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I have been reading a translation of the Corpus Hermetica by David Myatt and in his footnotes he says that key words that have been used in past English translations have been incorrect. The issue being that words, such as Nous being translated as “Mind” have modern associations which are too far away from the original idea.
Some of the words he suggests as meanings which point to the original Greek meanings turn the Hermetica (and Greek philosophy) on its head and reveal how far we have fallen away from the original intent.
Nous is a hugely important word in the Hermetica and yet the word “mind” does not really do it justice. If you see it meaning mind you could be forgiven for thinking that the God of the Hermetica is a giant brain and we are all its imagination. Myatt points out that in the Hermetica sentences where Nous is rendered mind make no sense.
“What does a translation like “I am Poimandres the mind of sovereignty” actually mean? Is there a disembodied mind which calls itself Poimandres… does this have the power of human speech… something that has sovereignty (authority) in its mind?”
Myatt, who has a better vocabulary than me, suggests the word “perceiverance” instead. Perceiverance is an obsolete word (its use died out in the 17th century) which means perception or awareness. The Greeks saw it as that awareness you have when you are compelled towards a course of action. “I am Poimandres the mind of sovereignty” should be read “I am Poimandres the authentic perceiverance” I am not a big fan of using out-of-date words where simpler ones would do so I would read it as “I am Poimandres the true awareness or perception.”
But even if you don’t like the word perceiverance is onto something which changes the way you see the Nous and prevents you making the mistake of the Kybalion and saying that the Universe is Mind. In otherwords Hermes is I AM rather than I Think.
In my book Helios Unbound I equate the Nous to the Higher Genius so it being awareness or perception takes on a new meaning. God is not intelligence but awareness. The much abused “perception is everything” statement is true… only we are talking about divine perception and awareness rather than its human mimicry.
So what other words does Poimandres believe have failed the test of time?
Dianoias which is often rendered as intelligence, thought or thinking. But more accurately in classical times was more to do with understanding something correctly. Myatt thinks the word intuition is better. So, the first line of Poimandres describes a situation where the writer was concentrating on what was real and his intuition flowed freely. This makes more sense than my thoughts were flowing freely.
Myatt has come up with something, although I think he would be better looking to better English words rather than out-of-date English or in some cases German words to explain his points. The idea should be to make this information more accessible, however it did get me thinking which is the idea of the Hermetica.
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