- Fama Fraternitatis, des löblichen Ordens des Rosenkreutzes by Johann Valentin Andreae -
Rosicrucianism was a result of the northern Protestant Reformation (Lutherans), and combined Elizabethan with German-Bohemian protestant influences (see also The Rosicrucian Enlightenment, by Frances Yates (1899-1981 CE)).
The Rosicrucian plan concerned a universal spirit of brotherhood and wisdom (pansophism), where knowledge was nurtured and available to all individuals, who would be free to pursue peace and happiness. Rosicrucianism was in some aspects an example of mysthical Christianity. The fundamental symbols of the Rosicrucians were the rose and the cross; the rose female and the cross male. The aim of Rosicrucianism was to afford mutual aid and encouragement in working out the great problems of life and searching out the secrets of nature; to facilitate the study of a perennial philosophy founded upon the doctrines of Pythagoras (ca. 570-ca. 490 BCE), Plato (424/423-348/347 BCE) and Hermes Trismegistus (Hermeticism, Corpus Hermeticum) and the Kabbalah (Hebrew pythagoreanism). Though calling themselves Christians, the Rosicrucians were evidently Neoplatonists and Neopythagoreans.
The Rosicrucian philosophy can be traced back to the Neoplatonism and Hermeticism of Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499 CE) and the development of Christian Kabbalah by Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494 CE). His syncretic world-view combined Platonism, Neoplatonism, Aristotelianism, Hermeticism and Kabbalah. Johann Reuchlin (1455-1522 CE) would be "Pico's most important follower" and his most well known works are De verbo mirifico ane De arte cabalistica. (see alsoChristian Hebraism in the Reformation Era (1500-1660), Stephen G. Burnett, BRILL, 2012, p. 16 and Kabbalah in Italy, 1280-1510, Moshe Idel, Yale University Press, 2011, 233-234). Christian Kabbalah would find its way to the Protestant regions of Europe.
The protestant roots of the Rosicrucian movement can be traced back to the metaphysics of extreme realism and the complete emancipation from authority of John Wycliffe (ca. 1328-1384 CE), Jan Hus (ca. 1369-1415 CE) and the Bohemian Brethren. It can be seen as a response to the failure of the Protestant Reformation to provide a solution for the perceived antagonism between faith (Book of Revelation) and physics or nature (Book of Nature), which had already haunted the Roman Catholic Church (see also The Rosicrucian Enlightenment Revisited, C. Bamford, SteinerBooks, 1999, p.201).
The reform of society is a theme which can be found already before the emergence of the Rosicrucain treatises. The mystic Joachim of Fiore (ca. 1135-1202 CE), who based his doctrine of the "Eternal Gospel" or "Eternal Evangel" on an interpretation of the text in Revelation 14:6: "... , having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, ... " (Three Angels' Messages), referred to a new "Age of the Holy Spirit", when mankind was to come in direct contact with God, reaching the total freedom preached by the Christian message. The first evangel was the Old Testament, the second one was the New Testament and the third one would be the Eternal Gospel. Several medieval groups preached the divinity of man, based on Neoplatonic ideas, and called this gospel the Eternal Evangel. (see also The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages, M. Reeves, Oxford University Press, 1969, p. 59 and An essay on pantheism, John Hunt, 1866, p.143 and The Eternal Gospel, R. W. Mackay, Williams and Norgate, 1867). This doctrine of the "Eternal Gospel" goes back to Origen's (185-254 CE) distinction between 'the eternal Gospel' and 'the temporal Gospel' in his Commentary on the Gospel of John (see also The Oxford Handbook of Systematic Theology, Ed . B. Webster, K. Tanner, I. Torrance, Oxford Handbooks Online, 2007, p. 497). The followers of Joachim of Fiore were called the Joachimites, a millenarian group that arose from the Franciscans in the thirteenth century.
Early traces of a reform movement of the sciences (reading the Book of Nature) date back to the time when Emperor Rudolf II (1552-1612 CE) ruled the Holy Roman Empire in Prague. His policy was opposed to the papacy and welcomed the Renaissance "religion of the world". At his death bed he refused the last rites of the Roman Catholic Church (see also Rudolf II and His World: A Study in Intellectual History, R.J.W. Evans, Oxford, 1973, p. 86). Emperor Rudolf II made of Prague a tolerant center of learning where alchemy, astrology and cabbalah could flourish (see also The Rosicrucian Enlightenment, F. Yates, Routledge, 2001, p. 17). The protestant Johannes Kepler (1571-1630 CE), who became the imperial mathematician to Emperor Rudolf II, would publish his works Astronomia nova and the Harmonices Mundi on the new astronomy which developed out of the Copernican revolution and which stood in the Alexandrian, Pythagorean and Platonic tradition of science and philosophy as opposed to the Medieval Aristotelian and Scholastic tradition. Michael Maier (1568-1622 CE), was a German physician and counsellor at the court of Emperor Rudolf II, wrote several Rosicrucian works such as the Themis aurea and Atalanta Fugiens (see also Count Michael Maier, J. B. Craven, William Peace & Son, 1910). Michael Maier would also visit England where he met Robert Fludd (1574-1637 CE). From England, the Elizabethan mathematician and astrologer John Dee (1527-1608 or 1609 CE) would visit Prague in 1584. (see also Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, The Art of Memory, The Occult Philosophy in the Elizabethan Age, and The Rosicrucian Enlightenment by Frances Yates and Keats Hermeticism and the Secret Societies, Jennifer N. Wunder, Ashgate Publishing Group, 2008). Giordano Bruno (1548-1600 CE) would visit Prague in 1588, where he stayed for approximately six months. Bruno tried to attract the emperor's attention to his "mathesis" and dedicated a book to him, published in Prague under the provocative title of Articuli adversus mathematicos. The work heralded "the whole Brunonian philosophy of a true universal religion rooted in occultism, and the salvation of mankind through the intuitions of an intellectual elite' (see also Rudolf II and His World: A Study in Intellectual History, R.J.W. Evans, Oxford, 1973, p. 230).
Rosicrucianism on the continent became closely linked to the German Electoral Palatinate and the Bohemian Protestant cause in the early 17th Century. A link was suggested with the "Giordanisti", presumed to be founded by Giordano Bruno (1548-1600 CE) during his stay in Germany, where he lectured at the Lutheran University of Wittenberg (1586-1588 CE), but this could not be proven. On 26 August 1619, the Bohemians had decided to offer the crown of their country to the Protestant Frederick V (1596-1632 CE), Elector Palatine and his wife Elizabeth Stuart (1596-1662 CE), daughter of James I of England. On the day of the coronation...German verses were to be sung to a psalm tune... Wyclif came from England, they explain, from whom Huss took his teaching, alluding to Wyclif's influences on the Hussite reformation; and now a queen comes to us from England. The Rosicrucian enlightenment however came to an end in 1620 at the beginning of the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648 CE) in Germany and the defeat of the Elector Frederick V at the Battle of White Mountain on 8 November 1620. In order to avoid prosecution during the Thirty Years' War, Bohemian Hussites and other protestants fled the region for protestant England, where Rosicrucian ideas would survive. Rosicrucianism was part of the broader movement which grew out of the reaction against Medieval Roman Catholic Thomism (Aristotelianism) and Scholasticism. The scientific and philosophical revolution of the 16th century was founded on the rediscovery of Pythagorean and Platonic (Neoplatonic) cosmology, mathematics and philosophy during the Renaissance. Due to the conflict of its ideas with Roman Catholic theology it would only survive disguised as a branch of Protestantism.
Early traces of a Rosicrucian philosopy in England can be found in the work of the mathematician John Dee (1527-1608), notably in The Mathematicall Praeface to Elements of Geometrie of Euclid of Megara and his Monas Hieroglyphica. The Praeface is essentially a plea for the application of mathematics to the searching out of all knowledge. If all is formed of number, then only through mathematics can the cosmos be understood. Demonstrations of this Neoplatonic and Pythagorean principle were to be found in architecture and perspective drawing which duplicate nature through numerical harmonies. The restored mathematics of antiquity for Dee was a key both to purify the spirit and to master nature. Dee visited the court of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II (1552-1612 CE) in Prague (see also Elizabeth I: Her Life in Letters, Elizabeth I (Queen of England), F. Pryor, University of California Press, 2003, p.69 and The Real History of the Rosicrucians, A. E. Waite, 1887, p. 15 and Freemasonry, secret societies, and the continuity of the occult traditions in English literature, Vol. 1, M. K. Manatt Schuchard, Ph.D Dissertation, University of Texas, Austin, 1975, p. 94).
Attempts to imagine an ideal society can also be traced back to the Civitas Solis of Tommaso Campanella (1568-1639 CE) and Utopia (1516) of Thomas More (1478-1535 CE).
The first traces of a religious and philosophical reform in Germany can be traced back to the Hermetic and Neoplatonic circles at the University of Tübingen. Simon Studion (1543-1605 CE) published his Naomatria in 1604 in which he described a new movement, the 'Confederatio Militiae Evangelicae' and his Theatrum Chemicum (1602), which provided a source for the Chymische Hochzeit Christian Rosencreutz Anno 1549 (see also The Alchemy of Light, Urszula Szulakowska, BRILL, 2000, p. 82 and Rose Cross Over the Baltic, Susanna Åkerman, BRILL, 1998, p. 97). The Naometria (Temple Measure), was a combination of mathematics, laws of nature, plan of the building of the allegorical Temple, and prophecy. Followers of Simon Studion were sometimes called Naometa. Members of such a group in Tübingen were Johann Valentin Andreae (1589-1674 CE), Tobias Adami, Wilhelm Wense and Tobias Hess (1568-1614 CE). Tobias Adami and Wilhelm Wense were followers of Tommaso Campanella (1568-1639 CE) and his philosophy of the 'tria principia': 'necessitas', 'fatum' and 'harmonia'. In 1617 Adami, Wense and Hess founded the 'Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft', together with Prince Ludwig of Anhalt-Köthen (1579-1650 CE) (see also The Reach of the Republic of Letters, Volume 2, A. Van Dixhoorn, S. Speakman Sutch, BRILL, 2008, p. 422).
In the Fama Fraternitatis Rosae Crucis the group put forward their basic principles found in the Crypt of Christian Rosenkreutz: "Jesus mihi omnia, Nequaquam vacuum, Legis Jugum, Libertas Evangelij, and Dei gloria intacta". The Rosicrucians turned towards Christ (Jesus mihi omnia), Nature (God reveals Himself in visible nature) and the inner word theology in order to find the esoteric way within towards the divine as opposed to the exoteric way through the visible (wordly) Churches, which had been tainted by religious conflicts. The inner word theology refers to "Noli foras ire, in teipsum redi; in interiore homine habitat veritas" (Do not go out, return to yourself, for the truth dwells in the interior of man) of Aurelius Augustinus (354-430 CE) in De vera religione (39:72). The same principle can be found in the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas:6 : "When you know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will understand that you are children of the living Father. But if you do not know yourselves, then you live in poverty, and you are the poverty".
Traditional Christianity had moved the believer's focus away from the exploration of the inner self and towards the adherence to rules, laws and an individual God. Creation witnesses to God's invisible attributes of eternal power and divine nature (Psalm 19 and Romans 8:18-21). The 'Nequaquam vacuum' refers to the horror vacui. The words 'Legis Jugum' refer to the Christian yoke of grace which consists of the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ as opposed to the Mosaic yoke of the law (Acts 15:10, Galatians 5:1). The 'Libertas Evangelij' refers to the Protestant principle of the freedom of interpretation of the Gospel, and its authority against that of the Church. The 'Dei gloria intacta' refers to the conception that the real Inner Man (microcosmos) is identical with the pure essence of the substance of the First Principle (macrocosmos). The Rosicrucians developed their view on theology along Neoplatonic and Johannine lines (Johannine Theology I and Johannine Theology II) with regard to the Divine Nature, the Incarnation and the Logos-Doctrine, the Holy Spirit, doctrine of sin and propitiation, eternal life, human nature and its regeneration, the Church and Sacraments, and Eschatology.
In the concluding line of the Fama Fraternitatis Rosae Crucis they sought refuge 'Sub umbra alarum tuarum Jehova' from 'Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings' (Psalm 17:8), 'Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me: for my soul trusteth in thee: yea, in the shadow of thy wings will I make my refuge, until these calamities be overpast' (Psalm 57:1) and 'But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall' (Malachi 4:2). The words may also refer to a message 'Sub umbra alarum tuarum protegimur', which William the Silent (1533-1584 CE) in 1582 sent to Queen Elizabeth I of England (1533-1603 CE) after a meeting in Antwerp with Walter Raleigh (ca. 1554-1618 CE), Lord Hunsdon, the Earl of Leicester, Fulke Greville, Philip Sidney, and Edward Dyer (see also The Works of Sir Walter Ralegh, Kt, p. 45).
The Rosicrucian Manifestos heralded the restoration of the true Christianity based on a right understanding of the Holy Scripture. The origin of Rosicrucianism dates back to the publication of the Allgemeine und General Reformation, der gantzen weiten Welt, Beneben der Fama Fraternitatis, des löblichen Ordens des Rosenkreutzes (Rumor of the brotherhood), together with Trajano Boccalini's (1556-1613 CE) Ragguagli di Parnasso (News-sheet from Parnassus), published by Wilhelm Wessel in Kassel in 1614. The Fama Fraternitatis envisioned the reformation of religion, and the reformation of knowledge. The reformation of religion expressed in the document is militant Protestantism. The reformation of knowledge can be found in the Baconian Advancement of Learning. The Fama Fraternitatis builds on the Pythagorean tradition of envisioning objects and ideas in terms of their numeric aspects. In the Ragguagli di Parnasso a Universal Reformation of the Whole Wide World, by order of the God Apollo, is published by the Seven Sages of Greece and some other Litterati. The Secretioris Philosophiae Consideratio Brevio a Philippo a Gabella, Philosophiae studioso, conscripta; et nunc primum una cum Confessione Fraternitatis R.C. (1615, Confession of the Brotherhood) and the Chymische Hochzeit Christian Rosencreutz Anno 1549 of which the Lutheran theologian Johann Valentin Andreae (1589-1674 CE) is presumed to be the author. Andreae was born at Herrenberg, Württemberg and studied physical and mathematical sciences as well as theology at Tübingen. A portion of the Confessio, is devoted to a Kabbalistic view on the Holy Bible, the characters and letters of which are said to contain images that are keys to predicting the future of the Church and of understanding nature and science. The marriage of science and Christian virtue was explored in the Chymische Hochzeit Christian Rosencreutz Anno 1549. Full of Christian Resurrection symbolism, the Chymische Hochzeit refers to the practice of alchemy and the Neoplatonic union of opposites. The mythical Christian Rosencreutz died in 1484, the year when Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499 CE) published his translation of the Corpus Hermeticum (1484). His grave was supposed to be found in 1604, 120 years after his death. The year 1604 was fraught with chiliastic significance: 'new stars' had appeared in the constellations Serpentarius and Cygnus, mentioned specifically in the Fama Fraternitatis.
Besides the Rosicrucian manifestoes, Johann Valentin Andreae was also involved in several other projects such as the short-lived 'Societas Christiana' or 'Civitas Solis'. In his utopian work Christianopolis (1619) Johann Valentin Andreae describes a utopian community that embodied his moral philosophies. Based on the strict Christian moral structure Andreae witnessed in Geneva, the citizens of Christianopolis are ruled by spiritual authority. Spiritual fulfillment and intellectual activity constitute the primary goals of each individual. Like all of Andreae's major works Christianopolis illustrates the application of Christian values, most importantly love and generosity, as predominant elements of order in a society. His utopian Christianopolis stands in the tradition of the Civitas Solis of Tommaso Campanella (1568-1639 CE) and Utopia (1516) of Thomas More (1478-1535 CE) (see also Andreae, J.V. (1619) Christianopolis, Johann Valentin Andreae, Springer, 1999, p. 288 and The Rosicrucian Enlightenment, F. A. Yates, Routledge, 1972, p. 181).
- Rebis (fifth woodcut) - Azoth by Basilius Valentinus (1613) |
- Azoth Ritual (twelfth woodcut) - Azoth by Basilius Valentinus (1613) |
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Renaissance Neoplatonism with its Hermetic views of the correspondence of macrocosm and microcosm and its vitalistic principles would find their way in Rosicrucianism and Alchemy (see also Alchemy Revisited: Proceedings of the International Conference on the History of Alchemy at the University of Groningen, Z. R. W. M. Von Martels (Ed.), Brill Archive, 1990, p.239-244, Keats Hermeticism and the Secret Societies, Jennifer N. Wunder, Ashgate Publishing Group, 2008, p. 26 and The Foundations of Newton's Alchemy, B. J. T. Dobbs, Cambridge University Press, 1983, p. 36). The work Azoth (First Matter) was a work on Alchemy published in 1613 by Basilius Valentinus (15th-century). It dealt with the Hermetic Rosicrucian philosophy which it demonstrated by means of spiritual Alchemy. Azoth is the essential agent of transformation in alchemy. It is the name given by ancient alchemists to Mercury, the animating spirit hidden in all matter that makes transmutation possible (see also Azoth Or the Star in the East, Arthur Edward Waite, 1994, Kessinger Publishing). The work stood in the tradition of Paracelsus (1493-1541 CE), who pioneered the use of chemicals and minerals in medicine and wrote De Natura Rerum (1537) (see also The Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of Paracelsus, Paracelsus, 2007, NuVision Publications). Paracelsus himself was influenced by the Renaissance Neoplatonism of Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499) (see also The Western Esoteric Traditions: A Historical Introduction, Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, Oxford University Press, 2008, p. 81 and Paracelsus An Introduction to Philosophical Medicine in the Era of the Renaissance, W. Pagel, Karger, 1982, p. 218). Paracelsus believed in the Greek concept of the four elements (materia prima), but he also introduced the idea that, on another level, the cosmos is fashioned from three spiritual substances: the tria prima of mercury, sulfur, and salt. The central figure in Valentinus's Azoth depicts the Alchemist. His limbs are in contact with the four Greek elements of earth, water, air and fire. His body (corpus) is symbolized by a cubic stone, his intellect by the moon (spiritus) and his soul (anima) by the sun. Spiritus, Anima, and Corpus (Spirit, Soul, and Body) form a large inverted triangle that stands behind the central emblem of the alchemist. Together they symbolize the Three Essentials behind anything, the celestial archetypes that the alchemists termed Sulfur, Mercury, and Salt. The alchemical salt may also refer to man as "salt of the earth" in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:13), which is part of a discourse on salt and light (Luke 8:16-18) (see also The Sermon on the mount: a theological investigation, Carl G. Vaught, Baylor University Press, 2001, pp. xi-xiv and The Continuum Encyclopedia of Symbols, Udo Becker, Continuum International Publishing Group, 2000, p. 257 and Northwestern Christian Advocate, Volume 59, 1911, p.6). The star-shaped pattern that makes up the body of the alchemist represents what Paracelsus called the "star in man", the hidden process that is going on in our souls, just as it is the hidden process behind the evolution of the Anima Mundi or the soul of the universe. The first ray in this inner star is the black ray labeled number one and pointing to the Corpus Stone. The star symbolizes the seven operations of spiritual alchemy: calcination, dissolution, separation, conjunction, fermentation, distillation and coagulation. The word 'VITRIOL' surrounding the seven-pointed star with the symbols of the known planets, means 'Visita Interiora Terrae Rectificandoque Invenies Occultum Lapidem' (see also Congeries Paracelsicae chemiae, Gérard Dorn, 1581, p. 144). The concept of "VITRIOL" was inspired by the words "Noli foras ire, in teipsum redi; in interiore homine habitat veritas" (Do not go out, return to yourself, for the truth dwells in the interior of man) of Aurelius Augustinus (354-430 CE) in De vera religione (39:72). De vera religione is the last work where Augustinus of Hippo leaned much on the philosophy of Neoplatonism, which was the vehicle of philosophy that had greatly facilitated his intellectual conversion to Christianity (see also Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity, Charles Taylor, 1989, Cambridge University Press, p. 129). We also find a similar theme "Withdraw within your self, and examine yourself" with Plotinus (204/5-270 CE) in the Enneads (I, 6, ch. 9). In the Gospel of John it is written that life which consists in union with God does not belong to man as he is naturally constituted: those who know that they have eternal life know that it is theirs because they have "passed out of death into life" (I John 3:14; John 5:24). Similar views can be found in Human Nature in its Fourfold State of Thomas Boston (1676-1732 CE).
The Alchemist in the center of the drawing also depicts the "old Adam" which has to be transformed into the "new Adam" or the "inner seed" of Christ within man in order to achieve the highest state of existence, which is the same as the Biblical term of "the kingdom of Heaven" (Bible, Matthew 6:33 and 13:44) within man and not a future place after death. (see also Polemical Encounters: Esoteric Discourse and Its Others, Olav Hammer, Kocku von Stuckrad (Ed.), Brill, 2007, p.150 and The Educated Imagination and Other Writings on Critical Theory: 1933-1963, Northrop Frye, University of Toronto Press, 2006, p.211 and Alchemy as a way of life, Frank Avray Wilson, C W Daniel Co Ltd, 1976, p.26 and Le Temple ésotérique des Francs-Maçons, Dominique Jardin, Jean-Cyrille Godefroy, 2012, pp. 152-155). Paracelsus in his work The Aurora of the philosophers (1575 CE) described "Adam as the first inventor of arts, because he had knowledge of all things as well after the Fall as before" (see also Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of Paracelsus, Part 1, Arthur Edward Waite, Kessinger Publishing, 2002, p. 48). The Bible gave the distinct title of "Son of God" to three personalities: Adam, Melchizedek (Hebrews 7:1-10), and Jesus of Nazareth (see also "..the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God." (Luke 3:38) and "I believe that you are the Christ, the son of God." (John 11:27)). The first Adam became a living being; the last Adam [Jesus], a life-giving spirit (1 Corinthians 15:45) (see also The Figures or Types of the Old Testament, Samuel Mather, 1705, p. 69 and Old Testament Survey, Rev. Dr. Gary Staats, 2012, p. 69). Jesus spoke of himself as "I am the First and the Last" (Revelation 1:17). The old Adam of Basilius Valentinus or first "Son of God" who was responsible for the Fall and original sin (Paradise lost), was created on Friday, while the new Adam or last "Son of God" (Jesus of Nazareth), who liberated humanity (Paradise restored), died on a Friday. Therefore Friday connected the old and new Adam. Adam and Eve by consuming the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil committed the original sin, which lead to the Fall of man in Genesis 2-3. Jesus by his sacrifice, liberated man from original sin. Mankind inherited aspects from both the old Adam (earth) and the new Adam (heaven) an therefore has a double nature: "The first man was of the dust of the Earth, the second man from heaven. As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the Earth; and as is the man from heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven." (1 Corinthians 15:47-49) (see also Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, Eliphas Levi, 1854 (Dogme) and 1856 (Rituel)).
Interesting enough, other religious and philosophical traditions also developed their own concepts of Adam. Adam may also resemble "Adam kasia", which means 'the hidden Adam' and comes from Iranian mythology where it means the soul of the first man. The hidden Adam is also called Adam Qadmaia ("the first Adam"). Among the Mandean (south Iraq and south-west Iran) Adam kasia means the soul of every human. Adam Kasia shows many similarities with the Kabbalistic concept of Adam Kadmon (see also The Secret Adam: A Study of Nasoraean Gnosis, Ethel S. Drower, Clarendon Press, 1960, p. 21 and The Mandaeans of Iraq and Iran: Their Cults, Customs, Magic Legends, and Folklore, Ethel S. Drower, Gorgias Press, p. 73). The Manichaeans believed that the first Adam or Protanthropos was "the World Soul", (Anima Mundi), sent to fight against darkness. The "Fall" meant the primordial man being delivered up to evil and swallowed in darkness, with the Universe as a whole coming into existence as a means of delivering the primordial Adam from Darkness (see also Spirituality in the Land of the Noble: How Iran Shaped the World's Religions, Foltz, Richard, 2004, Oneworld publications).
The 'Rebis' (from the latin res bina, meaning double matter) in Valentinus's Azoth is the end product of the alchemical magnum opus or Great Work (see also Hermaphrodites in Renaissance Europe, Kathleen P. Long, Ashgate, 2006, p. 131). After one has gone through the stages of putrefaction and purification, separating opposing qualities, those qualities are united once more in what is sometimes described as the divine hermaphrodite, a reconciliation of spirit (heaven, new Adam) and matter (earth, old Adam), a being of both male and female qualities as indicated by the male and female head within a single body (see also Transformation: Emergence of the Self, Murray Stein, Princeton University Press, 1989, p. 101). The male half of the Rebis holds a compass, which is used to draw circles and which represents spiritual qualities. The female half holds a square, used to measure right angles in squares and rectangles, thus representing the material world, with which women are also associated. The circle on which the Rebis stands contains a square and triangle. The triangle is spiritual and refers to the the tria prima of mercury, sulfur, and salt, of Paracelsus, while the square is material and refers to the four classical elements of earth, water, air and fire (see also Empedocles). For Paracelsus and the alchemists 'mercury' was the transformative agent/fluidity/volatility, 'sulfur' was the binding agent between substance and transformation/combustibility and 'salt' was the solidifying/substantiating agent. The four elements were four wombs ("matrices" or "mothers") created from the mysterium magnum via differentiation/separation. The mysterium magnum was the Mother of all things; the primitive matrix (see also Paracelsus: An Introduction to Philosophical Medicine in the Era of the Renaissance, W.Pagel, Karger, 1982, p. 348 and Paracelsus, Andrew Weeks, BRILL, 2007, p. 20). The number 4 and the 3 are the number of sides each has, and together they make seven, the number of completion (see also Celestial Symbols: Symbolism In Doctrine, Religious Traditions And Temple Architecture, Allen H. Barber, Horizon Publishers & Distributors, 2006, p. 37). The Rebis symbolizes the union of spirit and matter and thereby the full awakening of the hidden spark of light and consciousness that is trapped in matter. That can only be accomplished by a conjunction, a Sacred Marriage between Soul and Spirit. Philo of Alexandria (ca. 20 BCE-50 CE) had been the first to use the concept of the heavenly (primal) man, as the perfect image of the Logos, which is neither man nor woman, but an incorporeal intelligence purely an idea; while the earthly man, who was created by God later, is perceptible to the senses and partakes of earthly qualities (see also De Mundi Opificio, Philo, i. 46). Philo uses the duplicate Biblical account of Adam, who was formed in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), and of the first man, whose body God formed from the earth (Genesis 2:7). Philo combines with it the Platonic doctrine of ideas; taking the primordial Adam as the (Platonic) idea, and the created man of flesh and blood (earth) as the "image". The Rebis in Valentinus's Azoth is the reconstruction of the heavenly (primal) man through spiritual alchemy which is neither man nor woman. The Neoplatonic theologian Meister Eckhart (ca. 1260-ca. 1327 CE) in his work Von unsagbaren Dingen and other writings and sermons, identified the being and intellect of a unified deity that could be apprehended only through mystical apprehension of the divine through an inner spark of the soul: Seelenfünklein or 'scintilla animae'. This refers to the Neoplatonic concept of the ascent of the soul to the One, which becomes possible by cultivating the divine potentialities that exist in the deepest center of the human soul. In alchemy, the stone of the philosophers was the "orphan"; the term "son of the widow", now associated with Masonry, may be of Manichaean origin (see also Mysterium Coniunctionis, C. G. Jung, H. Read, G. Adler, Princeton University Press, 1970, p. 17-41 and Alchemy, Marie-Luise von Franz, Inner City Books, 1980, p. 50).
In his Mysterium Cosmographicum (1596), Johannes Kepler (1571-1630 CE) designed a mathematical model (hypothesis) of the universe based on the five Platonic solids, which he thought could be nested, within one another to produce six concentric spheres, corresponding to orbits of the six known planets around the sun. By ordering the Platonic solids in the order octahedron, icosahedron, dodecahedron, tetrahedron and cube, Kepler found that the spheres could be placed at intervals corresponding (within the accuracy limits of available astronomical observations) to the relative sizes of each planet's path around the sun. Kepler attempted to explain the proportions of the natural world and the cosmos based on the Pythagorean principle of the musica universalis (music of the spheres) which regards proportions in the movements of celestial bodies as a form of inaudible mathematical music. Later on he would be capable to abandon this concept, based on the observations of Tycho Brahe (1546-1601 CE) and his own calculations. Johannes Kepler stood in the Neoplatonic-Pythagorean mathematical tradition which also influenced both Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543 CE) Galileo Galilei (1564-1642 CE). The Rosicrucian movement only flourished in Protestant regions, because of the problems of their Neoplatonic-Pythagorean philosophy with regard to Roman Catholic theology, which was based on Aristotelian (Thomistic) philosophy. In De Stella Nova in Pede Serpentarii, et ... ... Trigono Igneo Johannes Kepler (1571-1630 CE) mentioned the sequence of Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions, which occur every twenty years, from 1603 to 1763. It shows the process of entering the three fire signs or 'Trigono Igneo' (Aries, Leo and Sagittarius), and how this had fully occurred from 1663 onwards. This also made the Rosicrucians to be called the "Fire Philosophers". Fire was also very important to alchemists, who were also often called "Philosophers of Fire", because they believed fire was the primary agent of transformation. Great predictions were made on the basis of these Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions, which happens only every 800 years. It had happened previously, Kepler pointed out, at the time of Jesus of Nazareth and of Charlemagne (742-814 CE). Tycho Brahe (1546-1601 CE) had expressed the view that this was the seventh since the world began, and so it was a special epoch. This conjunction was mentioned in the Fama Fraternitatis as the 'Trygono Igneo' which marked the opening of the vault in 1604. The opening of the tomb of Christian Rosenkreuz was symbolic of the opening of the Rosicrucian Vault which refers to the announcement of the existence of the Invisible College by means of the Rosicrucian manifestos.
Julius Sperber (ca. 1540-1616 CE) published his Echo der von Gott hocherleuchteten Fraternitet des Lobl. Ordens R.C. (1615) and De Magia (The Echo from the divinely enlightened Fraternity R.C., 1615). In his work he refers to the adage 'Hoc per Philosophiam verum est sed per Theologiam falsum' (see also Geschiedenis Van de Occulte En Mystieke Broederschappen, Marcel Roggemans, Lulu.com, 2010, p. 75 and The Invisible History of the Rosicrucians, Tobias Churton, Inner Traditions/Bear & Co, 2009, p. 229). In 1617 Robert Fludd (1574-1637 CE) published his Tractatus apologeticus integritatem Societatis de Rosea Cruce defendens and in his Utriusque Cosmi, Maioris scilicet et Minoris, metaphysica, physica, atque technica Historia (The metaphysical, physical, and technical history of the two worlds, namely the greater and the lesser) put forward his philosophical views. In his cosmology he put forward the terrestrial four elements and the heavenly seven planets. In his depiction of the universe in the Utriusque Cosmi Historiae he integrated the Figura paradigmatica from De Coniecturis (On Surmises) of Nicolaus Cusanus (1401-1464 CE). In De Coniecturis Cusanus puts forward: "Conceive of a pyramid-of-light as progressing into darkness and of a pyramid-of-darkness as progressing into light; and reduce to [that] figurative conception everything that can be investigated, so that by guidance from what is perceptible you can turn your surmise toward hidden [truths]. And in order that you may be aided by means of an example, consider the universe as reduced to the diagram here below. Notice that God, who is Oneness, is as the base-of-light; but the base-of-darkness is as nothing. Every creature, we surmise, lies between God and nothing" (see On Surmises (De Coniecturis), translated by Jasper Hopkins, p. 182 and The Contradiction Between Form and Function in Architecture, John Shannon Hendrix, Routledge, 2013). Robert Fludd was one of the last authors in the Renaissance Christian Neo-Platonic tradition (Rosicrucian) as philosophy and science had moved away from its esotheric aspects by the time Fludd published his works. Michael Maier (1568-1622 CE) published his alchemical emblem book Atalanta fugiens in 1617. The book contains 50 emblems and each individual emblem in the Atalanta Fugiens has a verse and epigram associated with it. Michael Maier was physician to the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II in Prague. Both Robert Fludd and Michael Maier were followers of the science and Hermetic, Neoplatonic, and Pythagorean philosophies of Paracelsus (1493-1541 CE), who had attended the Italian universities of Padua and Ferrara until about 1516. Like the Rosicrucians, the editors of the Kabbala Denudata (Kabbalah Unveiled) (1677-1684) believed the (Christian) Kabbala would be the key to attaining religious unity as well as a correct understanding of the Bible, in contrast to Greek wisdom (e.g. Aristotle) which have muddied the waters of divine Hebrew wisdom. They attributed the divisions among Christians to their misplaced dependence on Greek wisdom in general and Aristotle in particular.
The Speculum Sophicum Rhodostauroticum was published in 1618, probably by Daniel Mögling (1596-1635 CE) (pseudonym: Teophilus Schweighardt Constantiens) with the drawing of the famous depiction of the Invisible College of the Rosicrucians. The title page has at its head "under the Shadow of your wings" (a resistentibus dexterae tuae custodi me ut pupillam oculi sub umbra alarum tuarum proteges me, Vulgata, Psalms 16:8) referring to the concluding line of the Rosicrucian Fama Fraternitatis and with the four lettered name of God IHVH thrice repeated. The Tetragrammaton (IVHV) was supposed to hide the so called Lost Word and has a special meaning in Jewish and Christian Kabbalah as the symbol of Divine Truth. The letters of the Tetragrammaton embody the human form. The twelve transpositions of the Tetragrammaton all convey the meaning of "to be" and are supposed to correspond to the twelve signs of the zodiac. The theme "under the Shadow of your wings" is also to be found at the title page of Thomas Sprat's (1635-1713 CE). History of the Royal Society of London, for the Improving of Natural Knowledge (1667). Giordano Bruno (1548-1600 CE) had spent two years in England, meeting and mingling with the Sidney circle of the Elizabethan era around Philip Sidney (1554-1586 CE) of which Francis Bacon (1561-1626 CE) was a member. The uncompleted work Nova Atlantis (1624) of Francis Bacon was published in 1626. Bacon portrayed a vision of the future of human discovery and knowledge, expressing his aspirations and ideals for humankind. The plan and organization of his ideal college, Solomon's House envisioned the modern research university in both applied and pure sciences, which was not the case for the Scholastic and Aristotelian universities of his era. Francis Bacon divided the invention of Arts and Sciences into two parts: 'Literate Experience' and the 'Novum Organum'. He referred to Literate Experience as "the Hunt of Pan". The moon-goddess Diana was the parallel feminine Symbol to Pan, for she was the Goddess of the Arts and Sciences and the patron of the 'Novum Organum'.
The defeat of the protestants in Bohemia in the Thirty Years' War would cause an influx of Protestant refugees into England. The Polish alchemist Michael Sendivogius (1566-1636 CE) published his Statuts des Philosophes inconnus (French version in 1691). People like John Dury (1596-1680 CE), Amos Johannes Comenius (1529-1670 CE) and Samuel Hartlib (ca. 1600-1662 CE) would bring new ideas to England during the period of the English Civil War (1642-1651 CE) and the Commonwealth of England (1649-1660 CE) (see also Three Foreigners: the Philosophers of the Puritan Revolution in Religion, the reformation, and Social Change, Hugh Trevor-Roper, Macmillan, 1967, pp. 237 ff.). German, Polish and Bohemian philosophers have played an important role in the Rosicrucian movement, which later paved the way for the dawn of modern science with the foundation of the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge on 15 July 1662 during the reign of King Charles II of England (1630-1685 CE).
Amos Johannes Comenius (1529-1670 CE) was a Bishop of the Unitas Fratrum, commonly known as the Moravian Church. He became its President during the Thirty Year's War (1618-1648) which decimated the ranks of the Unity. At the close of the war, Bohemia and Moravia were ceded to Rome in the Peace of Westphalia (1648 CE). The few surviving members of the Unity had to either become Roman Catholic or leave their homeland. Comenius led a small band to exile in Poland and would visit England. He wrote his Labyrint světa a ráj srdce (E:Labyrinth of the World and Paradise of the Heart) (1623), about a Temple of Wisdom in his Schola pansophica (1650-1651 CE) (Pansophiae prodromus of 1639, Pansophiae diatyposis). Comenius would in his Via Lucis, Vestigata & Vestiganda (The Way of Light) (1641) put forward the pursuit of higher learning and spiritual enlightenment bound together. His magnum opus was De Rerum Humanarum Emendatione Consultatio Catholica (General discourse on the emendation of human affairs, or Consultatio) (1670) which contained a plan for the creation of a Christian society. Comenius in his work put forward the concept of a "tree of knowledge", continuously branching out and growing.
Samuel Hartlib (ca. 1600-1662 CE), from Elbing in Poland came to live in England and his two closest correspondents were John Dury (1596-1680 CE) and Comenius. Hartlib came to know Johann Valentin Andreae (1586-1654 CE) through his brother George hartlib, whoa was a student at heidelberg from 1612 to 1620 (see also The Rosicrucian Enlightenment , Frances Yates, Routledge, 2001, p. 157). Samuel Hartlib fled to England where he and other refugees from the continent would unite with English "seekers after hidden knowledge" and included the occult sciences of the Rosicrucian program. On 27 April 1633, Johann Fridwald (fl. 1628-33 CE) (Kaliningrad, (Prussia) Russia) sent a letter to Samuel Hartlib in London in which he offered to send agensts for the establishment of Antilia, a secret college based on the Rosicrucian principles of Johann Valentin Andreae (see also Hartlib, Dury and Comenius, G. H. Turnbull, University Press of Liverpool, 1947, p. 72). Hartlib was also indebted to Francis Bacon (1561-1626 CE) for a general theory of education, and this formed common ground for him and Jan Comenius. Hartlib published two studies of Comenius's work: Conatuum Comenianorum praeludia (1637) and Comenii pansophiae prodromus et didactica dissertatio (1639). He would play a role in the foundation of the Hartlib circle and the Invisible College, which in its turn was the forerunner of the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge. Hartlib also published A Description of the Famous Kingdome of Macaria (1641) about a reformed Christian society and welfare state. Hartlib's "Kingdome of Macaria" was a "Sophic Utopia" based on the works of Johann Valentin Andreae and Francis Bacon (see also Freemasonry, secret societies, and the continuity of the occult traditions in English literature, Vol. 1, M. K. Manatt Schuchard, Ph.D Dissertation, University of Texas, Austin, 1975, p. 148).
John Dury (1596-1680 CE) also fled the continent after the fall of the Bohemian kingdom and came to England. In 1630 he wrote Platform of the Journeys that must be undertaken for the Work of Peace Ecclesiastical which shows similarities to the ideas of the Rosicrucian project and the works of Jakob Böhme (1575-1624 CE) (see also Milton and Jakob Boehme, M. Lewis Bailey, Haskell House, 1964, pp. 66-67). John Dury also played an important role in facilitating the return of the jews to England. He brought Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658 CE) into contact with Menasseh Ben Israel (1604-1657 CE). Dury was also involved in the demonstration of the model of the Temple of Solomon by Judah Leon Templo (1603-1675 CE) to Charles II of England (1630-1685 CE).
Elias Ashmole (1617-1692 CE) was a celebrated English antiquary, politician, officer of arms, astrologer, early freemason and student of alchemy, who supported the royalist side during the English Civil War. Together with Robert Moray (1608 or 1609-1673 CE) and others, he was one of the founders of The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge. Ashmole's scientific outlook was deeply influenced by the mathematicians and astrologers with whom he associated during the Civil War. He was also adopted by William Backhouse (1593-1662 CE), who was a renowned English Rosicrucian philosopher, alchemist, and astrologer. Ashmole saw no incompatibility between the occult sciences that he favored and the emerging experimental natural philosophy. In 1650 Elias Ashmole published his translation of the Fasciculus Chemicus, of Arthur Dee (1579-1651 CE) under the anagrammatic pseudonym James Hasholle. The Fasciculus Chemicus, a collection of writings upon alchemy, had already been published in Latin by Arthur Dee (1579-1651 CE), the eldest son of John Dee. In 1652, Ashmole publishes his most important alchemical work, Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum. The Prolegomena indicate his familiarity and agreement with the leading themes of Hermetic philosophy. The Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum is described as "Containing Severall Poetical Pieces of our Famous English Philosophers, who have written the Hermetique Mysteries in their owne Ancient Language". The work of Elias Ashmole connects the hermetic and Rosicrucian tradition to the Royal Society and freemasonry (see also The Magus of Freemasonry, T. Churton, Inner Traditions-Bear, 2006).
Rosicrucianism may have an Islamic connection with the Platonic and Pythagorean philosophy of the secret society of the Brethren of Purity (Basra, Iraq), whose philosophy can be found in the Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity. Rosicrucianism also shows similarities to the Neoplatonic philosophy of the Italian Renaissance as was put forward by Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499), Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494 CE) and other members of the Platonic Florentine Academy.
Rosicrucian philosophy studied the philosophical traditions of the "complexio oppositorum" manifest in creation, the "Triadic Principle" (Law of Mean Terms) and the four elements, such as Terra (Earth), Aqua (Water), Aer (Air), Ignis (Fire) and the aether (spirit) as with Empedocles (ca. 495-435 BCE) (see also Proclus: An Introduction, R. Chlup, Cambridge University Press, 2012, p. 94 and Rosicrucian Fundamentals, F. R. Khei, Kessinger Publishing, 1996, p. 214 and Philosophia naturalis, Albertus Magnus, Basel, 1650 and Aurora Consurgens: A Document Attributed to Thomas Aquinas on the Problem of Opposites in Alchemy, Marie-Louise von Franz, Princeton University Press, Bollingen Series LXXVII, 1966). The world within the complexio oppositorum, as a creative embrace of masculine and feminine natures, is accompanied by their symbolic counterparts, the Sun and Moon (see also Viatorium spagyricum, Herbrandt Jamsthaler, Frankfurt, 1625). The moral task of alchemy was to bring the feminine, maternal background of the masculine psyche into harmony with the spirit (see also Mysterium Coniunctionis, C. G. Jung, H. Read, G. Adler, Princeton University Press, 1970, p. 37-41).
In a purely naturalistic interpretation the regeneration of nature by the influence of the sun symbolizes the spiritual regeneration of mankind by the sacred fire (truth and love). The acronym 'INRI' therefore is being interpreted as meaning 'Igne Natura Renovatur Integra' and also 'Igne Nitrum Roris Inventur' ('the nitre of dew is found by fire') referring to the Alchemical elements of Salt, Sulphur and Mercury (see also Secret Societies and Subversive Movements, N. H. Webster, Book Tree, 2000, p. 89). In the Hebrew Kabbalistic tradition INRI refers to the four elements of Empedocles (ca. 495-435 BCE): Iam, water; Nour, fire; Ruach, spirit or vital air; and Iabeshah, earth (see also Masonry Defined, Volume 2, E. R. Johnston, Kessinger Publishing, 2002, p. 637). Heraclitus (ca. 535-ca. 475 BCE) had connected logos with the image of fire. Along with Heraclitus, the Stoics related the logos with the image of a cosmic fire. In 'Hebrews 12:29' we find "For our God is a consuming fire". In 'Luke 3:16' about St. John the Baptist is said that "John answered, saying unto them all, I indeed baptize you with water; but one mightier than I cometh, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire" thereby referring to Christ. 'Igne Natura Renovatur Integra', meaning that by fire nature is restored in purity, or pure matter is restored by spirit; the Rosicrucian motto signifying that the working of the inner fire of the spirit, when operating free and unchained by its surrounding veils, reduces these veils into oneness with itself, so that pure, complete, or original nature is restored to its primordial essence. Thus, in its application to the human being, when a person lives entirely in the light or fire of the spirit or god within, all his veils of consciousness coalesce with the inner fire, so that his original spiritual being is restored and he becomes a god-man. This concept of human divinity can also be found in the Oratio de hominis dignitate (1486) by Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494 CE) where he states "... Erimus illis, cum voluerimus, nihilo inferiores". These ideas were inconsistent with Aristotelian and Thomistic theology with its view on man as a mortal being tainted by Original Sin.
Rosicrucian Order
Rosicrucian Order
Confraternity of the Rose Cross
The Order of the Rose and the Cross
Lectorium Rosicrucianum
The Rosicrucian Archive
The Rosicrucian Library
Rosicrucians - Catholic Encycopedia
Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica - BPH
Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana
Biblioteca Arcana
Flamel College - Hermetic education portal
Hermetics Library
Regnabit - Symbolism
Hermeneutics
Hermetic Fellowship
The Chaldaean Oracles
The Chaldaean Oracles of Zoroaster - Expositions of Pletho and Psellus
Hermetic Philosophy and Alchemy - Mary A. Atwood
Ancient Egyptian roots of the Principia Hermetica
Hermes Trismegistus
Hermes Trismegistus - Philosophy
Hermetic Research
An Introduction to the Corpus Hermeticum
Corpus Hermeticum
Commentary on the Pymander - Epopteia
Secretum secretorum
The Emerald Tablet of Hermes
The Emerald Tablet of Hermes
Christian Rosencreutz - (1378-1484)
Chymical Wedding
Confessio Fraternitatis
Fama Fraternitatis
Mons philosophorum
Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim - (1486-1535)
Libri tres de occulta philosophia - Cornelius Agrippa
Nicholas Flamel - (15th Century)
John Dee - (1527-1609)
John Dee Society
Mathematicall Praeface to Elements of Geometrie of Euclid of Megara - John Dee
Monas Hieroglyphica - 1564
Fasciculus Chemicus - John Dee
Robert Fludd - (1574-1637)
Utriusque Cosmi maioris salicet et minoris metaphysica - Robert Fludd
Three Treatises - Eirenaeus Philalethes
Sacred geometry
Sacred geometry - Bruce Rawles
Sacred geometry
Platonic solids
Archimedean solids
The Gospels seen as Sacred Geometry Plays
Societas Magica
Esoterica
Grimoires
Twilit Grotto: Archives of Western Esoterica
Gematria - Peter's
The Alchemy Webiste
Alchemy
Alchemy and Transmutation
Alchemy Electronic Dictionary
Alchemy - Nigredo, Albedo, Rubedo
Alchemy - Melanosis, Leukosis, Xanthosis, Iosis
Rosarium Philosophorum
The Making of a Philosophers- Stone
Magickal Athenaeum
Pseudomonarchia Daemonum or Hierarchy of Demons - Johann Weyer
The Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage - Abra-Melin (1458)
Vitruvian man
The Pythagorean Pentacle
Pentagram
Seal of Solomon - Star of David, hexagram
The Testament of Solomon - King Solomon
Clavicula Salomonis or Key of Solomon - King Solomon
Lemegeton Clavicula Salomonis or Lesser Key of Solomon - King Solomon
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