These "originals" -- called to this day in China "the Dragons of Wisdom" -- were the first disciples of the Dhyanis, who were their instructors; in short, the primitive adepts of the Third Race, and later, of the Fourth and Fifth Races.
The name became universal, and no sane man before the Christian era would ever have confounded the man and the symbol.
The symbol of Chnouphis, or the soul of the world, writes Champollion, "is among others that of an enormous serpent standing on human legs; this reptile, the emblem of the good genius, is a veritable Agathodaemon.
It is often represented bearded.
.
.
.
.
That sacred animal, identical with the serpent of the Ophites, is found engraved on numerous Gnostic or Basilidean stones .
.
.
.
The serpent has various heads, but is constantly inscribed with the letters [[ CHNOUBIS ]]."** Agathodaemon was endowed "with the knowledge of good and evil," i.e.
, with divine Wisdom, as without the former the latter is impossible.*** Repeating Iamblichus, Champollion shows him to be "the deity called [[ Eichton]] (or the fire of the celestial gods -- the great **** Thot- [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * This is about as just as though -- a few millenniums hence -- a fanatic of some future new creed, who was bent on glorifying his religion at the expense of ancient Christianity, were to say: "Everywhere the quadruped lamb was adored.
The nun placed it, calling it the Agnus, on her bosom; the priest laid it on the altar.
It figured in every paschal meal, and was glorified loudly in every temple.
And yet the Christians dreaded it and hated it, for they slew and devoured it.
.
.
." Heathens, at any rate, do not eat their sacred symbols.
We know of no serpent, or reptile-eaters except in Christian civilized countries, where they begin with frogs and eels, and must end with real snakes, as they have begun with lamb and ended with horse-flesh.
** " Pantheon, " 3.
*** The solar Chnouphis, or Agathodaemon, is the Christos of the Gnostics, as every scholar knows.
He is intimately connected with the seven sons of Sophia (Wisdom), the seven sons of Aditi (universal Wisdom), her eighth being Marttanda, the Sun, which seven are the seven planetary regents or genii.
Therefore Chnouphis was the spiritual Sun of Enlightenment, of Wisdom, hence the patron of all the Egyptian Initiates, as Bel-Merodach (or Bel-Belitanus) became later with the Chaldeans.
**** Hermes, or rather Thot, was a generic name.
Abul Teda shows in " Historia Anti-Islamitica " five Hermes, and the names of Hermes, Nebo, Thot were given respectively in various countries to great Initiates.
Thus Nebo, the son of Merodach and Zarpanitu (whom Herodotus calls Zeus-Belos), gave his name to all the great prophets, seers and Initiates.
They were all "serpents of Wisdom," as connected with the Sun astronomically, and with Wisdom spiritually.
[[Vol.
2, Page]] 211 TWO SCHOOLS OF MAGIC.
Hermes), to whom Hermes Trismegistus attributes the invention of magic."* The " invention of magic!
" A strange term to use, as though the unveiling of the eternal and actual mysteries of nature could be invented !
As well attribute, millenniums hence, the invention instead of the discovery of radiant matter to Prof.
Crookes.
Hermes was not the inventor, or even the discoverer, for, as said in the foot-note, Thot-Hermes is a generic name, as is Enoch (Enoichion, the "inner, spiritual eye") , Nebo, the prophet and seer, etc.
It is not the proper name of any one living man, but a generic title of many adepts.
Their connection in symbolic allegories with the serpent is due to their enlightenment by the solar and planetary gods during the earliest intellectual Race, the Third.
They are all the representative patrons of the Secret Wisdom.
Asclepios is the son of the Sun-god Apollo -- and he is Mercury; Nebo is the son of Bel-Merodach; Vaivasvata Manu, the great Rishi, is the son of Vivisvat -- the Sun or Surya, etc., etc.
And while, astronomically, the Nagas along with the Rishis, the Gandharvas, Apsarasas, Gramanis (or Yakshas, minor gods) Yatudhanas and Devas, are the Sun's attendants throughout the twelve solar months; in theogony, and also in anthropological evolution, they are gods and men -- when incarnated in the nether world.
Let the reader be reminded, in this connection, of the fact that Apollonius met in Kashmir Buddhist Nagas - - which are neither serpents zoologically, nor yet the Nagas ethnologically, but "wise men." The Bible, from Genesis to Revelations, is but a series of historical records of the great struggle between white and black Magic, between the Adepts of the right path, the Prophets, and those of the left, the Levites, the clergy of the brutal masses.
Even the students of Occultism, though some of them have more archaic MSS .
and direct teaching to rely upon, find it difficult to draw a line of demarcation between the Sodales of the Right Path and those of the Left.
The great schism that arose between the sons of the Fourth Race, as soon as the first Temples and Halls of Initiation had been erected under the guidance of "the Sons of God," is allegorized in the Sons of Jacob.
That there were two schools of Magic, and that the orthodox Levites did not belong to the holy one, is shown in the words pronounced by the dying Jacob.
And here it may be well to quote a few sentences from " Isis Unveiled.
" The dying Jacob thus describes his sons: "Dan," he says, "shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse-heels, so that his rider shall fall backwards ( i.e., he will teach candidates black magic) .
.
.
.
I have waited for thy salvation, O Lord!" Of Simeon and Levi the patriarch remarks that they" .
.
.
are brethren; instru- [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * " Pantheon, " text 15.
[[Vol.
2, Page]] 212 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
ments of cruelty are in their habitations.
O my soul, come not thou into their secret ; unto their assembly.
In Western Hermetic Qabalah, the specific harmonizing cosmic force symbolised by Tiphareth, the central Sephira of the Tree of Life — the equilibriating, compensating, healing, redeeming, and purifying factor of the universe, recognised by the occultist as one power among the hierarchy of supreme cosmic forces rather than assigned the exclusive position it holds for the Christian mystic. Distinct from logos (the ordering principle through which the universe was created, not this specific mediating/healing Sephirotic force) and trinity (a claim about the Godhead's internal three-personed structure, not a single emanation's function within a tenfold system).
The footnote explicitly states that 'the solar Chnouphis, or Agathodaemon, is the Christos of the Gnostics,' identifying Christ as a cosmic wisdom-force rather than a historical figure.
The Hermetic axiom that the structure of the cosmos is reflected at every scale — 'as above, so below; as within, so without' — making each level a legible map of the others.
The passage demonstrates the Hermetic principle of correspondence by showing the serpent symbol mapping across Egyptian, Gnostic, Chaldean, and Indian traditions, and connecting the astronomical (Sun) to the spiritual (Wisdom).
A historical or mythical chain of transmission for secret wisdom from master to disciple across time and cultures — the credential of the teaching, not merely its content. Distinct from oral_tradition (the spoken-not-written modality of transmission, which a lineage may or may not use) and hidden_sayings (the concealment-for-readiness of a teaching's meaning, independent of who transmitted it or in what unbroken chain).
The passage's central thesis is the chain of transmission from the Dhyanis through the Dragons of Wisdom to the adepts of successive Races, with the generic names Hermes, Thot, Nebo, and Enoch marking the same lineage across cultures and millennia.
A magical or spiritual orientation that turns occult power toward self-aggrandizement, domination, or personal ends divorced from — or actively opposed to — service of the divine, contrasted with the Right-hand Path's use of the same powers in reverent service and selfless healing. Distinct from psychic_attack (one specific malevolent technique this orientation may employ, not the standing orientation itself) and forbidden_knowledge (a transgression-against-divine-prohibition narrative, not an ongoing praxis-orientation).
The passage explicitly describes the Left Path through the 'black magic' of Dan, the 'instruments of cruelty' of Simeon and Levi, and the 'clergy of the brutal masses' who followed the wrong path.
A magical or spiritual orientation that directs occult power toward reverent service of the divine and the welfare of others, in disciplined subordination to a moral code — the positive complement to the Left-hand Path's self-aggrandizement, and the orientation an initiatory order upholds in barring seduction, extortion, and the sale of initiation for gain. Distinct from left_hand_path (the opposing orientation this concept mirrors) and theurgy (a specific ritual technique of divine engagement, not the standing ethical orientation of the practitioner).
The passage describes the Right Path through the 'Adepts of the right path,' the 'Prophets,' and the 'Sodales of the Right Path' who maintained the true Secret Wisdom.