Lactantius on Hermes Trismegistus Excerpts from The Divine Institutes

Lactantius on Hermes Trismegistus

Excerpts from The Divine Institutes; Book I, Chap. vi; Book II, Chaps. xv, xvi; Book IV, Chaps. vi, ix (translated by the Rev. W. Fletcher).

Book I. Of the False Worship of the Gods.

Chapter vi.-Of Divine Testimonies, and of the Sibyls and Their Predictions.

Now let us pass to divine testimonies; but I will previously bring forward one which resembles a divine testimony, both on account of its very great antiquity, and because he whom I shall name was taken from men and placed among the gods. According to Cicero, Caius Cotta the pontiff, while disputing against the Stoics concerning superstitions, and the variety of opinions which prevail respecting the gods, in order that he might, after the custom of the Academics, make everything uncertain, says that there were five Mercuries; and having enumerated four in order, says that the fifth was he by whom Argus was slain, and that on this account he fled into Egypt, and gave laws and letters to the Egyptians. The Egyptians call him Thoth; and from him the first month of their year, that is, September, received its name among them. He also built a town, which is even now called in Greek Hermopolis (the town of Mercury), and the inhabitants of Phenae honour him with religious worship. And although he was a man, yet he was of great antiquity, and most fully imbued with every kind of learning, so that the knowledge of many subjects and arts acquired for him the name of Trismegistus.17 

He wrote books, and those in great numbers, relating to the knowledge of divine things, in which be asserts the majesty of the supreme and only God, and makes mention of Him by the same names which we use-God and Father. And that no one might inquire His name, he said that He was without name, and that on account of His very unity He does not require the peculiarity of a name. These are his own words: "God is one, but He who is one only does not need a name; for He who is self-existent is without a name." God, therefore, has no name, because He is alone; nor is there any need of a proper name, except in cases where a multitude of persons requires a distinguishing mark, so that you may designate each person by his own mark and appellation. But God, because He is always one, has no peculiar name. 

Book II. Of the Origin of Error.

Chapter xv.-Of the Corruption of Angels, and the Two Kinds of Demons.

When, therefore, the number of men had begun to increase, God in His forethought, lest the devil, to whom from the beginning He had given power over the earth, should by his subtilty either corrupt or destroy men, as he had done at first, sent angels for the protection and improvement206 of the human race; and inasmuch as He had given these a free will, He enjoined them above all things not to defile themselves with contamination from the earth, and thus lose the dignity of their heavenly nature.207 He plainly prohibited them from doing that which He knew that they would do, that they might entertain no hope of pardon. Therefore, while they abode among men, that most deceitful ruler208 of the earth, by his very association, gradually enticed them to vices, and polluted them by intercourse with women. Then, not being admitted into heaven on account of the sins into which they had plunged themselves, they fell to the earth.  

Thus from angels the devil makes them to become his satellites and attendants. But they who were born from these, because they were neither angels nor men, but bearing a kind of mixed209 nature, were not admitted into hell, as their fathers were not into heaven. Thus there came to be two kinds of demons; one of heaven, the other of the earth. The latter are the wicked210 spirits, the authors of all the evils which are done, and the same devil is their prince.Whence Trismegistus calls him the ruler of the demons. But grammarians say that they are called demons, as though doemones,211 that is, skilled and acquainted with matters: for they think that these are gods. They are acquainted, indeed, with many future events, but not all, since it is not permitted them entirely to know the counsel of God; and therefore they are accustomed to accommodate212 their answers to ambiguous results. The poets both know them to be demons, and so describe them. 

Hesiod thus speaks:-

"These are the demons according to the will of Zeus, Good, living on the earth, the guardians of mortal men."

And this is said for this purpose, because God had sent them as guardians to the human race; but they themselves also, though they are the destroyers of men, yet wish themselves to appear as their guardians, that they themselves may be worshipped, and God may not be worshipped. The philosophers also discuss the subject of these beings. For Plato attempted even to explain their natures in his "Banquet; "and Socrates said that there was a demon continually about him, who had become attached to him when a boy, by whose will and direction his life was guided. The art also and power of the Magi altogether consists in the influences213 of these; invoked by whom they deceive the sight of men with deceptive illusions,214 so that they do not see those things which exist, and think that they see those things which do not exist. These contaminated and abandoned spirits, as I say, wander over the whole earth, and contrive a solace for their own perdition by the destruction of men. 

Therefore they fill every place with snares, deceits, frauds, and errors; for they cling to individuals, and occupy whole houses from door to door, and assume to themselves the name of genii; for by this word they translate demons in the Latin language. They consecrate these in their houses, to these they daily pour out215 libations of wine, and worship the wise demons as gods of the earth, and as averters of those evils which they themselves cause and impose. And these, since spirits are without substance216 and not to be grasped, insinuate themselves into the bodies of men; and secretly working in their inward parts, they corrupt the health, hasten diseases, terrify their souls with dreams, harass their minds with phrenzies, that by these evils they may compel men to have recourse to their aid. 

Chapter xvi.-That Demons Have No Power Over Those Who are Established in the Faith.

And the nature of all these deceits217 is obscure to those who are without the truth. For they think that those demons profit them when they cease to injure, whereas they have no power except to injure.218 Some one may perchance say that they are therefore to be worshipped, that they may not injure, since they have the power to injure. They do indeed injure, but those only by whom they are feared, whom the powerful and lofty hand of God does not protect, who are uninitiated in the mystery219 of truth. But they fear the righteous,220 that is, the worshippers of God, adjured by whose name they depart221 from the bodies of the possessed: for, being lashed by their words as though by scourges, they not only confess themselves to be demons, but even utter their own names-those which are adored in the temples-which they generally do in the presence of their own worshippers; not, it is plain, to the disgrace of religion, but222 to the disgrace of their own honour, because they cannot speak falsely to God, by whom they are adjured, nor to the righteous, by whose voice they are tortured.  Therefore ofttimes having uttered thegreatest howlings, they cry out that they are beaten, and are on fire, and that they are just on the point of coming forth: so much power has the knowledge of God, and righteousness! 

Whom, therefore, can they injure, except those whom they have in their own power? In short, Hermes affirms that those who have known God are not only safe from the attacks of demons, but that they are not even bound by fate. "The only protection," he says, "is piety, for over a pious man neither evil demon nor fate has any power: for God rescues the pious man from all evil; for the one and only good thing among men is piety." And what piety is, he testifies in another place, in these words: "For piety is the knowledge of God." Asclepius also, his disciple, more fully expressed the same sentiment in that finished discourse which he wrote to the king. Each of them, in truth, affirms that the demons are the enemies and harassers of men, and on this account Trismegistus calls them wicked angels; so far was he from being ignorant that from heavenly beings they were corrupted, and began to be earthly. 

Book IV. Of True Wisdom and Religion.

Chapter vi.-Almighty God Begat His Son; And the Testimonies of the Sibyls and of Trismegistus Concerning Him.

God, therefore, the contriver and founder of all things, as we have said in the second hook, before He commenced this excellent work of the world, begat a pure and incorruptible Spirit, whom He called His Son. And although He had afterwards created by Himself innumerable other beings, whom we call angels, this first-begotten, however, was the only one whom He considered worthy of being called by the divine name, as being powerful in His Father's excellence and majesty.  But that there is a Son of the Most High God, who is possessed of the greatest power, is shown not only by the unanimous utterances of the prophets, but also by the declaration of Trismegistus and the predictions of the Sibyls. Hermes, in the book which is entitled The Perfect Word, made use of these words: "The Lord and Creator of all things, whom we have thought right to call God, since He made the second God visible and sensible. But I use the term sensible, not because He Himself perceives (for the question is not whether He Himself perceives), but because He leads25 to perception and to intelligence. Since, therefore, He made Him first, and alone, and one only, He appeared to Him beautiful, and most full of all good things; and He hallowed Him, and altogether loved Him as His own Son."  The Erythraean Sibyl, in the beginning of her poem, which she commenced with the Supreme God, proclaims the Son of God as the leader and commander of all, in these verses:

"The nourisher and creator of all things, who placed the sweet breath in all, and made God the leader of all."

And again, at the end of the same poem:-

                                        "But whom God gave for faithful men to honour."

And another Sibyl enjoins that He ought to be known:-

                                        "Know Him as your God, who is the Son of God."

Assuredly He is the very Son of God, who by that most wise King Solomon, full of divine inspiration, spake these things which we have added:26 "God founded27 me in the beginning of His ways, in His work before the ages. He set me up in the beginning, before He made the earth, and before He established the depths, before the fountains of waters came forth: the Lord begat me before all the hills; He made the regions, and the uninhabitable28 boundaries under the heaven. When He prepared the heaven, I was by Him: and when He separated His own seat, when He made the strong clouds above the winds, and when He strengthened the mountains, and placed them under heaven; when He laid the strong foundations of the earth, I was with Him arranging all things. I was He in whom He delighted:  I was daily delighted, when He rejoiced, the world being completed." But on this account Trismegistus spoke of Him as "the artificer of God," and the Sibyl calls Him "Counsellor," because He is endowed by God the Father with such wisdom and strength, that God employed both His wisdom and hands in the creation of the world.

Chapter ix.-Of the Word of God.

But the Greeks speak of Him as the Logos,60 more befittingly than we do as the word, or speech: for Logos signifies both speech and reason, inasmuch as He is both the voice and the wisdom of God. And of this divine speech not even the philosophers were ignorant, since Zeno represents the Logos as the arranger of the established order of things, and the framer of the universe: whom also He calls Fate, and the necessity of things, and God, and the soul of Jupiter, in accordance with the custom, indeed, by which they are wont to regard Jupiter as God. But the words are no obstacle, since the sentiment is in agreement with the truth. For it is the spirit of God which he named the soul of Jupiter. For Trismegistus, who by some means or other searched into almost all truth, often described the excellence and majesty of the word, as the instance before mentioned declares, in which he acknowledges that there is an ineffable and sacred speech, the relation of which exceeds the measure of man's ability. I have spoken briefly, as I have been able, concerning the first nativity. Now I must more fully discuss the second, since this is the subject most controverted, that we may hold forth the light of understanding to those who desire to know the truth.

Notes

17 [See vol. i. p. 289 note 2, this series.] 

206 Cultum. 

207 Substantiae, "essence." 

208 See 2 Cor. iv. 4, "the god of this world." 

209 Middle. 

210 Unclean. 

211 dah/monej. Other derivations have been proposed; but the word probably comes from dai/w, "to distribute destinies." Plato approves of the etymology given by Lactantius; for he says that good men, distinguished by great honours, after their death became demons, in accordance with this title of prudence and wisdom. [See the whole subject in Lewis' Plato, etc., p. 347. ] 

212 To combine, qualify, or temperate. 

213 Aspirations. 

214 Blinding tricks, juggleries. 

215 They lavish. The word implies a profuse and excessive liberality. 

216 Thin, unsubstantial, as opposed to corporeal. The ancients inclined to the opinion that angels had a body, not like that of man, but of a slight and more subtle nature. Probably Lactantius refers to this idea in using the word tenuis. How opposed this view is to Scripture is manifest. [Not so maniifest as our translator supposes. I do not assert what Lactantius says to be scripturally correct: but it certainly is not opposed to many facts as Scripture states 

them; whether figuratively or otherwise, I do not venture a suggestion.] 

217 Augustine gives an account of these deceits, De Civit. Dei, ix. 18. 

218 Thus the ancient Romans worshipped Fever, Fear, etc., to avoid injury from them. 

219 Sacramento. 

220 See Acts of Apostles xvi. 18, and xix. 15, 16. In the Gospels the demons say to Jesus, "Art Thou come to torment us before the time?" [Suggestive of 2 Pet. ii. 4.] 

221 The practice of exorcism was used in the early ages of the Church, and the faithful were supposed to possess power over demons. See book iv. ch. 27. 

Justin, Tertullian and other writers attest the same. There were also exorcists in the Jewish synagogues. See Acts xix. 13. 

222 Sed. Other editions read et; but the one adopted in the text brings out the meaning more distinctly by contrast = they did not disgrace religion, but their own honour.

25 Literally, "sends." The passage appears to be corrupt: u9popi/ptei has been suggested instead of u9pope/mpei, "falls under perception," "is an object of perception." 

26 Prov. viii. 22-31. Lactantius quotes from the Septuagint. 

27 According to the Hebrew, "possessed me in the beginning," and so the authorized version. 

28 Fines inhabitabiles. Other editions read terras inhabitabiles, "uninhabitable lands." 

60 lo/goj.