The Hermetic viewpoint on the elements is an ancient and intricate system of understanding the Other World. In this excerpt from “A Guide to the Elementals” by André Consciência, we delve into the idea that the Zoroastrians had a better understanding of the elements than Aristotle. The divine, represented by heat and moisture, was the substance of the four elements in their light, and the elements in the material world were their cold and dry facets. This book focuses on the four elements of Earth, Water, Air, and Fire, and their relationship to the magical world. The text also delves into the concepts of Manichaeism and the possibility of a magician attaining Godhood to create natural elementals of a substance beyond that of the elementaries. This book is a valuable resource for anyone interested in the intricate and fascinating world of the elementals and their role in magic.
(Note from the Publisher)
Chapter 2 Journeying the Elements
From a Hermetic Viewpoint
In hermeticism, just as the scientist dissects his object of attention to better and more methodically study its components, we divide the Other World into five elements, of which four are the subject of this book: Earth, Water, Air and Fire. It is a vision more akin to the ancient Persian, the term Magician actually deriving from the
Mazdian magi, whose prayers were towards the sun, moon, earth, fire, water and winds, manifestations of the omnipresent light. We may even affirm that the Zoroastrians had a better understanding of this subject than Aristotle, for to them the divine, represented by heat and moisture, was of the substance of the four elements in their light, and the elements in the material world were their cold and dry facets.
Elements and Elementals on Zoroastrianism and Manichaeism
In the Zoroastrian vision, we would be forced to see the Hebrew Garden of God as the sphere of the quintessence and the four rivers that surround it as a crust divided into two layers, the four divine virtues being the four elements of the omnipresent light of existence, and then the four grosser elements that are material and side effects of existence. Franz Bardon explained things more or less as Aristotle, in that the elements came progressively, but at the same time, in their merging with Neoplatonism, Zoroastrian sages spoke of the Endless Light from which came an all-embracing fire, it emanating the spirit of the power of the soul and the spirit of the power of nature. From the combination of the last two came out cosmic substance. In turn, this cosmic substance, by connecting with the spirit the power of the soul, would create a Firmament that would finally generate the substratum of the four elements, the four elements functioning as the seeds of the world and the substance of Being.
This seems to explain exactly the process of the creation of the Zone Girdling the Earth, mentioned by Bardon, and then its various layers rising again into the Endless Light. In the structure presented by Zoroastrianism, there is the Infinite, and in the Infinite the first form of consciousness is omnipotence in which something or nothing has acted. From the realization of this act comes the all-embracing fire of omniscience, where the infinite becomes conscious of itself. The spirit of the power of the soul is the divine self therein obtained, that is, the divine dimension of time, eternity, the notion of entity unconditioned. The spirit of the power of nature is as divine ego, divine identity and it is the radiation of omnipresence and the divine dimension of space, the spaceless, for omniscience must know if not all time and space, the timeless and the spaceless.
The timeless and the spaceless put together to form the cosmic dimension of the Akasha, from where an everlasting firmament, the Zone Girdling the Earth, emerges. It mirrors immortality and omnipresence as time and space, and exhibits their theatrical interactions through Being, projected in the four elements.
Some Mazdeans proceed to speak of seven elements, it being that the mineral kingdom, the vegetable kingdom and the animal kingdom derive from the four elements, and the secret job of the beings of the four elements is to foster and keep them. They are, therefore, fashioners and guardians of the creations of Ahura Mazda.
In Manichaeism the old Persians thought of these elementals as the sons and armours of the primordial man, indicating the possibility of the magician who has attained Godhood to create natural elementals of a substance beyond that of the elementaries. This is because Manichaeism seems to be the microcosm of the cosmic Zoroastrian vision, that is, while Zoroastrians saw creation as a cosmic process in the infinite without, Manichaiests saw creations as coming from the inside outwards. The Garden of God is here the Paradise of Light, surrounded by what we know as the Akasha on whom dwell the mind and the four powers of the mind: intelligence, reason, thought and cognition. These four powers put together constitute the soul. The conjunction of mind, its powers and the soul is, in the tradition of Manichaeism, the first form of man, as this type of being is able to perceive polarity in undefined light and to order darkness and chaos, unveiling the objective or phenomenal world. In turn, it is by the reflective power of such perceived objects that he is able to see matter. To them, there is no material quality in any of the four elements, matter being but an illusory distortion, and where we place the earth element they have the element of light.
I will speak no further of this, but let the mature magician extract the key himself instead, for such a key is of the very essence of mental wandering and magical evocation, making it possible at once.
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To purchase and take a look inside click on the links below. This book contains full colour illustrations including over 60 hand-drawn seals. André goes into incredible detail about the Elementals and his experiences meeting them.
