The Corpus Hermeticum: Initiation Into Hermetics, The Hermetica Of Hermes Trismegistus Paperback – May 4, 2013

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The Corpus Hermeticum is a small collection of texts which are believed to originate from ancient Egypt, and from what I understand, is that the earliest known copies of this collection was written in Coptic. Whatever the story is up to this point, it was then translated into Latin in the 1400s by a scholarly Italian Catholic priest named Marsilio Ficino. George Robert Stowe Mead translated this into English in the year 1906 in the form of the second volume in his three volume set titled Thrice Greatest Hermes, and he was a historian and translator from England. So this book is an old translation of the Corpus Hermeticum and translated during a time when English writing style was seeing changes, so the writing is poorly constructed. The Corpus Hermeticum is an important part of Gnosticism, Theosophy, and in many other esoteric systems, so this book is a central piece for many groups of people. The book’s content is something like you would expect from the Christian Bible, people discussing life and spiritual matters in an archaic way.I had wanted a hardcopy of the Corpus Hermeticum and thought this low priced Mead translation seemed like a good choice but I thought this book was lacking. The print date shows August 18th 2019 yet there is no introduction, no background, and none of Mead’s footnotes. So it’s a little too little even for the little price, and that’s on top of the inherently poor translation. The reason I chose Mead is because I don’t know of any better translations. I have seen some suggested translations but then I find criticism of those as well, so Mead to me seems to be something of a standard and I am familiar with Mead from his other works. Brian Copenhaver’s translation probably is better but it costs more. If you want a minimalist copy of the Corpus Hermeticum, then the Pantianos Classics print of Mead’s translation might be for you. I didn’t care for this book that much though because I know it could have had more effort put into it.Effort leads me to the last point, the design and physical quality of the book. Undersized margins and poorly cropped back cover shows me that there was not much care put into the structure of the book. The materials are standard though, good paper, ink, and binding, printed using the Amazon print service. The font is good and text size is fairly large. So you have to pull the book apart so much to read near the spine. The spine doesn’t even have the book title written on it, it’s just a plain gray strip. Even though the book was under $7, this is still too much for what you’re getting. For $10, you can buy The Hermeticism Collection on Amazon that includes The Kybalion, Corpus Hermeticum, and the Teachings of Thoth, all in one book. I haven’t purchased that book but it looks potentially better.

So - I would consider myself pretty advanced spiritually. But this book left me scratching my head. I need the "Cliff's Notes." LOL - I have read the Emerald Tablets and the Book of Enoch with no problem. For some reason, I just could not get through this. Was it the writing style? I'm not sure. Because I know that there is a REASON the bible and many books of spiritual wisdom are written in parables. For me, this may be something I need to break down slowly to understand. Or I may find myself on the internet looking for a video to help explain it. From what I read, the heavy words could have equalled out to the same thing on about two pages. Learn the laws of Hermetics - in plain English if you can. It would be much easier.

Happiness is playing the drum in your own school band.And happiness is walking hand in hand.Happiness is two kinds of ice cream.Knowing a secret.Climbing a tree.Happiness is five different crayons.Catching a firefly.Setting him free.Happiness is being alone every now and then.And happiness is coming home again.Happiness is morning and evening,Daytime and night time too.For happiness is anyone and anything at allThat’s loved by you.Happiness is having a sister.Sharing a sandwich.Getting along.Happiness is singing together when day is through,And happiness is those who sing with you.Happiness is morning and evening,Daytime and nighttime too.For happiness is anyone and anything at allThat’s loved by you.

This is a nice deal for those wanting the Hermetic Corpus in a translation that is at least the best in the Public Domain (which means bombastic Victorian English, so be aware). However only the first 13 tractates are included here, and most awkwardly of all, the introduction talks about The Perfect Sermon to Asclepius being included, but it ISN'T. There are no footnotes either. Even the commentary is not original work, but is copy-pasted from Gnosis.org.Be very suspicious when buying an Amazon CreateSpace book: because the person behind it has no obligation or overhead to keep him in line, expect less polish in general. This was mostly a simple copy-paste job, so it is odd that he chose not to copy and paste the remaining tractates.

This book is hard to understand depending on your ability to understand deep spiritual concepts, some people read the books that Th.o.t.h. wrote when he was Hermes and read the words but have absolutely no idea as to what the heck they just read. In fact, his writings convey. truth to the reader on several different spiritual levels. It may mean one thing to you now, but if you read say 2 years from now and have grown spiritually it would take on a much deeper and rich level of truth. I highly recommend anyone to at least try to read and understand.

Not for the beginner. There must be a previous book as a preparation. Or some follow up. " Let those who have ears, hear." I have no ears even after 40 years of searching. Not looking forward to my reincarnation....

As an alternative to more recent interpretations of the existential philosophies that influenced the onset of Christianity, I found this book's content beyond fascinating. If you enjoy reading religious philosophy for your own understanding and not for adherence to any particular (usually narrow) interpretations, this book is for you.Unless the narrow interpretation you're looking to reinforce is Gnosticism, which case this book is still for you.Short, sweet, worth the money.

For the price can’t complain too much, however the cover is absolutely terrible. The resolution of the print is something that would be acceptable in the 1980’s , you can see the pixels and is not properly aligned.The font is quite big so that makes an easy read even late in the evening and the materials are quite cheap as you can smell the chemicals.

Fantastic condition. Clear and concise. A read for those interested. It is in the original language so you have to have the mind set to understand it. Of course its an alternative philosophy.

A difficult subject for me. But the book is exactly as expected. Speedy delivery, everything as expected. It is now up to me to understand its concepts!

the style of writing can be a little confusing, however if you're into this kind of thing you'll be ok.

Great book but misses the four last sections of the book, do not buy.