

Raphael Patai - The Jewish Alchemists

Haeffner, Mark. The Dictionary of Alchemy: From Maria Prophetissa to Isaac Newton. The Aquarian Press, London, 1991. ISBN 1-85538-085-4

HERMES TRISMEGISTUS - 1 page

THE EMERALD TABLET - 1 page

ANCIENT GREEK ALCHEMY - 1-2 pages

CLEOPATRA THE ALCHEMIST - 1 page

ZOSIMOS OF PANOPOLI1S - 1-2 pages

NOTES:

HERMES TRISMEGISTUS

PLATO

ARISTOTLE

PSEUDO-DEMOCRITUS (First or second century AD)

CLEOPATRA THE ALCHEMIST (First or second century AD)

UNKNOWN - THE LEYDEN PAPYRUS X AND THE STOCKHOLM PAPYRUS (Late 3rd century)

ZOSIMOS OF PANOPOLIS (300 ad)

STEPHANOS OF ALEXANDRIA (First half the of the 7th century)

ANONYMOUS - 8th or 9th century AD

KHALID IBN YAZID - 635–c. 704

JABIR IBN HAYYAN / PESUDO-GEBER (8th century)

AVICENNA (c. 980–1037)

ALBERTUS MAGNUS - 1193? or 1206?–1280

When pure red sulphur comes into contact with quicksilver in the earth, gold is made in a short or long time, either through the persistence [of the contact] or through decoction of the nature subservient to them. When pure and white sulphur comes into contact with quicksilver in pure earth, then silver is made, which differs from gold in this, that sulphur in gold will be red, whereas in silver it will be white. When, on the other hand, red sulphur, corrupt and burning, comes into contact with quicksilver in the earth, then copper is made, and it does not differ from gold except in this, that in gold it was not corrupt, but here [in copper] it is corrupt. When white sulphur, corrupt and burning, comes into contact with quicksilver in the earth, tin is made, [as is indicated from the fact that] it crackles between the teeth 3 and quickly liquefies, which happens because the quicksilver was not well mixed with the sulphur. When white sulphur, corrupt and burning, comes into contact with quicksilver in foetid earth, iron is made. When sulphur, black and corrupt, comes into contact with quicksilver, lead is made. Aristotle says of this that lead is leprous gold.

Turba Philosophorum?? Where is that?

ROGER BACON (c. 1219–c. 1292)

NICHOLAS FLAMEL 1330 - 1417

BERNARD, ERL OF TREVISAN - late 14th century

PARACELSUS (1493–1541)

FRANCIS ANTHONY (1550–1603)

MICHAEL SEDIVOGIUS - 1566–1636 or 1646

NOTES: DR. SLEDGE FIA LECTURE ON ALCHEMY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgP983eCRfM&ab_channel=ESOTERICA

Two big misconceptions about alchemy:

Alchemy was proto-experimental-science. Its also not JUST about physical transformation. The idea that something could be studied in isolation would have been unthinkable to Alchemists. They weren’t just looking at a single transformation, but the whole of nature, the mind, god, etc. Thoughts, symbols, plants, animals, the stars, are all connected. It is a holistic theory of everything. The transformation was the most important part.

What was Alchemy?

Alchemy is SEVERAL theories of nature around the Creation and Transformation of substances.

Medieval people were worried about alchemists in the same way that we are worried about modern scientists “playing god”.

The production of a universal solvent, a substance that dissolves everything. This was called the Alkahest.

The idea that you can take a chemical to suppress a cold, to take something from the outside to balance the inside, comes directly from the alchemical tradition.

For many alchemists, you had to be morally righteous to transform the world. Can does not mean Should.

PRACTICAL + THEORETICAL

PRACTICAL KNOWLEDGE, COMBINED WITH THEORY, DEFINES A SYSTEMATIC PROGRAM FOR EXPLORING REALITY ITSELF

THE ALEXANDRIANS

THE ISLAMIC WORLD

Its really the islamicate world where Alchemy really hits stride. Many alchemy words are arabic

THE MEDIEVAL ERA

THE GOLDEN AGE OF ALCHEMY

THE THEORY OF ALCHEMY

The Islamic world expands upon this

So what the alchemist is trying to do, is recreate these circumstances.

Simple 12 step program:

The idea being that you can transform one metal into another metal. There was good experimental evidence for this theory. If you take a bath of molten copper sulfate, and drop steel iron into it, it looks like it transforms into copper. Miners noticed this for a long time.

This 12 step theory could be verified with color changes. It would go from Black, to Whtie, to Yellow, and finally to Red.

Immortality was HUGE in chinese alchemy, but NEVER in western alchemy. Thats a sin.

The exact starting substance is extremely varied. As are the symbolic representations.

FROM ALCHEMY TO CHEMISTRY

ENTREPRENEURIAL ALCHEMY

CULTURAL HISTORY OF ALCHEMY

According to the Embalming Ritual (Papyrus Boulaq 3 and Papyrus Louvre,

inv. no. 5158), the ceremonialist calls out the names, as if they were fully-fledged

beings, of oils, substances of mineral origin (metals, precious minerals, and

bitumen), and even chemicals (natron, orpiment, earths, and dyes), which came

from Egypt or foreign countries, all attested to in the liturgical preparations,

to regenerate and exalt dead bodies with the example of divine personalities

through a mimesis (Goyon 1972: 17–84).

In the Greco-Roman period, the funerary use of the First and Second Books

of Breathings spread (Goyon 1972: 183–317). The first book announces

characteristics of hermeticism (Quaegebeur 1995). The second, more traditional

book reminds one of a characteristic of the Embalming Ritual (cf. supra): the

ceremonialist in charge gathers the necessary products to ensure the deification

of the body.

Expressions like “chemical element” or “chemical reaction,” at least in their

modern meanings and formalizations, are alien to ancient classical philosophy

and science. However, Greek and Latin authors certainly made various attempts

to describe, conceptualize, and explain the material transformations that they

experienced in the natural world.

Byzantine alchemical collections do include the names of Plato and Aristotle in

the lists of the fathers of alchemy, which are handed down in Greek manuscripts

(CAAG II 25–6). In his commentary on Zosimos’ (lost) work On the Action,

Olympiodorus – perhaps to be identified with the writer of that name who was

a Neoplatonic commentator of Aristotelian works (Viano 2006: 199–206) –

draws a close comparison between early Greek philosophers and the fathers

of alchemy, namely Hermes, Chymes, Agathodaimon, and Zosimos

In Olympiodorus’ doxographical section (see above), the name of

Democritus is missing. On the other hand, Democritus is mentioned throughout

Olympiodorus’ commentary (as well as in almost every Greek and Byzantine

alchemical work), not as the founder of atomism, but as the author of four

pseudo-epigraphical books on alchemical dyeing that date back to the first

century ce (Martelli 2013). [huh, weird?]

Democritus’ name seems to have been used by this writer

because of the atomist’s expertise across several arts or technai (Martelli 2013:

34–6), as emerges, for instance, from the portrait given by Petronius (Sat. 88):

“Democritus extracted the juice of every plant on earth, and spent his whole

life in experiments to discover the virtues of stones and twigs” (Democritus, fr.

B300,6 DK; transl. by Heseltine 1913: 173).

According to Democritus,

infinite and eternal atoms, which differ in shape and size and move and combine

in an empty space (the void), are the ultimate constituents of the natural world.

Atoms of the same kind tend to congregate, thus forming various materials,

from the sea to earthy substances, such as salt, soda, alum, and bitumen (fr.

A99a DK). Moreover, the philosopher speculates on the atomic composition

of metals. Iron is lighter than lead because it contains more void, while its

atoms are densely packed in specific areas; lead, on the contrary, is formed of

atoms more regularly arranged (Theophr. Sens. 62 = fr. A135 DK; see Halleux

1974: 74–6).

*****A complete system of four elements – earth, water, air, and fire – recognized

as the fundamental constituents of the natural world was fully developed by

Empedocles (fifth century Bce), who used the term “roots” (or, sometimes,

the names of Olympian gods) to refer to these elements.

If early Ionian

philosophers identified a single dynamic substance with the cosmic principle

(archē) undergoing cyclic transformations, Empedocles “posits a plurality of

substances of fixed natures that interact in different proportions to produce

mixed substances” (Graham 1999: 165). These substances (i.e. the elements),

eternal and unalterable, are mixed together and separated by two opposite

cosmic forces, LOVE and STRIFE, whose work is often assimilated by Empedocles

to the work of craftsmen (Wright 1981: 39).

In Empedocles’ opinion, the soft

seeds of both parents, when mixed together, become hard, because the hollows

in each fit into the densities of the other. The hardness of tin-copper alloys was

explained in the same way: while the two metals are soft, their “mixture” is

hard, presumably because the structures of copper and tin allow them to fit one

into the other in tight juxtaposition (Halleux 1974: 69–70).

While Empedocles referred to the four elements as “roots,” one of the

earliest occurrences of the term stoicheion (στοιχεῖον, lit. “letter”) as “element”

appears in Plato’s Timaeus. In this cosmological account – a “likely account”

(eikos mythos/logos), as the philosopher defines his argument in the dialogue

(29d; 30b) – each of the four elements has the shape of a geometric figure

(or solid) whose main components are right-angled triangles: fire-tetrahedron;

air-octahedron; water-icosahedron; earth-cube.

Even though the elements of a mixis react to give rise to a new homogeneous

substance, they remain present in potentia; that is, they can be still detected

if the substance is properly analyzed. This analysis is the central object of the

fourth book of Metereology, in which Aristotle discusses the composition of

homogeneous bodies by describing eighteen pairs of opposite transformations

(or affections) that they can or cannot undergo.

As Düring

(1944: 10) points out, “one of the chemical principles laid down by Aristotle

was undisputed until some twenty years ago, namely the theory formulated

in the words corpora non agunt nisi liquida. Only in 1925 did Arvid Hedvall

succeed in proving that solid bodies also were capable of chemical reactions.”

The reactivity of liquids was also stressed by various Greco-Egyptian alchemists:

natural substances, when dissolved, produce wonderful transformations,

as Pseudo-Democritus claims (Martelli 2013: 94–5)

Huh, they literally didn’t think that solids could chemically react

Aristotle deals with metals and minerals at the end of his third book

of Meteorology (III 6, 378a–b), where he provides a sketchy account on

metallogenesis. Here, in order to explain the blending of the elemental

constituents of minerals, Aristotle refers to the mixture of two kinds of

exhalations: (a) smoky–dry exhalations and (b) vaporous–moist exhalations

(Eichholz 1949; Halleux 1974: 98–105; Wilson 2013: 271–7). Vaporous–

moist exhalations are trapped inside dry rocks and solidify (probably because of

the cold), thus condensing into substances called ta metalleuta, that is, “metals”

in this context (Aristotle lists iron, gold, and copper as examples of metalleuta;

see Halleux 1974: 35–44)

CONCLUSION TO THE SECTION

n the Egyptian civilization, precious

stones and minerals were not just valuable commodities, but were believed to be

material manifestations of the presence of gods. For this reason, their treatment

was included in religious rites that were carried out under strict control of the

clergy. The Egyptian classification of stones and metals depended on the nature of

the gods from which they stemmed. The mythological origins of these materials

exalted their value well beyond the world of the living. The funerary adornment

of the pharaohs, the rite of embalming, and other complex religious rites endowed

these precious materials with the properties of regenerating the dead.

The natural philosophies conceived by the Greek and Roman authors

created a theoretical framework that was partially independent of the

mythological and metaphysical assumptions of previous civilizations. Some of

the most successful concepts, however, embodied earlier ideas. Empedocles’

theory of the four elements and Pseudo-Democritus’ view on the sympathies

existing among substances echoed ideas and concepts that had been circulating

in Egypt for a long time. On the other hand, by exploring the ideas that

matter could be constituted of atoms (Democritus), of solid geometric forms

(Plato), or of ever-changing combinations (Aristotle), the Greek philosophers

presented new chemical theories that were at the basis of a classification of

metals and stones destined to be absorbed, discussed, and developed by the

Byzantine alchemists.

HANEGRAAFF ON ALCHEMY: (Starts 12)

Things that are wrong about most alchemical scholarship according to Hanegraaf:

“Many alchemists, for example, were interested predominantly in bringing about metallic transmutation, generally by means of the Philosophers’ Stone. Others, like → Paracelsus or Alexander von Suchten, downplayed this aspect of alchemy in favor of medicinal applications. Some emphasized productive processes of all sorts – distillation, refining, salt or pigment manufacture, etc. – along the lines of an early chemical industry. Some emphasized the theological implications of alchemical work, while others ignored this dimension entirely.” (13)

Many writers and practitioners pursued several or even all of these goals, and this brief catalogue does not even mention the important intersections of alchemy over its long history with fine art, theatre, literature, religion, political and social movements, and many other areas of culture and society.

“The idea of a monolithic, constant, and ancient “tradition” within alchemy received a boost from the development of the spiritual interpretation of alchemy in the 19th century. A key event here was the publication of Mary Anne Atwood’s Suggestive Inquiry into the Hermetic Mystery (1850). Atwood reduced all “true” alchemy to a quest for spiritual elevation operating through Mesmeric trances, the knowledge of which, along with → animal magnetism, she believed to be a secret tradition dating back at least to the ancient Greeks.” (13)

“There is no evidence that a majority, or even a significant fraction of pre-18th century European alchemical writers and practitioners saw their work as anything other than natural philosophical in character,” (13)

”It is important to clarify the distinction between 19th century occultist views of a self-transformative “spiritual” alchemy and the actual religious dimensions of pre-18th century alchemy.” (14) THANK YOU

“In the first place, there is now no question that the vast majority of early modern alchemists were deeply involved in practical pursuits, which they carried out and interpreted with clear-headed, conscious thought.” (14) JUNG WAS A BITCH

Basically, because alchemy was seen as spiritual or psychological mumbojumbo, it was denied a place in real scholarship except maybe as a counterexample. Alchemy was portrayed as the backward counterpart to the enlightenment of science, despite the fact that before 1800, there was no difference between chemistry and alchemy.

“Second, a closer, more contextualized study of individual alchemists has shown not only the inadequate – indeed, sometimes caricatured – portrayals of them current in the secondary literature, but also the significant contributions which alchemy has brought to the development of early modern science” (14) OH THATS A GOOD POINT. (even contemporary secondary literature about alchemists paints them as fantastical, nigh-mystical figures, the mad scientists of their day. This makes properly contextualizing them even more difficult, as many were mythologized during their own lives.)

“For example, alchemy brought forth such principles as an emphasis on the determination and conservation of weight in chemical processes, well-developed and explanatory particulate matter theories, analysis and synthesis as tools for understanding nature, the power of human artifice to create new or improved products over natural ones, and perhaps even the notions of force key to Newton’s physics.”

“Yet until about the end of the 17th century, the terms alchemy and chemistry were used largely interchangeably, and did not carry their modern definitions and distinctions.” (15)


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