The Texts · Corpus Hermeticum XIII
Corpus Hermeticum XIII:
On Rebirth
Corpus Hermeticum XIII is a Greek dialogue in which Hermes Trismegistus leads his son Tat through a spiritual rebirth: ten powers of God drive out twelve torments, Tat sees himself in all things, and Hermes teaches him a secret hymn and binds him to silence. Of all the treatises in the collection, it reads most like a rite.
Corpus Hermeticum XIII is a Greek dialogue in which Hermes Trismegistus leads his son Tat through a spiritual rebirth (palingenesia), then teaches him a secret hymn and binds him to silence. It is the thirteenth of the seventeen treatises of the Corpus Hermeticum, written in Roman Egypt like the rest of the collection, and the one that reads least like a lecture and most like a rite. Its title in the manuscripts calls it a secret discourse on the mountain, on being born again, and on the promise to be silent.
Who speaks, and where it sits
Two voices only: Hermes, the teacher, and Tat, his son and pupil. Tat speaks first, and his opening lines tie the treatise to the rest of the collection. He refers back to the General Discourses (Genikoi logoi), in which Hermes had said that no one can be saved before rebirth, and to a conversation they had on the way down from the mountain (on the reading, see Disputed places). The treatise is therefore written as a sequel: the pupil has heard the theory and now asks for the thing itself. In §15 the dialogue looks further back still, to the revelation of Poimandres (CH I): Hermes has made the ascent to the eighth sphere that Poimandres foretold.
The numbering used here is that of the critical edition by A.D. Nock and A.-J. Festugière (Corpus Hermeticum, vol. II, Paris, 1945), which divides the treatise into 22 sections. Brian Copenhaver’s English translation (1992) uses the same numbers, and so does G.R.S. Mead’s public-domain translation (Thrice-Greatest Hermes, vol. II, 1906, pp. 219-233), which heads the treatise “Corpus Hermeticum XIII. (XIV.)” because older editions counted it as fourteenth. John Everard’s English of 1650 numbers it differently again: it is his “seventh book”, with his own verse numbers.
Corpus Hermeticum XIII section by section
The table groups the 22 sections into nine movements. The headings are ours; the events are the text’s.
| Sections | What happens |
|---|---|
| §1 · Tat’s request | Tat reminds Hermes that in the General Discourses he spoke in riddles and said that no one can be saved before rebirth. On the way down the mountain Tat asked for the discourse on rebirth, and Hermes promised it for the day Tat would become a stranger to the world. Tat says he has prepared himself, and asks from what womb and from what seed a human being is reborn. |
| §2 · Riddles | Hermes answers in riddles: the womb is wisdom that understands in silence, the seed is the true Good, the sower is the will of God. The one born is a god, a son of God, the all in all, made of all the powers. This kind of thing, Hermes says, is not taught; God brings it back to memory when he wills. |
| §3-6 · Hermes as the proof | Tat protests that he is a true son and is owed a plain answer. Hermes speaks of himself: through God’s mercy he has passed out of himself into an immortal body and is now born in mind; this cannot be taught or seen with bodily eyes (§3). Tat feels driven out of his senses; the author of rebirth, Hermes says, is the son of God, one man, by the will of God (§4). Tat thinks he now sees Hermes’ greatness in his ordinary form; Hermes corrects him, because the mortal form changes every day (§5). What is true is what is untroubled, without colour or shape, unchanging, contained by no body (§6). |
| §7 · The twelve torments | Hermes gives the method in four short commands: draw into yourself, will it, put the bodily senses out of work, purify yourself of the irrational torments of matter. He then names twelve torments, from ignorance to malice, and says that many more follow behind them. They leave, not all at once, the person on whom God has mercy, and this is the way of rebirth. |
| §8-10 · The ten powers | Hermes tells Tat to keep a reverent silence and calls down the powers of God one by one, the first seven each driving out a named torment (see the table below). Once the Good, Life and Light have come, no torment of darkness comes near (§9). “The ten” drive out “the twelve”: the birth in mind is complete, and by it we are made gods (§10). |
| §11-13 · Tat sees | Tat now sees not with his eyes but through the powers, and finds himself everywhere: in heaven, earth, water and air, in animals and plants, before, in and after the womb (§11). Asked how ten can expel twelve, Hermes explains that the bodily “tent” is built from the circle of the zodiac, twelve elements of one nature, and that the decad, which generates souls, contains the monad and is contained by it (§12). Tat: he sees the All and himself in mind. Hermes defines rebirth as no longer picturing things in the three dimensions of body; the text then breaks off for a few words (§13). |
| §14-16 · The new body and the hymn’s setting | The body made of the powers is never dissolved; the natural body is (§14). Tat asks for the hymn Hermes heard from the powers on reaching the eighth sphere, as Poimandres had foretold; Hermes says Poimandres gave him no more than what is written (§15). The instruction: stand in the open air, facing the south wind at sunset and the east at sunrise, and be silent (§16). |
| §17-20 · The secret hymn | The hymnôidia kryptê, the secret hymn. Hermes calls on earth, the abyss and the heavens to open, and on the trees and winds to be still, while he praises the maker of all (§17). He then calls on his own powers, one by one, to sing through him (§18), offers his praise as a “reasonable offering” through the Word (§19), and ends by finding rest in God’s will. Tat says he has set the hymn in his own cosmos; Hermes corrects him: in the cosmos known by mind (§20). |
| §21-22 · Tat’s offering and the oath | Tat composes his own short praise; Hermes tells him to add “through the Word” (§21). Hermes ends with the promise of the title: Tat must keep silent about this virtue and reveal to no one how rebirth was handed on, so that they are not taken for slanderers. He has come to know himself and their common Father in mind (§22). |
Ten powers against twelve torments
Summaries usually reduce this to ten powers against twelve torments; the text is less tidy. Hermes names twelve torments in §7: ignorance, grief, incontinence, desire, injustice, greed, deceit, envy, treachery, anger, recklessness and malice. In §8-9 he calls down the powers, but only seven are matched to a torment by name:
| # | Power called down (§8-9) | Torment it drives out (§7-9) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Knowledge of God | Ignorance |
| 2 | Joy | Grief |
| 3 | Self-control | Incontinence |
| 4 | Perseverance | Desire |
| 5 | Justice | Injustice |
| 6 | Sharing (generosity) | Greed |
| 7 | Truth | Deceit |
| 8-10 | The Good, with Life and Light | Envy leaves when Truth comes; the rest (treachery, anger, recklessness, malice) are not named again and flee together |
In §12 Hermes explains why ten are enough. The twelve are one nature with twelve faces, drawn from the zodiac; they cannot even be told apart (recklessness cannot be separated from anger), so they leave together. And ten is the number that generates souls, containing the one as the one contains the ten. Rebirth is thus described as an escape from the stars’ hold on the self, argued in the language of astrology and number. The idea, its parallels and the arguments about it are on Palingenesia; this page stays with the text.
Key lines (public-domain translation)
All quotations below are from Mead’s translation of 1906, which is in the public domain; square brackets are Mead’s own supplements. Section numbers are Nock-Festugière’s.
“Whene’er I see within myself the Simple Vision brought to birth out of God’s mercy, I have passed through myself into a Body that can never die. And now I am not what I was before; but I am born in Mind.” (CH XIII.3, Hermes, tr. Mead 1906)
“Withdraw into thyself, and it will come; will, and it comes to pass; throw out of work the body’s senses, and thy Divinity shall come to birth; purge from thyself the brutish torments …” (CH XIII.7, Hermes, tr. Mead 1906)
“And when the Ten is come, my son, that driveth out the Twelve, the Birth in understanding is complete, and by this Birth we are made into Gods.” (CH XIII.10, Hermes, tr. Mead 1906)
“In heaven am I, in earth, in water, air; I am in animals, in plants; I’m in the womb, before the womb, after the womb; I’m everywhere!” (CH XIII.11, Tat, tr. Mead 1906)
“Father, I see the All, I see myself in Mind.” (CH XIII.13, Tat, tr. Mead 1906)
Mead’s “Mind” translates nous (see Nous); his “Gnosis of God” in §8 is the first power, the one that drives out ignorance (see Gnosis).
Disputed places
Up or down the mountain. In §1 the critical text reads epi tês tou orous katabaseôs, “on the descent from the mountain”. This is the reading in Reitzenstein’s text, and the one printed with Copenhaver’s translation in a handout by Christian Bull for a Princeton seminar. Here Mead set Reitzenstein aside and followed Parthey’s reading metabaseôs and translated “in Wending up the Mount”; Everard, who followed Patrizi’s text, has “at the going up to the Mountain”. The older English titles, Everard’s “The secret Sermon in the Mount of Regeneration, and the Profession of Silence” and Mead’s “The Secret Sermon on the Mountain”, are still common names for the treatise. Mead himself argued that the mountain is symbolic, not a place.
Gaps in the text. Mead marks words missing in §5, §7, §9 and §13. The gap in §13 falls right after Hermes’ definition of rebirth, and Mead guessed it held a reference to keeping silent; any translation that reads smoothly there has filled the gap.
Whose womb. In §1 Tat asks from what womb and seed one is reborn. Mead notes that Reitzenstein’s reading would make the question refer to Hermes’ own rebirth (“from what womb thou com’st to birth”); Mead kept the usual reading.
Ten against twelve. As the table above shows, the text pairs seven powers with seven torments and lets the last three powers clear the field. Readers who want a neat one-to-one scheme have to supply it.
Rite or literature. Whether CH XIII records a ritual that was performed is open. Festugière read it as literary mysticism; Anna Van den Kerchove and Christian Bull read it as reflecting actual initiatory practice, helped by the Coptic Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth found at Nag Hammadi in 1945, which also has a teacher and a pupil, a hymn and silence, and refers to the Genikoi logoi, the discourses of which treatise X, The Key, calls itself a summary. The text itself gives a setting and times for the hymn (§16) but no instructions for the rebirth beyond Hermes’ words.
“Born again”. The language of new birth, a son of God and “one man” (§4) invites comparison with John 3. William C. Grese’s monograph Corpus Hermeticum XIII and Early Christian Literature (Brill, 1979) is the standard study of these parallels; they are usually explained as shared religious language of the period, not borrowing in either direction.
Reception
1463 and 1471. Marsilio Ficino translated CH I-XIV into Latin for Cosimo de’ Medici in 1463, so XIII reached Latin Europe with the first fourteen; the first printing appeared at Treviso in 1471.
Lazzarelli. Lodovico Lazzarelli (1447-1500), translator of CH XVI-XVIII (see CH XVI), read the rebirth of CH XIII as the heart of the Hermetic mystery, in Wouter Hanegraaff’s judgement. His dialogue Crater Hermetis casts Lazzarelli as a spiritual father who gives rebirth to King Ferrante of Naples and Giovanni Pontano. Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples printed it at Paris in 1505 beside Ficino’s Latin Corpus, so readers met a Renaissance rebirth dialogue bound together with its ancient model.
1650 and 1906. Everard’s Divine Pymander put the treatise into English as the “seventh book”; Mead’s translation and commentary of 1906 made it widely available to Theosophical and later esoteric readers. Its rebirth is sometimes taken for reincarnation; the text does not support that: the rebirth happens in this life, and the reborn Tat is still talking to his father.
Now. Since the Nag Hammadi find, CH XIII is read together with the Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth as evidence, or as a literary image, of Hermetic initiation, and it is a central text for those who read the Corpus as a practice. For how the seventeen treatises differ on practice and salvation, see the Corpus treatise by treatise.
Translations to read
- G.R.S. Mead, 1906, Thrice-Greatest Hermes, vol. II, pp. 219-233, with commentary from p. 234. Public domain, made before the critical text; scan at the Internet Archive.
- John Everard, 1650, The Divine Pymander, “The seventh book”. Public domain, following Patrizi’s text and order (Scott 1924, vol. I, p. 43 n. 3); useful for the history of reception, less so for the sense of the Greek; Wellcome Library copy at the Internet Archive.
- Walter Scott, 1924, Hermetica, vol. I, Greek and English. Published in 1924 and public domain in the United States; Scott reorders and supplements the Greek by conjecture, so use it to compare readings; scan at the Internet Archive.
- Richard Reitzenstein, 1904, Poimandres, pp. 339-348: the Greek text Mead worked from; scan at the Internet Archive.
- Brian P. Copenhaver, 1992, Hermetica (Cambridge University Press): the scholarly standard in English, based on Nock and Festugière, with notes. In copyright.
- Clement Salaman, Dorine van Oyen, William D. Wharton, Jean-Pierre Mahé, 1999, The Way of Hermes: a readable first pass. In copyright.
The full list of translations, with their bases and scope, is on the Corpus Hermeticum page. The hymn’s goal, the eighth sphere, is explained on The Ogdoad and Ennead.
| Position | Treatise XIII of the seventeen in the Corpus Hermeticum |
|---|---|
| Speakers | Hermes Trismegistus and his son Tat |
| Length | 22 sections (Nock-Festugière); hymn in sections 17-20 |
| Language and date | Greek; Roman Egypt, roughly 100-300 CE, like the rest of the collection |
| Latin | Marsilio Ficino, 1463; printed Treviso 1471 |
| First English | John Everard, The Divine Pymander (1650), as the seventh book |
Fair questions
What is Corpus Hermeticum XIII about?
It is a dialogue in which Hermes Trismegistus leads his son Tat through a spiritual rebirth: ten powers of God drive out twelve torments, Tat sees himself in everything, Hermes teaches him a secret hymn and makes him promise silence.
Who speaks in CH XIII?
Only Hermes and his son Tat. Tat asks, Hermes answers and leads; Poimandres, the revealing Mind of CH I, is mentioned in section 15 but does not speak.
Is the rebirth in CH XIII reincarnation?
No. It is a change in this life: Tat is reborn 'in mind' while still in his body and still talking to his father. The Hermetica discuss the soul's movement between bodies elsewhere, as a different doctrine.
Why is it called the 'Sermon on the Mountain'?
The manuscripts title it a secret discourse on the mountain. Tat refers to a conversation on the mountain; the critical text says on the way down, while Mead (1906) and Everard (1650) followed readings that take them up it.
Where can I read CH XIII for free?
Mead's 1906 translation (Thrice-Greatest Hermes, vol. II, pp. 219-233) and Everard's 1650 version are public domain and scanned at the Internet Archive. For study, use Copenhaver (1992).
Sources & further reading
- A.D. Nock (ed.) and A.-J. Festugière (tr.), Corpus Hermeticum, vol. II: Traités XIII-XVIII. Asclepius (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1945): Greek text and section numbers of CH XIII.
- Brian P. Copenhaver, Hermetica (Cambridge University Press, 1992), CH XIII with notes; Cambridge Core.
- G.R.S. Mead, Thrice-Greatest Hermes, vol. II (London and Benares: Theosophical Publishing Society, 1906), pp. 219-233 (translation), from p. 234 (commentary); scan.
- John Everard, The Divine Pymander of Hermes Mercurius Trismegistus (London, 1650), the seventh book; scan.
- R. Reitzenstein, Poimandres (Leipzig: Teubner, 1904), pp. 339-348; scan.
- Walter Scott, Hermetica, vol. I (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1924); scan.
- Clement Salaman, Dorine van Oyen, William D. Wharton, Jean-Pierre Mahé, The Way of Hermes (London: Duckworth, 1999).
- William C. Grese, Corpus Hermeticum XIII and Early Christian Literature (Leiden: Brill, 1979).
- Christian H. Bull, “Hermetic Rituals? The Rebirth and the Visionary Ascent”, handout, Princeton, 18 May (year not stated on the handout): Greek of CH XIII.1, 3-4, 7-8, 12-13 with Copenhaver’s translation; PDF.
- Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “The Real Hermetic Tradition (Lodovico Lazzarelli and Giovanni da Correggio)” (blog, 24 October 2020); W.J. Hanegraaff and R.M. Bouthoorn, Lodovico Lazzarelli (1447-1500): The Hermetic Writings and Related Documents (Tempe, 2005).