Abstract
If we try to define a term like mystical experience or to understand the purpose of a cultic practice, we should engage in a very complex investigation. In a short paper like this, there is no possibility of providing a correct and detailed analysis of these questions, only some considerations can be presented concerning the nature and function of Hermetic cultic practices. Therefore, I will analyse a particular phenomenon in detail: the prayer (or as we read in a text, the hymn of praise), which plays a special and central role in the Hermetic mysteries, and what is more, in the cultic practice. In this context I define prayer as one of the main means in the process of communicating with the divine sphere. As it will be seen, the Hermetic prayer has a special structure, which is in connection with its goals. Iamblichus’ work about the mysteries provides some important aspects for disclosing this structure, so I will analyze not only the Hermetic but also the Iamblichean text.
When you pray you will find rest,
for you have left behind
the suffering and sickness of heart. (NHC II 7, 145, 10–12)
This essay was written with the assistance of the Hungarian Scientific Research Fund, project number OTKA K 101,503.
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Notes
- 1.
The function of Hermetic cultic practices has been a subject of debate for a long time. When the Hermetic texts first became a centre of interest, it was generally admitted that the texts were used for cultic performances by some religious groups. (For this interpretation see: Richard Reitzenstein: Poimandres . Teubner, 1907, Leipzig; Harold R. Willoughby: Pagan regeneration: a study of mystery initiations in the Graeco-Roman world. University of Chicago Press, 1929, Chicago.) After A-J. Festugière published his voluminous book (La révélation d’Hermès Trismégiste. Gabalda, 1950–1954, Paris), which influenced classical scholarship to a great extent, the general belief was that Hermetic prayers were only literary phenomena . The Nag Hammadi discovery brought about a turn in the research, because it became evident that, contrary to and despite Festugière’s research and viewpoint, the Hermetic texts were used in religious communities as well. See: J-P. Mahé: Hermés en haute-Egypte. Presses de l’Université Laval, 1978–1982, Quebec.
- 2.
De myst. VII. 4. 256. For the quotations I used the following edition: Iamblichus: On the Mysteries. Trans. Emma Clarke, John Dillon, Jackson P. Hershbell. Society of Biblical Literature, 2003. Atlanta.
- 3.
De myst. V. 4.
- 4.
CH. IV. 7.
- 5.
De myst. V. 8.
- 6.
Irenæus: Adv. haer. I, 21, 4.
- 7.
Kurt Rudolph: Gnosis. The Nature and History of Gnosticism. T.&T. Clark, 1984, Edinburgh. 220.
- 8.
De myst. V. 7.
- 9.
CH. I. 31.
- 10.
De myst. II. 11. 96–97.
- 11.
De myst. VII. 4. 255–256.
- 12.
CH. XIII. 16. See: Brian P. Copenhaver: Hermetica (The Greek Corpus Hermeticum and the Latin Asclepius in a new English translation, with notes and introduction). Cambridge University Press, 1992, Cambridge. 52–53.
- 13.
See: CH. XIII. 20: This praise that you have told, father, I have also established in my cosmos. – Say ‘in the intellectual cosmos,’ child. Cf: NHC. VI. 52, 1–63, 32.
- 14.
CH. XIII. 17.
- 15.
CH. XIII. 17–20.
- 16.
Simon Pulleyn: Prayer in Greek Religion. Clarendon Press, 1997, Oxford.
- 17.
About the function of prayer in ritual see: Fritz Graf, ‘Prayer in Magic and Religious Ritual’, in Christopher A. Faraone-Dirk Obbink (ed.), Magika Hiera. Ancient Greek magic and religio n. Oxford University Press, 1991, Oxford. 188–213.
- 18.
De myst. V. 26, 237–238.
- 19.
About the performativity of language in ritual practices see: Amina Kropp, ‘How does magical language work? The spells and formulae of the Latin defixionum tabellae’, in H. S. Versnel, D. Frankfurter and J. Hahn (eds.), Religions in the Graeco-Roman World. Brill, 2010, Leiden. 357–380. Frances Hickson Hahn, ‘Performing the Sacred: Prayers and Hymns’, in Jörg Rüpke (ed.), A Companion to Roman Religion. Blackwell, 2007, Oxford. 235–248.
- 20.
See: Anna Van den Kerchove: La voie d’Hermès. Pratiques rituelles et traités hermétiques. Leiden, 2012, Brill. 185–274.
- 21.
NHC VI, 6, 60. In: James M. Robinson (ed.): The Nag Hammadi Library in English. Leiden, 1996, Brill.
- 22.
The perfomer must open the cosmic spheres so that his prayer can get to God.
- 23.
The term was introduced to religious science (in the field of magic) by Tambiah, borrowing it from linguistic theories. So it is not a newly discovered conception, but it could be well applied to Hermetic texts as well. See: S. J. Tambiah: The Magical Power of Words. Man, Vol. 3. 1968. 175–208.
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Hamvas, E. (2017). Prayer as a drōmenon in the Hermetic Initiative Texts. In: Vassányi, M., Sepsi, E., Daróczi, A. (eds) The Immediacy of Mystical Experience in the European Tradition. Sophia Studies in Cross-cultural Philosophy of Traditions and Cultures, vol 18. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-45069-8_2
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