Iamblichus: On the Mysteries · 195 of 218 · tr. Thomas Taylor
Chapter VIII-ai
with evil dæmons], which are hurled forth before the Gods, but on entering the interior parts of the temple, unmoved, and guarded by the mystic rites, they genuinely receive in their bosom divine illumination, and divested of their garments, as they would say, participate of a divine nature; the same mode, as it appears to me, takes place in the speculation of wholes.” That mitred sophist, Warburton, as I have elsewhere called him, from not understanding the former part of this latter extract from Proclus, ridiculously translates the words πολυειδεσι και πολυμορφοις των θεων προβεβλημενοις γενεσιν , “multiform shapes and species, that prefigure the first generation of the Gods.” See his Divine Legation of Moses, book ii.
p.
152, 8vo.
a work replete with distorted conceptions and inaccurate translations.
And yet, as great a sophist as Warburton was, and notwithstanding the work I have just mentioned abounds with false opinions, and such as are of the most pernicious kind, yet he is compelled by truth to acknowledge, in book ii.
p.
172, “that the wisest and best men in the Pagan world are unanimous in this, that the mysteries were instituted pure, and proposed the noblest end by the worthiest means.” But this by the way.
67 .
This divination according to the imagination through water, may be illustrated by the following extract from Damascius (apud Photium): Γυνη ιερα θεομοιρον εχουσα φυσιν παρᾳλογοτατην.
υδωρ γαρ εγχεασα ακραιφνες ποτηριῳ τινι των υαλινων, εωρα κατα του υδατος εισω του ποτηριου τα φασματα των εσομενων πραγματων, και προυλεγεν απο της οψεως αυτα απερ εμελλεν εσεσθαι παντως.
η δε πειρα του πραγματος ουκ ελαθεν ημας .
i.
e.
“There was a sacred woman who possessed in a wonderful manner a divinely gifted nature.
For pouring pure water into a certain glass cup, she saw in the water that was within the cup the luminous appearances of future events, and from the view of these she entirely predicted what would happen.
But of this experiment we also are not ignorant.” 68 .
“The Platonists,” says Psellus (ad Nazianzenum) “assert that light is spread under divine substances, and is rapidly seized, without any difficulty, by some who possess such an excellent nature as that which fell to the lot of Socrates and Plotinus.
But others, at certain periods, experience a mental alienation about the light of the moon.” 69 .
Concerning this vehicle, in which the phantastic power resides, see vol.
ii.
of my translation of Proclus on the Timæus of Plato, p.
The transformation of base substance — outer matter or the inner soul — into a purified, perfected, or 'gold' state; the magnum opus as both laboratory practice and spiritual allegory.
The text describes divination through water and the transformation of the human state into a divine nature.
The Stoic and Plotinian doctrine that all parts of the cosmos are bound by hidden affinities, so that a movement in one part resonates through the whole; the metaphysical basis for astrology, magic, and divination.
The text notes that evil dæmons are hurled forth before the Gods, implying a dynamic relationship within the cosmic order.
Pronoia — the doctrine that the divine actively orders the unfolding of the cosmos and human affairs toward intelligible ends, against pure chance or blind necessity.
The text describes the mysteries being instituted with 'the noblest end by the worthiest means,' indicating divine ordering of human affairs.
The doctrine — central to Eastern Orthodox and Maximian theology — that the human person is progressively transformed into a partaker of the divine nature by grace, not merely justified or united in passing ecstasy.
The passage explicitly states that participants 'participate of a divine nature' and are divested of garments to become divine.
Iamblichean ritual practice that engages the gods directly through consecrated material symbols and actions, on the premise that divine power descends into properly prepared matter — distinct from philosophical contemplation alone.
The text describes rituals that engage the gods directly through consecrated actions like entering the temple interior and divesting garments.