User:Bari' bin Farangi/sandbox

Not to be confused with the Emerald Tablets of Thoth the Atlantean, the work of 20th-century occultist Maurice Doreal.

The Emerald Tablet, also known as the Smaragdine Table or the Tabula Smaragdina, is a compact and cryptic text traditionally attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus. The earliest known versions appear in three Arabic recensions preserved in mystical and alchemical treatises between the 8th and 10th centuries CE—chiefly the Secret of Creation (Arabic: سر الخليقة, romanized: Sirr al-Khalīqa) and the Secret of Secrets (سرّ الأسرار, Sirr al-Asrār).

From the 12th century onward, Latin translations—most notably the widespread so called vulgate—introduced the text to Europe, where it attracted great scholarly interest. Mediaeval commentators such as Hortulanus interpreted it as a "foundational text" of alchemical instructions for producing the philosopher's stone and making gold. During the Renaissance, interpreters increasingly read the text through Neoplatonic, allegorical, and Christian lenses; and printers often paired it with an emblem that came to be regarded as a visual representation of the Tablet itself.

Following the 20th-century rediscovery of Arabic sources by Julius Ruska and Eric Holmyard, modern scholars continue to debate its origins. They agree that the Secret of Creation, the Tablet's earliest source and its likely original context, is either wholly or at least partly compiled from earlier Greek or Syriac materials. The Tablet remains influential in esotericism and occultism where the phrase as above, so below, a paraphrase of its second verse, has become a popular maxim. It has also been taken up by Jungian psychologists, artists, and figures of pop culture, cementing its status as one of the best-known Hermetica.

Tis true without lying, certain and most true. That which is below is like that which is above and that which is above is like that which is below to do the miracle of one only thing. And as all things have been and arose from one by the mediation of one: so all things have their birth from this one thing by adaptation. The Sun is its father, the moon its mother, the wind hath carried it in its belly, the earth is its nurse. The father of all perfection in the whole world is here. Its force or power is entire if it be converted into earth. Separate thou the earth from the fire, the subtle from the gross sweetly with great industry. It ascends from the earth to the heaven and again it descends to the earth and receives the force of things superior and inferior. By this means you shall have the glory of the whole world and thereby all obscurity shall fly from you. Its force is above all force, for it vanquishes every subtle thing and penetrates every solid thing. So was the world created. From this are and do come admirable adaptations where of the means is here in this. Hence I am called Hermes Trismegist, having the three parts of the philosophy of the whole world. That which I have said of the operation of the Sun is accomplished and ended.

— English translation of the Emerald Tablet by Isaac Newton.

Background and early Arabic versions

Beginning from the first century BC onwards, Greek texts attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth, appeared in Greco-Roman Egypt. These texts, known as the Hermetica, are a heterogeneous collection of works that in the modern day are commonly subdivided into two groups: the technical Hermetica, comprising astrological, medico-botanical, alchemical, and magical writings; and the religio-philosophical Hermetica, comprising mystical-philosophical writings.

These Greek pseudepigraphal texts found receptions, translations, and imitations in Latin, Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, and Middle Persian prior to the emergence of Islam and the Arab conquests in the 630s. These conquests brought about various Arabic-speaking empires in which a new group of Arabic-speaking intellectuals emerged. These scholars received and translated the aforementioned wealth of texts and also began producing Hermetica of their own. Until the early twentieth century, only Latin versions of the Emerald Tablet were known in the Western world, with the oldest dating back to the twelfth century. The older Arabic versions were rediscovered by Eric John Holmyard and Julius Ruska.

Arabic text of the Emerald Tablet as written on the final folio of the Book of the Secret of Creation (man. Paris, Arabe  2300).

The Emerald Tablet has been found in various ancient Arabic works in different versions. Like most other works attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, the Emerald Tablet is very hard to date with any precision, but it is generally considered to belong to the late antique period (between c. 200 and c. 800). The oldest version is found as an appendix in an encyclopaedic treatise on natural philosophy believed to have been compiled in Arabic in the late eighth or early ninth century. It is known as the Book of the Secret of Creation. Although no Greek or Syriac manuscript has been found, some scholars consider it plausible that this work is a translation of a much older Greek or Syriac original. At the same time others think it is more likely that it was an original Arabic composition based on older materials. The Arabic text presents itself as a translation of a work by Apollonius of Tyana. The pseudepigraphal attribution to Apollonius is common in mediaeval Arabic texts on magic, astrology, and alchemy.

Nineteenth-century Arabic text of the Emerald Tablet and part of its frame story in the Book of the Secret of Creation. (man. Tehran, Majles Library, 14456/IR1526).

The introduction to the Book of the Secret of Creation presents a narrative that outlines key philosophical and alchemical ideas. It explains that all things are composed of four elemental qualities—heat, cold, moisture, and dryness—drawn from Aristotelian theory. These elements and their combinations are said to determine the sympathetic or antagonistic relationships between beings. In the frame story, Balīnūs, a legendary figure known as the Master of Talismans, discovers a crypt beneath a statue of Hermes Trismegistus. Inside, he finds a tablet made of emerald, held by an old man seated with a book. The central part of the text is an alchemical treatise, notable for introducing—for the first time—the theory that all metals are formed from two basic substances: sulphur and mercury. This concept later became a foundational idea in mediaeval alchemy. Emerald is the stone traditionally associated with Hermes, while quicksilver is his metal and Mercury his planet. Mars is associated with red stones and iron, and Saturn is associated with black stones and lead. In antiquity, Greeks and Egyptians referred to various green-coloured minerals (green jasper and even green granite) as emerald, and in the Middle Ages, this also applied to objects made of coloured glass, such as the "Emerald Tablet" of the Visigothic kings or the Sacro Catino of Genoa. The text of the Emerald Tablet appears as an appendix. It has long been debated whether it is an extraneous piece, solely cosmogonic in nature, or whether it is an integral part of the rest of the work, in which case it would have had an alchemical significance from the outset. It has been suggested that the Emerald Tablet was originally a text of talismanic magic that was only later understood as being alchemical in nature.

This version of the Emerald Tablet is also found in the Second Book of the Element of the Foundation, attributed to the eighth-century alchemist Jabir ibn Hayyan.

Arabic text of the Emerald Tablet from a 1627 Secret of Secrets (man. Paris, Arabe 2417).

Another text of the Emerald Tablet is found towards the end of the Secret of Secrets from the tenth century. This entire treatise is framed as a pseudepigraphal letter from Aristotle to Alexander the Great during the latter's conquest of Persia and is introduced via a number of letters between the two. It discusses politics, morality, physiognomy, astrology, alchemy, medicine, and more. Similarly, an Arabic treatise called the Book of the Silvery Water and the Starry Earth by Ibn Umayl reproduces a version of the Emerald Tablet. This treatise was translated to Latin with as Latin: Tabula Chemica, lit. 'Chemical Tablet'. In this version of the story, a stone table rests on the knees of Hermes Trismegistus in the secret chamber of a pyramid. This table is inscribed with Arabic: بيرباوي, romanized: bīrbāwī, lit. 'hieroglyphic' writing.

Fourteenth-century depiction of Ibn Umayl's discovery story in a pyramid from manuscript Book of the Silvery Water and the Starry Earth. (man. Topkapı Palace Library, man. Ahmet III 2075).

The literary theme of the discovery of Hermes' hidden wisdom can be found in other Arabic texts from around the tenth century. For example, at the beginning of the Book of Crates. In the narrative a Greek philosopher named Crates is praying in the Temple Sarapieion. While in prayer he has a vision of the ancient sage. It reads:

"Then I saw an old man, the most beautiful of men, seated on a chair. He was dressed in white garments and held in his hand a board attached to the chair, upon which rested a book. Before him were wondrous vessels, the most marvellous I had ever seen. When I asked who this old man was, I was told: He is Hermes Trismegistus, and the book before him is one of those that contain the explanation of the secrets he concealed from humankind."

Arabic textual witness

Secret of Creation

The earliest known version of the Emerald Tablet—found in the eighth- to ninth-century Book of the Secret of Creation and the Craft of Nature by pseudo-Apollonius of Tyana—reads as follows:

حقٌّ لا شكَّ فيه صَحيح،
إنّ الأعلى من الأسفل والأسفل من الأعلى،
عمل العجائب من واحد كما كانت الأشياء كلّها من واحد بتدبير واحد،
أبوه الشمس، أُمّه القمر،
حملته الريح في بطنها، غذته الأرض،
أبو الطِّلسمات، خازن العجائب، كامل القوى،
نار صارت أرضاً ٱعزِل الأرض من النار،
اللطيف أكرم من الغليظ،
برِفق وحُكم يصعد من الأرض إلى السماء وينزل إلى الأرض من السماء،
وفيه قُوّة الأعلى والأسفل،
لأنّ معه نور الأنوار فلذلك تهرب منه الظُّلمة،
قُوّة القوى
يغلب كلّ شيء لطيف، يدخل في كلّ شيء غليظ،
على تكوين العالَم الأكبر تكوّن العمل،
فهذا فَخْرِي ولذلك سُمّيتُ هرمس المثلَّث بالحكمة.

(a) truth; no doubt [it] is true
indeed, the uppermost is from the lowermost and the lowermost is from the uppermost,
[it] worked the wonders from one, (just) as all things come from one by means of one plan/with one considered act,
[its] father is the sun, [its] mother is the moon,
the wind carried [it] in her womb, the earth fed [it],
father of talismans, keeper of wonders, perfect in power,
fire became earth, separate the earth from the fire,
the soft/delicate/gentle/subtle is more noble than the crude/rough/unintelligent/gross,
with gentle-being and wisdom [it] ascends from the earth to the heaven and descends to the earth from the heaven,
and in [it] is the power of the uppermost and the lowermost,
since with [it] is the light of lights therefore the darkness escapes (away) from [it],
power of powers
it prevails over everything soft/delicate/gentle/subtle, enters into everything crude/rough/unintelligent/gross,
against the creation of the macrocosm the work was created,
this is my renown and therefore I am named Hermes the threefold with the wisdom.

—Weisser 1979, pp. 524–525. —literal translation; multiple possible meanings have been given in italic; since Arabic only has two grammatical genders and the translated pronoun is grammatically male, [it/its] can also be translated as [he/his/him].

Second Book of the Element of the Foundation

A shorter version is quoted in the Second Book of the Element of the Foundation attributed to Jabir ibn Hayyan. In it lines 6, 8, and 11–15 found in the Secret of Creation are missing. Other parts appear to be corrupt. It reads:

حقا يقينا لا شك فيه
إن الأعلى من الأسفل والأسفل من الأعلى
عمل العجائب من واحد كما كانت الأشياء كلها من واحد
وأبوه الشمس وأمه القمر
حملته الأرض في بطنها وغذته الريح في بطنها
نار صارت أرضا
اغذوا الأرض من اللطيف
بقوة القوى يصعد من الأرض إلى السماء
فيكون مسلطا على الأعلى والأسفل

Truth! Certainty! That in which there is no doubt!
That which is above is from that which is below, and that which is below is from that which is above,
working the miracles of one [thing]. As all things were from One.
Its father is the Sun and its mother the Moon.
The Earth carried it in her belly, and the Wind nourished it in her belly,
as Earth which shall become Fire.
Feed the Earth from that which is subtle,
with the greatest power. It ascends from the earth to the heaven
and becomes ruler over that which is above and that which is below.

—Zirnis 1979, p. 64. —Holmyard 1923.

Secret of Secrets

An even later version—from the tenth-century pseudo-Aristotelian Secret of Secrets—reads:

Fourteenth-century Arabic text of the Emerald Tablet from Secret of Secrets (man. Berlin, Landberg 121).

حقا يقينا لا شك فيه   أن الأسفل من الأعلى والأعلى من الأسفل   عمل العجائب من واحد بتدبير واحد كما نشأت الأشياء من جوهر واحد   أبوه الشمس وأمه القمر   حملته الريح في بطنها، وغذته الأرض بلبانها   أبو الطلسمات، خازن العجائب، كامل القوى   فان صارت أرضا اعزل الأرض من النار اللطيف   أكرم من الغليظ   برفق وحكمة تصعد من الأرض إلى السماء وتهبط إلى الأرض   فتقبل قوة الأعلى والأسفل   لأن معك نور الأنوار فلهذا تهرب عنك الظلمة   قوة القوى   تغلب كل شيء لطيف يدخل على كل شيء كثيف   على تقدير العالم الأكبر   هذا فخري ولهذا سمّيت هرمس المثلّث بالحكمة اللدنية

European mediaeval period

Text of the Emerald Tablet in its Latin translation by Hugo of Santalla (man. Paris, Latin 13951).

The Book of the Secret of Creation was translated into Latin in c. 1145–1151 by Hugo of Santalla. This text does not appear to have been widely circulated. It was again translated to Latin when the Secret of Secrets in an abridged, 188-line-long medical excerpt by John of Seville, around 1140. The first full Latin translation of the Secret of Secrets was rendered by Philip of Tripoli around a century later. This work has been called "the most popular book of the Latin Middle Ages". A third Latin version can be found in an alchemical treatise likely from the twelfth century. This latter, most circulated version is called the vulgate, as it was widespread and formed the subsequent basis for all later editions. It is found in an anonymous compilation of commentaries on the Emerald Tablet, translated from a lost Arabic text–variously called the Book of Hermes on Alchemy, the Book of Dabessus, or the Book of the Rebis. Its translator has been tentatively identified as Plato of Tivoli, who was active in c. 1134–1145. However, this is merely a conjecture, and although it can be deduced from other indices that the text dates to the first half of the twelfth century, its translator remains unknown.

The translator of this version did not understand the Arabic: طلسم, romanized: ṭilasm, lit. 'enigma; talisman' and therefore merely transcribed it into Latin as telesmus or telesmum. This accidental neologism was variously interpreted by commentators, thereby becoming one of the most distinctive, yet ambiguous, terms of alchemy. The word is of Greek origin, from τελεσμός Ancient Greek: τελεσμός, romanized: telesmos. The obscurity of this word's meaning brought forth many interpretations. It has been asserted that the original meaning may, in fact, have been a reference to talismanic magic. The Emerald Tablet was a popular summary of alchemical principles, wherein the secrets of the philosopher's stone were thought to have been described. This belief led to its consequent popularity and the wide array of European translations of and commentaries on the text, beginning in the High Middle Ages and persisting to the present.

Herman of Carinthia was one of a few European twelfth-century scholars to cite the Emerald Tablet. He does so in his 1143 treatise On Essences, where he also recalled the story of the tablet's discovery under a statue of Hermes in a cave, from the Book of the Secret of Creation. Carinthia was a friend of Robert of Chester, who in 1144 translated the Book on the Composition of Alchemy, which is generally considered to be the first Latin translation of an Arabic treatise on alchemy. An anonymous twelfth-century commentator tried to explain the aforementioned neologism telesmus in the phrase Latin: Pater omnis telesmi, lit. 'Father of all telesms' by claiming it is synonymous with Latin: Pater omnis secreti, lit. 'Father of everything secret'. The translator followed this claim with the assertion that a kind of divination, which is "superior to all others" among the Arabs is called Latin: Thelesmus. In subsequent commentaries on the Emerald Tablet only the meaning of secret was retained. Roger Bacon translated and annotated the Secret of Secrets around 1275–1280. He thought it an authentic work of Aristotle and it greatly influenced his thought. He cited it constantly, from his earliest writings to his last. The most widespread commentary accompanying the text of the Emerald Tablet is that of Hortulanus. He was an alchemist, who was likely active in the first half of the fourteenth century, about whom very little is known except for what he states about himself in the introduction of the text. Hortulanus, like Albertus Magnus before him, saw the tablet as a cryptic recipe that described laboratory processes using "deck names". This was the dominant view held by Europeans until the fifteenth century. In his commentary, Hortulanus, again like Albertus Magnus, interprets the sun and moon to represent alchemical gold and silver. Hortulanus interprets "telesma" as "secret" or "treasure".

Discovery of the Emerald Tablet in a Pyramid shown in the Rising Dawn.

A serpentine Mercury beheads the Sun and Moon; golden and silver blossoms sit in a glass vessels over a flame. From the same manuscript (Zurich, Rheinau 172).

From around 1420, the Rising Dawn introduced one of the earliest cycles of alchemical imagery, combining complex metaphors with the motif of glass vessels. Its illustrations depict symbolic operations such as putrefaction, sublimation, and the union of opposites through figures like Mercury, the sun and moon, dragons, and eagles. These images reflect philosophical principles including “two are one” and “nature vanquishes nature”. Drawing on late antique traditions preserved in Ibn Umayl's Book of the Silvery Water and the Starry Earth, the manuscript visualises the myth of the rediscovery of Hermetic knowledge, portraying hieroglyphic signs as divinely instituted symbols immune to verbal distortion. The Rising Dawn thus helped establish the Renaissance notion of alchemical imagery as a medium for transmitting original wisdom through visual, rather than textual, means.

Mediaeval Latin textual witness

On the Secrets of Nature

The Tablet text as translated into Latin in c. 1145–1151 by Hugo of Santalla in his On the Secrets of Nature–his translation of the Arabic Secret of Creation–reads:

Superiora de inferioribus, inferiora de superioribus,
prodigiorum operatio ex uno, quemadmodum omnia ex uno eodemque ducunt originem, una eademque consilii administratione.
Cuius pater Sol, mater vero Luna,
eam ventus in corpore suo extollit: Terra fit dulcior.
Vos ergo, prestigiorum filii, prodigiorum opifices, discretione perfecti,
si terra fiat, eam ex igne subtili, qui omnem grossitudinem et quod hebes est antecellit, spatiosibus, et prudenter et sapientie industria, educite.
A terra ad celum conscendet, a celo ad terram dilabetur,
superiorum et inferiorum vim continens atque potentiam.
Unde omnis ex eodem illuminatur obscuritas,
cuius videlicet potentia quicquid subtile est transcendit et rem grossam, totum, ingreditur.
Que quidem operatio secundum maioris mundi compositionem habet subsistere.
Quod videlicet Hermes philosophus triplicem sapientiam vel triplicem scientiam appellat.

Secret of Secrets

The Tablet as translated into Latin in pseudo-Aristotelian Secret of Secrets differs significantly from both the Santalla's version and the later vulgate translation. It reads:

Veritas ita se habet et non est dubium, quod inferiora superioribus et superiora inferioribus respondent. Operator miraculorum unus solus est Deus, a quo descendit omnis operacio mirabilis. Sic omnes res generantur ab una sola substancia, una sua sola disposicione. Quarum pater est Sol, quarum mater est Luna. Que portavit ipsam naturam per auram in utero, terra impregnata est ab ea. Hinc dicitur Sol causatorum pater, thesaurus miraculorum, largitor virtutum. Ex igne facta est terra. Separa terrenum ab igneo, quia subtile dignius est grosso, et rarum spisso. Hoc fit sapienter et discrete. Ascendit enim de terra in celum, et ruit de celo in terram. Et inde interficit superiorem et inferiorem virtutem. Sic ergo dominatur inferioribus et superioribus et tu dominaberis sursum et deorsum, tecum enim est lux luminum, et propter hoc fugient a te omnes tenebre. Virtus superior vincit omnia. Omne enim rarum agit in omne densum. Et secundum disposicionem majoris mundi currit hec operacio, et propter hoc vocatur Hermogenes triplex in philosophia.

Latin text of the Tablet in the Secret of Secrets from c. 1290–1320 (man. Oxford, Christ Church 99).

Vulgate

Fifteenth-century Latin text of the vulgate Emerald Tablet (man. British Library, Arundel 164, folio 155r).

The most widely distributed Latin translation, called the vulgate, translated from a lost Arabic text also differs significantly from the other two early Latin versions. A critical edition based on eight manuscripts prepared by Robert Steele and Dorothea W. Singer in 1928 reads:

Verum sine mendacio, certum, certissimum.
Quod est superius est sicut quod inferius, et quod inferius est sicut quod est superius.
Ad preparanda miracula rei unius.
Sicut res omnes ab una fuerunt meditatione unius, et sic sunt nate res omnes ab hac re una aptatione.
Pater ejus sol, mater ejus luna.
Portavit illuc ventus in ventre suo. Nutrix ejus terra est.
Pater omnis Telesmi tocius mundi hic est.
Vis ejus integra est.
Si versa fuerit in terram separabit terram ab igne, subtile a spisso.
Suaviter cum magno ingenio ascendit a terra in celum. Iterum descendit in terram,
et recipit vim superiorem atque inferiorem.
Sicque habebis gloriam claritatis mundi. Ideo fugiet a te omnis obscuritas.
Hic est tocius fortitudinis fortitudo fortis,
quia vincet omnem rem subtilem, omnemque rem solidam penetrabit.
Sicut hic mundus creatus est.
Hinc erunt aptationes mirabiles quarum mos hic est.
Itaque vocatus sum Hermes, tres tocius mundi partes habens sapientie.
Et completum est quod diximus de opere solis ex libro Galieni Alfachimi.

True it is, without falsehood, certain and most true.
That which is above is like to that which is below, and that which is below is like to that which is above,
to accomplish the miracles of one thing.
And as all things were by contemplation of one, so all things arose from this one thing by a single act of adaptation.
The father thereof is the Sun, the mother the Moon.
The wind carried it in its womb, the earth is the nurse thereof.
It is the father of all works of wonder throughout the whole world.
The power thereof is perfect.
If it be cast on to earth, it will separate the element of earth from that of fire, the subtle from the gross.
With great sagacity it doth ascend gently from earth to heaven. Again it doth descend to earth,
and uniteth in itself the force from things superior and things inferior.
Thus thou wilt possess the glory of the brightness of the whole world, and all obscurity will fly far from thee.
This thing is the strong fortitude of all strength,
for it overcometh every subtle thing and doth penetrate every solid substance.
Thus was this world created.
Hence will there be marvellous adaptations achieved, of which the manner is this.
For this reason I am called Hermes Trismegistus, because I hold three parts of the wisdom of the whole world.
That which I had to say about the operation of Sol is completed.

—Steele & Singer 1928, p. 48/492. —Steele & Singer 1928, p. 42/486.

Renaissance and early modernity

First emblem alchemical from Fleeing Atalanta: the wind hath carried it in its belly.

Second alchemical emblem: the earth is its nurse.

During the Renaissance, Hermes Trismegistus was widely regarded as the founder of alchemy and native to Babylon. He was thought to be a contemporary of Noah or Moses and his legend became intertwined with biblical narratives. One illustrative example of this belief is found in the anonymous text Who Were the First Inventors of this Art, extracted from a gloss of the fourteenth-century Textus Alkimie. This text or a later French one, incorporating much of its narrative, influenced a discovery legend claiming the tablet to have been discovered after the Biblical Flood, in Hebron Valley which is connected to the image of the Emblem of the Emerald Tablet in the 1599 text called the Golden Fleece attributed to Salomon Trismosin.

The narrative further evolved via Hieronymus Torrella's 1496 Splendid Work of Astrological Images. In it, Alexander the Great discovers a Latin: tabula zaradi, lit. 'zaradi tablet' in Hermes' tomb while travelling to the Oracle of Amun in Egypt. This story is repeated in 1617 by Michael Maier in Symbols of the Golden Table, referencing a Book of Chymical Secrets attributed to, but likely not written by, Albertus Magnus. That same year, he published Fleeing Atalanta. It was illustrated by Matthaeus Merian the Elder, possibly with cooperation from his cousin Theodor de Bry, with fifty alchemical emblems, each accompanied by a poem, the score of a fugue, and alchemical and mythological explanations.

The first printed edition appeared in 1541, in Of Alchemy. It was published by Johann Petreius and edited by a certain Chrysogonus Polydorus. Polydorus is likely a pseudonym used by the Lutheran theologian Andreas Osiander who edited Copernicus' On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres in 1543 and published by the same printer. This edition of the Emerald Tablet is the so-called vulgate version, accompanied by the commentary by Hortulanus. In 1583, a commentary by Gerard Dorn was published in Frankfurt by Christoph Corvinus. In On the Light of Physical Nature this disciple of Paracelsus drew up a detailed parallel between the Emerald Table and the first chapter of the Genesis.

By the early sixteenth century, the writings of Johannes Trithemius marked a shift away from a laboratory interpretation of the Emerald Tablet, to a metaphysical approach. Trithemius equated Hermes' one thing with the monad of Pythagorean philosophy and the anima mundi. This interpretation of the Hermetic text was adopted by alchemists such as John Dee, Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, and Gerhard Dorn.

The emblem of the Tabula Smaragdina Hermetis

The emblem of the Emerald Tablet as depicted in Supplement to the Golden Fleece.

Another depiction from the French translation La Toyson d'or.

From the late sixteenth century onwards, the Emerald Tablet is often accompanied by a symbolic figure called the Latin: Tabula Smaragdina Hermetis, lit. 'The Emerald Tablet of Hermes'. This figure is encircled by an acrostic in Latin: Visita interiora terrae rectificando invenies occultum lapidem, lit. 'Visit the interior of the earth, and by rectifying, you will find the hidden stone' whose seven initials form the word Old French: vitriol, lit. 'sulphuric acid'. At the top, the sun and moon pour into a cup above the symbol of mercury. Surrounding this mercurial cup are the four other planets, representing the classic association between the seven planets and the seven metals: Sol/Gold, Luna/Silver, Mercury/Quicksilver, Jupiter/Tin, Mars/Iron, Venus/Copper, Saturn/Lead. It is unclear whether the image was originally coloured. In versions that do contain colour, each planetary-metallic pair is associated with a specific hue: gold–Sol–visita, silver–Luna–interiora, grey–Mercury–terrae, blue–Tin–rectificando, red–Iron–invenies, green–Copper, and black–lapidem. At the centre are a ring and a globus cruciger; at the bottom, the celestial and terrestrial spheres. Three charges represent, according to the accompanying poem, the three principles of Paracelsian alchemical theory: the Eagle for Mercury/Spirit, the Lion for Sulphur/Soul, and the Star for Salt/Body. Finally, two Schwurhands appear alongside the image, affirming the creator’s veracity.

The oldest known reproduction of this emblem is found in a manuscript dated 1588–89. It was circulated anonymously and was likely written in the latter half of the sixteenth century by Salomon Trismosin—likely a pseudonym employed by a German Paracelsian. The image was accompanied by a didactic alchemical poem in German titled Außlegung und Erklerung des Gemelds oder Figur (lit. 'Interpretation and Explanation of the Painting or the Figure') likely written by the same author. The poem explains the symbolism in relation to the Great Work and the classical goals of alchemy: wealth, health, and long life. Initially, the image was presented with the Emerald Tablet only as a secondary element. However, in printed editions of the seventeenth century, the poem was omitted, and the emblem came to be known as the Tabula Smaragdina Hermetis—the symbolic or graphical representation of the Emerald Tablet. The emblem proliferated quickly, was frequently reproduced, and gained narrative antiquity. From Ehrd de Naxagoras in his 1733 Supplement to the Golden Fleece came an example of such a narrative. Therein a woman named Zora finds "a precious emerald plaque" engraved with this emblem in Hermes' grave in the valley of Hebron. The emblem thus came to be situated within the esoteric tradition of Egyptian hieroglyphs Renaissance-Platonic and alchemical belief that "the deepest secrets of nature could only be appropriately expressed through an obscure and veiled mode of representation".

Early Modern textual witness

Text of the Emerald Tablet, from Johannes Petreius' Of Alchemy.

Latin Of Alchemy

The 1541 Nuremberg edition from Johannes Petreius' Of Alchemy—largely similar to the vulgate—reads:

Verum sine mendacio, certum, et verissimum.
Quod est inferius, est sicut quod est superius.
Et quod est superius, est sicut quod est inferius, ad perpetranda miracula rei unius.
Et sicut res omnes fuerunt ab uno, meditatione unius, sic omnes res natae ab hac una re, adaptatione.
Pater eius est Sol, mater eius est Luna.
Portavit illud ventus in ventre suo.
Nutrix eius terra est.
Pater omnis telesmi totius mundi est hic.
Vis eius integra est, si versa fuerit in terram.
Separabis terram ab igne, subtile ab spisso, suaviter cum magno ingenio.
Ascendit a terra in coelum, iterumque descendit in terram, et recipit vim superiorum et inferiorum.
Sic habebis gloriam totius mundi.
Ideo fugiet a te omnis obscuritas.
Haec est totius fortitudinis fortitudo fortis, quia vincet omnem rem subtilem, omnemque solidam penetrabit.
Sic mundus creatus est.
Hinc erunt adaptationes mirabiles, quarum modus hic est.
Itaque vocatus sum Hermes Trismegistus, habens tres partes philosophiae totius mundi.
Completum est, quod dixi de operatione Solis.

Tis true without lying, certain and most true.
That which is below is like that which is above and that which is above is like that which is below
to do the miracle of one only thing
And as all things have been and arose from one by the mediation of one: so all things have their birth from this one thing by adaptation.
The Sun is its father, the moon its mother,
the wind hath carried it in its belly, the earth is its nurse.
The father of all perfection in the whole world is here.
Its force or power is entire if it be converted into earth.
Separate thou the earth from the fire,
the subtle from the gross
sweetly with great industry.
It ascends from the earth to the heaven and again it descends to the earth
and receives the force of things superior and inferior.
By this means you shall have the glory of the whole world and thereby all obscurity shall fly from you.
Its force is above all force,
for it vanquishes every subtle thing and penetrates every solid thing.
So was the world created.
From this are and do come admirable adaptations where of the means is here in this.
Hence I am called Hermes Trismegist, having the three parts of the philosophy of the whole world.
That which I have said of the operation of the Sun is accomplished and ended.

—Petreius, Johannes 1541. De alchemia. Nuremberg, p. 363. (available online) —Isaac Newton. "Keynes MS. 28". The Chymistry of Isaac Newton. Ed. William R. Newman. June 2010. Retrieved 4 March 2013.

French sonnet

Title page of the quoted work by Hesteau.

In the fifteenth century a French anonymous verse version appeared. A revised 1621 sonnet version by Clovis Hesteau de Nuysement reads:

C'est un point aſſuré plein d'admiration,
Que le haut & le bas n'est qu'une meſme choſe:
Pour faire d'une ſeule en tout le monde encloſe,
Des effects merveilleux par adaptation.

D'un ſeul en a tout fait la meditation,
Et pour parents, matrice, & nourrice, on luy poſe,
Phœbus, Diane, l'air, & la terre, ou repoſe
Cette choſe en qui gist toute perfection.

Si on la mue en terre elle a ſa force entiere:
Separant par grand art, mais facile maniere,
Le ſubtil de l'eſpais, & la terre du feu.

De la terre elle monte au Ciel; & puis en terre,
Du Ciel elle deſcend, Recevant peu à peu,
Les vertus de tous deux qu'en ſon ventre elle enſerre.

It’s a sure point, full of admiration,
That the high and the low are but one same thing:
To make from one alone, enclosed in the whole world,
Marvelous effects by adaptation.

Meditation has made all things of this single one,
And for its parents, matrix, and nurse, they place it:
Phoebus, Diana, the air, and the earth on which
That thing reposes in which all perfection lies.

If you change it into earth, it has its full force:
Separating by great art, yet in an easy manner,
The subtle from the dense, and the earth from the fire.

From the earth it ascends to Heaven; and then, into earth
From Heaven it descends, receiving little by little
The virtues of both, which in its womb it encloses.

—Hesteau 1639, p. 10. —literal translation.

The Enlightenment and decline of alchemy

Beginning of the tractate On the Authorship of the Emerald Tablet from the Egyptian Oedipus vol. 2 no. 1.

However, from the dawning seventeenth-century Enlightenment onward, a number of authors began to issue challenges to the attribution of the Emerald Tablet to Hermes Trismegistus. Chronologically first among them was the former alchemist Nicolas Guibert. He believed the ancients had never mentioned alchemy by name and the practice of identifying gold and silver by the names of planets was an idea first advanced by Proclus. He argued, therefore, that the Emerald Tablet must be inauthentic. These attacks were supported by a rising spectre of doubt surrounding all things Hermetic, following a linguistic analysis by Isaac Casaubon, calling into question the authenticity of the Corpus Hermeticum and Hermes himself. The most prominent attack came from Athanasius Kircher in his Egyptian Oedipus. Kircher rejected the Emerald Tablet’s attribution to Hermes Trismegistus, as it did not support his interpretation of hieroglyphs; he argued that the Tablet’s “barbaric” Latin betrayed a much later, post‐classical origin. Additionally, he pointed out that no ancient Greek philosophers ever mention it—a silence he took as evidence of forgery. Further, he associated it with a group of alchemists he considered delusional and rejected the story of its discovery in Hermes’ tomb as a pure figment of their imagination. He applied critical arguments he otherwise rejected when the text in question conflicted with his aims. Kircher’s critique was forceful enough to draw out a response from the Danish alchemist Ole Borch in his 1668 On the Origin and Progress of Chemistry. In which Borch sought to distinguish genuinely ancient Hermetic writings from later forgeries and to re‐value the Emerald Tablet as truly Egyptian in origin. Amid this climate of inquiry and doubt a 1684 tractate by Wilhelm Christoph Kriegsmann asserted that Hermes Trismegistus was not the Egyptian Thoth but the Phoenician Taaut, whom Tacitus identifies as Tuisto, the ancestral founder of the Germanic peoples. The debate continued and both Borch’s and Kriegsmann’s treatises were reprinted (alongside many others) in Jean-Jacques Manget's Curious Chemical Library.

The Emerald Tablet was still translated and commented upon by Isaac Newton, who rendered the recondite Latin: telesmus as "perfection". But the result of this age of upheaval and inquiry was the gradual decline of alchemy during the eighteenth century. The hardest blow to alchemy's legitimacy was the advent of modern chemistry and the work of Lavoisier—with the 1720s marking the turning point when alchemy lost the trust of the emergent chemical community. The emerging category of modern science fundamentally conflicted with the practical and theoretical traditions of alchemy. It left no room for alchemists within the new definition of the scientist, leading to a sharp decline in alchemical works after the 1780s.

Esotericism, psychology, surrealism, and popular culture

Alchemy and the Emerald Tablet continued to interest occultists, such as Giuliano Kremmerz, Jan van Rijckenborgh, Éliphas Lévi, and Gottlieb Latz. As well as the theosophist Helena Blavatsky and the perennialist Titus Burckhardt.

The Emerald Tablet also occupies a central role in Carl Jung's psychology of alchemy. He saw it as the paramount text of alchemy. Jung had read Ruska 1926 and was familiar with the Arabic text of the Book of the Secret of Creation and the debates surrounding the text's age and original language. He focused his textual analysis, however, mainly on the Latin vulgate text. The Tablet’s alchemical operations—most notably the “operation of the sun”—became, for Jung, powerful metaphors: the sun’s “art” of creating gold is none other than consciousness splitting from a “primeval” archetypal source, working through the “prima materia” of the psyche, and reuniting to generate a transformed, individuated self.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, alchemy fascinated the surrealist André Breton. He saw in Hermetic practice a model for “transubstantiating the world” and resisting the modern reign of miserablism . In the 1924 Surrealist Manifesto he said: "Heraclitus is surrealist in dialectic. Lully is surrealist in definition. Flamel is surrealist in the night of gold." Many commentators interpret Breton’s formula as Hegelian, but his circle was steeped in living Hermetism: the Surrealists devoured Fulcanelli, tried to enlist Eugène Canseliet and René Guénon for La Révolution surréaliste, and flocked to Maria de Naglowska's occult soirées in early‑1930s Paris. Additionally, Hegel's philosophy itself was influenced by Jakob Böhme and Emanual Swedenborg, a fact Breton was acutely aware of. In a 1942 essay, Breton overturned the Emerald Tablet’s dictum “as above, so below” in the opening via an image of soaring a bird and a lift descending into a mine-shaft clashing. The metaphor leads to a new commandment: “Never believe in the interior of a cave, always in the surface of an egg”. Breton thereby employed alchemy to collapse depth and surface and to bind dichotomous forces into a seamless whole. He saw Max Ernst, who claimed to have been born from an egg, as that very “alchemical egg”—his birth myth and his art as having fused celestial and chthonic forces into a single force.

Jorge Ben released the studio album A Tábua de Esmeralda ("The Emerald Tablet") in 1974. In it, he explored the theme of alchemy through tracks like “Os Alquimistas estão chegando Os Alquimistas,” “Errare Humanum Est,” and “Hermes Trismegisto e Sua Celeste Tábua de Esmeralda,” using reiterated modal phrases that evoked a liturgical resonance. The album exemplified Ben’s distinctive fusion of samba with elements of jazz and rock, shaped by his percussive, self-taught guitar technique and supported by musicians from across the spectrum of Música popular brasileira. Some Música popular brasileira-traditionalists saw this as a concession to the US garage rock-inspired style known as Jovem Guarda.

In the time travel television series Dark, the mysterious priest Noah has a large image of a graphic depiction of an emerald tablet, featuring the text of Emerald Tablet, tattooed on his back. The image, which stems from Heinrich Khunrath's Amphitheatre of Eternal Wisdom (1609), also appears on a metal door in the caves that are central to the plot. Several characters are shown looking at copies of the text. A verse from the 1541 Nuremberg version Latin: Sic mundus creatus est, lit. 'So was the world created' plays a prominent thematic role in the series and is the title of the sixth episode of the first season.

See also

• As above, so below
• Hermetica
• Tablet (religious)

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Further reading

• Davis, Tenney L. (1926). "The Emerald Table of Hermes Trismegistus. Three Latin Versions Which Were Current among Later Alchemists". Journal of Chemical Education. 3 (8): 863–875. Bibcode:1926JChEd...3..863D. doi:10.1021/ed003p863.
• Holmyard, Eric John (1957). Alchemy. Harmondsworth: Pelican. pp. 95–98.
• Needham, Joseph; Gwei-djen, Lu; Sivin, Nathan (1980). Science and Civilisation in China, Volume 5, Part 4: Spagyrical Discovery and Invention: Apparatus and Theory. Vol. 5/IV. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 1–804. ISBN 9780521085731.
• Plessner, Martin (1927). "Neue Materialien zur Geschichte der Tabula Smaragdina" [New Materials on the History of the Tabula Smaragdina]. Der Islam. 16 (1): 77–113. doi:10.1515/islm.1927.16.1.77.
• Quispel, Gilles (2000). "Gnosis and Alchemy: The Tabula Smaragdina". In Van den Broek, Roelof; Van Heertum, Cis (eds.). From Poimandres to Jacob Böhme: Gnosis, Hermetism and the Christian Tradition. Leiden: Brill. pp. 303–333. doi:10.1163/9789004501973_014. ISBN 978-90-71-60810-0.
• Ruska, Julius (1925). "Der Urtext der Tabula Smaragdina" [The Original Text of the Tabula Smaragdina]. Orientalistische Literaturzeitung (in German). 28 (1–6): 349–351. doi:10.1524/olzg.1925.28.16.175.
• Ruska, Julius (1931). "Quelques problèmes de littérature alchimiste" [Some Problems of Alchemical Literature]. Annales Guébhard-Séverine (in French). 7. Neuchâtel: Institut Adrien Guébhard-Séverine: 156–173.
• Ruska, Julius (1935). "Die Alchimie ar-Razi's" [The Alchemy of al-Rāzī]. Der Islam (in German). 22 (4): 281–319. doi:10.1515/islm.1935.22.4.281.
• Robinson, Maureen (2003). "The History and Myths surrounding Johannes Hispalensis" [Die Geschichte und Mythen um Johannes Hispalensis]. Bulletin of Hispanic Studies. 80 (4): 443–470. doi:10.3828/bhs.80.4.1.

External links

• Various Translations of the Tablet